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Product stories r
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GR-1
aerodynamic golf club
design
While
studying industrial design at Coventy University, I did a placement
at a Formula One racing team called Arrows.
Spending
time in the wind-tunnel, watching talented engineers design
and test aerodynamic components, led me to think about a 'sports'
related project for my final year at college.
With the knowledge that average golfers swing their drivers
at speeds of over 100 mph, I set about designing a low drag,
ultra-aerodynamic driver.
A
prototype of my final design was built at Arrows, using off-cuts
of very expensive, high strength, low weight carbon fibre.
The
main features of my patented design are a streamlined 'aerofoil'
section hosel and ground effect inducing 'sole' channels for
maximum aerodynamic efficiency at the point of impact.
Wind
tunnel experiments conducted at Coventry University showed both
of these features increased the club head speed through lower
aerodynamic drag.
That
summer, The Open Championship was being held at St. Andrews,
Scotland.
With
my prototype in hand, I walked around the tented village to
see what other manufactures had to offer. A guy with an American
accent stopped to ask me what I was carrying. He introduced
himself as Scotty Cameron and invited me to meet his boss.
I
can recall sitting in a motorhome with Scotty and Wally. Wally
turned out to be Mr Wally Uihlein, CEO of Acushnet,
the parent company of, amongst others, Titleist, Cobra
and Scotty Cameron putters.
He
asked me, 'What do you want'? I just hadn't thought about what
I wanted to do and simply replied, 'I don't know'. Wally passed
me his business card and asked me to let him know.
The
next day I knocked on the door of his motorhome to be informed
that he'd already left for the USA.
John
Daly won The Open that year.
PETER GORSE. FOUNDER, GOLF REFUGEES
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