Gear: Titleist T100 irons (2023)
Price: $200 per club with True Temper AMT Tour White steel shafts and Titleist Universal 360 grips; $216 per club with Mitsubishi Tensei White AM2 graphite shafts
Specs: Dual-cavity design with SUP-10 stainless steel body, 17-4 stainless steel cradle and internal tungsten weights.
Available: August 28
Who They’re For: Low-handicap golfers who want increased consistency from an iron that delivers maximum feel and control.
The Skinny: While keeping the size and shape of the T100 irons unchanged, Titleist worked to enhance their consistency by improving how the faces are made and continuing to boost the blend of workability and stability.
The Deep Dive: The designers and engineers at Titleist who worked on the new T100 irons were given a task that has been assigned for years to their peers who work on the Pro V1 and Pro V1x golf balls: Don’t change anything, but make it better.
The Titleist T100 irons are popular among PGA Tour players and elite golfers because they blend a compact shape and the control that better players want with a touch of forgiveness. Players such as Jordan Spieth, Cameron Smith, Will Zalatoris, Sungjae Im and Tom Kim have won championships with them.
To make the clubs more consistent shot after shot, Titleist improved the way the faces and hitting areas are manufactured. Previously, every iron’s face was made perfectly flat by having a wide, high-speed milling bit pass over it. The bit left circular milling marks on the face, so after the grooves were added, it was necessary to polish away the milling marks before the chrome plating was applied. Now, after adjusting the way the bit passes over the face, Titleist says the polishing step is no longer necessary, which means the grooves will be slightly sharper and the clubs should perform more consistently.
As with the previous T100 irons, the 2023 version is designed with a dual-cavity construction that combines a forged, SUP-10 stainless steel face and body with a 17-7 stainless steel cap piece in the back of the club. Inside the cap, designers added pieces of tungsten in the heel and toe areas. There is an average of 80 grams of tungsten added to each club, with the piece in the toe larger to help offset the weight of the hosel and to pull the ideal hitting area into the center of the face.
The tungsten also creates extra perimeter weighting, so while the T100 has a compact blade length and overall size, it has extra stability and resists twisting on off-center hits more effectively.
Titleist has lowered the center of gravity in the 3-, 4- and 5-irons to encourage a higher launch and a steeper angle of descent for added stopping power on the greens.
To improve turf interaction and help golfers maintain speed through the turf, designers gave the trailing edge an upward curve instead of the more angular trailing-edge relief found in previous T100 irons.
From a cosmetic standpoint, the updated T100 and T150 irons appear very similar, but the T150 irons have lofts that are 2 degrees stronger throughout the set for extra distance. By working with a custom fitter, golfers should be able to create a blended set easily.
