LA Golf Ball Review
Breaking into the premium golf ball market is no easy feat, but LA Golf is a brand hell-bent on using ground-breaking technology and Tour player insight to break the status quo. For some time now, the Titleist Pro V1 and Pro V1x have been considered the benchmark as the best balls on the market and regularly lead the ‘ball count’ on recognized professional tours. But the Beverly Hills-based company, founded by Reed Dickens, believes its new ball can not only compete, but up-stage the performance of the leading Titleist golf balls. In fact, LA Golf is openly marketing its ball, which is only available in the US currently (it will be launching the UK next year), as carrying an extra three yards with the driver. So I took a dozen of the new LA Golf balls to the golf course to see how they performed against my current ball of choice, the Titleist Pro V1x.
The clean and simplistic yet classy packaging of the LA Golf balls surprised me a little, but perhaps alludes to them wanting the ball's performance to do the talking. The balls themselves again are also simplistic in design, with just the LA Golf name stamped through the middle and ‘Beverly Hills’ written down the side that features as an alignment aid - a nice touch.
I always like to test balls starting with the short game as often a good 50 percent of our shots in a round of golf come from being on the green or the surrounds. Initially I thought the ball felt a little firm in hand - a characteristic of some of the best low spinning golf balls, but after a few putts and chip shots I really warmed to it. I’m someone who prefers a slightly more ‘clicky’ feel on chip and pitch shots anyway, so I was pleased that the ball didn’t feel overly soft when greenside, yet still spun just as I would expect when struck correctly.
Moving up through the bag was where I really understood why the Californian-based brand is bragging about the performance of its ball and is charging golfers a premium to game it. It’s not that the ball is doing anything drastically different to any other premium ball offerings such as the TaylorMade TP5x or Callaway Chrome Soft X, but it's certainly comparable. I saw iron shots fly little lower than I would expect my normal Pro V1x to, but the forward ball flight was something I welcomed when hitting into the wind. There seemed to be good stopping power when attacking pins, despite the firm playing surfaces, a lot of this probably down to the clever layering system within this four-piece ball.
Off the tee is where I was impressed the most with the LA Golf ball. The 350 dimple pattern helped produce a pretty fierce and penetrating ball flight that tore through wind well and produced a really solid yardage with the driver. I didn’t notice any real length advantage in direct comparison to my Titleist Pro V1x, both balls finished just past the other on numerous occasions during testing, but it was actually the heel strikes where I saw really solid performance from the LA Golf ball. Where my ball would normally fade and climb in the wind due to excess spin, the LA Golf ball remained really consistent with its launch and ball flight, probably giving me around 10 yards extra when I missed the center of the face towards the heel.
Thanks to really impressive all-round performance, I really do believe the LA Golf ball can and will compete in the premium golf ball market space, especially considering this is the first iteration of the ball. The LA Golf ball is currently only available in the US for a hefty price tag of $69 a dozen. Is this fully justified? My initial findings would suggest the performance package isn't elevated above the existing premium ball options to warrant the higher outlay but in similar fashion to the PXG Xtreme, there's a lot to enjoy about this new player in the ball game.
