The mini driver remains a mystery for many weekend golfers. Is it a driver with a smaller profile? Is it a fairway wood with a larger profile? You’re bound to get a different answer depending on who you ask.
The truth is, the club can be whatever you want it to be. For those who struggle off the tee, a mini driver can provide a bump in accuracy due to the shorter shaft. It also offers a bump in off-center forgiveness compared to the compact 3-wood.
It’s easy to discuss the similarities and differences, but most golfers would prefer to see data to back up the claims. This is where the Golf Laboratories swing robot plays an important role in defining each club’s spot in the bag.
For our most recent test, we ran a complement of Titleist GT products — GT3 driver, GT3 3-wood, GT280 mini — on the robot (same power setting) to determine similarities and differences between the clubs.
Here are the big takeaways.
1. Same ballpark
There’s a belief that the mini driver is going to easily outpace the 3-wood in carry distance and become a strong secondary option off the tee. Based on our robotic findings, we can confirm GT280 recorded a higher carry distance number in head-to-head testing with the GT3 3-wood. But it’s closer than you might imagine.
The GT280 was at 246.1 yards while the GT3 came in at 243 yards. The numbers aren’t close enough to be within the noise, but it’s fair to say the delta isn’t significant. And don’t forget, this is taking into account a 13-degree GT280 at 43.5 inches and a 15-degree GT3 at 43 inches.
If you’re wondering how launch and spin compare, GT280 was one-degree stronger (15.8 degrees vs. 16.9 degrees) and 200 RPMs lower spinning. Again, we’re not talking about noticeable performance differences between the two.
So if the clubs are fairly similar in performance, it’s worth pondering whether the mini driver has a noticeable edge over the 3-wood.
2. What’s the catch?
So we’ve ascertained that the mini doesn’t boast a significant speed edge over the 3-wood at roughly 104 mph. It’s not ideal news if you’re looking for something to keep pace with the driver (we’ll get to it in a minute).
The good news is the larger mini head, which ranges from 280cc to 340cc for most products in the market, provides an improvement on off-center performance. More specifically, misses impacting the toe region of the club.
With GT280, toe misses saw carry distance drop by 5.4 yards compared to 13.5 yards with the 3-wood. Heel misses were nearly identical at 13.9 yards and 14.2 yards. Improving a common miss by a little more than 8 yards is noticeable, so don’t think we’re completely knocking the mini.
On the flip side, dispersion on heel and toe misses went to the GT3 3-wood with an average of 10.4 yards versus 15.5 yards for the mini.
3. In the driver’s seat
It should come as no surprise that the driver remains the longest clubs of the three. The data confirmed the GT3 driver was roughly 20 yards longer than the mini (265.6 yards versus 246.1 yards), with a nearly identical carry delta on toe misses (5.3 yards versus 5.4 yards). And the dispersion data was more in line with the 3-wood than the mini.
So what does all of this mean? It confirms that even golfers hovering around 105 mph are good to stick with a reliable driver/3-wood setup. If toe misses are a consistent problem, consider the idea of swapping out the 3-wood for a mini. Just don’t expect an extra 10-15 yards off the tee.
The next step for this test is to go below 85 mph and above 110 mph to determine if there’s a performance benefit to be had on the extreme ends of the speed spectrum.
This article was originally published on golfdigest.com
