Tour Validated: Testing with Hunter Mahan and why you should try everything | Gear | GOLF.com

It the latest episode of Tour Validated — hanging with Hunter Mahan and Ping’s Kenton Oates at Trinity Forest — things got pretty wild.

If you watch the video below, the core takeaway is right there in the title. Even when you’ve played at the highest level in the world like Hunter did, it’s easy to stay locked into what you know. Or, better put, what you think you know.

But after spending a couple of hours hitting everything in the current Ping iron lineup — moving far outside his comfort zone — Mahan showed exactly why shaking up your assumptions can completely change how you look at the game.

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The Blueprint Lineup: T vs. S

We started right where Hunter lives, looking at the player irons. Hunter’s gamer setup is the Blueprint S, which is arguably the most popular iron on tour right now. But we kicked things off with the Blueprint T — the traditional muscle-back blade that instantly sent Hunter flashing back to high school memories of old-school blades and classic setups.

The biggest surprise with the T iron wasn’t just the clean, simple look at address — it was how it interacted with the turf compared to older traditional blades. Hunter noted that older players’ clubs could feel sharp and unforgiving if you didn’t have a massive, downward strike. These new T models get through the turf way better.

When we got on the launch monitor with the 6-iron, the numbers showed what was happening under the hood. The Blueprint T felt like absolute butter, but when we moved over to his gamer Blueprint S, the S gave him roughly 600 to 700 more RPMs of spin. For a shallow player who sweeps it off the turf rather than taking massive divots, that extra spin is non-negotiable. Without it, the window drops, doubt creeps in, and your brain starts unconsciously manipulating your swing to compensate. The T is a gorgeous, modern forgiving blade with clever weighting to help mishits, but the S is dialed precisely to his needs because of that crucial spin window. Like wedges, there’s the right iron sole for every player as well. This is an example of that. It’s to say that the T is a lower-spinning head, and it’s lower spinning for Hunter because of how he delivers the club. For some players the T spins much more than the S.

It’s mad science, people!

Stepping Into the Technology: i240

Next up, we moved to the i240. This is where you start seeing a little more offset and a slightly longer blade length.

Hunter’s initial reaction was visual — he’s used to a shorter heel-to-toe profile with a high-pinched toe, so looking down at something a bit more rounded takes some adjustment. But when he started hitting it, the engineering story told itself. The i240 launches a couple of degrees higher than the Blueprint series and gets up in the air effortlessly.

The real magic of an iron like this is what happens on a miss. When Hunter hit low on the face, the i240 saved him. He only lost a tiny bit of speed, and the spin rate stayed right where it needed to be. It’s an iron built to preserve your numbers when your strike isn’t 100% pure, giving you high-flying consistency without feeling bulky. Think game improvement for Tour players and low handicaps — that’s the i240.

The Rocket Launchers: i540, G440 and G740

Then things got wild. We dropped into the i540, the G440 and finally pushed all the way into the max-forgiveness G740s, and Hunter officially entered a whole new dimension.

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When Hunter hit a 9-iron in the i540, it came out at a staggering 124 mph ball speed — about 9 mph faster than his standard setup — with the loft of a traditional 8-iron. He looked at us laughing and joked, “Do I look bigger? I need three 9-irons and just change the lofts every two degrees!”

This is where understanding the loft progressions across the Ping lineup completely flips how you have to think about golf clubs. If you look at those numbers, the lofts get progressively stronger as you move into the distance families. But the engineers at Ping don’t just crank the lofts and let the ball crash into the ground. They build in wider soles, lower and deeper center of gravity and extra length in the long irons specifically to counteract that strong loft.

Kenton and I were laughing on the range because normal golfers get so caught up looking at the number stamped on the bottom of the club. They see a 7-iron or a 9-iron and think it has to fly a certain way based on what they played 20 years ago. But as Kenton pointed out, these stronger-lofted clubs are engineered to launch much higher and get into their window instantly and FAST.

In many cases, If you took a traditional tour-style loft and bent it back into these high-tech distance heads, the ball would literally shoot straight up to the moon and stall out in the wind.

When Hunter hit the G440 and the ultra-wide-sole G740, the club heads were doing all the heavy lifting to control the low point and get the ball launching effortlessly. Even though the lofts were cranked compared to his gamers, the ball was still soaring over 120 feet in the air with plenty of stopping power. As Hunter put it while testing out the wider soles and game-improvement shapes, the club doesn’t want to dig — it just sweeps across the turf and lets the technology launch the ball cleanly.

The Loft Story: How the Numbers Shift Across the Lineup

When you look at how Ping designs these sets, you can see how the lofts change dramatically as you move from players’ irons into the distance and game-improvement families. In the player-focused Blueprint T, Blueprint S and i240 sets, a standard 6-iron sits at 29.5 degrees of loft, while the 9-iron comes in at 41.0 degrees.

As you move out of that player category, those lofts start dropping aggressively to pump up ball speed (some people call this loft jacking but it’s not that simple). In the i540, the 6-iron strengthens to 25.5 degrees and the 9-iron sits at 37 degrees. Step into the G440, and the 6-iron is also at 25.5 degrees with the 9-iron at 37.0 degrees. Finally, pushing all the way into the max-forgiveness G740, the 6-iron cranks down even further to 24.5 degrees and the 9-iron drops to 36 degrees. No wonder the ball goes so far, look at the lofts, say a lot of people. But if you pay close attention to what Kenton mentions in the video, it’s by design. Those irons are designed to maintain speed into the window as swing speed slows with things like age and injury.

So is it ego? No. Look at it more as a fountain of youth, hanging on to your gapping, launch and carry distances that you’re used to as long as humanly possible. That’s not a crime.

Quick Comparison: Iron Lofts by Model (6-Iron & 9-Iron)

The Big Takeaway

The biggest lesson from the whole day wasn’t just finding out what won on a Trackman. It was about taking ownership of your bag and staying OPEN MINDED.

Amateurs often buy clubs based entirely on what looks cool or what a friend plays, without really knowing what their non-negotiables are or what each tool in the bag is actually supposed to do to help them. Mahan didn’t have to test every club in the lineup; he could have just walked away saying his current setup works.

But taking the time to test everything proved that the game isn’t about the number stamped on the sole of your iron; it’s about getting to that place where the tool in your hand helps you create the shot you want to hit more often than not. Technology isn’t here to feed our egos, it’s here to make our lives easier. Period.

Ready to overhaul your bag in 2026? Find a club-fitting location near you at True Spec Golf.