6 PGA Tour Stars Using New Equipment This Week At The Hero World Challenge

It's Hero World Challenge week on the PGA Tour and that means new gear for a number of players - as it's the first time we've seen some of them in a while and there's also new product set to be launched in early 2024 for them to test.

There's already been a few new bits of 2024 gear spotted on tour recently and emerging on the USGA Conforming List, including the TaylorMade Qi10 LS driver - which Rory McIlroy and Tommy Fleetwood had in the bag at the DP World Tour Championship earlier in the month.

Tiger Woods has put the Qi10 LS in the bag this week, and a standard Qi10 has hit the USGA Conforming List this week, too.

So, which players have new gear in the bag this week? Let's take a look...

Scottie Scheffler

Image 1 of 2

Let's start with the World No.1, as not only has he got TaylorMade's unreleased 2024 driver in the bag but also a putter from a brand that many golf fans will have never heard of.

Scheffler is using the TaylorMade Qi10 LS this week in The Bahamas in his first start since the Ryder Cup two months ago.

And with the flat stick, Scheffler has swapped out his Scotty Cameron Newport for an Olson Golf putter, which is a brand created by Californian Logan Olson. Not a great deal is known about it yet, other than it's in a very similar Anser-style to his previous model and it comes fitted with a SuperStroke grip.

Tiger Woods

The 15-time Major winner, as mentioned above, is another with the Qi10 LS in the bag this week. He also has a new driver shaft fitted in it, going with a Graphite Design Tour AD-VF shaft instead of his previous Fujikura Ventus Black 6 X model.

Woods is still wearing FootJoy shoes, although he was spotted in a black pair on Tuesday that could have been a Nike prototype, but we aren't able to confirm at this stage.

Will Zalatoris

Like Woods, Will Zalatoris is also making an injury comeback this week, having not teed it up since the WGC-Match Play in March. The American has always been known as a streaky putter, with some of his close-range strokes going viral on social media for their unorthodox nature.

This week, the two-time Major runner-up has a completely new putting method in play in the form of the 'broomhandle'. He previously used the armlock technique but has gone for an even longer putter now, with the head model being the L.A.B. Mezz.1 Max.

It's the same broomstick-style shaft and L.A.B head combo used by the Lucas Glover, who won in back-to-back weeks on the PGA Tour in August.

Justin Rose

The Englishman has been an equipment free agent since parting ways with Honma in May 2020, and he's used a wide range of equipment and plenty of different brands ever since.

He's still testing his gear now, as the image above shows, with Rose hitting both a Titleist TSR3 and the new TaylorMade Qi10 LS during the Hero World Challenge Pro-Am. It remains to be seen which one goes into play during the tournament days.

Jason Day

The former World No.1 and Bridgestone Golf ambassador is using a brand new Bridgestone ball this week in The Bahamas. Little is known about the golf ball just yet. He previously used the brand's Tour B X model.

"I have had the opportunity to work with the Bridgestone team on the design of the new ball over the last year. We've done a significant amount of testing and the final version is really dialled-in…  I’m super excited to put it in play and see how it reacts in tournament conditions," Day said.

"Bridgestone is confident that we can still innovate on the golf ball, and it's very rewarding to watch a player of Jason’s caliber put our new technologies to the ultimate test," the company said.

Taylor Montgomery

Montgomery, the PGA Tour's best putter, is the first PGA Tour pro we've seen using the standard TaylorMade Qi10 driver - which hit the USGA Conforming list earlier this week.

The American isn't even in the field for the Hero but was playing in the Pro-Am on Wednesday and is perhaps a reserve for the 20-man elite field.

According to the USGA Conforming List, the Qi10 features Carbonwood printed on the sole, a Speed Pocket and a back weight port. Like the Stealth and Stealth 2 models, it again features a carbon face. It doesn't feature the front draw/fade moveable weight port that the LS model has.

There's also a weight towards the heel section, which could be to promote a slight draw-bias. Lofts available are 9 and 10.5 degrees versus 8, 9 and 10.5 for the LS version that Woods and Scheffler have.