Trend Tracker: Gear Notes From Houston Open and Around the World

This week, the PGA TOUR is headed to San Antonio for the Valero Texas Open, the final event before the first men's major of the year, The Masters. But before we head to San Antonio, let's take a look back at the exciting week that was in professional golf at the Texas Children's Houston Open, the LPGA's Ford Championship, and then head over to the DP World Tour for a little gear nugget to wrap things up.

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Min Woo (Insert Cooking Joke Here) Earns his First PGA Tour Win

Even with a Saturday 63 that had him leading by 4-shots entering the final round of the Houston Open, it was anything but a cake walk for Australia’s Min Woo Lee, especially with world No. 1 Scottie Sheffler hot on his tail, as well as a larger group including Gary Woodland also storming forward. Things got the closest on the par-5 16th hole of Memorial Park GC when Lee failed to hit the fairway and hit his tee shot into the water - it was his first bogey in more than 40 holes. Unfazed, 26-year-old Lee still managed to par his way in to seal the one-shot victory.

Now when it comes to Lee's clubs, his bag is anything but standard. He plays a Callaway Elite Triple Diamond Driver—which by design helps to lower spin, something very helpful for a player with such high ball speed, like Lee. Plus, his irons 6 through pitching wedge (labeled as a 10) are custom milled Callaway blades.

Having had the chance to hold these irons in hand recently, the things that stand out are their sole widths and the size of the muscle pad of the blade. Compared to other blades on the market, Lee's custom set has slightly wider soles with more bounce to keep the blade moving efficiently through the turf —another factor particularly important for players who have a lot of club head speed.

Now speaking of club head speed, one thing that was fun to watch and compare on Saturday when they were paired together were the driver distances of Lee versus Sheffler. To highlight the differences and explain the reason why they differ, we even made a little video:

Min Woo Lee's Full Bag of Gear

Driver: Callaway Elyte Triple Diamond

Fairway: Callway Elyte 16.5 (3HL)

Utility: Callaway X-Forged UT

Irons: Callaway X-Forged (4-5), Prototype Blades (6-PW)

Wedges: Callaway Opus (50), Titleist Vokey SM10 56 M-Grind, Titleist Vokey SM9 60 T-Grind

Putter: Odyssey O-Works 1W(wide)

Ball: Callaway Chrome Tour X

Other Notes From Houston

Rory McIlroy said after his round on Sunday that after his round on Saturday, he tweaked the loft of his driver slightly lower to help reduce spin, especially on cut shots. I'm sure this came in handy on Sunday when the wind started to pick up during the final round. *Getty Images

*Getty Images

"I just took a little bit of loft off it. I felt like it was getting a little bit spinny, especially if I wanted to hit cuts off the tee, so I took a little bit of loft off it," McIlroy said. "Yeah, definitely went through the wind better today and felt a little more comfortable."

And let's not skip over Gary Woodland's putter. With "zero torque" or lie angle balanced putters seemingly all the rage recently, Woodland earned one of his best finishes in years using a prototype Scotty Cameron Phantom 9 tour that appears to sit toe-up up similar to other zero torque putters. He also put the new 2025 Pro V1 in the bag too.

One final note I'll highlight from the top five in Houston is Sami Valimaki switching to the new 2025 Titleist Pro V1x golf ball, Titleist GT3 driver, and Vokey SM10 wedges. Valimaki was previously a Callaway staffer and appears to be carrying an unbranded golf bag while using Callaway irons, so to see him mix it up this week and have a great finish is always a fun sight for us gear nerds.

LPGA Ford Championship

At the Ford Championship on the LPGA Tour out in Arizona, Hyo Joo (HJ) Kim won in a playoff over Lilia Vu.

As much success as LAB golf has had on the PGA TOUR in the last couple of years, these putters are also trending all over the place, including on the LPGA Tour. Kim had a Mezz1 putter in her bag and needed only 24 putts in her final round on the way to shooting a 64—which got her into the playoff before taking home the win.

DP World Tour Hero Indian Open

Now, speaking of putters, we're not done yet! Over on the DP World Tour, Eugenio Lopez-Chacarra won The Hero Indian Open hosted at the Gary Player-designed DLF Golf and Country Club in New Delhi, India.

Lopez-Chacarra's unusual putter was made by famous clubmaker Tad Moore, who at one point years ago crafted a line of putters for Maxfli during their original heyday on the PGA TOUR. Moore continues to make putters to this day but has become much more well-known in the hickory golf scene for his reproductions of classic clubs. I don't have an exact timeline on Lopez-Chacarra's putter, but I believe this to be the first win with one of Moore's putters in quite some time.

Thank concludes another busy week in golf and golf gear - now on to San Antonio.