5 Things I've Already Added To My Bag In 2026 (That You Should Too)

I am a three handicap golfer

It feels like I've been a three handicap golfer for as long as I remember. And I'm fed up of playing average golf

and not getting any better. So I have made some significant gear changes to my bag

to help me arrest that decline in my progress and shoot some of the lowest scores I've ever had in 2026

And I've done it through making five key equipment changes which I'm gonna talk you through in this video

You might learn something and hopefully might inspire you to make a few gear changes of your own

and turn your scoring around this year. So without further ado, let's dive into those five equipment changes

I've made already in 2026. Right now, the first thing I've added to my golf bag in 2026

is a higher lofted driver. Now I was lucky enough to go to Telamide HQ

in Carlsbad, the kingdom, and get fitted for the new QI4D driver

What became apparent during that fitting was clearly I'm not able to move the driver as quickly as I used to do

Now this is no slight on TaylorMade's aerodynamic claims. This is more my body telling me it's entering its 40th year

and those days of swinging it at 110 miles an hour are long gone

So while I used to play a nine and a half degree driver, sometimes 10 degree driver, I got fitted into the core model

QI 4D and in a 10.5 degree lofted head set on the standard

So clearly I'm getting more loft than I was accustomed to and as Duane, my fitter, reminded me during the fitting

loft is your friend. I think more golfers than you think might benefit from playing

a little bit more loft, especially when you consider the core heads these days, in a lot of different brands

not just tailor-made, do tend to offer a little bit lower spin than they're used to

So you can afford to play a little bit more loft to get that optimum ball flight of high launch

low spin and more distance. And what I noticed with my 10.5 degree head

versus my 9.5 degree head that I had before, was that the bull flight wasn't actually that much higher

It was very playable. It was sort of the windows I was hoping to see

my drives going. And I'm gonna demonstrate that for you now, hopefully

Obviously shaft plays a part with your flight windows as well, but let's see if I can hit a good one here for you

Nice. Well, it's pretty much straight down the middle, not much deviation there

I'm really happy with that one. So hopefully you saw that on the flight there. Wasn't too high, wasn't too low

it was that perfect sort of flight window for a driver. So while I haven't actually gained that much distance

switching into this new driver, I've definitely noticed an increase in my accuracy. I'm finding a few more fairways

I've been playing a lot over the winter and those sorts of shots sort of down the middle of the fairway have become, thankfully

a little bit more frequent, which I'm really happy with. So first change, high lofted driver

definitely something more golfers should consider. Gives you a little bit more control

over where the ball's going. And with that lowest spin profile, so a lot of these heads these days

might just unlock a little more distance as well. Now the second change I've made to my equipment

this year already is using ribbed grips. As you can see here now a rib grip

for those who are not familiar, is a grip that has a ridge or a spine

running along the back of it. And the idea with a rib grip is it just gives you a sense

of where your fingers are positioned on the grip and it allows you to do that on a more consistent basis

So you're feeling it in the same part of your fingers every time. Now me specifically

for the Golf Pride Align grips here in the MCC Plus Four

And I have to say, I was a skeptic when it came to rib grips

I've never really liked the feeling of something sticking into my fingers when I holding the club but decided to give the Align grips a try when it came to sort of trying to arrest the decline in my iron play and while it felt a little bit uncomfortable at first over time that I did seem to get used to that feeling and I definitely

noticed an improvement in obviously positioning my hands in a more consistent place and that

feeling of confidence you get over the ball when you know that you're holding the club

in the same way every time is actually sort of quite invaluable. You look at people like

like Scotty Scheffler, who is very meticulous about how he holds the club

and he has that special training grip to make sure that he holds the club

in exactly the same place every time. That's one of the secrets behind his consistency

especially when it comes to his irons and his wedge play. He makes sure he's holding the club

in exactly the same way, in exactly the same place every time. And I think an aligned grip

is a really good place to start with that. You know, if you haven't played aligned grips

or rib grips in the past, having something like this, which is quite a subtle ridge

a good entry point into this sort of design obviously golf pride has recently launched the

align max which has a more pronounced ridge on it and i did try that and that felt like a bit too

much of a step change for me from going from no rib to quite a plounce of it so this is a sort of

a nice middle ground because that sort of subtle ridge and the in the ends of your thing or the

sort of the middle of your fingers and just gives you that reminder of where you need to be feeling

it in your fingers every time and that for me out on the golf course has led to i would say a couple

of things the first being slightly more better ball striking and also slightly more consistent

start lines especially with my irons i was really struggling with my irons and sort of the direction

they were going in but i'd say my dispersion has tightened up a little bit with my irons

and i tend to be striking the ball a little bit better as well so definitely something to try

if you struggle with your grip we know how important the fundamentals are whether it's your

grip your stance your posture alignment all those things are pros value that incredibly highly and

and a line grip is a really good place to start get your hands on the consistent place on the

club every time and you should start to see your shots improve right the third change i've made to

my golf bag this year it's a big one i've jumped on the bandwagon of high lofted fairwoods and i've

added a seven wood to my bag the hybrid is out and the seven wood is in and i have to say i've been

really positively surprised about the impact it's had on my game and hitting shots from a variety

of different places around the golf course and it's a change I wish I'd done sooner frankly so

this 7wood I've got here is the TaylorMode QI4D it's 21 degrees aloft in the standard setting and

there's a few reasons why I really love the 7wood the first thing was I was worried about hitting

shots with it how I'd sort of nearly hit myself in the left nostril with how high it would go

go too spinny too high and it just wouldn't give me the optimum ball flight and carry distance I

was looking for but oh how wrong I was. When I was hitting shots with it off the deck the actual

flight window was only a tiny bit higher than where I'm used to seeing my three would go so I

think that's a sort of misconception that people have about seven woods. It's going to go too high

too spinny, not going to be practical but actually it was definitely not as high as I was expecting

it to be and you can still knock it down in the wind if you want to so that's the sort of option

you've got with seven woods but where it's really helped me in this particular situation so where

the lie is not terrible but it's not great. I'm in the rough here, it's winter, it's

wet, obviously it's not ideal but the ball is just sitting down a little bit and I would

really struggle with hybrids to get clean contact on shots like this but with the 7-wood

it just feels like it pops the ball out a lot more easily. Hopefully I'll demonstrate

one for you now As I said not sitting the best but this 7 up till now anyway has been a very good at extracting balls from this sort of situation so hopefully I can demonstrate that for you now

Pushed it a little bit, but a very clean contact, I have to say. Actually, distance-wise

it's pretty comparable with where my hybrid is. So my hybrid was going about 216 carry on average

in the Golf 1 3 Performance Lab, and the 7WD when I tested it, it's going around 220. So a little bit

bit more distance but not too much but with the seven wood you're also getting a lot more stability

and forgiveness so a little bit more help on those off center hits so those distances are a bit longer

and they're a little bit more consistent but then also crucially you can use it off the tee as well

so if the hole is a little bit tight and you want something that's a bit of a fairway finder the seven wood is going to give you that option if you need it and the other thing i really like

about the seven wood versus my hybrid is it has a little bit more right bias to it in terms of

shot shape so my hybrid would tend to miss left a little bit whereas with the 7wood they've made

a little bit flatter inside the the weighting of the head actually promotes a little bit more

of a straighter ball flight rather than a left flight so that shot in there is a classic example

it's just missed target on the right hand side which i'm okay with i'm happy sort of i'd rather

it's sort of missing right than pulling or or hooking to the left because that's when you can

get into some serious trouble so uh well i'll just get the mud off this clubface and just say

to you the 7wood it's been a revelation in my bag i'm really excited to see what it can do for me

in 2026 and if you've not tried one i really would recommend at least trying one versus your hybrid

that's in your bag at the moment or a long iron give it a try look at the numbers and then take

it on the course and see how it can perform those different situations because it could be as it has

done for me a really versatile addition now just a reminder if you are enjoying this video do click

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those for the best price in your area right that's enough of that let's get on with the video

now the fourth change i've made to my golf bag in 2026 is a set of fresh wedges now i've been

pretty skeptical about how often golfers actually need to change their wedges over time especially

in the winter you sort of get a full sense of security of actually balls are stopping quite

quickly because it's soft so you maybe think that you don't need wedges but it all will become

apparent i'm sure to you in the the spring and the summer months when chips start running away from you

and you persist with those old wedges and it's going to start costing you shots around the green

so i've gone for some new wedges i've got the new tireless voki sm11s they look absolutely

fantastic what i like about what voki have done here is they've not changed too much in terms of

the design and the profile of them it's a like for like swap for me from my sm10 straight into my sm11s

because actually when you sort of inspect your wedges or your current wedges like i have here

there's definitely these aren't actually that old i had them in the bag since mark 2024

but um yeah that's nearly two years and they're definitely showing starting to show signs of

wear and tear which is something you need to be cautious of when it comes to your equipment and

especially if you play a lot of wedge shots into and around the greens that you're scoring clubs

I've started to see some of the grooves deteriorating a little bit and I've got some scratches and

scuffs on the sole of my wedge. There's a couple of places where the chrome finishings actually

come off the wedge. I remember I hit a shot out of the rocks once a few months ago. That's caused

some significant damage which is probably not going to help over time. So look out for those

signs of wear and tear. Titleists say you should look to replace your wedges around about every 75

rounds. So I've played about 50 rounds with these but I've practiced quite a lot with my wedges so if

If you someone who is a serial practicer with your wedges you might find that your grooves are deteriorating a little bit quicker than maybe other golfers out there and that why you should consider more of a faster switch into some new wedges i got a pretty straightforward shot here which hopefully my new wedge i about to

demonstrate just before this golfer arrives on the green hopefully going to chip one nice and close

you might notice a little bit extra bite it's got nice and pin high with a fresh set of wedges

more spin around the greens especially when the ball's sitting down you can be a little bit more

aggressive with your landing spots and hopefully get up and down a few more times when you're

really short-sided and you've not got a lot of green to work with right and the fifth and final

equipment change i've made in 2026 is the biggest one it's the one that's had the most positive

impact on my game on my scoring and that is switching to a golf ball with a stripe design

on it and you might have seen a video i did a few months ago testing no line versus a line versus a

stripe and while the line came out on top i had definitely had the most amount of confidence

with using the old tailor-made tp5x stripe in that particular example and i've persisted with this

since the start of the calendar year and it's had a massive impact on my putting i feel so much more

confident over those it's both sort of short putts from four to eight feet where i've seen it have

the most impact and especially putts that are quite straight where you start over the ball

second guessing yourself about the read having something like a stripe is just going to give

you that confidence that you know on this particular length of putt you're not really

worrying about the pace that's going to happen naturally you're just trying to start the ball on the line that you've chosen if you read it correctly more than not it should go in and for

me it has been going in the last few months it's been a revelation that i can't see myself ever

switching back to a golf ball without a stripe i'm not particularly fussy on brand i've got the

brand new tailor-made TP5X stripe, which has a slightly narrower, visually less distracting

design and a bit cleaner, a bit more subtle, but just as effective. I've also been using

this Callaway Chrome Soft X stripe with the colours on it. Again, visually similar in

concept but just as effective. But I've got this one lined up here on this particular

putt which I think is sort of a right half putt. What I like about the tailor-made version

here is it's got this little dot on it which I think just gives you that extra point of concentration maybe sort of over the ball thinking, a last minute reminder about something

that you're focusing on, whether it's your grip or your hand position or your alignment

whatever it might be. But what you've got to do is sort of, what I like about the stripe design in particular

is that you know this is lined up to where you want to be, so you just arrange yourself

appropriately based on where that line is pointing, so make sure your stance is correct

get that sight line all lined up with where the line of the ball is pointing and as I

don't worry about the pace, just focus on returning that putter face back to square

just like that. And then it goes just about on that left edge. So yeah, big revelation for me

And if you haven't tried a golf ball with a stripe design, and maybe you're struggling

to hold those makeable putts from between four and eight foot, I would definitely recommend

trying a stripe design and failing that, a line on the golf ball. I was surprised at how

impactful it was on my putting and I'm really confident it's going to help me learn my handicap

in 2026. So there you have it, I hope you enjoyed that look at the five things I've added to my

golf bag in 2026 but I really want to hear from you what changes are you going to make to your

bag or have you already made to your golf bag in 2026 that you hopes are going to turn your scoring

around. I'd love to hear from you, get in those comments down below but that's it from me here

at Burley Park Golf Club, I'll see you next time