Underneath Armour Drive Professional: Primed to Carry out

Are you able to drive it like a professional? 

All proper. I’m being solely a bit of facetious. Underneath Armour simply introduced its new flagship golf shoe, the Drive Professional. The objective? Because the title suggests, the Drive Professional hopes to assist your recreation by way of a trio of golf shoe applied sciences. 

Is Underneath Armour promising longer drives? Not essentially. However they aren’t actually shying away from what they’ve seen in testing. “Able to Drive like a Professional?” is the tagline for the brand new launch. 

Underneath Armour has been within the lab. And that’s the reality. The footwear staff at UA labored hand in hand with famend biomechanist JJ Rivet to design a shoe that works with the pure motions of the golf swing. 

Let’s take a more in-depth take a look at the brand new Underneath Armour Drive Professional and the Swing Help System (S3) that fuels its upgraded efficiency over its predecessor. 

Tactician Versus Transcendent

Underneath Armour is in the identical place as practically each golf shoe producer. How do you cater to skilled golfers who want performance-enhancing footwear with out alienating the informal, on a regular basis golfer who simply needs one thing cool and cozy?

The Baltimore-based sportswear model has actually break up their golf shoe line down the center. On one facet, you will have the Drive Professional and Drive Professional SL. These are billed as UA’s high efficiency sneakers. 

“Over the previous few years, we’ve witnessed large development in additional informal golf sneakers that provide nice versatility & type, which has undoubtedly been a constructive development for the game” stated Jake Haley, Senior Product Line Supervisor for Golf Footwear at Underneath Armour. “Nevertheless, for the golfer that’s eager for each potential answer to extend yardage and tighten dispersion (and spending north of $600 on drivers within the course of), they should be investing within the piece of kit they use on each single shot – their shoe!”

Alternatively, the brand new Phantom Golf sneakers (extra on these in a separate piece) sit squarely on the “cool and informal” facet of issues. 

The scope of this piece is to deal with the brand new Drive Professional, the golf shoe for tacticians. But it surely’s necessary to the touch on how Underneath Armour is positioning its new sneakers for 2024, just because I feel that is how each model ought to do it. 

UA isn’t dancing round the truth that the Drive Professional could not look fairly as cool or informal in comparison with different sneakers within the model’s lineup. It’s for a really particular golfer, one who, like Jordan Spieth, needs final efficiency. 

A transparent separation between efficiency golf sneakers and “informal” golf sneakers is a delineation that I really feel strongly each model ought to make. 

Tech Story: Swing Help System

Each golf membership has a tech story, and most golf sneakers do, too. That is the stuff that actually will get me excited, that may both make or break your new stuff. 

For this yr, Underneath Armour’s tech story is the introduction of the Swing Help System or “S3” as you’ll typically see it referred to. 

What’s S3 and why the heck do you have to care?

Because the title suggests, S3 refers to 3 totally different and distinct efficiency attributes of the brand new Drive Professional that work holistically. 

“The Swing Help System™ (S3) is the differentiator,” stated Haley. “Created in partnership with Jordan Spieth and main golf biomechanist, JJ Rivet, the Swing Help System™ is a revolutionary 3-layer construction that guides the pure actions of the foot within the golf swing.”

Smarter Traction

Underneath Armour upgraded the traction of the Drive Professional with two distinct spike kinds. One is the S3 spike which UA designed with Macneill Engineering. The opposite spike is the tried and examined SoftSpikes Tour Flex Professional. 

The best approach to describe the distinction between the 2 is the S3 spikes are extra directional whereas the Tour Flex Professional spikes are omnidirectional. The place the S3 spikes are positioned in sure areas to offer very target-directed traction, the Tour Flex Professional spikes present 360-degree traction in a much less focused strategy. 

The mixture of each ought to present traction that grips when it must. On the spikeless facet of issues, the Drive Professional SL depends on a hybrid TPU-rubber outsole that gives torsional rigidity (one thing that spikeless sneakers usually lack) and floor penetrating traction in moist or dry situations. 

Twin-Foam Cushioning

Single foam setups are so final yr. It’s not unusual now (particularly with the sneakers I’ve seen coming down the pipe for 2024) to see a golf shoe designed with two totally different foams. 

Most of the time, a twin foam cushion setup consists of a softer, plusher foam and a firmer, extra secure foam. The style through which these are intertwined and applied within the general design make a giant distinction in the best way of consolation, floor really feel and stability. 

This yr, Underneath Armour relied on their flagship foams, HOVR (softer) and Charged (supportive), to information the foot by way of the golf swing. The visible cues on the midsole inform the entire story. The blue sections of the midsole are HOVR and the white foam is Charged. 

You’ll principally see the softer HOVR foam within the heel and medial forefoot with the Charged foam on the surface. The setup is designed to information the pure movement of your foot as you roll from the within (HOVR) to the surface (Charged). 

The location of the softer HOVR foam promotes a sinking, nearly rolling, really feel that guides your weight placement in your lead foot as you transition to the extra supportive Charged cushion to complete your swing.

Lockdown Lacing

I’ve usually stated a golf shoe is barely pretty much as good as its lockdown (I haven’t actually stated that however I’m saying it now). A practical lacing system is barely half of the battle, although. Anybody could make laces. Not anybody can present complete lockdown to maintain your foot “one” with the golf shoe. 

Underneath Armour spent a whole lot of time creating this new Lockdown Lacing system with Rivet. 

He discovered that being locked down from the lateral ball to the medial instep of your foot will provide help to produce probably the most energy and stability. That is the place you’ll see a brand new elastic band built-in into the lacing system. This band offers this angular lockdown that can preserve your foot precisely the place it must be. 

“Final” however not Least

Outdoors of the brand new S3 know-how, Underneath Armour took the time to hearken to participant (and client) suggestions to vary the final of the shoe. The brand new Drive Professional now’s constructed on a wider final that gives extra room within the forefoot for added stability and higher match. 

This, coupled with a brand new molded sockliner, also needs to improve the general consolation with out taking away from the particular S3 know-how. 

My Preliminary Ideas

I’ve spent ample time within the new Drive Professional (and Drive Professional SL). I additionally had the pleasure of going to Good, France, to satisfy with Underneath Armour and Rivet to study extra concerning the biomechanics of the golf swing. 

Can a golf shoe actually offer you extra velocity, higher dispersion or extra distance? After attempting out each the Drive Professional and Professional SL alongside a few of our top-performing golf sneakers from all main manufacturers, the Professional SL got here out on high as the very best for my swing. All I can let you know is what I noticed as I labored with Rivet on his customized pressure plates. My peak floor pressure was higher general with the Drive Professional SL.

Underneath Armour noticed comparable outcomes on the PGA Present Demo Day, the place they put Drive Professional to the check with actual golfers.

“We even put our neck on the road at PGA Present Demo Day, the place we have been the one footwear model current, and the 55 Demo Day testers added a mean of 11 yards, 3.9mph membership velocity, and 4.5mph ball velocity versus their present sneakers. Actually embodying UA’s model mission – to make athletes higher.” Haley stated.  

Whereas I’ll save most of my efficiency feedback for our Most Needed testing, I’ll depart you with this: every change UA made to the brand new Drive Professional was carried out as a result of it has efficiency advantages. 

“We hope that our obsession over each single facet of the shoe is felt by the golfer after they placed on the Drive Professional or Drive Professional Spikeless.” Haley concluded.

Whereas that will appear a bit of apparent, the identical can’t be stated for each golf shoe. Keep in mind that divide I talked about? Underneath Armour went all-in making the Drive Professional a efficiency golf shoe: no frills, no beauty storytelling (exterior of the coloring of the froth midsole). The Drive Professional seems to be to be Underneath Armour’s most superior golf shoe ever. 

You should purchase the $170 Drive Professional and $150 Drive Professional SL now. 

PS: Searching for extra budget-friendly choices? The new Drive Fade SL is $120 and options a whole lot of the identical nice tech as its large brother. This takedown mannequin seems to be to be a terrific funds performer.