How Callaway took fairway woods to the next level with Elyte

Jacob Davidson, Callaway Golf’s vice president of product strategy, has long worked on the equipment belonging to some of the PGA TOUR’s biggest stars. But he knows those elite players aren’t the only ones who will benefit from this year’s Callaway Elyte fairway woods.

“This is a massive step in innovation that will help all golfers,” Davidson says of Callaway’s latest line of fairway woods.

Callaway already was the top-selling fairway wood over the last few years, but it always is seeking ways to continue innovating. There were two specific areas the company looked at in the Elyte line of fairway woods.

The first was the propensity for players’ mishits to be low on the face of their fairway woods. Callaway also crafted an impressive new sole on these clubs.

Callaway strategically placed a 35-gram, floating tungsten weight low and forward on the sole of the club to optimize launch across the face, especially on mishits, and promote faster ball speeds. The technology, which Callaway calls a "speed wave," also helps golfers tighten the dispersion of their shots.

The Elyte fairway woods’ new "step sole," meanwhile, helps to reduce the sole’s contact area with the ground by a whopping 57 percent compared to previous Callaway models. The step sole was developed after studies of TOUR players’ turf interaction at impact, and designed to minimize skidding and drag at impact to ensure more solid strikes.

“Through our research, we found how much easier it was for TOUR players to find the center of the face with our Apex utility wood, so we really dug into why that was,” Davidson says. “We’re excited to bring that step sole in, which allows you to find the center of the face a little easier.

“The Elyte’s mission statement is really to allow golfers to see easier launch and more speed from the bottom of the face. And that comes from tungsten speed wave and step sole.”

Callaway also continues to lean into its technological advancements around artificial intelligence. Callaway first used A.I. was for the 2019 Epic Flash driver release and this year. The Elyte fairway woods have Callaway’s most-advanced A.I. face to date – the new Ai10x, which delivers 10 times more control points than the Ai Smart Face. It’s the first time Callaway has had “full control” over the face, according to Davidson, as the team needed to still do some manual blending for last year’s clubs.

“For the first time, the whole face is a model that could be simulated,” Davidson said. “It’s been a long journey and a process leveraging A.I. We’ve built out the computing power to where we can allow A.I. to leverage the entire face, and we have full control over it, and having the ability to do that is a game changer.”

The TOUR uptake of the new Callaway Elyte fairway has been quick and impactful. Min Woo Lee used the new 3-wood en route to winning the Texas Children’s Houston Open, while Sam Burns, Akshay Bhatia and Xander Schauffele are also already playing Elyte fairway wood as well.

Three-woods, Davidson said, are the hardest club to fit TOUR pros into because they often find one they like and just continue to stick with it. But before the year began at The Sentry, Davidson says Callaway had a higher conversion rate of pros into Elyte than it ever had for a previous model.

“These just went into the bag because they were better than what they had before,” he explains. “It’s something we’ve always battled, but this year it went really well.”

The TOUR pros were quick to react. It was only within the “first couple swings,” Davidson says, that many of them stated how much they could feel and see the difference – especially the first time they caught one low on the face.

“But seeing the ball not spin excessively and maintaining ball speed when you catch it a little thin – you’re maintaining confidence that it’s going to carry the bunker or water,” Davidson says. “At the end of the day, the two new technology platforms really give golfers a ton more confidence and freedom, whereas previously people, including TOUR guys, would have tough decisions to make when hitting fairway wood.”