The all new Royal Collection BBD’s Tour VS line is now available in the TSG pro shop so I thought I’d take the time to test out some Tour VS demos sent over by Royal Collection.

Always a leader for fairway woods….

Royal Collection has been known to make some of the best Fairway woods over the last 10 years or so and have been producing clubs for over 17 years. Many golf enthusiasts in the West may be familiar with their Driving Cavity design through that was borrowed by the now defunct brand Sonartec. Sonartec has long been a popular choice of many PGA and LPGA professionals for their superbly designed and super performing fairway woods and utilities, most of which were passed down from Royal Collection years after their model release in Japan. In the past however, RC focused more on the  “Athlete” golfer (what they call low handicappers or scratch golfers in Japan) or professional player but in the last few years they strayed away a bit from that path by offering clubs like the Star FD and SFD III which were very playable and offered enough forgiveness for the average golfer.

Tour VS, typical RC for the Athlete golfer…

With the new BBD’s Tour VS line, RC goes back to its bread and butter which is premium compact clubs made for the better player. As a smaller company here in Japan, Royal Collection puts a lot of emphasis on design and quality. Like TSG, they are small enough to care and big enough to deliver. They have long taken feedback from top professionals all around Japan as well as world wide on many of the design aspects in the clubs.

The new Tour VS is no different, with the driver and fairway woods sporting the very familiar channeled center sole coupled with a newly designed V cut outer sole. As desired by the better player and pro, both driver and fairway wood are very compact and traditionally pear shaped. Also noticeable right away is the deep face of both heads. Both these clubs are aimed at control and workability. The deeper faces sport a higher center of gravity resulting in a much more penetrating trajectory c0mpared to many drivers and fairway woods on the market that focus on high trajectory with super low CG points.

Designed for the faster swinger…

Both the driver and fairway wood are geared towards the faster swinger, the feel of the driver is solid and and higher swing speeds will reap the benefits of great distance and run.  The head is 425cc and looks it or even smaller and the face angle while spec’ed as square, could pass for being up to 1* open.  The Fairway Wood is crisp at impact thanks to a special high rally 455 stainless face matched with it’s soft sus630 body. The tester I had was a 5 wood and at the driving range, several onlookers commented on how small the 5 wood was and how it made their fairway wood look huge. The Tour VS FW is not tiny volume wise, in fact it’s bigger than the previous Pro TP when it comes to CC’s at 152cc for the 5 wood but because of it’s deep face and high back head, at address it could pass for 130cc’s.  The deep face, high back design and square to open face angle of the fairway wood makes it easily workable with draw and fades at will. Many automatic fairway woods these days are made to go straight as possible or draw but this one will go either way with some forgiveness as well. The channeled sole and V Cut sole outer edges help reduce friction with the ground to make cleaner impact. The sole features are really helpful benefits especially with the FW’s deeper face.

Penetrating ball flight from 425cc’s…

While RC is best known for fairway woods, their drivers are no pushovers. The Tour VS driver is spec’ed at 45″ in length and comes with stock Tour AD RC graphite that plays true to flex. This 60g shaft in stiff flex features 4.1* of torque so has good feel to it and matched with the head produces really penetrating flight.  The shaft itself is mid kicking and while it contributes somewhat to the trajectory, the biggest impact is the shorter and higher CG on the Tour VS which is natural for a high back compact head.

See the driver in action…

Feedback from many testers and publications have pointed out the low spin and low trajectory. Tester Kanetani pro over at GDO recently did a video review of the driver which you can watch here, and he notes the low trajectory and stresses the compact nature of the driver.  (clicking on the image below will open the movie in another window and media player is required – video in Japanese but as always you can see the driver in action).

Tour performance and quality from the Tour VS…

I really liked the compact shape of both the new Tour VS driver and fairway wood myself. They are aimed at the better player who likes a deep face and wants woods that focus on stability and control coupled with good feel. while the Tour VS line is available with R flex shafts, I’d recommend the driver to those with over 95mph swing speeds and I believe the driver will best excel at 105mph and above based on its design and face feel. The fairway wood can be played by the better player who wants a deep face which is also great off the tee. The FW’s are on the heavier side which don’t benefit the slower swinger.  As an example, the PRGR egg Spoon is comfortably under 310g for it’s 15* club while the Tour VS 3 wood is right around 330g. If the stock shafts don’t work for you, custom orders as always are available from Royal Collection with many of the top shafts in Japan today. Traditional shape heads, solid feel, penetrating and workable trajectory all packaged in a pretty good design and look. Athlete golfers will be pleased.

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