Larry Bobka, one of the most respected golf club designers in the industry, recently unveiled new Handmade Stix LB-1 blade irons, which are currently available for pre-order for $599.99 on the 2nd Swing website (Bobka is currently a master fitter at the 2nd Swing Minneapolis location).

On our most recent Two Guys Talking Golf podcast, Bobka spoke in-depth on his new designs, which are cast from 431 stainless steel.

Check out the clip from our podcast below where he talks about the LB-1 irons:

Bobka, who also designed Tiger Woods’ classic Titleist 681T prototype blade irons, told the full story of joining Titleist and working with Woods on his old custom blades.

For your viewing pleasure, we also clipped out Bobka’s story about the Woods irons:

Andrew Tursky was on site at the Fortinet Championship this week and got all he could handle in terms of new equipment news. There were new irons, drivers, and even headcovers all over the range, so we had to dig into two of the biggest stories out there on this week’s Two Guys Talking Golf Podcast (give us a follow on Instagram: @tg2wrx).

Rickie Fowler’s new irons

Rickie Fowler has been changing a lot of equipment in his bag as he has struggled to get his golf game back into shape. We have seen him with different drivers, shafts, irons, and putters throughout the 2021-2022 season. Fowler has typically played some form of blade during his career, and Cobra even made him some signature Rev33 blades that were beautiful, but razor thin and intimidating for us mortal golfers.

Rickie showed up to the Fortinet with some brand new, unreleased, Cobra King Tour irons. The King Tour irons look a lot like the current Cobra King Tour MIM irons, and we can only assume that the new Tour will replace the MIM.

The interesting thing about the King Tour irons is that they look a little larger than his preferred blades and that they might have a little more ball speed and distance built into them. From the images you can tell there is a little slot behind the face that might be filled with some type of polymer.

Rickie didn’t get into the tech of the new King Tour irons but did tell Tursky that he was gaining around 3-4 yards on shots that he stuck low on the face. He finished the first round of the Fortinet Championship in the top four, so the new irons have seen some success under pressure. I know many of us hope to see Rickie back to form soon, and maybe these new King Tour irons can be the catalyst.

Hideki Matsuyama’s driver change

The other big story comes from a former Masters Champion testing out some new drivers on the range, Hideki Matsuyama. Matsuyama is well known as a golfer who loves to test and tinker with new golf equipment. Each week there is a good chance that he will have multiple drivers, irons, and fairways in the bag searching for the perfect club that week.

Earlier this week, Hideki was spotted with some new, unreleased, Srixon drivers out on the range in Napa. We spotted a few pros testing the new Srixon ZX7 MkII and ZX 5 MkII LS on the range.

Andrew spoke to the Srixon reps and learned Hideki has been trying the new drivers and seems to have settled on a Srixon ZX5 MkII in 10.5 degrees of loft (and his trusty Graphite Design Tour AD DI 8 TX shaft).

The ZX5 MkII LS looks to have an adjustable weight on the sole that is moved far forward —closer to the face — to possibly lower the spin. We haven’t heard anything specific from Srixon on the new drivers, but with their recent success, we would expect to see some solid performance out of the line.

Check out the full TG2 podcast, below

It has been a long time since Ping made a raw wedge. Almost all Ping models have been either plated in chrome or in a black finish. But recently, Ping’s tour players have been requesting wedges that are raw steel, and the company wanted to deliver for its pros.

Wedges that are raw carbon steel will rust over time, and they aren’t something we see a whole lot of in our local golf store. Wedge companies have plenty of evidence that rusty wedges on the shelves don’t sell like traditional wedges that are plated with chrome or another “attractive” finish that won’t rust.

• RELATED: Ping’s new Glide Forged Pro Raw tour wedges – 2022 BMW Championship

Another note here: Just to be clear, rusty wedges don’t spin more than chrome wedges, but companies have found that in wet conditions the raw face and grooves lose less spin. 

Our own Andrew Tursky spotting the raw Glide Forged Pro wedges at the BMW Championship this week and took a ton of photos. The Ping tour truck was loaded with just about every loft and grind that they made the Glide Forged Pro wedges in their Hydropearl finish. So the wedges you see here are raw steel and will start to rust once put in play.

Ping didn’t give any information on if these will ever come too retail or stay a tour-only product. From a guy who loves the rusty look on his irons, wedges, and putter I hope we get a chance to put these in our bags!

To hear Andrew give more detail on the Ping Glide Forged Pro wedges from the BMW Championship, take a listen to the TG2 podcast!

• RELATED: Ping’s new Glide Forged Pro Raw tour wedges – 2022 BMW Championship