Callaway X Forged + X Forged Max Irons | The Swing Report

The new Callaway X Forged and X Forged Max Irons represent Callaway’s return to classic forged performance. The Callaway X Forged and X Forged Max irons are engineered from a single piece of 1020 carbon steel to deliver exceptional feel and control for two different player profiles.

00:00 Introduction
03:25 Callaway X Forged Max Testing
08:12 Callaway X Forged Testing
13:15 Final Thoughts

In this Swing Report video, 2nd Swing’s Drew Mahowald is joined by 2nd Swing Master Fitter Jake Montgomery to test and review the new Callaway X Forged and X Forged Max Irons.

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Hey golfers, I’m Drew Mold the Second Swing Golf here in the tour van with Jake Montgomery, fitting manager at Second Swing with two new Callaway irons here in the summer of 2025. New X Forge models. It’s been a while since Callaway kind of revamped the X-Forgged name with some newer technology, new designs. We’ve got two of them here, the XForge and the XForge Max. So, there’s already just based on the names, we kind of draw some context clues as to maybe the differences between them. But first impressions, give me um kind of your thoughts on the look and then what you think we might see from these. Yeah, I mean, these look great. I’ll be honest, I think that the Callaway players iron category has maybe lacked a little bit since the the ended the last iteration of the TCB. That was a great players iron. I had a lot of success with it. Spun quite a bit, which was great for a lot of players. Um, these look fantastic. They they This is definitely something I can get into a scratch golfer’s bag and they’d have no problem setting that down, looking at that at a dress. Yeah. Um, I think that what we’re going to see here is compared to a lot of their other lines, especially like the AI stuff, it’s not going to be as hot. It’s going to spin a little more. It’s going to launch a little lower. This is going to be for your traditional CB player. Um, when I first saw the X-Forge Maxed, I immediately thought that looks like an original ZX-7 from Stricks. It has a very similar kind of badge backing there. It has a triole design that’s kind of like the VT soul. Um, so I’m curious to see how that performs. It’s anything like the Stricksson, people are going to absolutely love it. Yeah, I think you’re seeing a lot of the um, you know, these these manufacturers go to that, you know, there’s different names out there for it, right? some sort of sole that has relief on both sides um to improve that turf interaction. And you know, unfortunately on a mat, you can’t necessarily test that or really see the the impact of it. But there’s definitely something out there that is working for these manufacturers to give something that’s not just a flat sole without relief. And you’re seeing a lot of that built in now. You see it with both of these relief on both sides. They’re calling it a trile sole design. There’s, you know, three tiered there, you know, depending on the brand, uh there’s names out there for it. And then of course as you mentioned Shrexon has kind of that the VT sole they call it where there’s um definitely there’s kind of one main point or one ridge in the center but nothing nonetheless that turf interaction piece is important as the differences between the two. They’re really both single piece forgings. So there should be some really soft feel here. Yeah. The Max obviously is a little bigger little thicker on the top line and sole. Um there’s also a little bit more mass kind of behind maybe the hitting area there um in the cavity. But I think the differences speak for themselves both in the look um the size and then also we got to talk about loft too. The loft at the X Forge is 33 standard 31 for the XForge Max which is the same as the new Apex AI 150. So we’ll have to compare those two maybe in a different video. But nonetheless here the XForge family continues with these two. Um any any expectation as far as testing that we’ll see in terms of actual numbers? If I had to guess with that being two degrees stronger, we’ll probably see four to five miles an hour faster ball speed, spin rate, 400 RPMs lower. Okay, we’ll see how accurate I can be on that. But that’s kind of what I’d expect from the Well, I trust you’ll be pretty close. Let’s see what happens. Let’s do it. All right. Callaway X Forged Max. Mhm. This club, I think you mentioned Shrixon right away. There’s definitely a lot of similarities to um the ZX7 or ZX7 Mark II where there is a little bit, you know, it’s a single piece forging, but there’s kind of a a similar shape in the cavity and even the look at a dress, you know, because I I have said that Shrixon the ZX-7 sort of irons have not been the thinnest among sort of the players cavity irons and I would say this is in a similar shape and size, very close, but um I do like how it looks. It’s very appealing. It’s not a great first swing. I do actually like how that turned out pretty good. Felt a lot worse than it looks. Cuz I hit I felt like it was Yeah. I mean, one three zero smash factor tells the story. I hit it maybe a little bit fat. So, the spin went way down. That was hit way better. Cut a lot better. Yeah, that’s my typical shot um in the bay there. Big high draw with this club at 31 degrees. That’s somewhat I would say around 190 is probably my carry number. All right, that’ll be an interesting one. That was way off the toe. So, we’re seeing I’m actually surprised shot one and shot three to see the ball carry 180 still on really poor contact is encouraging. We’re still getting plenty of height from those as well. There’s another one that’s a little thin, but it’s going to work. Mhm. I actually like I’m liking a lot of the misit performance here from this one. It is a quote unquote max iron. So there’s that already kind of stipulates some forgiveness and some stability on the club head. Another one a little thin. Mhm. So, okay, this is interesting. So, this is going to be probably a lot lower distance than I anticipated on average, but I think we got a pretty good indication of how this thing performs on missits because I had really one good swing out of my five swings there. But the carry distance didn’t suffer much at all, which is really a big takeaway I have from that. Um, because you’ll I mean, we’re going to post a video on the AI-150s. we’re going to see a lot of a difference in terms of the quality of golf swings that I put on that one versus this. But to see how consistent the carry distance was is really the takeaway I have here. I know the spin fluctuated because I hit, you know, a 1 130 then a 142 then 13 and it’s all over the place, but I’m impressed with just how the forgiveness of an iron being despite it being a kind of a single piece forging. Yeah. I mean, I’m gonna see here if I can get strike location. Yeah, you’re going to have a few different ones there. Yes. I mean, it’s it’s it’s varying on the face a little bit. Um, but I mean, that does show that it’s pretty forgiving. It lives up to that max name. Um, variation in carry is only 5 yards for five shots where they weren’t all hit out of the same portion of the iron there. Peak height only varied 13 feet. Landing angle only varied three degrees. Lowest land angle of the day was at 41. And that was one that we just caught kind of thin. You can see that launch angle drop down. I think I’m going to hide that just for the moment. Yeah. And that gets your launch angle at 17. Yeah. Five degrees of vari or yeah five feet of variation there. Eight feet there. Land angle at 47 feet. I mean it it still looks pretty consistent for not hitting it the same every time. And I mean a player that’s in this iron is looking for that where they want something that’s not going to be super hot like a typical hollow body iron. Something that feels good but something that’ll be nice to them and they don’t strike it perfect. Yeah. I think that’s where this iron could really win is a player that, you know, might is still looking for forgiveness, but like and still but also really wants that like forged feel, something soft, something that um, you know, maybe they’re a player that was in a forged iron, like a forged muscle back, right? And they’re just looking to maintain that distance, um, but they still want that soft feel. This seems like a club that’s going to work really well for them and still getting that forgiveness that you might not get out of other forged irons. I like this a lot so far. All right, so with that said, if I hit the X Forge solid, I might actually hit it as far as this one. Um, but I doubt the Mish hit performance will be as good. Yeah, let’s try it. The X-Forgged a lot smaller. Not crazy smaller than the XForge Max, but certainly much thinner top line. And it seems like the blade length is also smaller. Do you notice there’s more loft on there? I do. Um, but again, it’s not like it’s I don’t think it’s a crazy difference. I mean, it’s two degrees, but I will say I I I do think this is really clean look. Um, really clean. I think this will be a pretty solid club for them. It’s kind of in the same It reminds me a lot of like the uh P7 MC or I guess a CB now where it’s small, compact. Just a little bit of a cavity there though for some for some forgiveness. Yeah, just seems like the muscle backs are kind of fading away a little bit. Even on tour, there’s just I think golfers are realizing just a little bit of help can be really nice. Yeah, I mean, they’ve gotten so good at making these more consistent, reliable that there’s really no downside now to having a little more forgiveness in the club. And it just when you put it down to the dress, you don’t see anything. Yeah. So, it just looks like a muscle back. Okay. slightly towards the toe there. I like that there’s like no sound with that one though. That was like really soft. Yeah, definitely seeing more spin. Yep, that’s to be expected. Giving me plenty of height and stopping power on that one for sure. All right, face was open on that one. We’ll see if it draws back or not. A little bit. Yeah, I am impressed. I don’t know if if um you know if it can be heard on the video by the viewers. I don’t know if you’re hearing something. It just there’s not a lot of sound. Like I I if you’re a player that really likes you know you want the muted feedback or or very little audio feedback, I think this is going to be a good one for you. Very good. This is very repeatable so far. All right, another one that was a slight miss to end things, but it’s actually Yeah, pretty good. Well, that I had two. I think the first and the last shot were maybe like slight toe. Mhm. And they performed really well. Like that’s they they probably lost an average uh you know, compared to the average like four or five yards. That actually lines up a lot with what I would have maybe expected. I think you mentioned the differences in spin you might have thought and carry yards and I think it actually lines up pretty decently there. Yeah, I mean we’re seeing about 600 RPMs of carry variance there. The launch angle is about a degree and a half higher. Land angle is a little bit steeper. Your peak height’s actually pretty similar because this was a little faster in ball speed, right? Um I kind of explained to golfers that you can have something with more ball speed that’s actually going to peak higher than something with more spin. Uh just because it kind of keeps climbing that ladder as it goes up. But where you see the difference is in the landing. On the way down, it’s just coming down a lot steeper. Um, distance was a lot more consistent. We were at 2.6 yards of variation there. Again, that doesn’t surprise me either. Um, part of that has to do with the strikes were a little better. So, that’s that’s always going to help. Um, but dispersion was tighter. You saw more consistent distance. Face angle was around the same. You’re just slightly more open with the X forged. Yeah. Attack angle was similar. I also swing this a lot slower. Yeah. Which I don’t I mean I wasn’t really trying to do anything there. Um I think they’re actually the same shaft, too. The I believe both are the same. I’ll I’ll confirm here, but um yeah. Yeah, it’s the mid the mid 115 in each S300. So, it’s the same shaft. So, it could have been just a confidence thing, too. Maybe I was just feeling a little bit more confident as someone who has a set of strict irons in the bag right now. um testing the XForge Max and that has like just fit my eye a little bit. Yep. Um but yeah, this is like I’m still very impressed with the carry distance consistency with both of them. Despite maybe some not great swings, varying hit locations as we already saw. We pulled up the the heat map there. We saw how the ball still traveled a distance that was, you know, maybe losing a few yards compared to a solid center strike, which I think that’s got to be really encouraging for a player that wants to maintain uh forgiveness maybe in a softer feeling iron. Yeah. And in the uh AI 150 video, we talked a lot about split sets. I think there’s a lot of split sets between these two in the future. Yeah, that’s uh again, we t you mentioned it. Callaway not shying away from that. Nobody’s shy away from it, but you know, there’s all kinds of irons in the cowboy lineup, and the blend set possibilities are endless there. So, this is another kind of addition to all of those possibilities with both of these. Really good. Right, Jake? Testing complete. Callaway X Forged and XForge Max irons. I thought I was really encouraged by the testing. I think there was a clear um level of consistency with the carry distance. That was the most impressive to me. Yes, absolutely. I mean, there is definitely a delineation between these two. This is going to be your faster, lower spinning iron. We still saw plenty of peak heights. I mean, it it’s still getting in the air very well. It’s just on the way down going to be a little different. That’s going to be softer, steeper, more spin. This is going to be more distance focused. Yeah. Again, I think that these two as a split set would be a fantastic option. But if you already hit the ball plenty high and you’re just looking for more distance without sacrificing feel, the Max is going to be an awesome option for you. Yeah. If you’re looking for just very precise shot shape, shot distances, the standard XForge is going to be the model you want to get into. Yeah, because I think the the X Forge I know we you kind of covered it just there. We can kind of talk about the golfers in particular that that might be I don’t know if we don’t have to put handicap ranges on it necessarily, but um the XForge Max I guess I would say is like you mentioned we we’ve mentioned a few different players but the player that might be looking for a little bit of help um but wants a soft forged feeling iron. That’s exactly what that’s for because it provides all that. It looks clean and compact, not super small but also not like outrageously game improvement iron looking. The X Forge I think is going to be a tour iron. You’re gonna see a lot of players, I think, on their staff probably put this in the bag or maybe some already have at this point. Um, it really looks small. It’s It looks bladeike from a dress. Like, it has a really thin top line. There’s not a lot of length heel to toe. And it’s going to be a great option for really the the lower handicap players who want to work the ball, want really soft feel, want something small to look at at a dress. Um, but like you said, the combo set possibilities here, there’s a lot. I mean, you could go really, you know, you could you could really combo these at any point. And I think I imagine you could set up the loft in a way that would work really well for this. Absolutely. Yeah. I think between that, obviously, all the AI options that Callaway has too, they have a really robust lineup of irons. 100%. I mean, I really think that this is going to be a strong performer in the year plus to come. Uh, like I said, this is kind of a hole that I think they’ve had there for a little while. um that I’m really glad that they are addressing and it’ll be awesome to have these as options in the bay because like a say for example a Stricks ZXI7 or a Titalist T-150, it’s been such a strong category for me this past year and to have another weapon in that arsenal is just great news. Yeah, I think the Callaway X forged irons of the past have been awesome and received really well. So, kind of cool to see them revive this this name, this brand, and I think it’ll be really successful in the fitting bay. So, golfers, if you’re interested in the XForgged irons from 2025, either the standard XForgged or the XForge Max, schedule a fitting, give us someone like Jake in the fitting bay, and you’ll hit better golf shots with your irons. More greens regulation can lead to lower scores. So, thank you, Jake, so much for joining. Um, again, really looking forward to these this year. Thanks for having me. [Music]