PING i240 IRONS | The Swing Report

The new PING i240 irons advance PING’s popular Players technology, providing added forgiveness along with the control, look and feel that will appeal to a wide range of skill levels. PING i240 is PING’s highest-launching Players model, giving golfers more control and the ability to consistently hit their distance numbers and stop the ball close to the hole.

0:00 Intro, Key Details and Specs
3:04 Testing
13:47 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 PING i240 Irons.

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Hey golfers, I’m Drew Maholder, Second Swing Golf. We’re out here on the driving range with some new irons to review today. Jake Montgomery, fitting manager at the Minneapolis Store, is with us. Jake, um, this is kind of the next step in what has been a really successful series of irons for Ping. Yep. Over the last several years, you had the I210s, I230s, now the I240s are here. Y um this has been I mean talk to me about why this type of iron from Ping has been so successful over the years. Yeah. I mean this has been really a fitter’s best friend. Uh most players coming in really struggle with getting spin on their irons. We struggle with peak height. We struggle with land angle. The I230 was far and away the highest spinning iron in this kind of players distance category. I wouldn’t even necessarily say that it’s fully players distance just based on the loft structure. I mean this has the same loft structure as their blueprints. They’re not jacked loft by any means, but they are faster. Um, so they do produce a little bit faster ball speeds there, but they launch high and they spin a lot, which for most golfers again is really what they need kind of coming in. So, we had a ton of success with the I230. I’m really excited to see what the kind of what the I240 is doing for us. Yeah, the I240 is, you know, it has a lot to live up to um with both of the I210 and I230, but they’ve clearly made some changes. You can see visually on the back of the iron, this cavity badge. They have made it 8 and 12% lighter. It’s a new ABS badge and that has obviously allowed them to kind of redistribute some weight. Yep. On the perimeter, make it more forgiving. Uh the other big piece too that I think is going to be really impactful is the grooves. The grooves are wider. Going to provide more spin, especially from the fairway, which really helpful. Yep. 100%. Yeah. I mean, you can see where they are kind of moving the center gravity. There’s this new kind of carbon fiber badge right there. And there’s a kind of a weight port down here in the in the in the sole, I should say. So, they’re really trying to bring that center gravity low, get the wall launching high and spinning more. Yep. They still do have the tungsten screw uh in the toe there. They’ve had that as a staple of these irons as well. And then the shaping. Now, I’m I’m curious. I don’t have the measurements in front of me. My initial thought is that it might look slightly larger than the i230. Um I don’t have the measurements, so maybe that’s incorrect just purely visually. Uh my first kind of takeaway from it. Yeah. However, we’ve seen these types of irons in the bags of plenty of Ping pros, and they also noted that the size and shape of this is based on feedback from their their staff. I mean, I know I was actually on the Pink Tour truck. They had built a set of I240s for Victor Havland. Uh we’ll see if he’s in if they’re in the bag at this the time this video is published, but clearly there’s some tour feedback went into these irons still. So, it might be slightly larger, but clearly there’s some tour um demand for these. Yeah, I mean there really wasn’t an iron that kind of spanned across more handicaps than the I230. I fit this anyone from a two to a 20. So really there was a lot of different players that could kind of get into this iron. Might make sense why they made it a little bit bigger. Yeah, exactly. So we got a whole set to test today. We might hit a little seven iron and a little bit of four iron and we’ll see what the numbers suggest. Again, we’re outside. Um it’s a great beautiful day to hit some new ping irons. Yep. Let’s do it. So, Miss Montgomery, uh, got seven iron. Let’s put that down at the address first and just see. Yeah. Kind of what what you what you think. I know I made a comment about it making maybe being a little large in I230. Is that something you agree with or does it still look pretty sleek to you? Yeah, I mean, I’ve played I230 for a while though, so I’m I’m very familiar with the iron itself. Um, I would say it maybe looks a fraction bigger heel to toe and maybe a smidge larger in the top line there. I mean, it’s it’s not a radical difference. I mean, the the transition from the shaft into the head looks pretty similar offset wise. Um, I think that they might have just made it like I don’t know, 5% bigger, something like that. Okay. Still, but still very friendly to look at and% a players type club still. It still looks better to me than like say like a P790 or something like that. For sure. Right. Let’s see what this thing has in store here. That was a smidge low on the face. Okay. Smidge low on the face. And what Ping has said about these irons, too. Um, is it is what is it? The highest launching players iron that they’ve ever made is the descriptor there. So, little low on the face. Actually still carried it 165 there. The Smash Factor obviously dips to 125, but um, a pretty good miss there, I’d say. Overall, yeah. What’s your What would you say as a seven um, carry that you play for on the course usually? I mean, 175 is kind of my my gamer carry. If I’m swinging at 92, 93, I’m looking for about 125 ball speed or so. Okay. Yep. That felt better. Okay. So, a little bit. So, that one I’m curious where. So, that one you felt a little bit better on the contact. It might have been a smidge high, but it was definitely more center. Yeah, it was definitely I think a little bit on the the spin was still down below 6,000 there. I think that was potentially because Yeah, a little bit high in the face. Actually, if I bring up impact, we’ll see if it got it. Yeah, a little high in the face there. I will say both of those balls were right in the same carry window about 165 or so. Gotcha. Little left on me. That draw showing up there a little bit. Yep. Got that one over to over 6,000 spin. 64 carry. Again, we should note too, you’re not we’re not using the premium ball that you play. These are the range balls out here at Braar, which they are good quality range balls, but range balls nonetheless. Yeah. Felt maybe a little high in the face again, but pretty solid. Yeah. Smash factor went up a little bit there. Yeah. Carry 169 there. Spin back in a normal kind of 7,000 range, which I think is what you were anticipating with this club. Um, yeah, that one was a lot closer to the center of the face on contact there. Pretty good. Launch that, but it was right face a little bit open, huh? Yeah, definitely was uh the best contact and sound I think that I I’ve seen and felt from you so far. So, yeah, that one did jump into actually over 180 yards there on the carry. Wow. Um, because you definitely flushed that one in the middle for sure. Yeah. Let’s get Let’s get uh Let’s get one more here. Then we’ll be good. That’s the best ball hit. That That sounded really good. That was almost a dead straight ball flight. We got a 134 smash there. We got ball speed at 125. Yes. I mean, when I’m hitting it good, that’s about what I’m looking for. That’s spin over seven. Yeah. So, let’s see. We’ve got some shots here. We can average things out here after that. I will say this, we did have that one swing that kind of was sort of a it took off a little bit further that I mean you hit it more solid. Yeah. Um but let’s see. We got 93.6 on the club speed average, 119.5 on the ball speed, 6200 spin, 168.4 carried, 177.6 total. I think there was a couple swings there that weren’t perfect contact from your standards. Um how about just in general the feel of that thing? I mean, it’s not a Right. We got a This is not a forged iron. No, I mean, it definitely didn’t feel punishing at all. Um, a couple of the highface shots like I I could feel what I did. Yeah. But it I mean, it still felt pretty solid. Like, right now, I’m currently playing like a a CB set. So, something that’s a lot smaller. Got it. profile on these. Just not nearly as forgiving. And I mean, some of those misses would not have been right performing as well as they did with this i240. Yeah. Um, what was kind of the variance of my carry there? the Well, let’s see. I’m gonna what I’m going to do is take out that deep one there. Yeah. Um, which was 183. And now those and again, these four shots that you know, first four shots I think were a couple that you didn’t quite catch perfectly, right? But those four were 165, 160, 164, 169. Yeah. So, you’re right in that same range. And again, this is also a club that’s maybe um you know, depending on I don’t know what the loss of your current set is, but it’s a little bit different build than what you’re playing. Um and again, we’re using range balls out here to see the consistency on that I think is pretty good. Yeah. On those ones. Um so the spin average again right in that kind of mid6000s. Yeah. I mean, that’s right where I’m kind of shooting for it to be. Be right where you’re looking. Land angle was what? Land angle was 42 degrees on those. Actually, I’m going to I got to bring up that last one for the total average of that which was uh 43.3. Okay. So, little bit I think there’s you know that well that I should say that last shot that you hit was a 48.5. Yeah. I mean that’s kind of more than if you hit the ball solid you’re going to get plenty of stopping power 100%. I mean I would say that I probably put some C++ swings on those first ones there. Just didn’t quite get the ball speed and the spin out of it that I typically would. Like that last shot there felt real nice. Yeah. And that’s about the numbers that you’re saying that they are. It’s kind of what I’m used to seeing out of a seven iron. Yeah. Um I mean, the reason I went to these originally was just launch and spin. Yeah. Especially a few years back, I was so steep on it and so in out that I couldn’t get anything really up in the air. These are the only clubs that could get me a land angle over 45°. I just like how consistent the dispersion was here that, you know, again, on some swings that you I could just tell on the feedback you didn’t like. But you can see on the map here, you’ve got the the one that went kind of far there, right? These four are really close together despite various contacts. Um shots you didn’t love, but they’re very much playable for you. And um you know, you’re still putting for birdie on those ones, just maybe a little below the hole, right? So, um I want to see how the forearm performs cuz I think this is also going to be a club moving forward that could be blended with say blueprint S, blueprint T in a combo. So, maybe let’s try let’s try the four iron here and see how that one works for you. That was pretty nice. Maybe a little on the toe, but okay. I like that ball flight from a four iron. Yeah, that seemed to go plenty high for you. What was the landing on that one? Landing angle there was 42. Yeah, I’m pretty happy with that out of a four. Yeah, you carried at 205. Okay. 4785 on the spin there. So, and that was kind of with a little bit of the toe ball. So, is that where you’re what would you look at? I mean, I don’t spin four irons very much. I swing so steep on them that they they really just kind of come out like bullets. Um, I was honestly pretty pleased with that height there. Um, what was the total height number? The peak height was 85 ft on that one. I mean, for me for a four iron, that’s pretty good. That was towy. Good dispersion. I mean, it happens because it doesn’t look like it’s totally different from that last one. No, we’ll see. Yeah. I mean, you dropped a couple carry yards. The spin went down a little bit as expected. It went to 4176, though. It didn’t go down to like the 30,000. Okay. The total distance was very similar. Uh, just at 216 total there. Okay. So, pretty good. Obviously, the ball flight’s a little lower because of the the contact, but that’s pretty darn good for that miss, I think. 100%. I mean, that was not good contact, and that really didn’t punish me. That was flushed. Yeah. Just a little bit of a pull draw. Uhhuh. How’d the contact feel on that one? Still to tell you. I mean, you can see it. It’s the same spot every time. It’s just in the tail. Oh, sure. And again, this is also a lie angle conversation on off camera. You had said something about your irons are a little upright build. These I these came in for us standard spec all across the board. So, there’s that conversation that has to be had here. But, I will say um the three distances that we’ve got with the 4iron here, um the carry distances are 205, 199, 199. Okay. So, total distances is 215, 216, 218. Yeah. So, yeah. I mean, that 215 number is right around where I’m kind of looking for my four iron to be. And yeah. Yeah. I mean, honestly, like I do play it just kind of landing in front, rolling up a little bit. So, it’s about Let’s get one more here. That was much better. That looks really good. The baby draw. Yeah. Efficient there. 1.42 42 on the smash factor, 137.6 on the ball speed. But again, what I like here is things like the distance didn’t jump super far compared to what you have done, right? So you got a 207 carry there for 222 total, right? So if we bring up actually the dispersion is going to look pretty nice here. Um, so we’ve got your two dispersions. You can I’ll give you the the look at the screen there, but yeah, very consistent there. Just left to center, right? And if we bring up the um total averages there, 139 smash, 4,600 on the spin, 202 or actually 203, probably round it up carry to 218 total. Yeah. So that’ll sound about exactly what you’re 100% I mean 4,000 spin for me in a 4 iron is very good. Yeah. Um I’ve even considered just dumping the 4 iron all together and just playing a hybrid just because I can’t get that club to spin. I mean I’m already in a sevenwood. Um so that that part of the bag for me is just kind of difficult to get launch. Um I mean that was pretty good. I mean, last year I was playing I230 blueprints combo set. So, I mean, again, I I went to that because these things give me pretty good peak height in my longer irons. Um, yeah, I’m just glad to see that kind of the identity of this iron hasn’t changed. It’s designed to go high. It’s designed to launch. It’s designed to spin. Yeah. And we saw some forgiveness as well and some consistency I think that it’s going to deliver. And again, this is both with a seven iron and a four iron. So, I imagine in the fitting bay you’ll have, you know, a lot of full sets, but also the ability to put a four or five or a long iron in for somebody’s set. Yep. Absolutely. All right, Jake, testing complete. I240 irons. We hit both a seven and a 4 iron. Yep. What were your kind of general thoughts after seeing some of the numbers and kind of watching the ball flight here a little bit, too? Yeah, I mean, I was happy to see that the the look, sound, and feel really didn’t change too much from the predecessor. the I230 was such a good iron that honestly they could have put a four on there and then just kept it out for two more years if they really wanted to. Um I think what they’re doing with kind of redistributing weight, putting more down in the sole of the club is really just going to help most golfers kind of get that ball up in the air. Um when we’re hitting the seven iron, I wasn’t putting the best strike on it. So I wouldn’t say that was a super fair representation of like what you’re going to see. That last shot where I cut was like 48 land angle. That’s kind of more what I expect to see from this club. when you hit this thing solid, it just jumps up in the air. Um, so I was glad to see that performance kind of remained. Yeah, I think that is the key, right? Ping has said it’s going to be the, you know, the highest launching players are they’ve ever built. Um, and I think they’ve also with some of the construction changes they made, they’ve separated a little bit further from Blueprint S to where a player doesn’t have like a a you have to flip a coin between those two. There’s distinct differences now between those two. Um, talk about then the the player that this is going to be, you know, most suitable for. And you mentioned already that the I230 was kind of for a pretty wide range of handicaps. I imagine that the I240 is similar and that a lot of different types of players can play it. Yeah. I mean, I would say any player that is steeper on the golf ball and struggles with getting the ball up in the air is going to benefit from this iron. If you just need maximum forgiveness, we’re probably going to be closer to the I530 or G440. But if your ball striking is somewhat solid and we’re looking for peak height, this is absolutely an iron we should take a look at. Now, handicaps can range based on a bunch of things. You can be the best ball striker in the world and be a horrendous putter. So, that’s why I kind of say like it it spans all handicaps, but really any player that strikes the ball fairly well and is looking for more height is going to be in this iron. Yeah, that’s a pretty good summation there because I think I mean overall you’re right. We don’t like to kind of corner things by handicap because of what you said, but I mean this is an iron that’s going to work for a lot of players out there. So, Ping I240, go get fit today with someone like Jake. We’ll get you dialed in for uh the latest from Ping. Really good iron. This family has been awesome for several years now and there’s no reason it’s going to stop. So Jake, thanks so much for doing the testing today. Thanks for having me. [Music]