TaylorMade Qi35 Max driver V Callaway Elyte x driver

If you are looking for the most forgiving driver of 2025 then the TaylorMade Qi35 Max driver will be on your list to try alongside the Callaway Elyte X driver

As an average golfer with a slower swing speed I test both to see which one is best suited to mid and high handicap golfers. This could be the best driver of 2025.

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if you’re looking to buy a new driver in 2025 then the likelihood is you could be looking or considering one of these two that I have in my hand possibly the most forgiving drivers of 2025 the best drivers for mid to high handicappers it is of course the Callaway Elite X model and the QI 35 Max I’m going to put them in a very straightforward head-to-head and try and decipher which one might suit you might not what is the difference between these two in overall performance now before we dive into the day there are some quick considerations to make these are both what you consider to be draw bias drivers so they’re going to help people who effectively slice the ball there is a little bit of maneuverability in terms of weighting in a Callaway model and that’s just one slot that you can change this weight here into a more draw bias setting and there is no adjustability in terms of head weights with the Q I35 model there is of course plenty of adjustability in The Loft sleeve on both of these one final thing is is the looks and shelf appeal I think to be fair Taylor ma have absolutely smashed out the park on the look stake this for me is their best looking lineup they’ve had to date looks superb not only from a shelf appeal perspective but when you turn it over and the crown the address position stunning not so complimentary towards the Callaway certainly on the Shelf appeal element uh not overly fond of what they’ve done underneath however when you turn the club over it’s perfectly acceptable let’s say but if if you’re buying on looks alone the QI 35 is an allout winner but of course look doesn’t hit the golf ball for you so that’s all I’m going to do in terms of the comparisons on the looks and the text story I’m just going to hit some golf balls and we’ll do a good old fashioned head-to-head 138 ball speed this by the way is the QI 35 Max we’ve managed to hit a good old fade there which is my shot shape so as much as these are uh biased in terms of their weight into it to draw there’s certainly plenty of movement within that ball from left to right what’s really interesting there is a 139 ball speed off a 94 Club head speed so it’s very efficient spin rate the story behind the max model this year really has been to utilize all the characteristics in terms of the waiting to launch the ball high but it spun very high last year so it could have some detrimental effects on your overall performance and what they’ve tried to do is find a balance between the two so still be able to launch the ball very high still keep it as a 10K Moi driver but drop that spin rate down so you’ve really got to consider what it is you want a new driver for this year and you’ve really got to start studying these parameters and see if in actual fact there is any worth in changing and what it is that you’re trying to change from your current driver into a new one because at the end of the day this a huge investment and at 500 quid we’re going to try and decide whether or not it’s worth it or not on that shot itself real good performance of that club head speed I’m going to collect 10 shots with the QI 35 Max and then I will switch up to the Callaway equivalent I can certainly fade this thing still that’s better still a little bit of a cup but 141 ball speed um and again that spin is not popping up above 3,000 reps so you’ve got a great combination there uh between again ball speed to Club head speed spin number kept low launching not too high which would be the fear with a Max product um and overall that 230 carry is pretty hot for me to be honest with you so first few shots really impressed with what this thing is doing so far I was just going to start things off but uh they’re they’re different in shape again the uh the crown on the Callaway Elite is is sort of flatter and there’s a more rais profile it’s again down to very much personal preference of the dress the only other thing I would say and quite notably is that the Callaway product seems a lot more shut um to the to the left left so there’s a lot more neutral position that the um the QI 35 seems to sit in which would suggest like I said a bit more of a the draw bias um that we were expecting that’s certainly shot off the face yeah really good ball again the interesting thing for me is they they they sound very different this time around um again not a big deal but it’s something that the callow uh sounds hot in the sense that it seems to shoot off the club Feast there um really good starting points 230 carry um that again ball speed to Club head speed I always say that’s the ratio that’s important that’s where you get Smash factor from uh so in simple terms no matter how or it very much depend on how fast I swing the club is going to be what kind of ball speed I can actually achieve so anything for me with a smash factor that 147 is performing efficiently but it’s the other numbers that are impressive 148 launch 2 and 1 half th000 revs of spin that’s a good start and like I said it sort of it feels feels hot that is so frustrating I got drag that one left I’ll drag dragged it’s done okay um and again that’s sort of ball speed touching 140 223 carry I flatten that ball flight out I just close the face a bit and that’s one of the things that I would be interested to see what happens and don’t forget if you’re someone that slices the ball a lot it’s this kind of driver that is going to negate that in terms of the weighting system it’s still it doesn’t mean it’s going to go away it just means it can help in reducing it is the way I would explain it 138 again that might have a cut on it yeah big cut yeah so really just reiterates the points I just made do not buy a driver any type of driver on the thought process that it will eliminate a certain shot type there’s a big fade going in there in what is a uh a driver that’s weighted to suggest it won’t do that so uh do not be conned by the idea that that might be the principle however it still performed relatively well in terms of ball speeds um those are the numbers spin rate crept up a bit there so again I’ll hit 10 shots with this and see can we really identify a difference but maybe more importantly is there any worth in buying either of these two drivers in 2025 are you going to see any sort of gain from these two compared to your existing gamer right we like to keep these things nice and simple because that’s effectively what it is it’s a numbers game this is track man data and there’s a lot of personal preferences what will come into this equation but for me this is what I achieved and first of all you look down on the bottom here that is the averages so 226 carry my driving distances are 225 to 235 that’s where I’m at and that would be dependent on Club head speed so today 94 mph average Club head speed 226 carry ball speed of 139 gives us an average smash factor of 148 so that was very efficient I’m pretty much as good as I can get with the club head speed that I had today so more than happy with the carry distance and the ball speed the launch for me again was a nice ball flight for driver 13.7 launch and then maintaining this 22 spin that’s a great combination so and when I say that it goes back to what I mentioned when I talked about the QI 35 and in the range what they’ve tried to do they’ve tried to reduce this spin number down in the max product because what you don’t want is you don’t want a ball necessar balloons on you hovers and Spins too highly and that was always a problem so for a golfer like me who sat in this kind of 95 mph Club Ed speed the max was a dangerous product because it could really spin high and effectively impact a lot on this carry distance now the max product would suit my type of Club head speed and a lot others I would suggest so we’ll come back into the detail of some of them shots but then I’m going to go into the X the elite X we’ll do exactly the same highlight them all and we got a 229 carry so we are three yards up in carry and what you believe the average Club head speed was identical 94.3 is that right yes it is so that’s a real good comparison so we got 94.3 Club speed carrying 229 ball speed 138.5 launching a little bit higher but again maintaining a very low spin number a smash Factor all those things combined a 1 1.47 so again with my club head speed it’s performed incredibly well and I think those other parameters are really interesting because you’d expect like I said the balls to start to launch high in the X model as they call it and that spin number to creep up so that’s really interesting I’m going to have a look at one other thing which people talk about um dispersion um and I always think it’s a bit of a myth to be quite honest with you first of all no driver will I don’t think have a great impact on your dispersion I think that’s very much when I say dispersion left to right dispersion because what effectively happens to me in terms of forgiveness when you hit an off center strike the ball still travels as far as it does uh with a center strike that’s what forgiveness is for me forgiveness isn’t about left and right and as you can see we’ve got plenty of kind of balls from left side of the fery to right side of the fery what you’ll see is this is the sort of Center stripe I got more balls towards the left side of the Fairway which suggests to me when I was hitting this thing thing that the X model does a great job of negating eliminating that fade so it’s weighted in a way that we can we’re eliminating this side of the Fairway I can still do it as you seen on the video but it did have a positive impact in terms of negating that right we do exactly the same thing and go into the dispersion more than happy again these are kind of like they’re fine in the Fairway both drivers by the way both left and right of it well you’ll see here with the center stripe is we’ve got a bit of a mixed bag still finding majority on the left side of the Fairway but we’ve got a few that leaked out to the right as well I found like I said one interesting thing for me in this test personally was more to do with the head set up and the at least the visual offset what it felt like at a dress and that being a lot more on the X model it almost felt more shut off at a dress and a driver that I would literally sort of close easier and that closing means again NE ating that fade a little bit so that was one of the difference I sort of found at address sort of seen it in the numbers maybe with more balls on the left hand side of the Fairway with that X model but there was the overriding sort of result is ultimately there’s no difference between the two in terms of performance and we all really kind of know that we know that there is no great expectation this carry distance isn’t going to increase significantly ball speeds are are where they are at you’ve just got to find a drive driver that suits you in all these other parameters that make sure you’re getting the most efficient driver for your swing type and the likelihood is to be quite honest with if you’ve got a driver in recent years you’re not going to really see any great gains if any at all so be very wise how you spend your money I know you’re all educated people out there go and get custom fit consider these numbers and make sure you do some realistic comparisons and uh if you are going to commit a big purchase like this these things all of these things have got to be beneficial and that’s how you’ll get a decent performing driver in your hands right that’s me done hey uh very straightforward very simple process and really it’s over to you now to do your own testing and see what you find as ever thank you for watching and uh I will see you all very soon