BEST GOLF DRIVERS OF 2024 | HIGH-MOI DRIVERS | BEST OF 2024

This edition of the BEST OF 2024 series features the best golf drivers of 2024, including the PING G430 Max 10K driver, TaylorMade Qi10 driver, Callaway Paradym AI Smoke Max driver, and Cobra DARKSPEED X driver. This BEST OF 2024 video highlights the best High-MOI drivers available in 2nd Swing fittings early in 2024.

0:00 Intro
4:05 Testing (Callaway Paradym AI Smoke Max)
10:00 Testing (TaylorMade Qi10)
16:30 Testing (PING G430 Max 10K)
22:04 Testing (Cobra DARKSPEED X)
26:36 Kevin’s Picks

In this video, 2nd Swing’s Drew Mahowald is joined by master fitter Kevin Kraft to test and review the best golf drivers of 2024 in the high-MOI category. These drivers include the Callaway Paradym AI Smoke Max, TaylorMade Qi10, PING G430 Max 10K, and Cobra DARKSPEED X.

Shop Fitter’s Choice drivers at 2nd Swing: https://www.2ndswing.com/golf-club-fitters-choice-awards-2024

Schedule a Tour Van driver fitting today for one of these four drivers: https://fitting.2ndswing.com/schedule-now/

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Hey golfers I’m drum holder second Swing Golf here in the tour van joined by Kevin Craft today uh for a very fun kind of series once again for 2024 the best of 2024 and today we’re sort of doing it in two parts this year because we’re

Going to account for more drivers to be released probably at some point this year so first part is going to be the new ones early in 2024 and Kevin we’ve got four of our favorites so far so these are the sort of standardi category um I’ll just go down the line here what

We’ve got so um right now the one built already for you Callaway Paradigm AI smoke Max MH we’ve got tailor made qi1 we’ve got the Ping g430 Max 10K and Cobra dark speed X so initially here Kevin youve been fitting out with these probably for what a few weeks yeah um

First Impressions on these four drivers all very good yeah yeah they’re all very good uh there’s a lot a lot of similarities uh some subtle differences things like a matte finish on the the cobra versus the glossy finish and lots of fingerprints fingerprints on the qi1 um they’re all good yeah they’re all

Good they’re all very friendly they’re all very forgiving they all feel good uh sound can be a little bit different right that’s that’s one thing that we’ll see with with customers you know they’ll like a particular sound when sound translates into right right right yeah so um and also at

The end of the testing we’re going to come back and get your top pick in performance in Innovation and in sort of look SL sound feel into one category there so three categories at the end for you to pick a winner on so um but also we should we should discuss the shaft

That he going to be you’re going to be hitting with these this is a we haven’t done a ton of testing with this on our channel before so talk to me about this shaft and if it may or may not be in the bag for you this year Okay so so this is

The autoflex SF 505 XX now it’s a lot of letters and numbers that you just said so when somebody sees XX they think okay double double X right yeah if you look at the way this shaft moves doesn’t really this not really look as if it’s

Going to be a double X flex shaft yeah however the autoflex is essentially designed to be stiffer the faster you swing it so this particular shaft is rated for up to 20 mes hour of Club head speed I do not have 120 miles hour of Club head speed well not

Yet it it ain’t going to happen it ain’t gonna happen uh do I have a I’ve hit I’ve hit okay it’s it’s it’s sort of in there put your mind to it uh yeah so uh you know my normal playing speed is going to be somewhere in that 106 109 range just

Depending on you know the day probably had some slow days I’ve had some fast days but but um you know it kind of looks like a if you took a the whole wrapper off of a roll of Lifesavers yeah it does what this one looks like they

Have a few iterations they’ve got a a black with yellow they got a black with pink and they’ve got an all black with just different color on the autoflex uh name but um I kind of like this one yeah it fits my personality does it

Definitely does I weird so uh it is it is pretty good so we’re going to we’re going to work with this one today see how it goes I have not tested anything I have not tested any of these heads with this shaft yet okay so this going to be

Informational for you as well yeah the only one that I have hit with this shaft in it so far is what I’m actually gaming this year which is the the dark speed LS which we’ll do in a sub review so yeah all right should be interesting should be should be we’ve

Got ° ° heads for each of them um we’re going to start with the Paradigm because you’ve got a build already yeah um are you ready to swing ready as I’m going to be let’s do it yeah okay all right starting with Paradigm AI smoke Max yes um it it did

Really well in our stream report video yeah um in the initial review of it so I expect pretty good things here with this this test I expect good things out of all these yeah that’s true they’re they’re all really good drivers so um yeah just really interested to see how

This all going to work cuz with the autoflex interestingly enough they’re supposed to be in a particular uh swing weight range and also uh a particular length range and really you go to about as low a loft as you can as you can get right uh does tend to launch fairly High

Yeah so okay so we don’t have we don’t have those numbers going on with any of these so yeah what we get what we get you know we uh you registered a swing by the way just now with your little uh that’s GNA that’s going to hurt my

Yardages not a great start for Paradigm I 21 mph Club head speed that’s uh that’s definitely going to hurt a little bit Yeah okay all right yeah this is going to be fun I’m interested to see what happens here with that shaft and these these driver heads yeah me too me

Too solid speed to start yeah 1076 not bad that started a little further right than I was expecting face registered a little bit open oh yeah it did indeed okay all right came back though yeah Drew back in I should probably get the other Fairway up too oh

Yeah that’s a little quicker turny than I want to See that’s there is a really good ball I think we had a little bit of gear effect on that previous one yeah yeah I think that was a little the previous one looking at what the the path was the path was only like 2.8 so I wouldn’t expect to see that

Much turn on a 2.8 so it had to be gear effect oh oh that’s okay oh there it is yeah there it is it is out there on the toe gear effect every now and then I know things I think so there’s some more speed y

Getting close to 160 on the ball speed there we go that was also a little toey should be all right though yep wow that did work yeah yep yeah not your most efficient strike but yeah no 143 is not exactly a great smash Factor but okay so I already have a comment

Okay that I need to make and I’m gonna show it by removing this last swing that was uh this last one that you sort of not your best strike okay look at all these uh strikes and look at the spin consistency oh yeah yeah yeah that’s

Pretty good one of the things I’ve liked about this yeah it’s been even though it feels Wiggly yeah right the way it performs the way it feels in transition all that stuff is great and it’s been a very low spin I want that low spin MH

Definitely want that low spin yeah so so our rule we what we wanted to do is do the best four out of six swings here um I don’t I mean we kind of I took this one out because of the 143 smash is there another one here that I mean you

Got really these four here that are I mean I guess the 1066 the one that was a little slower that’s right here in the middle yeah but if we do that we got these four here is their map and numbers wise that spin gets even more crazy consistent so

Basically if we look at every shot here just over 2000 just over 2000 190 1907 just over 2000 that was your uh you know off the toe strike yeah and then just over 2000 so really consistent spin with the um let’s see paradig AI smoke Max

And then also you know their whole thing this year of course is their new AI smart face and and retaining the distance on maybe slight Mish hits and it’s pretty smart you’re it’s pretty is pretty smart pretty smart it’s pretty smart your distance was over 290 with

Every single t- shot um in total and Carrie was 260 or more every time rounding up this little low trajectory wise I actually okay I mean I have this cranked down so okay I would actually like to see more like 110 so in some of

The work I’ve done with with my head and this shaft 8 degrees has been really good and I’ve been able to get 105 110 um but so I think the I think our our carry numbers down a little bit from from what I really want to see but I’m

Okay with I’m okay with 296 I I’ll live with that yeah I mean and here’s your you had that one that we kind of was out on the toes that’s kind of bring but you’re in the right spot for the most part with maybe the exception of one

That’s pretty much my finger print right there yeah that’s where I like to live yeah so yeah okay so and then Al again we’re going to bring up the spion I mean this again we narrowed the Fairway for you just to show you know it’s not the this the TPI Fairway is relatively

Realistic compared to what you’d see on a golf course and you really only had this one that would miss the Fairway so yeah that’s okay I mean we we’ve seen it in video If you you put me up against it I’m going to miss a fairway now and then

Yeah like our I can hit one in a row our Adam long challenge yeah um if you missed it Kevin tried to recreate 69 fies in a row which was the PJ to a record set earlier this uh spring and and Kevin hit one in a row

And missed it fairly next time so um okay so there’s our numbers with the AI smoke Max let’s go to tailor made next okay tailor made qi1 qi1 how much different does that look compared to the AI smoke Max visually it looks a lot different yeah fingerprints are still an

Issue this is the only thing the only thing I don’t like about this driver yeah is the fact that I’m going to spend a lot of time because I am crazy uh looking down going oh man there’s a fingerprint right yeah yeah and I’m going to obsess over it I’m just be

Like know I can’t if there’s a broken piece of a leaf and I I see it I’m just going to be like I just I can’t deal so you’re always you’re going to be in favor of a matte Crown no matter what I really am

Like couple years ago it was all Matt it was fantastic yeah it was great right it was awesome no fingerprints that was the 2022 the Rogue gu Max was was Matt stealth was Matt yep Ping’s always been yep Cobra yeah Cobra was yeah I think right two years ago yeah so

The yeah the the rad speed was yeah yep yeah last year’s last year’s wasn’t but last year’s was a little harder to see the uh harder to see the fingerprint a color scheme yeah true so yeah but anyway you give me you give me a nice glossy black I’m gonna see every single

Yeah yeah all right so I like this just it looks good and I think it looks really pretty cool with the shaft in it yeah that’s true yeah oh I blocked one is that low on the face maybe too H just looking at spin might have been a suppose that could have been

A little low heel no that’s pretty normal spot okay no I didn’t know I was just wondering just left the face open was about the same spot I think they came back interesting getting a little more spin here yeah this is it’s not a little it’s

A lot okay so there’s a lot more spin here well through two swings here yeah that one just looked and sounded like you hit it harder and you did little little bit lower spin well that one ain’t going right no it’s not wow okay that felt like the best of the

Group yeah that did look like the best yep wow there’s a good one to end on there we go okay again kind of low man I might need to I might need to Loft up that’s a six okay so let’s go back here let’s see which ones are we going

To remove here probably maybe this one yep that one’s gone this one here I suppose sure or this one I mean let’s let’s let’s we got one left one left we got one right one right let’s yeah let’s get rid of let’s get rid of that guy okay and we’ll see It’ll

Be should be a pretty fair yeah pretty fair comparison there okay so I mean if you look at it that way it’s like I’m going to miss one just a little bit to the left it’s actually this is actually a little bit to the right and I’m going

To hit a couple of the fa that we got one over here left that’s hanging out you’ve got these it’s like they they all have their own match only to be said about consistency folks yeah yeah um all right so numbers here um interesting that the

Spin was much higher on the qi1 that’s yeah I’m looking back at spin again I looked at spin with AI smoke and it’s not bad spin no it’s not bad spin not bad but I just there’s so much more spin I mean it it came down a little bit with

These last two yeah um but I just I wonder if we can almost I don’t want to say jump to the conclusion already but is qi1 just the more more spinning higher spinning driver certainly seems to be yeah yeah that’s my that’s my initial takeaway but I know you were

Mentioning carry distance yeah um it jumped up a little bit at the end here with a couple of those yeah okay now granted we had this one that you kind of hit a little lower let’s say we you know go like this switch it things go little

Bit more you know change a little bit yeah so there’s um yeah there there’s some differences there what did you think out of hitting those two hitting this one after hitting the yeah I smoke Mac um honestly I I think I like the responsiveness off the face a little

Better off the Callaway okay um yeah you know again I’m this is all new like i’ I’ve hit all these things but I’ve not done it with this com sha um I felt like I just knew where it was coming off and and everything on the it does you also

Were just you were swinging it seemingly more consistent too with the paradig I smoke strangely enough I went up and Loft with this one compared to the to the Callaway and I actually hit it lower yeah cuz you did move this you moved the Callaway down a little bit was down to

8.2 or sorry uh yeah 8.25 you you kept that one and this one right at nine yeah interesting yeah and so that could be related maybe a little bit to the spin I still think the spin is much higher than it should be though

No I mean look 23 2383 is a good spin number no it’s not it is I guess I’m saying the difference I like lower spin yeah because I feel like I’m capable of squaring it up most of the time right and I understand that with lower spin

I’m going to have a little wider dispersion just based on fact that if I leave the face open there’s not going to be as much Spin To Make It Stop So yeah I’m willing to take that on um I’m not bothered by 2383 I just like

I guess I just I feel like that number is much it’s much more it’s much more different than I thought it would be compared to the Cowboy I guess is what I’m saying but um okay so Qi 10 I mean still really good numbers I mean we got

A good dispersion up there it looks good it feels good yeah sounds good everything’s good just yeah spun a little bit more all right g430 Max 10K okay this is a much different driver than the other two I think uh in some ways yes indeed so I imagine that looks even more different

Than it’s large footprint Grande Grande footprint yeah I think and it again from here it looks like it’s also squat flattened yeah okay more than doesn’t really look I mean it just look yeah okay I mean if you’re going to make a driver bigger and you’re going to keep

It look bigger and you’re going to keep it at the the parameters that we’re allowed to have it’s going to have to be yeah squished yeah little little tiny bit right um yeah but it looks pretty good I know it does it’s not glossy so you don’t have any fingerprints to worry

About got that right got that right yeah no looks good to me it’s uh yeah yeah looks like a ping driver that’s going to be really forgiving that’s let’s find out 75 fet in the air that was a low it was a low launch man hit the screen pretty

Low that one launched higher oh yeah there’s the draw again that’s the shot I really want to see I like that that one right there yep so I know you like to start it out right little push draw yeah yep and if it pushes and it stays there fine I just

Don’t like to see the one going left speed’s taking back up I can tell yep trying to so that’s about as Mo the most draw You’ like to see right there yes absolutely I mean pass a little more from the inside than I’d probably really

Like to do I’m trying to get those ball up in the air too is weird um there it is wow that one the spin went down on that one even yeah that one felt that one felt good I I was actually pleased with the feel on that also pretty pleased with the feel

On that one oh didn’t quite pick your spin up on that one ah missed it but I missed it out toward the toe yeah yeah so that’s the result okay all right so I think I might see I’m going to take out this I’m going to take out this knuckle baller

For the one that misread the misread um probably take out that one yep first swing and then we got one more here I think you leave it cuz it’s it’s all it’s all very much in the frame yeah so this dispersion pattern is starting to become a pretty consistent theme for for

You here Mr Kevin um looking quickly at the numbers very efficient at 148 the highest launch so far of the three um also the highest average Peak height ball was getting up there a little bit um your uh spin was kind of a little bit it’s kind of in between the two so

I know actually I feel like this one was better in the sense that um we had the misre on the SP Mis read you know sort of a guessing on the italics one but only other one that went under 2000 was this one here and you it was basically

Off the toe if I remember correctly yeah so pretty good I think it’s consistently just over 2,000 spin um what else did you think about the 10K so Club head speed definitely came down yeah and I wonder could be the weight to the Head too yeah I mean I wonder if it’s just

The size could right I mean a lot of these companies are working with with with drag right Cobra which we’re going to do next they specifically have been working on trying to reduce the drag so uh if that one moves faster then that could be that could be the deal right I

Didn’t feel like I was really swinging any any less hard um this felt really stable though yeah I mean really stable it’s uh it’s a good feeling driver it’s a good sounding driver mhm U yeah I mean all of your all of your your t- shots

Here were uh Fairway walls here I think so we’ve got that one short and then we’ve got this one which was a you know we took it out just because this italic the italicize spin number but all seven of those t- shots were in the Fairway on the relatively

SL comparison I got a driver that I can hit in the Fairway now right right yeah so um pretty good stuff though I think uh I think we can say the 10K is is one of the strong competitors this year yeah um we also want to talk I mean that that

Carry number is getting a little bit higher as well as you hit the ball higher in the air so the total distance is pretty similar throughout yeah so I actually it’s the second longest but I swung two miles an hour slower than I did with Qi 10 yep so you can work

Smarter not harder sure yeah maybe 2 miles an hour smart harder yeah we’ll call it that yeah uh last one the I know potentially your favorite Cobra dark speed X you’re now after this is the fourth driver last one we’re going to test today thoughts on the

Appearance of that one I love it it looks good I love I just love this murdered Outlook yeah um really cool you got the carbon fiber you got the matte finish fingerprints no fingerprints right it’s awesome um still haven’t figured out exactly what I’m going to go with in terms of shaft

Color but I think I may just go with this guy because you know Taste of the rainbow right sure yeah yeah so yeah I like it it looks good it looks good curious what happens here with with the dark speed yeah oo there’s some speed out of the

Gate nice and some Spin and some height nice nice see that one’s going to turn over a little bit or maybe not we’ll see oh there it is just a little bit that’s kind of my perfect shot right there I like that a lot it’s about a what seven yard draw

Something like that yeah oh you have Eclipse 160 ball speed that’s better over 300 yards see it is in here it is in here I don’t show it in here very much but it’s in here this ball flight has been very consistent through what four swings now

Yeah after the you know well yeah extr ex extenuating circumstances on that one this one let’s see this one took off a little bit lower I feel like still really good wow okay how about that how about that I decided to go after one a little bit

That’s wow you did and you hit it zero feet a curve zero feet a curve okay okay there’s our dispersion with six golf balls wow okay so I don’t even we want to remove anything in theory we could do this take out the 110 because it’s it’s an outlier

Compared to the rest that’s a good point yep all because every single one of the rest them is 148 smash so we’ll just do that um okay let’s look at the numbers quick uh things got better things got faster things got higher in the air with

The dark speed what was nine degree loft I have aside from the Callaway which I did go lower initially and then you know the numbers were were a little lower than I wanted so I went back up I would have tuned them all down had the numbers

Not sure seemed a little low this one was just at nine so no no Shenanigans going on back here behind the scenes no it was just very consistent I mean so this one you went after right but after that before that you had um you know 148 on every single

Swing the launch was around 14° 13 to 14° every single time spin around 2,000 every single time and then your carry this is three times you hit at 272 in the air you hit one 274 one 270 um and then three out of the four

Three out of the five here excuse me and then this last one actually that you went after all went over 100 feet in the air as well which like pretty good from the dark speed yeah very good it’s not like it was it was it wasn’t like it was

The fastest club that you swung either it was actually your third out of the four yeah in average Club speed but ball speed wise was really good spin was almost ideal again really consistent too I mean we’re under 200 on on you know variance on spin rate so that’s really

Good this also felt really really stable I I I’m I’m a fan yeah yeah I think I mean there’s again this is one this is one test here and we’re going to do this again later in the year for this category but that dispersion kind of speaks for itself up there it’s smallest

And it’s kind of the stuff there so I think I have an idea one thing I’m learning Cobra heads and autoflex really seem to work well match yeah all right Kevin testing complete there for the best of uh 2024 I guess the high Moi or standard drivers part

One of the year he had these four models um interesting results in the testing yeah um and so I guess let’s just dive right into the testing and performance so to speak so um what we’re going to do is have you pick one of the four models

That was sort of the best performance um and this can be based on your testing today and it can also be based on your fittings as well so far but I know on the testing I think I have a pretty clear runaway favorite yeah uh yeah I

Think it came off pretty fair like speed wise Club speed I mean yeah we’ve got the numbers up there right now um it’s it’s uh I don’t know the club speed was pretty pretty good across the board the Cobra dark speed for you just launched a

Little bit higher gave you a little more carry distance yeah than the rest um it’s it’s tight in terms of performance because if you look at if you look at ball speed compared to Club head speed the they were all really good yeah uh I swung the Ping two miles an hour slower

Than the qi1 and a mile an hour slower than the dark speed there’s also a bit of you know if I tune up in Loft you know what what is what’s that going to change right we might see a little more spin uh might get a little bit more carry I’ll tell

You what from a from how these feel standpoint I thought the two most stable were the were the Ping and the Cobra okay okay um you know overall performance in our test today gota be the Cobra dark speed X was was definitely the the the best of that

Group um I would say that if this was if I was doing an actual fitting on me I would take the Ping and I would go up another degree and see what that does to the overall numbers um you know because in in a fitting we’re going for how can we make

It absolutely the best right in this instance we’re just taking fourheads playing them as similar as possible and and seeing what what did the best so um so for our our purposes today just looking at it what we have straight up data not even not even my

Own personal opinion yeah Cobra was the winner yeah Cobra was the winner performance I think that’s it’ be it’d be tough to publish this video and say h something not Cobra was the the performance winner for this test this video but um I know you’ve been you’ve we actually recorded the podcast this

Morning about it you you mentioned how much the 10K has impressed you in fittings Absol it’s not surprised to see that it also performed well on this test too um I Innovation here and this is kind of a weird um category in the sense that it’s kind of at least in my mind

It’s like which of the drivers represents a technological advancement the most um you know what new technology might there be or um the novelty of the of the driver and and what it’s designed to do um which one is your favorite in that space yeah for in terms of of

That’s that’s really a tough one in terms of of innovation when you look at at what’s gone on inside these heads uh or in these faces right um everybody’s improved on on previous gen uh though this one’s not even in this one’s not even going up against its previous gen

This is its own thing but you know the AI smoke is hard to it’s hard to say that they haven’t really maybe gone the furthest yeah in terms of how they’re changing their face smart face design absolutely how they’ve added more weight adjustability to it um I think

Overall from a you know who’s who’s put the most into it I’m probably going to give that one to Callaway yeah I think I think that’s just and we we had a a session with them at the PJ show and they talked about the supercomputer and and all the simulations that they are

Able to do and H the face iterations with how the smart face technology works so uh it’s it is crazy what they’ve done with it and we see it I mean you see you hit off the heel toe wherever the ball the the retention of the performance is

Is really really good with these drivers so and and Callaway is going to be you know Callaway is really right at the Forefront of this whole AI technology everybody’s everybody’s now kind of trying to catch up y a little bit and we’re going to see more of this out of

Every manufacturer because this is this is the future of Club manufacturing and how we’re going to see improvements year-over-year um every year I say they so good that’s the only way to even do it is to get AI you know architecture uh involved so um all right lastly we

Talked a lot about it during testing but just how these drivers look and how they feel and sound which one of them is your favorite Cobra yeah I figured and we talked about the the fingerprints and stuff but I also just it’s so clean right it’s clean there’s no even the

Even the the little alignment you know C there is is muted it just you put it down it’s just a nice clean driver head um I do tend to like matte better than glossy I do love the the look of this and I like the shape of this and uh just

The fingerprints man the fingerprints yeah I think tailor made and Cobra uh I I think if I were to maybe guess how the general public would vote on this category of look fi sound I think those two would be the favorites just based on how clean they are and then just

Depending on where you stand on the glossy versus Matt so I’m just going to kind of run through these all real quick so the only thing I don’t like about the AI smoke is the same thing that I didn’t like about the previous tailor drivers which is this

Line now I like this I really like this kind of dark grayish yeah uh carbon fiber I think that’s a really good look they push that all the way to the end man that’s going to be a heck of a good-look driver and this one you know

What so it’s got same kind of thing it’s got the wider band here y I don’t that doesn’t bother me as much you got to be able to incorporate the turbulators in there if you don’t like the turbulators you don’t like turbulators it is what it

Is there is a lot going on on this head but there’s a lot going on underneath the hood too and and this weight being all the way back here this thing is so stable so stable I don’t have any problem with the look of this of this

Golf Club at all it does look a bit bigger the footprints a little bit bigger but um yeah and we mentioned it’s a little bit different in it designed to some it is just a little bit farther back the we versus maybe these other ones so more for giving most likely this

One compared to maybe the others but for this performance today in this test Cobra dark speed was a pretty darn good winner so um golfers we hope that uh we helped you with your driver decision this year in 2024 and if you’re still not sure or maybe want to test them for

Yourself schedule a fitting with someone like Kevin or any of our Master Fitters we’ll get you dialed in for a new driver this year longer straighter t- shots is the goal and we can help you do that so we something you like looking at too

Exactly got to have it got to have it all so Kevin thank you for hitting all the shots today some really good testing up there and uh yeah this is awesome yeah that’s Good