Are adjustable shafts money-making gimmicks, or can they really help your game?

To answer the question posed in the title, let me get my cards on the table right now.

For the vast majority of golfers, it’s a gimmick.

Take for example, TaylorMade’s Tour Van in a Box. For $999 (because companies think consumers are incapable of rounding up), you get three shafts, a clubhead with adjustable weights, and 1,071 weighting/shaft combinations.

Since when were hobbies, past times, and recreational diversions supposed to be fun? Hell no – they’re supposed to be work!

In order to test out every combination in various playing conditions (not to mention with various balls), you’d have to quit your job, abandon your family, and devote yourself full-time to the project.

Don’t be too hasty, though. You’ll need that job to pay for this almost boundless variety of ways to slice your drive into the woods.

Now, lest I be too judgmental, it is conceivable that some options exist for the golfer who is actually interested in tinkering, yet doesn’t want to empty the kids’ college fund to do it.

One such option would be SMT Golf’s interchangeable head and shaft packages. SMT is one of the bigger little names in the various international long drive circuits, and offers a range of driver clubheads. Now these can be fit to a line of interchangeable shafts, beginning with one-head and two-shaft packages for $285, on up to a two-head and three-shaft package for $479.

Hear that? That’s the same number of shafts and double the clubheads as TaylorMade for less than half the price. However, the clubheads offered by SMT don’t have adjustable weights. They do, on the other hand, come in different lofts, which is an option that even adjustable weights and shafts cannot offer if just one clubhead is included.

Geez. I’m dizzy just thinking about the possibilities. All those shaft/weight/clubhead combination options are crowding the myriad swing-thoughts out of my head.

Maybe that’s a good thing. But I’m guessing it’s not.

In fact, I’m certain that getting just one driver that fits me will work far better over the long haul than finding one that fits me 1/1,071th of the time.