The mini driver revolution is officially upon us. With more and more of these intriguing new clubs hitting the USGA conforming list seemingly by the week, I am taking a look at Callaway's version, the Paradym Ai Smoke Ti 340 mini driver to see what it can offer the consumer market. Does it sit amongst the best drivers or even the best fairway woods? Or both? Let's find out...
Firstly, many people have been asking the question, what or who is a mini driver for? Well, the answer to that question in my opinion can be different from player to player. As a PGA Professional, I have noticed a growing number of my high-speed contemporaries using a mini driver to great effect of late as a pure driver alternative around particularly tight golf courses where a 3-wood might drop too much yardage and add too much spin. As such a mini driver, pitched somewhere between 3-wood and driver in terms of loft, length, and face depth has produced some excellent results. Similarly, I have seen a number of my recreational friends using this type of club extremely successfully as a direct 3-wood replacement, feeling that the extra head size provides more confidence than the traditionally more compact 3-wood.
From a technology standpoint, Callaway is giving us a 340cc head, a titanium construction, and the same Ai smart face that we have seen with the rest of the Ai smoke family. Callaway tells us that the Ai smart face creates micro deflections across the face to optimize launch and spin conditions on both centered and miss-struck shots.
With lofts of 11.5˚ and 13.5˚ available and a shaft length of 43.75”, this sits directly in that twilight zone between driver and 3-wood. The Paradym Ai Smoke Ti 340 mini driver also features adjustable 12 and 4-gram weights on the sole to dial in spin and Callaway’s adjustable loft sleeve for further customization.
Visually, I think Callaway has done a great job, much as I did with the rest of the Ai Smoke driver range. The grey colorway looks extremely premium and the head shaping is excellent at address. If I were being picky, I would probably have left off the triangular alignment aid on the top edge as I prefer the cleaner look of the triple diamond models, but that is a very minor point and on the whole the visual is excellent.
I think it would be fair to say that the Paradym Ai Smoke mini driver's main competitor would be the TaylorMade BRNR mini copper, and there is a subtle difference. TaylorMade’s version comes in at 304cc in volume whereas Callaway has gone a little larger at 340cc. Having tested both, I did find this made a difference in how and where I would use each model. The additional real estate of the Ai smoke model was very comforting off the tee, however, I did find the head dwarfed the ball a little more off the floor than with the TaylorMade version which some may find a little intimidating. That said, all of the Callaway marketing correspondence has emphasized that this club has been designed very much as a driver alternative rather than a 3-wood replacement so perhaps the fairway performance is not a big concern.
I tested the Callaway Paradym Ai Smoke mini driver at Royal North Devon Golf Club with my FullSwing KIT launch monitor and TaylorMade TP5 golf balls and the performance impressed me. From the tee, ball speeds and efficiency were extremely impressive, in fact, they were not far behind my gamer driver at all. The additional loft and subsequent spin increase did take a little distance off my ‘normal’ driver numbers, but on average, I was only losing around 13-15 yards of carry. For context here, I found my best results in the -1 loft setting on the 13.5˚ head and with the heavier 12g weight in the lower spinning forward position.
The feel off the face will be a familiar one to current Ai Smoke users, with a satisfying dull thud at impact and fairly muted audio.
When I played around with the settings, I found that you could make massive performance differences, perhaps more so than on any other club I’ve ever tried. Firstly the sole weights made a good 3-500rpm difference to my spin output and with 3 degrees of loft adjustability on top of that, you can basically create a totally different golf club with a couple of clicks of a wrench. With that in mind, it is imperative that you have a very clear idea of what you are looking to achieve from gaming a club like this before you start wielding your wrench.
It is important to note that the Paradym Ai Smoke mini driver is only available in very limited quantities so if you are keen, I would suggest acting fairly swiftly because once they are gone, they are gone. The RRP is £449/$449.
Overall, a really interesting and strong-performing product. If you are very clear on what you want from it and get it set up accordingly, then you will have a serious weapon on your hands.
