Cleveland Hibore XLS Tour Driver New for 2008 Review

Is Cleveland Golf's latest HiBore incarnation the best of the series

?

When the original HiBORE driver hit store shelves, I was among the first in line to pick one up. Frankly, it didn't work out well. The driver was supposed to hit the ball high, straight, and long. My typical swing with the original HiBORE produced drives that flew wedge-shot high, very straight and about as far as a 3-wood.

Look and Feel

The first thing you'll notice about the Cleveland HiBore XLS Tour driver is it has a more traditional compact pear shape, which is much smaller than a traditional looking 460 cc driver, and it also has a longer Tour length hosel. The design is based on precise PGA Tour specifications and Tour testing and feedback. The stock Fujikura 55 gram Fit-On M Gold regular flex shaft makes the club very easy to swing and lightweight. The face of the HiBore XLS Tour is opened 2 degrees and weighted at the toe to promote a fade based workability. The enhanced sweet spot of the face of the HiBore XLS is 17% larger than the HiBore XL, making it Cleveland's largest ever and one of the biggest on the market. The HiBore XLS Tour also features the maximum USGA clubhead dimensions to push the MOI limit. 5300 MOI represents a 13% increase from the HiBore XL for control off the tee for straighter drives. Weight was added to the heel and toe in the form of "stability foils", which create a higher MOI and more stable clubface. A really cool feature of the HiBore XLS Tour driver is the authenticity feature built into the toe of the club. The HiBore XLS toe graphics will change from white to yellow in daylight or UV conditions.

Performance

The sound the HiBore XLS Tour makes when you hit this club reminded me of the sound a baseball makes when you hit it with a aluminum bat, it did take a little time to get used to the sound. One of the things they did with the HiBore XLS Tour is open the clubface 2 degrees, and weighted the toe for fade based workability. Now I normally play a fade and the open face design really accentuated my fade, making my shots fade very severely. But after some alignment and swing adjustments, I was able to factor in the built fade bias of the clubface, which is quite nice. Cleveland has packed the HiBore XLS Tour driver with three technology features, that they claim give you higher ball speeds, optimal launch angle, and greater overall distance.

One of those features is Distance Driven Geometry. What this means is they moved the weight lower and deeper in the clubhead, which creates an optimized center of gravity in the center of the face, resulting in optimal launch conditions and higher ball speeds for greater distance off the tee. In my tests, I did notice that my launch angle was much higher than with my Callaway BigBertha 360 driver and gave me more distance, but not as much as the TaylorMade Tour Burner driver I reviewed. The other technology utilized by the HiBore XLS Tour is Energy Transfer Core. This is basically an engineered system of thin, lightweight titanium spines that transfers energy to the ball to create more efficient transfer of energy from the club to the ball and create higher ball speeds.

Cleveland Hibore XLS Tour Driver New for 2008 Review

By: golfstoreshop

POST COMMENT

Hats of New Era - Latest Products Comment Lord Of The Rings Slots New Cinematic Spins Technology Earth 4 Energy Andy Lau Is Not The Messiah Could Not Winning The New Century Conditioner Other Tax Incentives For New Home Buyers Catch up and enter the new world of Tweets to have fun and enjoyment What Do You Need To Bring To a New Car Dealer? Home Solar Power for Alternative Heating, Power of the Sun Renewable Energy – Essential Need For Mankind Florence, Ky Dentist, Dr. Marc Marlette Invites Patients To Visit His Practice's New State-of-the-art Website Home improvement loans – Loans to give a new look to your home Abercrombie & Fitch (A&F) has come out with a new line of t-shirts Used Quarry Machinery VS New Equipment