Golf In New York City Blog

Power-Bilt is Back with Nitrogen Charged Metal Woods

November 13, 2008

Yesterday at Chelsea Pier in Manhattan I had the opportunity to test Power-Bilt’s latest technology in its Air Force One line of drivers, fairway woods, and Hybrids. Believe it or not, these golf clubs are Nitrogen Charged.

First some history – A trip down memory lane:

I remember when wooden clubs were made out of wood. Club makers started with a block of persimmon woods and shaped the club head by hand. After a number of processes an insert and a soleplate was attached to the club head by screws.

The insert was made of many different materials and many were jazzed up by using shapes and color. The insert was screwed onto the club head and was square against it. It was totally reinforced.
One of the major club manufacturers in those days was the Power-Bilt Golf Club Company.
Power-Bilt is a division of Hillerich & Bradsby Company (H&B). H&B are probably better known for making baseball bats for the likes of Derek Jeter.

The company dates back to 1884, when John “Bud” Hillerich invented the revolutionary Louisville Slugger baseball bat. Mr. Hillerich’s great grandson, John Hillerich, IV, is now President & CEO of Hillerich & Bradsby Co., making H&B the longest running, family owned sports equipment manufacturer in the world. Other H&B brands include Louisville Slugger, TPX, TPS, Louisville Hockey and Bionic Gloves.

H&B expanded into golf in 1916, and introduced the Power-Bilt brand name in 1933. In 1934, Olin Dutra used Power-Bilt clubs to win the U.S. Open. In all Power-Bilt clubs have won eight majors, and over one hundred PGA and LPGA tour and worldwide pro events.
Power-Bilt has a great history and was always an innovator in persimmon wood technology. They designed clubs with back weights that made the ball go farther and helped golfers play better. Constant innovation and world-class performance led to worldwide popularity.
Recently we have not heard much from Power-Bilt and they seemed to have lost some of their golf popularity.

End of Trip!

Yesterday at Chelsea Pier in Manhattan I had the opportunity to test Power-Bilt’s latest technology in its Air Force One line of drivers, fairway woods, and Hybrids. Believe it or not, these golf clubs are Nitrogen Charged.

What makes Air Force One completely different from anything on the market is “Nitrogen Charged Technology”, which is patented. Power-Bilt is introducing an entirely new technology and is the only golf company to infuse a club head with nitrogen gas.

It works like this: The face of any good driver, regardless of brand, flexes when it hits a golf ball. This is often referred to as the “trampoline” effect. The thinner the face, the more it flexes. Big hitters want a thin face, but not too thin or the club may be susceptible to breakage or can be deemed “nonconforming” by the United States Golf Association.

By filling the head of a driver, fairway metal wood or hybrid club with nitrogen gas, Power-Bilt is able to offer clubs with multiple face thicknesses. Please do not confuse multiple face thicknesses with variable face thickness. There is a face thickness for big hitters and one for golfers with a slower club head speed. This allows all golfers to flex the face the way pros do.

The inside of the clubhead is coated with a leak-proof resin then filled with nitrogen to pressures up to 150 psi. The air pressure supports the face without mechanical bracing allowing the face to be thinned much more so than what is found on comparable clubs. This result is the thinnest face in golf, which creates a toe-to-heel sweet spot and a face that flexes for all golfers. Multiple face thicknesses will be offered meaning golfers can chose the face thickness that best suits their swing speed. This is the only technology in golf allowing the slow-swing golfer to compress the face at the same level as a tour player.

Nitrogen is very safe. They use it in racing tires and space suits. It is weightless and has large molecules. Power-Bilt’s research found the nitrogen is the best gas to use for this purpose.
In summary, Air Force One by Power-Bilt Golf features Nitrogen-Charged Power, a technology currently not being used in golf. It comes with a five year warranty and conforms to United State Golf Association guidelines.

Starting in January you will see information commercial featuring Roger Twibell and Fuzzy Zoeller promoting the clubs.

It helps the ball fly longer and straighter and that is a very good thing. It is certainly worth your while to try these clubs. Mine is on order!

We should all congratulate Davis Love III on winning the 2008 Children’s Miracle Network Classic championship. Davis shot 64 on Saturday and 64 on Sunday. He played the last six weeks of the tour and was able to keep his tour card. Davis had 15 straight rounds in the sixties. This is his 20th win on the PGA Tour which comes with a lifetime exemption. Great Job!
Below are some of Davis Love’s words during the Sunday post round interview:
Well, the important thing is … and one thing I thought about out there in the middle of the round is that at least I haven’t been playing well, but I’ve been willing to work hard and learn and not just sit back and take it easy.

And I’ve learned a lot. I’ve talked to Bob Rotella. I went to his house last year, spent a lot of time with him. Spent some time with Morris Pickens, who’s a sports psychologist at Sea Island, trying to learn why we get good and why we get bad and how we get off.

And Rotella told me about Trevor Immelman not looking at the scoreboard at the last round of the Masters, and he didn’t know after he hit it in the water at 16 where he stood, and that’s what I was trying to do all day was just play and not know where I stood.

Obviously I knew I was leading, but I didn’t know what other guys were shooting. I just knew the two guys in my group, and I even tried not to look at the sign, just to keep myself focused on just playing the game.

I learned a lot over the last few years on how I can improve myself when I’m under pressure and when I’m not playing well, and it certainly paid off today because those last two holes, I could have chipped out, hit it on the green, missed the putt, not got up-and-down on the bunker and finished well back, and I just stayed in the process, just one at a time trying to do my best on each one. And I played them with confidence.

I was in trouble, but I was confident that I was going to get the ball up-and-down. I wasn’t thinking about winning or losing or screwing up. I was thinking about chasing that ball and getting it up-and-down. So a lot went into those last two holes over the last two years, for sure.
Well, I’m going to for another hour try to act like it’s not a big deal (laughs) and hold it together. But you know, it’s a big win for me.

It’s been a long time, and you know, a lot of people have put in a lot of worry and thought and effort and tried to help me get back to where I was. And you know, a lot of people have had a lot of confidence in me. And I’ve tried to balance the “what’s wrong with Davis? How can we help Davis?” You know, “how do we get him through this?”

It’s been a long three years because everybody, like me, expects me to play better, and certainly I’ve had a couple bad breaks, but I still, even after getting hurt, I should have played better all year. I shouldn’t have been this long to put four good rounds together. And not necessarily have to win, but I haven’t put four good rounds together all year.

I haven’t made the saves and hit enough fairways and greens and taken the pressure off my putter. That’s what I basically did, until the last two holes. I had the pressure off of my putter. I wasn’t missing every green and having to get up-and-down.

Scotty [Verplank] put the pressure on his putter today. I hit a lot of fairways, a lot of greens, had a lot of birdie putts. In Vegas and in Scottsdale and in New York, I’m putting for birdies and driving it down the middle of the fairway. I’m doing everything well, but I just wasn’t putting it all together, and I think this week, obviously to win everything has to go right.

I had some good breaks, made some good up-and-downs, but I played very, very well. It means an awful lot to put it all together.
You always question, am I doing the right things and can I still do it and why am I doing it. Why am I pounding balls on the back of the range. You know, I had a good wake-up call at the end of last year when I didn’t get to play these tournaments and fell out of the top 50, and you know, had to get in the gym and get my body back first and then get my game back. So it was definitely a challenge.

It wasn’t exactly what I needed after not playing well, like you said, for a couple years, was to have to come back from an injury. But I didn’t doubt my desire or I didn’t doubt the fact that I could compete, but the little things, you know, making the putts when you had to and all that, that’s golf.

You know, you never know whether like a [David] Duval or whoever, you never know when it’s going to turn on and when it’s going to turn off. And you certainly do turn off and how do you turn it back on, and that’s why I said I spent a lot of time with Rotella.

My son started working with Morris Pickens, and I listened for an hour lesson, and he goes, you got any questions? I said, yeah, I got questions about me, not about him (laughs). I’m not doing all that stuff.

So you know, I’ve questioned, you know, whether I’m doing the right things, and what it comes back to is I know how to do it. I just got to put the time in and keep doing the simple things, not trying to reinvent my game or my swing or the way I play. Just play Davis Love golf, and it’s good enough, and the confidence, I mean the chicken or the egg. We’ve been through that a million times. What comes first?

I think having a plan and sticking with it and being patient … one player was throwing stuff in his locker Sunday at Scottsdale, and he said, I don’t know how you’ve been out here playing so long. And.

I was getting ready to go take a shower, and I said, “Patience,” and I turned around and I walked off. And that’s really what it is. You got to be patient. You got to work hard and you got to, like I said earlier, be willing to learn.

But I’ve been very patient with myself. I haven’t beat myself up, and if I have questioned or wondered where it went or where I was going, I never gave up and I never thought that I couldn’t get it back. I just wondered how I was going to get it back.

And you know, obviously my brother and Joe LaCava have seen me play all year and just wondering what’s going on. You know, where is the winner’s circle, because I look like a guy that should win, and it’s all in your head.

It’s nice to do some things today, like make a few putts and hit a few great shots and make a birdie after Steve makes a birdie. The things that are all about competing, getting the ball up-and-down on the bunker on 18, those are the things that is a difference.

And Matt Cuza said something in the race yesterday, one of the guys made a good pit stop. He said, “That’s a champagne-spraying pit stop right there, boys.” And when I got that ball up-and-down on nine, I said, “That’s a champagne-spraying pit stop right there,” or up-and-down, because that’s how tournaments are won is when you do something, you know, out of the ordinary, you make a great … Steve made a couple long putts that I’m sure he felt like were momentum builders, but that up-and-down at 9 was what won me the tournament.

Bill Castner and Randy Friedman, a well-known mental coach expert, golf coach and author will be conducting a series of One-Day Winter Golf Seminar Instruction Workshops in both Clark, NJ and Manhattan. Workshop dates are November 15th (Clark), December 20th (NYC), January 18th (Clark), and February 15th (Clark). Also speaking during the workshops will be Class A Club Fitter - Tom Murphy, PGA Golf Professional - Leo Tabick and personal trainer Keith Shearer.

The Winter Seminar Applications are available or For more information call Bill Castner (917-208-5197).

Our readers might be interested in Ray Tennenbaum’s article, PUBLIC WELCOME, in the latest issue of the Met Golfer Magazine (copies available on mgagolf.org). The article mentions several public, daily-fee courses in our area, and discusses the nearly completed renovations at Pelham/Split Rock and Dyker Beach Golf Course. There is a terrific picture of the newly designed Clubhouse at Pelham/Split Rock.
If any of our readers have comments about the course improvements at these courses, please email them to us so we can update the website and let everyone know what you think about the renovations.