Background: Playing for 15 years, age 63, handicap 13. Took Golftec lessons to bring my old over the top swing back on plane, and now private lessons to improve ball striking and work on my nemesis Driver. Decent average short game and putting.

4 lifetime club fittings: 1) Callaway 2007 X-forge with Project X 5.5 flighted shafts in the now closed Callaway store in Las Vegas Forum shop 2) Callaway 2009 X-forge with project X 5.5 flighted shafts at a Callaway demo day. 3) Agnostic fitting at Keplers in Walnut Creek, Callaway Apex irons with KBS V90 shafts 4) Club Champion, in November 2018, with details below.

I am a believer in getting club fittings and agnostic fittings only makes more sense, by finding the best performance for your personal swing without regard to manufacturer. I play over 50 rounds a year, and my Apex irons were pretty beat up. NCGA sent an email offer for Club Champion 50% off (which is available to the general public). After researching other agnostic club fitters in the bay area, their full bag pricing was $800 to $1000. Club Champion is at $350, so at 50% off, $175 for full bag fitting was a no brainer.

Reviews I read showed high regard for Miguel and he did not disappoint. Friendly, young (relative to my age), personable, patient, enthusiastic, this job was well suited for him, and you can tell he enjoys what he does.

Due to scheduling conflicts, I broke my 4 hour full bag fitting session into two 2 hour sessions on separate days, and I highly recommend this tactic. Even though I am a range rat, and I can and have hit 100 to 150 $@!#% before my round, you do get tire during your fitting, and you don't want to have an off day with your ball striking while being fitted. First session was irons and putter, second session was driver, woods, and hybrids.

Sessions are indoors so you have a controlled environment. You start with finding the right shaft, and then the right club head. Turns out the Callaway Apex is still the right club head for me, but I now a new KBS 70g graphite shaft, giving me more than one more club in distance compared to the current set of irons. These new graphite shafts are not your father's graphite shafts, so technology has improved where the weight is lighter, but performs like steel. I noticed a gap between my PW and my gap wedge, and I knew the shaft differences caused the gap. So the solution was simple, use the same shaft from your iron set down through your speciality wedges, which I chose the Callaway Mack Daddy Forged wedges. I currently have the Callaway JAWS wedges, so the transition should be easy.

I have never been fitted or tested for my putting stroke, and I wasn't going to give up my 2016 Scotty Cameron Newport 2.0, but I paid for the fitting and Miguel tested my putting stroke. The SAM putt lab setup is awesome, showing your back swing and through swing whether your putter face is open or closed. Turns out my putter style is the correct one for my stoke, but the data showed the 4 degree putter loft was too high for my stroke and recommended a 1 degree of loft. Miguel bent my Scotty right on the spot, and then I holed three 20 foot putts in a row. I was very pleased and glad I was tested. I am a confident putter, and my fitting showed a minor recommendation, meaning no change to putter, length, putter head style such as mallet, etc. but I can see those with putting issues would benefit greatly with a putter fitting.

On a separate session, we did the driver and 3 wood and hybrids. Same method, found the correct shaft, then driver club face. My iron set only goes up to a 6 iron and I fill the rest with hybrids. So starting with the my new 6 irons that the simulator showed 180yards. I was skeptical that on the course the new 6iron would actually go 180yards, but it's all relative, I just needed a hybrid that goes 190yards and then another hybrid that goes 200yards on the simulator. So we found the right shaft and club head 4 hybrid and 3 hybrid that fit those distances on the simulator. My old set had a 5, 4, 3 and 2 hybrid (27deg, 22deg, 19 deg and 17 deg), so now I no longer needed the 5 hybrid. We found a shaft/3 wood that goes 220 on the simulator. So the fitting insured no gaps from lob wedge through 3 wood.

Now here's the downside: new clubs are expensive, so be prepared to spend some serious greenbacks. Upgrades of shafts, grips, SST puring, brings a normal $150 per iron club up to $300 per iron club. Add $275 custom driver shaft to the $499 driver head, plus $14 grips, $30 SST puring. You get the idea.

But numbers don't lie, this set will be better than my current set, so it's worth it to me. Life is too short to play bad golf. Hope these clubs can help me reach my lifetime goal of reaching single digit handicap. Good luck out there!