How TaylorMade Golf Distance+ Golf Balls Changed My Saturday Round

Last Saturday was one of those rounds where the ball finally behaved. Same course I have played for fifteen years, same three buddies, same push cart. The only thing I changed was the sleeve of TaylorMade Distance+ golf balls in my bag.

I am Gene, 58, retired HVAC contractor, and I play to about a 14 handicap. That means I hit some good shots, a few bad ones, and a lot of ones in between. I do not get paid to play, and I do not get free clubs. What I have is one regular Saturday foursome and a driving range ten minutes from home, so when I test something, I test it the slow way: nine holes twice a week, a bucket of balls, and a putting setup in the garage.

I will be honest about what I expected. A distance ball usually means a rock that skids across the green and sounds like a handball off the putter face. TaylorMade Distance+ surprised me on that front, and not just on one hole. I used the same sleeve for three straight rounds, and by the third I stopped checking the brand on the tee because I already knew which ball it was.

Before that Saturday I had put in one range session with these balls, mostly to see whether the distance claim held up off a mat. It did. What surprised me more was the sound. They come off the face with a solid thump, not a click, and they do not feel dead on short chips. Here is what happened on the course, and what I would tell anyone my age who is tired of losing distance to a ball that feels like nothing.

I do not promise you will shoot lower. I can tell you the ball came off the face hot, held a line in the wind better than my old gamer, and still stopped on the green instead of racing over the back.

The first clue came on the second hole, a 365-yard par 4 that usually plays into a breeze off the bay. I hit my driver about where I always do, a little high on the face, and figured I would have a 9-iron left. I walked up to find a 7-iron distance instead. That is not magic, and it is not a new swing. I have made the same swing for three years. The ball simply carried a little farther and rolled out a little more, and on a course I know shot for shot, the difference showed up in the club in my hand.

The second clue was the feel. I was bracing for that thin, clicky sound you get from a lot of distance balls. These are softer off the putter face than I expected, and around the greens they checked up instead of sliding. I am not going to tell you they spin like a tour ball, because they do not. But for a guy who mostly wants to two-putt from 30 feet, they behaved better than I had any right to expect. I even made one of the few putts I can honestly claim, a twelve-footer that hit the hole with enough pace to have lipped out if the ball had been harder.

The third clue was the durability. I play a public course with hard fairways and plenty of trees, and I hit one dead into a branch on the seventh. I found the ball in the rough, checked for a scuff, and played it the rest of the way. By the end of the round it still had the paint and the number on it. I am not saying you cannot cut one with a cart path, because you can. I am saying these held up better than the soft premium balls I used to spend twice as much on.

The honest part: my score that Saturday was an 89, which is about my average. The TaylorMade Distance+ did not shave strokes off my handicap, and I would not trust anyone who promised it would. What it did was remove one variable. I stopped thinking about the ball and started thinking about the shot, and for a weekend golfer that alone is worth the price of a sleeve.

If you are in your forties or fifties and you play once a week, you are exactly who these are for. You are not trying to spin the ball sideways into a tucked pin. You are trying to hit the green from 150 yards and have something left in the tank on the back nine. That is the job these balls do.

What I'd Tell You If We Were Sitting at My Kitchen Table

If you walked into my garage and asked whether TaylorMade Distance+ golf balls are worth trying, here is what I would say. They are a distance ball first, and that is fine, because most of us are not losing strokes with our wedges, we are losing them on approach shots that come up short. I would also tell you to ignore the word 'distance' for a second and think about what you actually need: a ball that flies straight enough, feels decent around the green, and does not make you wince when you hit one into the woods. If your swing speed is in the mid-80s like mine, these give you a little carry without feeling like you are hitting a rock.

I would also say this: buy them because they are easy to play, not because you expect a magic score. They are easy to follow in the air and easy to spot on a leafy fairway, they survived three rounds for me, and the price leaves room in the budget for a bucket of balls. That is the whole honest pitch. TaylorMade makes plenty of balls, but for a 14 handicap walking nine holes twice a week, the Distance+ is the one I would buy again. Check the current price on Amazon, and if you get a sleeve, I hope your Saturday round feels a little simpler too.