Ping’s Blueprint S irons have seen some major hype recently, so obviously I couldn’t wait to get my hands on them.
From Matt Fitzpatrick winning the Dunhill, to (uncontracted) Adam Scott putting them in the bag, there’s been a huge buzz around these irons recently on tour. With Ping saying these irons cover all their top tour pro’s “must haves” in control and precision this was a review I was excited to do - always a good start when heading to the golf course with some new bats...
Who Is It Aimed At?
As you can imagine by the small and thin profile of the Blueprint S irons, they are designed for anyone looking for ultimate control and precision across their irons.
Developed with Ping’s top tour players in mind, these premium irons combine the looks and feel of a forged, better player iron, with extra forgiveness to help suit a range of lower-handicapped golfers at the top end of the bag.
The Tech
With fully forged 8620 carbon steel heads, the Blueprint S irons are finished with a compact shape, thin topline and Hydropearl 2.0 Chrome Finish for a premium touch.
Ping have introduced split-set construction technology with their precision pocket forging, allowing a pocket within the cavity of the 3, 4 and 5 irons.
The use of this pocket saves 10g of weight, which can be redistributed across the clubhead, to increase MOI and optimise the CG position.
We also see an elastomer insert with these pockets, to help retain the solid feel and sound that we’d expect in a forged players iron.
As we’ve seen before with Ping irons, the Blueprint S features tungsten toe screw and shaft tip weights, to allow for swing weight fine tuning.
The rest of the design work has gone into the shaping and look of the irons to make them that little more playable than the likes of the Ping i525s.
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Ping Blueprint S Irons Review
Looks
As you might expect from the Blueprint irons we've seen in the past, these irons just look incredible! They’re compact with a thin topline, but not excessively so to make me lose confidence stood over the ball, like I’d maybe be feeling with the more bladed Blueprint T model.
They look a little like the i210s but the detailing across the clubhead is incredibly clean and simple, giving an overall premium finish to these fully forged irons.
At the longer end of the set, we see a small pocket within the cavity on the 3, 4 and 5 irons. However, it’s hardly noticeable in comparison to the shorter irons, with the whole set looking very cohesive.
Feel
Given the buzz around these irons on tour, going into testing I had pretty high aspirations for them - Adam Scott isn't going to put an iron in the bag that doesn't feel great, is he? When I first addressed the ball, I did notice that topline looking a little thinner than my current Titleist T150 irons, however, from that first shot I didn’t feel the need for any added confidence with these irons.
Despite an initial high bar set for the Ping Blueprint S irons, I was really impressed. The feel at impact is exceptional – very clean, powerful without being too hard, and just gave a really solid overall strike with plenty of feedback on the quality of strike.
As someone who’d tend to choose a hybrid over a longer iron, I thought the feel across the longer clubs was great too. Ping have said they’ve included an elastomer insert within the forged pocket across the 3, 4 and 5 irons, to help in retaining the sound and feel across the longer end of the set.
On Course Performance
With the Blueprint S irons I felt like I was throwing darts on every shot. I was able to stand over the ball with a mid-iron and focus on landing the ball close to the flag, rather than thinking about potentially missing the green. Even my slight off-strikes felt really solid and kept me nicely on the dancefloor throughout the set.
Despite winter testing conditions, there was clearly a lot of control and stopping power with these irons, which made them really fun to play with out on the course. From the initial outdoor testing, I had nothing negative to report back on these irons!
The Data
With us testing in Manchester through winter, I was expecting the ball to be going a little shorter than usual therefore we did have to make an allowance for that. Needing to place myself a bit closer to the hole than usual, or taking a club up with these irons, had me interested to see what kind of distances I was getting on Foresight...
When we took these irons indoors to HUKD, it was clear that there was a little drop off in distance compared to my T150 irons. With an average carry of 130 yards and total of 143, the Blueprint S 7-iron (standard loft 33.0°) was travelling similar to what I’d expect from my T150 8-iron. That said, we did expect this given that the Ping lofts aren’t mega strong, and the main claims around these irons are on control and precision.
If I did want to look to gain some extra distance, like all Ping irons, the Blueprint S are available in a ‘Power Spec Loft’, that puts them more inline to what I have with my own stronger lofted irons (31.5° 7-iron), so this wasn’t a concern for me during testing.
Something that was really impressive from the data was the shot shape consistency through the right-to-left sidespin remaining very constant, for a gently, controllable draw. This also resulted in a left-to-right deviation of only 8 yards across all the shots hit indoors, which explains what I was finding out on the course - they are very accurate.
Ping Blueprint S Irons Verdict
After testing these irons out, I can see why Ping are claiming that the Blueprint S irons cover their top tour pro’s “must haves” in control and precision.
The overall package of these irons is exceptional, from the looks and feel over to the performance on approach. Although we did see a drop off in distance, this was mainly due to the weaker lofts across the set.
Coming in at £200 per club for a steel shaft, and £210 for graphite, these irons do have a pretty big price tag attached to them. Something Ping have done however is aligned the shafts of these irons to the Blueprint T and i230, to allow for blended sets. So, although a full set of Blueprint T is certainly going to cost you, it might be that we see golfers putting some of these irons in play, rather than a full set.
If you’re looking to invest in a premium set of irons with amazing control and precision, you should absolutely give the Blueprint S irons a try.
Would I Use Them?
There’s very little I can fault these irons on, other than the cost! I would happily put these irons in play any day, especially if I could get that little extra distance to bring them inline to what I’m used to seeing.
Ping Blueprint S Irons Pros and Cons
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