By: Eric Hensler, Club Fitter
With every new year, comes brand new driver releases, Cobra being one of the first to release their new line of drivers in the new year. The 2020 Cobra Speedzone and Speedzone Xtreme are touting subtle but amazing changes to the very successful 2019 Cobra F9 driver, one of the fastest drivers we tested.
The main goal with Speedzone and Speedzone Xtreme is to deliver very fast, very consistent ball speeds across the face while staying as stable as possible. These drivers have exceeded that goal and should now be mentioned in any discussion of the best new drivers on the market. Here’s an in-depth look at the technology packed into these drivers.
Tech Specs:
The two different drivers are designed for 2 different golfers but are both trying to achieve the same goal in longer, faster, straighter drives. The Speedzone is for traditionalists with CG adjustability who like to work the ball without sacrificing forgiveness. This is helped by the 2 movable weights to help fine tune the CG and swing weight to help us get the most out of the driver as possible during the fitting.
The Speedzone Xtreme is designed to go as fast and straight as possible. A wider, flatter profile with 17 grams of tungsten offers the highest measured MOI and most stable club face to help all golfers keep the ball in the fairway.
Both drivers feature Cobra’s new “6 zones of speed”:
- Power Zone – Using the only CNC Milled Face in a driver, COBRA has expanded the milled area of the face by 95% enabling them to control face and leading-edge thickness. In addition, every face is 100% inspected to ensure a larger SPEEDZONE across the face for maximum ball speed.
- Strength Zone – featuring a new Titanium T-Bar Speed Chassis that results in fast, forgiving performance.
- Light Zone – the 360 Carbon Wrap Crown design makes up 50% of the driver body, providing ample stiffness and support to the chassis while saving 25 grams of discretionary weight. That weight has been repositioned low and back and around the perimeter where it is needed most.
- Low CG Zone – low CG is essential for driver performance, delivering maximum ball speed, higher launch & low spin. In the Speedzone driver, 69 grams of mass has been strategically positioned low in the driver for optimal launch conditions.
- Aero Zone – combining aerodynamics with a low center of gravity continues to be a strength that Cobra delivers with its drivers. The new shaping harnesses airflow for maximum drag reduction and increased clubhead speed.
- Stability Zone – Speedzone’s high MOI design positions weight away from the center of the head to maximize stability on off-center hits for longer, straighter drives.
First Impression:
Overall, the look of the Speedzone has been an improvement over F9 and the performance matches. The ball speed, on average, is similar to the highly touted TaylorMade Sim and Callaway Mavrik drivers. My testing for this was done on a very cold day so the numbers presented here won’t represent my “normal numbers” but all things being equal, the driver flat-out performs. The sound of the driver as well really blew me away, it sounds more like a “thump”, much duller than the loud “ting” that we have become accustomed to with all recent drivers. Consistency in distance was very similar as well, as well as dispersion. As you’ll see in the Trackman dispersion chart, both drivers are very consistent with carry and total distance.
Looking at the Trackman numbers, the purple is the Speedzone with the heavy weight forward and the yellow/orange color is Speedzone Xtreme. At first glance, they are very, very close, almost identical to each other. Average clubhead speed is the same, launch is the same, only difference is the ball speed, which Speedzone seemed to be a little faster due to the CG being more forward with the heavy weight in the front position. Spin axis was lower in the Speedzone Xtreme due to it being more forgiving and more stable.
Final thoughts:
Overall, these drivers are for players looking for a new driver that offers a high tech, fast and forgiving club head. Speedzone provides the better player with a more aesthetic profile, while still offering high performance while the Speedzone Xtreme is the better option for those who need a more stable, forgiving driver.