"I have a lot of opportunities to play with amateur golfers. And there's one thing that I never fail to notice." Mr. Kanai said this as he headed towards the tee box on the next hole.

"What I always notice is that a lot of golfers tend to make big mistakes once there within 100 yards of the pin. With driver shots, the margin of error is fairly large so making a mistake doesn't do so much damage mentally. Making mistakes with the green right in front of you, though, not only hurts your score, but it also really affects you mentally. I have always thought that the closer the ball is to the hole when a mistake happens, the greater the damage. A lot of these players too often choose wedges that are difficult to use or require too much accuracy. At least that's my opinion."

At this point, the conversation shifted, and Mr. Kanai let loose with a big shot down the right side of the fairway with the New Premium Red driver.

"Take a look at the green. The pin is above the left bunker. So, if you send the tee shot where I hit it, you can easily aim for the pin. It's not that I'm boasting. From that position, you're exactly 100 yards from the pin. That's the distance for an approach wedge. What I was getting at was how to use the wedge. I wanted to mention that after looking at the approach wedge and sand wedge in the New Premium Red iron set (TR-X505 irons). With these two clubs, when I put the wedge in my hands I got the same feeling as far as shape and addressing the ball as with middle irons and short irons. These aren't necessarily speciality clubs. So, you can basically use them the same way you would use other irons. If you look at them as special, you might tighten up a bit. That might cause a big mistake by making you put too much power into the shot or messing up your timing a bit."

After this discussion, Mr. Kanai said, "Just a second. I'm going to aim for that pin."

With a controlled, three-quarters swing, he landed the ball just at the base of the pin.

"Sorry to keep you waiting. That shot felt really good. If you feel good hitting a shot, it's easier to get results. Right? The other irons felt really easy to hit, so you would expect the same from the wedge. You can hit it with the same timing, so the ball is really easy to control."

As Mr. Kanai walked up close to the green, he stopped and tossed a ball into the rough.

"The edge of the green is about 20 yards from that ball. And from there, there's about 20 yards to the pin. The ball is completely sunk into the rough. This would probably be seen as a special circumstance. So, usually, people would say you need to use a sand wedge that can swing out of the rough. Actually, that club is really for golfers who get a lot of speed on the club head and golfers who like to swing the club sharply. The cavity-back sand wedge has a high moment of inertia, which means it overcomes turf resistance. So you can hit this shot with the same kind of extension as with a regular iron shot. There is, of course, some resistance, so you do have to put a little more power into the swing and aim for a location that is about twice as far from where you want to the ball to land. But that should be enough. The ball will easily get out of the rough for you."

After hearing this discussion from Mr. Kanai, how did Shoto Mitamura and Yasuo Shimada use the New Premium Red wedges? Next, we'll follow them. (Continued)