Breakthrough Golf Brava Driver Shaft Review

Breakthrough Golf Brava Driver Shaft Review

Breakthrough Golf Brava Driver Shaft
Grade: A
Teacher’s Comments: I am impressed with the way the Brava revived a moribund driver head with distance and consistency.

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A couple of years ago, Breakthrough Golf Technology (BGT) sent one of their Stability Putter shafts for review. I had it installed on my Scotty Cameron Newport and noticed a significant improvement. I’ve liked the result so much that in the ensuing couple of years, the Cameron has replaced my venerable Heavy Putter as my gamer. (Read GolfBlogger’s BGT Stability putter shaft review for all the details.)

BGT was on to something, because other companies now are offering putters with combination graphite-steel shafts.

Given my positive experience with the BGT Stability Putter Shaft, I was happy to receive BGT’s latest product: The Brava driver shaft.

Breakthrough Golf is the latest project by legendary equipment designer and entrepreneur Barney Adams. The thesis behind these projects is that creating a more stable shaft — one less prone to twisting — results in more consistent strikes and thus more accuracy (and distance in the case of the driver).

The goal of the Brava is to enable more center strikes and a better face angle. Ultimately those contribute to higher ball speed and smash factor.

BGT says that the Brava shaft is

built with premium Toray™ carbon fiber, which is 10x the strength of steel at a fraction of its weight. This translates to less energy needed when swinging and results in an exceptionally stable driver head for more distance and tighter ball dispersion.

To test the Brava, I decided to recycle a King F8 driver that I had in storage. I was never entirely happy with that club. Shots flew too high and I never had a consistent miss. I wondered if the Brava could improve it.

Applying my clubmaking skills, I epoxied the shaft into a Cobra sleeve I got on Ebay and attached it to the King F8 driver head.

Unfortunately, my first test did not go well. The sleeve turned out to have an inner and outer jacket, and the two separated on my initial swing, with the head flying further than the ball. I played the rest of that round without a driver.

I re-epoxied the inner to the outer sleeve and then it worked as intended. Still, on my next round with the BGT shaft and Cobra head, I carried a spare driver in the bag.

After a month of regularly using the Brava shaft, I am duly impressed. The Brava has absolutely revived an otherwise moribund driver. The King F8 with the Brava shaft now is a club I can rely on for consistent distance.

As usual, I tested the gear live on course at Washtenaw Golf Club (course link) Hundreds of rounds on that course have given me a very good sense of distance and shot shape. I don’t think my best shots with the Brava-enhanced driver are as long as my longest shots with my PXG 0311 XF Driver, or the Tour Edge Exotics C721, but on a whole I’m quite pleased (and the driver head surely has something to do with that as well). It is never really about how far you hit the ball on that one perfect drive, but about whether you can rely on a club to produce results you can rely on.

The Cobra-Brava combo still generates high trajectory, but the ball doesn’t balloon and drop from the sky. I get a decent amount of roll once the ball hits the fairway.

I also am pleased with the shot dispersion. I’m hitting fairways with the Cobra-Brava combo in a way I wasn’t with the Cobra-Stock Shaft. Just to be sure, I took the stock shaft out with me on a couple of trips and swapped the shaft out for comparison. (That’s one of the nice things about these clubheads with the sleeves; they can be swapped out.) I like the driver head MUCH better with the Brava shaft.

If nothing else, the improved performance of the Cobra head with the Brava is supporting evidence for the oft repeated notion that the shaft is the engine of the club.

My experience with the Brava driver aligns with the claims made by BGT — that it offers consistency — and because of that, consistent distance.

BGT offers the Brava in four flexes:

Flex	A	R	S	X
Head Speed	75 MPH	85 MPH	95 MPH	105 MPH
Tip Diameter	.335″	.335″	.335″	.335″
Length	46″	46″	46″	46″
Weight	46 gm	50 gm	54 gm	58 gm
Torque	5.6 ̊	4.4 ̊	4.3 ̊	3.5 ̊
Launch	High	High	Mid-High	Mid-Low
Spin	High	Mid	Mid	Mid

I got the R flex.

Noticing my BGT Shaft Preview, a reader recently emailed to ask how it felt compared to other shafts. I sometimes think of shafts as falling into categories such as duds, snappers and lifters. Duds don’t have much of a feel; they lack liveliness. Snappers are shafts that feel to me as though they’re unloading along the plane of the arc – snapping the ball forward. Lifters feel like they’re tossing the ball in the air.

The BGT is a puncher. It feels a bit like throwing a straight punch into a bag from the hips and shoulders. With the Brava, the clubhead just punches the ball straight down the fairway. It is a satisfying feel.

I really think that there’s something to BGT’s new Brava shaft. If you’re in the market for a new driver, you should give the Brava a try at your fitting (and you really should get fit for a driver). BGT has a store locator that will show you the closest facility that stocks their shafts.