Srixon Z Star Tour Diamond Review

Srixon Z Star Tour Diamond Review

Srixon Z Star Tour
Grade: A
Teachers’ Comments: A successful mix of distance and spin.

Manufacturer’s Site
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The Srizon Z Star Tour Diamond is the company’s new premium golf ball for the 2022 season.

A three-piece design, the Z Star Tour Diamond has three key features:

• FastLayer Core: Srixon says that the FastLayer Core starts soft in the center and gradually becomes firm around its edge. This, Srixon says, offers distance with a softer feel.
• SpinSkin with SeRM: The urethane cover on the Diamond is slightly thicker than on previous balls. This is said to provide better spin and control. What Srixon calls SpinSkin with SeRM is a durable coating with “flexible molecular bonds. ” It is said to dig deep into wedge and iron grooves, maximizing spin for more control and stopping power.
• 338 Speed Dimple Pattern: Srixon says that the new 338 Speed Dimple Pattern delivers less drag and more lift boosts overall distance and flies true, even in the toughest wind conditions.

The result, Srixon says, is a ball with balanced performance: long game distance with more greenside control. Its performance is designed to be somewhere between the high spinning but softer Z Star and the longer, more firm but lower spinning Z Star XV.

In play, I’ve found that the Z Star Tour Diamond offers similar distance and ball flight to the Pro V1s that I used as a comparison ball. Some back-of-the-envelope calculations based on my Garmin GPS results says that my very best tee shots with the Z Star Diamond are 4 percent shorter than my best with the Pro V1, but that the iron shots are 1 percent longer.

Srizon doesn’t claim that the Z Star Tour Diamond is the longest, though. The claim is that it is balanced.

I have never had the swing speed to stop a ball in its tracks, but I get the sense that the Srixon does not run as far for me after an iron shot into the green. At my old school home course, Washtenaw Golf Club, I’ve grown accustomed to landing the ball short of the green and letting it run out.

Anecdotally, the Srixon Z Star Tour Diamond seems to fly farther, but run less, often leaving me closer to the open fronts of the green.

For me, the major difference between the Srixon Z Star Diamond and the Pro V1 is in the feel. The Srixon feels softer. That, in spite of the fact that the Z Star Diamond is said to have a compression of 102, while the Pro V1 has a reported compression of 87.

The difference might be in the composition and thickness of the urethane covers. Whatever the numbers, the Srixon feels less clicky.

The Z Star Diamond is explicitly designed with the better player in mind. Majors savant Brooks Koepka has the Z-Star Tour Diamond in play. I’ve never been one to put stock in any comparison of equipment the pros play to my own needs, though. I’ve been to enough tournaments to know that the only thing I have in common with Tour players is that we both carry 14 clubs and have a ball whose diameter is 1.68 inches.

For what it’s worth, Srixon recently was subsumed under the Dunlop Sports America brand umbrella, along with Cleveland Golf and XXIO. All of these were owned by Sumitomo Rubber Industries (the SRI in Srixon). The Japanese tire and rubber company was founded in 1909 with an investment in Dunlop Japan. SRI acquired Dunlop Japan in 1963, and bought out the rights to the Dunlop brand of tires in 1986. SRI also produces equipment for racket sports.

I like the Z Star Tour Diamond, and think that it is worth giving a sleeve a try, especially for players with higher swing speeds.

Recommended. Especially for longer players.