Callaway Golf Introduces the Big Bertha C4 Driver, the Biggest And Most Forgiving Driver in the Company's History
C4 refers to the Compression Cured Carbon Composite material used in the face and body of the Big Bertha C4 Driver. Six years of research and development went into this breakthrough driver, enabling Callaway Golf to create a superior approach to composite clubhead design that is a vast improvement over the composite driver heads produced in the early 1990s by other manufacturers.
"In the past, composite drivers were designed to perform as close to steel and titanium as possible," said Richard C. Helmstetter, senior executive vice president and chief of new products for Callaway Golf. "But composite is a totally different animal. It has a different set of strengths. So we threw out the rulebook for designing metal drivers and started from scratch on Big Bertha C4."
Helmstetter and his team focused their attention on the properties that set composite material apart from metal: extremely light weight and high strength. Callaway Golf engineers worked to create a clubhead that is compression-molded in both bi-directional and unidirectional layers using heat and high pressure. This process makes the Big Bertha C4 material both lightweight and heavy-duty, resulting in a durable clubhead that is 360 cubic centimeters -- the largest clubhead in Callaway Golf history -- but still significantly lighter than other oversize drivers. A new technology was then employed to distribute 55 grams of weight around the perimeter of the driver head. Heavy strips of proprietary tungsten-loaded urethane were laminated into the ribbon area around the clubhead, which is finished with an aluminum soleplate. All this culminated in a driver that is remarkably light and durable with a tremendously high level of forgiveness.
"The moment of inertia (MOI) is a good measure of how forgiving a club is, and the MOI numbers for Big Bertha C4 are off the chart," Helmstetter said. "A larger head means a larger face area -- 5.8 square inches in the case of the Big Bertha C4 Driver -- giving golfers a bigger effective hitting area for a larger sweet spot. By using the tungsten-loaded urethane strips to move so much weight to the perimeter, the Big Bertha C4 does an outstanding job of minimizing any twisting at impact, even on off-center hits. One of my favorite things about the Big Bertha C4 Driver is that the Big Bertha C4 material produces a very solid pleasing sound through impact with performance that is downright futuristic."
In addition to forgiveness, distance is also a key part of the Big Bertha C4 Driver. The lightweight clubhead makes it beneficial to use a longer shaft in an effort to help golfers of all skill levels generate more clubhead speed. The new Big Bertha C4 Ultralight graphite shaft is 45.5 inches long, weighs just 53 grams, and the tip diameter is a generous 0.400 inch to maintain stability and durability. Five performance-specific flexes are available to suit the needs of individual golfers. Including a proprietary new lightweight grip, a finished Big Bertha C4 Driver weighs approximately 280 grams -- roughly 25 grams lighter than other drivers of comparable size.
"As we have always said, you can't argue with physics," Helmstetter said. "A longer shaft helps create more clubhead speed, which helps create more distance. While longer shafts have been traditionally viewed as more difficult to control, the extreme forgiveness of the Big Bertha C4 Driver head is designed to more than compensate for this possibility."
The Big Bertha C4 Driver is different from any driver Callaway Golf has ever made -- a fact that is underscored by departures from some patented Callaway Golf technologies, such as Tru-Bore(R) and Variable Face Thickness Technology. Those technologies work superbly in metal drivers, but did not fit the Big Bertha C4 design rationale. Big Bertha C4 is different, and many golfers will appreciate the difference it will make to their game.
The Big Bertha C4 Driver conforms to the Rules of Golf according to the USGA and the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews and is legal for recreational and tournament play around the world. The Big Bertha C4 Driver is scheduled to ship to retail accounts in January 2002. It is available in right-and left-handed models with a graphite shaft in five flexes: Ladies, Light, Regular, Firm and Strong. The suggested retail price for the Big Bertha C4 Driver is $540.
Callaway Golf Company makes and sells Big Bertha(R) Metal Woods and Irons, including Big Bertha ERC(R) II Forged Titanium Drivers, Big Bertha C4(TM) Compression Cured Carbon Composite Drivers, Big Bertha Hawk Eye(R) VFT(R) and Big Bertha Hawk Eye VFT Pro Series Titanium Drivers and Fairway Woods, Big Bertha Steelhead(TM) III Stainless Steel Drivers and Fairway Woods, Hawk Eye VFT Tungsten Injected(TM) Titanium Irons, Big Bertha Stainless Steel Irons, Steelhead X-14(R) and Steelhead X-14 Pro Series Stainless Steel Irons. Callaway Golf Company also makes and sells Odyssey(R) Putters, including White Hot(R), TriHot(TM), and Dual Force(R) Putters. Callaway Golf Company makes and sells the Callaway Golf(R) HX(TM) Red and HX Blue balls, Rule 35(R) Firmfeel(TM) and Softfeel(TM) balls, the CTU 30(TM) Red and CTU 30 Blue balls, and the CB1(TM) Red and CB1 Blue balls. For more information about Callaway Golf Company, please visit our Web sites at www.callawaygolf.com and www.odysseygolf.com .
SOURCE Callaway Golf Company
CONTACT: Larry Dorman, Mick McCormick, or Millie Speirs of Callaway Golf Company, +1-760-931-1771