If we ask you the question, “Who makes the best golf irons in the market?” How many of you would instantly think of Mizuno?
Mizuno has built a following over many years of golfers who swear by the fact that no manufacturer can rival Mizuno’s premium forged iron offerings.
Mizuno irons have been forged in the same factory in Hiroshima, Japan, since 1968, using forging techniques handed down through generations to create the fabled feel and look.
Some of the best players in the world have trusted Mizuno irons to achieve greatness. Sir Nick Faldo’s six major championships were all accomplished with Mizuno irons in his bag.
Tiger Woods claimed his first major victory at the 1997 Masters tournament using a split set of Mizuno MS-29 and MS-14 irons.
Through the years, legendary Mizuno irons have carried designations such as TP, MS, or MP, signalling that these irons represent the pinnacle of Mizuno’s technical know-how in making superior forged irons to be enjoyed by the game’s best and aspiring amateurs.
Today, Mizuno has created a new standard, which it has named its Professional series.
The first golf iron to be introduced in the Professional series was the Players Cavity Back Pro S-3. Now Mizuno has given us the Pro S-1 iron, which is set to follow in the tradition of the company’s greatest blade offerings.
We’ll take a closer look at the Pro S-1 irons, covering:
- Combining Tradition With Performance: The Pro S-1 Standard
- Player Profile – Who Ultimately Benefits from Bagging the S-1s
- Enhanced Precision Via Custom Fitting
Combining Tradition With Performance: The Pro S-1 Standard
At the heart of any great Mizuno iron is Mizuno’s legendary forging technique, which has been honed and perfected in their Hiroshima factory.
Each Mizuno Pro S-1 head starts as a 10-inch billet of 1025E carbon steel, heated to 1200°C and forged to shape. By forming the head and neck as one, Mizuno preserves continuous grain flow, central to its Grain Flow Forged HD feel, enhancing integrity, consistency, and durability.
The attention to detail in creating forged irons, including the new Pro S-1, is a reason why Mizuno proudly states that “Nothing Feels Like a Mizuno”.
So far, you would think that the Mizuno process can’t be topped, but Mizuno doesn’t rest on its laurels when it comes to creating the ultimate feel irons.
Mizuno places a copper underlay behind the chrome, which has the effect of dampening the impact vibrations and enhancing the impact feel.
Mizuno has also engineered into the Pro S-1 its proprietary Harmonic Impact Technology (H.I.T), which also helps reduce vibration while providing a slightly firmer feel at impact without sacrificing any feedback.
The Pro S-1 iron is a pure blade, which generally means the type of player this golf club is aimed at needs no assistance with ball-striking or shot shaping.
However, Mizuno designers have been clever enough to integrate what they call the Channel Back Design, which helps redistribute mass behind the face to achieve a consistent vertical centre of gravity through each iron to regulate launch and spin throughout the set for more consistent results.
Mizuno has also spent time working on the Pro S-1’s sole based on the extensive feedback it received from its tour staff to aid ball striking and turf interaction.
The net result of this feedback is a sharper leading edge, more bounce, and a flatter camber profile. Mizuno believes the new sole will aid players with shallower angles of attack; however, players with a steeper angle of attack can also benefit and have confidence that the leading edge won’t get stuck in the ground.
At address, the Mizuno Pro S-1 iron sits snugly behind the ball thanks to its smaller head and boxier look, thanks to a squarer toe design, which is also inspired by feedback from tour professionals.
The smaller head profile, coupled with an almost paper-thin topline, works well for players who like to shape their shots either way. Players will also appreciate the soft white satin finish, which has a practical effect of reducing glare at address, but also helps to enhance the already legendary grain flow forged feel that only comes from Mizuno.
Blades generally don’t feature any offset; however, the Pro S-1 long irons feature minimal levels of offset to help get the ball airborne more easily before tapering out in the short irons.
Now that we’ve looked at the technical aspects of the Pro S-1, let’s take a look at the type of player these irons are aimed at.
Player Profile – Who Ultimately Benefits from Bagging the S-1s
Mizuno makes no bones about the fact that the Pro S-1 isn’t going to suit mid to high handicap golfers, the clue comes in the title, “Pro”.
Professionals and elite amateur players need minimal assistance when it comes to ball-striking. Their ability to find the middle of the clubface consistently negates the requirement for big cavity or hollow-body construction irons.
Consistency of ball striking links to consistency in launch and spin. Better players understand their numbers through hours of work with a launch monitor to understand what their optimal numbers look like.
The Mizuno Pro S-1 irons lean into these players’ requirements, with the Channel Back Design aiding a player’s abilities to achieve the required launch and spin numbers they are looking for.
Maximising launch and spin numbers leads to more accurate distance gapping and a tighter control on the standard ball flight, which a better player is looking to see in their shots.
Manipulating trajectory and shot shape doesn’t scare better players, and the smaller head profile is something they will welcome as they look to attack the tightest of pin locations on fast greens typical of a high-profile tournament.
Mizuno recognises that the better player isn’t looking for increased distance in a premium iron, so it has coupled the Pro S-1 to more traditional lofts (7-iron is 34 degrees with a 62-degree lie angle and 37.25-inch length).
While there is little argument that Mizuno has created a masterpiece with the Mizuno Pro S-1, which is a better player’s dream, is there any way that these irons can be further enhanced?
The answer lies in a golf club custom-fitting.
Enhanced Precision Via Custom Fitting
Mizuno’s Pro S-1 irons tick all the boxes in terms of what better players require from their golf irons, but the story doesn’t end in the tech or the materials used to create the Pro S-1s.
Creating the ultimate performance comes down to custom-fitting, which will tailor the iron’s configuration completely to any player’s requirements.
Being custom-fitted for any set of golf irons requires several boxes that need to be ticked before sign-off on the final configuration is given.
The first boxes to be ticked don’t even require any shots to be hit.
Establishing the correct length and lie angle for any player is crucial to consistent ball-striking and shot shape. Accurately assessing a player’s height and arm length is established at the outset to understand whether ultimately the finished set should be longer or shorter, upright or flat of standard.
Further evidence of a player’s existing golf clubs not being cut to the correct length or lie angle can be determined in the data captured via the launch monitor, which will accurately chart strike location and shot dispersion.
The next box to be ticked is establishing the correct shaft to be married to the Pro S-1 head.
While Mizuno opts for KBS Tour shafts as standard for the Mizuno Pro S-1, at Nine By Nine Golf, we can provide an even bigger array of shaft options from manufacturers like True Temper and Project X.
We also stock a variety of premium graphite shaft options designed specifically for irons from the likes of Mitsubishi Chemical and Fujikura.
Choosing the right golf shaft goes beyond opting for the right flex. Because each player has their own clubhead speed specific to their swing, obtaining the correct weight of shaft along with flex can help improve shot dispersion and ball striking, along with tightening up distance gapping and trajectory.
At Nine By Nine Golf, working with the fitter is one element of creating tailored clubs to each player’s individual requirements.
The second element comes in the building of the clubs. We pride ourselves on the fact that all customer clubs are built in-house by a team of experienced engineers.
It’s vital that the build accurately matches what’s on the spec sheet for each player, and the golf equipment our technicians use ensures that details such as clubs’ length and lie angles are precisely cut and measured.
The customisation is complete with the correct grip and layers of tape being applied to ensure the club is comfortable in the player’s hands.
We pay so much attention to the build detail because you rely on your golf clubs to perform on the course, whether you are a tour or mid-handicap player. What the player sees on the course is what they saw in the fitting bay and what was agreed on as best for their game.
The Mizuno Pro S-1 irons aren’t designed for every level of player; however, more players could have some form of Pro S-1 irons in their bags as a result of being fitted for a combo set.
The combo set option could lead to players being fitted for the Mizuno Pro S-3 players cavity or another more forgiving model within the Mizuno range for the longer irons, before switching to the Pro S-1s in the shorter irons to help create better scoring opportunities.
You can even extend your Mizuno options further by looking at the complementary Pro T-1 or Pro T-3 wedges to fill out the bottom end of your bag.
Ready to test Mizuno’s Pro S-1s properly? Book a custom golf club fitting at Nine By Nine, or start your custom order online to access our full shaft/grip matrix and tour-level build details.