PING Glide 4.0 Wedges – Key Takeaways

PING updates its standard wedge line. New material: 8620 soft carbon steel 4 grinds, 46- to 60-degree lofts $217.50 steel, $232.50 graphite. Pre-sale and fitting start today.

The new PING Glide 4.0 wedges make one thing abundantly clear.

When PING changes/updates/upgrades its wedges, it doesn’t mess around.

And for what it’s worth, it’s been a while since PING updated the standard Glide line. The original Glide debuted in early 2015. Glide 2.0 showed up two years later. One year later, PING gave us a quasi-updated Glide 2.0 Stealth (MyGolfSpy’s 2018 Most Wanted Wedge). It wasn’t until the summer of 2019 that we saw Glide 3.0.

Nearly three years later, we get Glide 4.0. So what gives? Did PING let the Glide slide?

Not hardly.

PING Glide 4.0 Wedges: The Same. Only Different.

Unless your name is Vokey, updating/upgrading your wedge line is a risky proposition. When you’re the market leader, the first rule is to do no harm. After that, any evolutionary adjustment, additional grind and a new finish are about as far as you want to go.

But when you’re chasing the leader and trying to win the hearts and minds of the non-Vokey wedge-buying population, you can’t be conservative.

“When we look at wedges and what we’re trying to accomplish, we want the right grinds,” says PING Product Design Director Ryan Stokke. “We also want to target shaping. When you look down on a wedge, it needs to be the right overall size. Then it’s getting the right launch and spin, delivering on feel and delivering the fitting experience.”

That’s a tall order. And while PING didn’t exactly do a full-on grip-to-grind rebuild of the Glide franchise, the new Glide 4.0 wedges are different enough from Glide 3.0 to get your attention but similar enough to keep hardcore Glide users in the fold.

What’s New?

Perhaps the biggest change in the PING Glide 4.0 wedges is the material. While 3.0 was cast from 431 stainless steel, the Glide 4.0 wedges are a softer 8620 carbon steel. PING is careful not to use the word “forged” when talking about Glide 4.0 but it’s important to note the Glide Forged Pro wedges are forged from … wait for it … 8620 carbon steel.

Typically, wedges and irons that are 8620 Forged are first cast into near shape and then drop-forged into their final shape. Purists might scoff but it tends to be a more efficient and consistent process than single-billet forging. Again, PING isn’t calling Glide 4.0 forged so it’s safe to presume they’re fully cast from 8620 without the secondary process.

Additionally, PING is touting a larger and softer activated elastomer insert to back up the 8620 carbon steel.

“By using activated elastomer, we can move a lot of material out of the center of the club that can be moved to the perimeter,” says Stokke. “But we’re also increasing the face coverage and positioning of our activated elastomer. It just makes the whole impact area feel as though you’ve hit well-struck, solid shots.”

PING even quantifies the softness of the elastomer because, well, they’re PING. It measures 30 on the Shore A International Rubber Hardness Scale. Is that good? Well, zero is roughly a shoe insert and 100 is a hard plastic wheel. 30 is somewhere between an elastic band and a pencil eraser.

So yeah, it’s soft.

Four Grinds for 4.0

The next biggest change in Glide 4.0 is in the grinds. PING is still using the same four grind platforms: T for Thin Sole; S for Standard Sole, W for Wide Sole and E for the throwback PING Eye2 Sole. The grinds themselves, along with the head shaping, are different enough to matter.

You’ll find the biggest differences in the S and T grinds. The head size is noticeably smaller for both compared to Glide 3.0 as is what PING calls Hosel-X, the distance between the score lines and the hosel transition.

“The S grind is tried and true and is most familiar to our PING audience,” says Stokke. “It has a rounded lead edge and fits the broadest audience.”

The new T grind is a departure from the Glide 3.0 version and actually reverts back to the Glide 2.0 T grind. It features a high lead edge bounce and a half-moon-shaped sole with relief on both the toe and heel.

“If you measure it, it has more than 20 degrees of lead edge bounce,” says Stokke. “But because the sole is so narrow and has all that relief, it’s a much better balance. You can open this club up and do a lot of the highly versatile greenside shots. But the lead edge bounce gives you a little bit more playability than you’d normally get from a thin sole grind.”

Stokke says the new version of the old T sole is a better match for players with more handle lean who are looking for more versatility. Additionally, the grind opens up more options for PING’s WRX custom shop.

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Wide Soles and Eye Soles

The Glide 4.0 W (Wide Sole) has been changed the least from 3.0. It’s a traditional wide sole with a rounded lead edge and very little trail edge relief. PING says it’s by far the most forgiving of the grinds and is designed for square-face and bunker shots. It also matches up well with PING’s game-improvement G-series irons and makes for an easy transition.

The E Sole, the Eye2, is also getting a bit of a makeover. PING reintroduced the E sole in Glide 2.0 as a throwback to the immensely popular Eye2 wedge. The Eye2 was the original high toe wedge and, for Glide 4.0, PING has taken extra steps to match the original shaping.

“This head shape comes from scanning the original Eye2,” says Stokke. “The big thing is extreme ease of use hitting out of a bunker. But outside of the bunker, it actually plays closer to a T grind. It’s pretty low bounce.”

Hydropearl 2.0 and Spin Science

Another detail PING mentions but other OEMs don’t is 100-percent quality inspections on key processes, particularly when it comes to face and groove machining. It’s doesn’t necessarily mean other OEMs don’t do that level of inspection, it’s just that PING is the only one really talking about it.

“When you’re right up to the USGA limits, we have to do high levels of inspection to make sure everything is conforming,” says Stokke. “Additionally, every club goes through a number of different gauges to make sure the head shape, hosel, hosel transition, sole shape and bounce profiles match the design intent.”

The new PING Glide 4.0 wedges have the same friction face properties and wheel-cut grooves as the Glide Forged Pro wedges which debuted last fall. It features a unique emery blast process, a machined face and wheel-cut grooves. The lofts used primarily for full shots (46 through 52 degrees) have 20-degree grooves while the lofts used for partial shots (54 to 60 degrees) feature steeper 28-degree grooves.

And when you have something that works, you stick with it. The Glide 4.0 wedges feature PING’s water-shedding, super-hydrophobic Hydropearl 2.0 finish.

Fitting Options

Everyone agrees it’s a good idea but wedge-fitting opportunities are harder to find than Tom Brady’s retirement party.

PING is trying to make wedge fitting more accessible and is providing its fitters with more tools to help get golfers into the right wedge setup. Along with wedge tape, which will help determine whether you need T, S or W soles, PING will also be providing wedge fitting bags to 400 fitters globally. The bag will include 15 different shaft options, five grip options and 11 different loft and grind options for a total of 825 possible combinations.

The fitting bag will include color-coded heads with different lofts and soles, along with stock PING Z-Z115 steel and Alta CB Slate graphite shafts. It will also include optional shafts, ranging from the Dynamic Gold X100, S300, 105, and 120 to the KBS Tour, Elevate 95, Project X LS and Nippon Pro Modus3 105, plus lightweight and junior-specific options.

“Players can now take wedges on the course or at least outdoors for fitting,” says Stokke.

PING will also be providing charts to help golfers find not only the best combination of grinds for their game but to also help them choose whether Glide 4.0 or Glide Pro Forged will best suit their games.

Ping Glide 4.0 Wedges: Specs, Price and Availability

As mentioned, the PING Glide 4.0 wedges will come with the Nippon-made PING Z-Z115 steel and PING Alta CB Slate (SR, R, S) graphite shafts as stock. The steel PING AWT 2.0 (R, S, X) and the graphite Alta Distanze Black 40 will also be available, along with the custom options listed above. The Lamkin Crossline 1150 is the stock grip. It’s longer than a normal grip with less taper, making it easier to choke down if the need arises.

The Glide 4.0 grind/loft breakdown, as you’d expect, is logic-based. The standard S-Sole has the widest offering: every two degrees from 46 to 56 at a 12-degree bounce plus 58- and 60-degree models with 10 degrees of bounce.

Both the E- and W-Soles feature 54- through 60-degree models while the thin T-Sole is available only in 58- and 60-degree models with six degrees of bounce.

The PING Glide 4.0 wedges will retail for $217.50 in steel and $232.50 in graphite.

They’ll be available for pre-order and fitting starting today.

For more information, visit PING.com.

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