We tell you that switching golf balls makes a difference and you’ve seen the ball test data but if you want a Tour example, now you have the perfect one. Cameron Young switched golf balls prior to the Wyndham Championship in 2025 and his success since then is something to pay attention to.
But there’s one more thing that makes this story even more interesting. It’s been reported that the Pro V1x Double Dot (the ball Young has in play now) would likely conform under the USGA and R&A’s proposed new Overall Distance Standard. Young didn’t just find the right ball for his game, he may have accidentally found a ball that won’t hurt him at all with the proposed rollback.
Why he switched
Young had been playing the Titleist Pro V1x Left Dot for years, a higher-spinning ball. The problem is he already spins it too much. Young has a fast swing and a steep angle of attack which naturally cranks up spin on every iron shot. Playing a high-spin ball on top of that was working against him.
During a visit to the Titleist Performance Center in Massachusetts, Young worked with the team to test a prototype Pro V1x Double Dot. It is a lower-spinning model outside the standard product line. Young was quoted as saying the ball came out of a window he really liked, describing how the top of the flight came straight back down rather than floating, which to him signaled real consistency.
He put the new ball in play for the first time at the 2025 Wyndham Championship, deciding just 48 hours before his opening round. He won by six shots and matched the tournament scoring record. It was his first PGA Tour win after 94 starts and seven runner-up finishes.
What changed
The area of his game that improved most visibly was approach play and his ability to control iron shots into greens. Before the switch, he was losing strokes to the field on approach shots on average across the 2025 season, ranking outside the top 125 on the PGA Tour in that category. After the switch, his approach numbers flipped and stayed positive. Here’s how the key categories compare year over year.
| Stat | 2025 (Full Season) | 2026 (Current) |
|---|---|---|
| SG: Approach | -0.124 (129th) | +0.486 (19th) |
| Greens in Regulation | 64.18% (159th) | 69.14% (20th) |
| Fairways Hit | 53.85% (167th) | 61.90% (40th) |
| Scoring Average | 70.06 (86th) | 69.00 (4th) |
| SG: Total | +0.802 (19th) | +1.703 (3rd) |
The approach game: Before and after
To put it in perspective, here’s a sample of what his Strokes Gained: Approach looked like tournament by tournament before and after the switch. Positive numbers mean he gained strokes on the field, negative means he lost them.
Before the switch
| Tournament | SG: Approach |
|---|---|
| Cognizant Classic | -1.17 |
| Arnold Palmer Invitational | -0.57 |
| Valspar Championship | -1.53 |
| Masters | -0.49 |
| RBC Heritage | -0.97 |
| The Open Championship | -0.52 |
After the switch
| Tournament | SG: Approach |
|---|---|
| Wyndham Championship 🏆 | +0.77 |
| FedEx St. Jude Championship | +1.14 |
| TOUR Championship | +1.41 |
| Genesis Invitational | +1.49 |
| Arnold Palmer Invitational | +0.81 |
| THE PLAYERS Championship 🏆 | +2.01 |
| Masters | +1.02 |
| Cadillac Championship 🏆 | +0.57 |
The takeaway
It’s not just the ball that set Young’s career on the right track but are we going to sit here and say it had nothing to do with it? A player that talented, with that many near-misses, finds the right ball and suddenly wins three times.
What we do know is that Young went looking for a ball that worked with his game instead of against it, and everything changed shortly after. You don’t need a prototype Titleist to do the same thing. You just need to find something that fits how you swing it.
Sean
3 weeks ago
Comparing average hackers off 16 to a Top 10 tour pro is laughable.
Your average hacker lacks any consistency, lacks the ability to tell the difference between a ball, can’t compress a ball properly, can barely get it in the air. That’s why they are off 16 and that’s why it’s the global average.
Unless you’re playing of low single figures, it doesn’t matter nearly as much as your lack of technique and skill.