Is a Triangular Driver Any Good?

There is a lot of cool gear in the golf world that doesn’t always fit into Most Wanted Tests or Buyer’s Guides. You still want to know how it performs. In our We Tried It series, we put gear to the test and let you know if it works as advertised.

What We Tried

Cleveland HiBore XL Driver

Your HiBoring Hero

John Barba – The one MyGolfSpy staffer old enough to know better

We Tried It: The Cleveland HiBore XL Driver

Golf and I separated for a while.

By “for a while,” I mean 16 years.

My first kid was born in May 1991, just as I was starting to break 80 regularly.  My second kid was born 16 months later. By the time the fourth kid was born in 1996, golf was impossible.

Fast-forward to 2007. A new job with a corporate golf culture meant getting back into the game and getting new clubs.

Which brings us to the original Cleveland HiBore. It was my first “big boy” driver and, damn, I loved that club. I loved that it went long and (mostly) straight. I loved that people’s heads would snap around at the driving range when I hit it to see what the hell that noise was. In retrospect, I loved most of all that it was $299.

Being a golfer, I traded in the HiBore a few years later for a PING G10 which was traded in for a TaylorMade R1 which was traded in for … You get the idea.

So when Cleveland brought the HiBore back last month, your faithful scribe experienced a confounding mixture of excitement and skepticism. Would it be any good or would it be just another unexciting driver from Cleveland? And what about the $399 price tag?

A few trips to the range and a couple of launch monitor sessions told me Cleveland might be on to something. The real test, however, is on the course. After a two-day, 72-hole golfapalooza in Orlando right after Christmas, I have an answer for you.

Warning, dear reader: You might be surprised.

What is the Cleveland HiBore XL?

Short answer: It’s a Dorito with a Tensei shaft.

Long answer: It’s maybe the most innovative driver we’ve seen in years. Cleveland turned its AI-powered Etch-a-Sketch over, shook it until the screen cleared and told its supercomputer to make a driver with a huge, deep face with maximum MOI.

It came up with the triangular-shaped HiBore. It’s important to note the HiBore isn’t triangular just for the hell of it. Cleveland started its AI design process by focusing on the largest, most forgiving face possible, and then it asked for a high MOI.  The only way to do that while also conforming to USGA rules was to create this George Jetson-looking thing.  

And yes, I know there have been triangular-ish drivers before.

Regardless, this three-sided beast is a risky business move for Cleveland. But when you’re an also-ran in the driver market, playing it safe is even riskier. Sometimes you just have to say, “What the heck.”

Based on what we’ve learned, it’s a risk that paid off. The HiBore is a pretty good driver.

And have we mentioned it’s $399?

Range impressions

I try to fight it but I’m as prone to snap judgments as I am to snap hooks. That’s why my first five or six swings at the Sagamore Golf Center’s heated shed grabbed my attention. Every one of them was a long, tight draw that went where I aimed, right over the big wooden cow about 210 yards out.

I swapped it back and forth with my gamer, the PING G430 MAX 10K, and found I was getting acceptable results with both. Distance for both was, at best, an estimate, but neither I nor the cow saw anything that made either of us go “moo.”

For the record, the PING was custom-fitted with a Ventus Blue TR shaft cut to play at 45.25 inches. The HiBore is stock all the way: nine degrees with a Mitsubishi Tensei Blue shaft playing at 46 inches.

It was only when I got the Cleveland on a launch monitor at Golftec that I started muttering to myself. My normal swing speed is 92 to 94 mph. Normal drives are 235 to 240 yards although, when the stars align, I can reach 250 with some decent roll. With the Cleveland HiBore XL, I was hitting 96 to 97 mph with some of my best strikes running out past 260. One strike hit 100 mph and, just like that, it was 2007 again.

After several more sessions, I couldn’t wait to get this bad boy out on the course.

We Tried It Day One: Johnny Orlando and dawn …

The two-day Orlando adventure featured 36 holes at Shingle Creek with another 36 the next day at Celebration. The Cleveland HiBore XL started three of the four rounds and I kept stats using a Garmin S70 watch.

We teed off just as the sun was rising and my first drive with the HiBore was a carbon copy of my experiences at Sagamore. It was a nice, penetrating draw that found the fairway just to the right of center 261 yards away.

That first drive was what you’d like them all to be but, alas, they all aren’t. While there were still plenty of fairway-finding ka-boomers over those 36 holes, where the Cleveland HiBore XL shone was on less-than-perfect strikes. Of the 26 tee shots hit with the HiBore, 20 were in the fairway while the rest were all playable. Some shots I know were towards the heel or toe that would normally have been in real trouble were still acceptable and with more distance than I would have thought.

I’m not sure but I think that’s the definition of forgiveness.

By the afternoon, I had loosened up sufficiently and the course had dried out and firmed up a little. The afternoon distances reflected the firmer conditions.

Day One stats:

26 tee shots
20 fairways hit
5 rough
1 fairway waste bunker
Average distance: 245 (235 in the morning, 250 in the afternoon)
Best bomb: 278

Note: Dewy conditions in the morning, turning much firmer later; a slight breeze

Not bad for the first two rounds in over a month-and-a-half.

We Tried It Day Two: A tale of two rounds

After spending the first day in the trunk, the PING got the start on Day Two. Unfortunately, the ground was soft from overnight rain and it was one of those rounds where, no matter what, the wind seemed to be in your face. What’s more, I couldn’t consistently find the sweet spot and the results reflected that. Optically, the 10K head looked downright obese after staring at the Dorito-shaped HiBore the previous day. Fatigue was also a factor – after such a long layoff, 72 holes in two days is a hell of a lot of golf when you’re 64 years old. After foozling tee shots on 15, 17 and 18 (twice), the PING sat out the final 18 and the HiBore solidified its hold in the starting lineup. Let’s just say we had better results in Round Two. Mostly …

Day Two stats:

Round 1 – with PING

13 tee shots
8 fairways hit
2 light rough
3 out of play
Average distance: 213
Best bomb: 224

Round 2 – with HiBore

13 tee shots
11 fairways hit
2 light rough
0 out of play
Average distance: 235
Best bomb: 255

Note: Rain overnight, very wet conditions; first round mostly into a prevailing breeze

What does this all mean?

This We Tried It comes with plenty of caveats and asterisks. Sure, I picked up some swing speed with the HiBore but it was a full inch longer than the PING. On the other hand, the PING was custom fitted with what would be considered an “exotic” shaft upgrade. The HiBore was stock, although the Tensei Blue is a shaft I tend to get along with and it works well with the HiBore. The straight-up comparison at Celebration is interesting. I’m not sure how much the stunning difference in looks plays a role in visual comfort. This wasn’t a blind test, obviously, and we all know the mind can play very dirty tricks on us when it wants to.

Additionally, I gamed the PING G430 MAX 10K for nearly all of the 2024 season with very satisfactory results overall. It proved to be long enough for the courses and tee boxes I play (6,200 to 6,500 yards). Season-long stats show I hit fairways at a 59-percent clip with an average distance of 237. I won’t get too crazy about the PING driving distance in Florida since it was windy and each course was more damp in the morning than they were in the afternoon. Head to head, though, I’d have to say there’s something about that Dorito-looking triangular son-of-a-bitch that agrees with me.

We Tried It: The Cleveland HiBore goes in the bag!

Three rounds are enough to know if something is going to work for you. After 54 holes, the Cleveland HiBore XL will begin 2025 in the starting lineup. Yeah, it looks weird, but the more you look at it, the more the weirdness starts to fade. And, friends, if there’s one fundamental truth in golf, it’s this: 54 holes worth of long and straight will make anything look pretty damn sexy.

So 2025 starts with the Cleveland HiBore in the bag. There’s still a head-to-head coming with the new Sub 70 859 and I’ve yet to demo the new PING G 440 or any of the new stuff from TaylorMade, Callaway, COBRA, Mizuno and Wilson.

As a wise man once said:

“We’ll see.”

If you’re interested, the MyGolfSpy Forum has a Member Test of the HiBore going on right now. You can check it out here.