If one of your mates turned round and said they’d just got a full set of irons online for less than £600, what would you be expecting?
A second hand set? 10-year-old clubs? Well today we’re taking a deep dive into the Takomo 301 CB, a stunning players cavity back iron, which comes in at exactly that price point.
Across social media Takomo has seen a lot of hype for their clubs, and we've already been pretty impressed with their 101T irons earlier this year, so now we’re putting the players model to the test to see just how much you can get for your money.
Who Are They Aimed At?
These clubs are a great option for anyone wanting a premium look and feel across their irons, while keeping as budget friendly as possible for a brand-new set. If you’re looking to buy a set of Takomo irons you do need to know your exact spec and model you’re wanting, which can be difficult to know before trying them out.
The Tech
Now there isn’t too much tech to talk about with these irons. They’re a traditional players cavity back made from Forged S20C steel claiming to be great for control, workability, and forgiveness.
There's a short blade length and low centre of gravity, as well as a little more perimeter weighting and a wider sole compared to the pure-blade 301 MB, which is said to provide a bit more playability.
The interesting thing about all Takomo irons, not just the 301 CB model, is that there’s no way for you to try them out before you buy them, so you have to know your specs before-hand if you want a full fitted set, otherwise you'll have to make do with the off-the-shelf setup.
When buying a set, you simply go to the Takomo website, chose the model and specs you’re looking for, and that’s it.
Watch On YouTube
You can watch my full review via the Golfalot YouTube channel here:
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Takomo 301 CB Irons Review
Looks
The overall design of the 301 CB irons was very clean, with just a few small black details across the clubhead. The irons are very sleek and have a premium look to them – something I was not expecting when first taking them out the box.
I honestly think if you put the logo of one of the bigger, more well-known brands onto these irons, no one would question it from a visual perspective.
The only thing I wasn’t too keen on was at address I felt as though the shorter irons looked a little thicker and clunky, whereas the 4 and 5 irons appeared much thinner.
Personally, I change models within my own iron set so that I can have a thicker, more forgiving 4-iron. With the Takomo irons not having the option of custom fitting or a blended set, it might be hard for some players to achieve their ideal look across each iron in the set in that same way.
Feel
After being so impressed with the looks of the irons, I was expecting a firmer feel at impact or very little forgiveness, as I was thinking that these clubs must have a downfall somewhere. However, I was surprised at how nicely the ball came off the face and even how forgiving the clubs felt.
I’m not the biggest fan of longer irons in general and prefer to use either a more forgiving model across the top end of the set, or just go into hybrids instead. Because of this and how thin it looked, I had almost zero hopes for my ability with the Takomo 4-iron before testing.
However, I found it as easy to hit the 4-iron as I did the 9 or 8! I loved hitting the longer irons off the tee and found so much forgiveness that visually didn’t look like it would be there.
The Data
So far, the Takomo irons weren’t failing in any categories! We were thinking that something had to give for how much these irons cost, and we did see some small downsides when testing the irons indoors. We headed over to HUKD to get Foresight data on these clubs, which allowed us to directly compare them to my own current Titleist T-series irons, (I use a combo of T150 and T200s).
When we did the original T-series testing we went through each 6-iron in all four models to see which was going the furthest. My current set, the Titleist T150 irons, saw the highest distances and ball speeds coming in at a total of 167 yards and 108.4 mph.
This was considerably longer than the Takomo 6-iron at an average of 156 yards, but a respectable 106.8 mph ball speed. Even the shortest T-series model, the T100 6-iron, still went further than the Takomo at 161 yards carry and 105.8 mph ball speed. Something to bear in mind if it's distance you're looking for with irons.
On-Course Performance
I also took the Takomo irons out on the course at Stockport Golf Club, where I was challenged to only use the irons over the last 4 holes. Although this made the first hole feel very long, it made me appreciate how good these irons were off the tee.
Three of my tee shots went right down the middle, with only one going slightly off-line due to an off-centre strike, but not even landing me in the semi-rough thanks to the forgiveness in the irons.
I did see a bit more inconsistency from the fairway, struggling to hit some of the greens with the shorter irons. As mentioned earlier, the shorter irons are a bit chunkier than I’m used to, so part of this may have been that visual making me a bit more apprehensive over the ball.
However, one area I really liked the feel of the Takomo irons with, was around the greens. For me, this was really impressive, as it’s rare I enjoy using the standard wedge from any iron set and I’d always reach for a more specialised wedge around the greens.
I felt as though the wedge, 9 and 8-irons all had a nice feel and control to them across those shorter shots, and I ended up being excited any time I missed the green because I felt to confident of recovering from those positions.
Takomo 301 CB Irons Verdict
Other than falling slightly behind in distance, the Takomo irons performed really well in all categories and surprised me on how high quality they actually are.
Something I really like about these irons are the way they allow golfers to invest in a premium-feeling product without a price tag we’ve become accustomed to seeing for a full set, at sometimes 2-3x higher than Takomo!
If you already know your specs, then you can take advantage of the custom option on the website and this should only help you in getting a set which is best-suited to your game.
Would I Use Them?
Through the set I consistently saw a decrease in distance, and I wasn’t super keen how thick the shorter irons looked but how thin the longer ones were.
For this reason, I’m not jumping to switch to Takamo, however if someone handed me them to play for a round, I’d say great! The feel and performance were really impressive given the background of these clubs and I can imagine them being very solid for a lot of players.
Takomo 301CB Irons Pros & Cons
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Takomo 101T Irons Review
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