The Cleat Reborn

Jordan Spieth, CHAMP PiviX golf cleats
Jordan Spieth has used PiviX golf cleats on his Under Armour shoes.

In January 2015, golf course maintenance expert Tim Moraghan, the former Director of Championship Agronomy at the USGA and now the principal at Aspire Golf Consulting, wrote that modern plastic cleats had rather lost their way and were becoming something of a liability. “These so-called “soft” spikes are getting longer, sharper, wider and more aggressive,” he said. “As a result, they are inflicting more and more damage on our courses.”

It’s 20 years or so since the metal spike was hounded out of the game, replaced by softer cleats that considerably reduced scuff marks and other impairments on putting surfaces. Like Moraghan says though, over those two decades the cleat deviated from its intended path, becoming almost as harmful to highly-maintained turf as metal spikes. As golfers and green committees insisted on PGA Tour-like surfaces and greens were cut lower and lower, so blemishes left by cleats became more conspicuous.

“(One manufacturer) has a new shoe with 18 spikes, and each of those spikes has five Points of Contact with the turf,” said Moraghan. “That’s 180 impressions from each golfer with every step. That inevitably causes damage over time, and increases the cost of maintaining greens at the standard golfers now demand.”
Champ Pivix Golf Spikes

The game needed something that provided excellent traction and stability but which reduced damage to greens. MacNeill Engineering and its CHAMP brand believe they developed such a product earlier this year – the PiviX which was launched in April and has been impressing golfers and superintendents since.

Massachusetts-based MacNeill Engineering has been making studs, spikes, cleats, and accessories for golfers, cricketers, footballers, and soccer and baseball players as well as for the logging industry since 1931. The name CHAMP was Byron Nelson’s idea. The five-time major champion was a great proponent of the company’s SURE-LOCK spike, and suggested the company use his nickname for marketing purposes.

The PiviX is a lightweight, low profile golf spike that MacNeill Engineering President and CEO Harris MacNeill says was “designed to be green-friendly without sacrificing performance”. It incorporates spring-flex traction technology which “feeds” the spikes into the turf, providing “optimum traction throughout the rotation of the swing,” says MacNeill. The PiviX also features SLIM-LOK, a new, low-profile fastening system, and a ‘C’ wear indicator which turns solid when the cleat needs replacing. “PiviX represents a tectonic industry shift wherein golf shoe manufacturers are able to develop lighter, more comfortable and lower-profile designs,” says MacNeill. “This allows golfers to get closer to the turf for improved stability, feel and balance.”

Quickly adopted by several PGA Tour players, including Jordan Spieth, the PiviX was welcomed by shoe brands which were able to produce the comfortable, lightweight, low-profile shoes that have become popular with today’s golfers. Indeed, MacNeill says the feedback he’s received has been universally positive adding that, besides the response from golfers and shoe-makers, superintendents and course professionals have also chimed in. “They are praising the PiviX for the Spring-Flex technology as they recognize the flexible legs are helping to reduce damage to greens,” he says.

So everyone’s happy. Even Tim Moraghan, probably.

$14.99 for pack of 18
champspikes.com

Champ Pivix Golf Cleats

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