Ping Glide 4.0 Review

Ping changed the metal for this generation, moving from a hard 431 stainless to a softer 8620 carbon steel, and the difference at impact is immediate. Where the older Glides felt brittle, this one gives a muted press, helped by a custom tuning port elastomer thirty six percent larger than before. The face is also the friendliest in the class on a bad strike. Ping's wedges have always carried more mass around the perimeter than a tour blade, and a thin one out of the rough still carries something close to its intended yardage rather than dropping twenty yards short.

That is worth more to most golfers than an extra few hundred revolutions of spin. The grinds cover the usual four sole shapes with genuine differences between them, and the fitting through Ping's colour code system is more rigorous than most. Two things hold it back: the full shot spin trails the best in the category, and Ping lists it at $217.50 a head, which is the highest price of any mainstream wedge.