According to COBRA, its new DS-ADAPT game-improvement irons are – clears throat – “the ultimate combination of speed, distance and forgiveness.”
While I don’t have last year’s DARKSPEED irons launch press release handy, I’m willing to bet my Golf Cynics Society membership card and decoder ring COBRA was saying damn near the same thing just 11 months ago.
Not that that’s a bad thing.
COBRA doesn’t get nearly the credit it deserves for irons innovation. Exhibit A, submitted for your approval, are the 3D-printed LIMIT3D irons. We can probably stop there but we can add the KING TOUR, CB and MB which are among the sweetest-feeling player’s irons out there and the KING Tec player’s distance irons are consistently strong performers in MyGolfSpy testing.
When it comes to game-improvement irons, COBRA has been alternating between hits and misses. The 2023 AEROJET and AEROJET ONE Length finished second and third in our irons testing that year. However, last year’s DARKSPEED standard and ONE Length offerings were fair to middling performers.
Things will be different this year, however. While the COBRA DS-ADAPT irons do have some interesting updates, the biggest news has nothing to do with performance.
For the first time since Bryson DeChambeau turned pro, COBRA isn’t including a ONE Length offering in its game-improvement lineup.
Whoah.
No ONE Length???
COBRA rode its affiliation with Bryson hard right from the start. Since releasing the F7 ONE Length in 2017, COBRA has sold more than 55,000 sets of ONE Length game-improvement irons. The 2025 DS-ADAPT, however, isn’t getting the ONE Length treatment.
There’s no real explanation, other than that COBRA earlier this fall released its KING Tec-X irons in ONE Length and is categorizing the Tec-X as a “player’s game-improvement” iron.
If you were really counting on a new ONE Length game-improvement iron from COBRA this year, you’re going to have to, well, ADAPT.
COBRA DS-ADAPT irons: What’s new?
Like TaylorMade and Callaway, COBRA launches new game-improvement irons every year. In that light, it’s more than fair to ask how much an OEM can improve an iron offering in just 12 months.
Of course, it’s not like COBRA started working on DS-ADAPT the day after DARKSPEED was launched last January. Iron technology is a work in progress and updates are added when manufacturing capabilities make it doable. In that light, we can say there are at least two new bits of tech in the DS-ADAPT that make it worthy of your attention.
One problem, though. They’re both under-the-hood improvements that you can’t “see.”
COBRA builds its game-improvement irons around three basic features. First is PWR-BRIDGE, a weighting system built into the hollow-body design to get the center of gravity as low as possible. Second is its SPEEDSHELL cup face design and third is what COBRA calls H.O.T. (fHighly Optimized Topology) variable-face thickness.
All three are COBRA variations on the same themes that virtually every OEM uses in its game-improvement irons. They’re the levers R&D can pull to get CG lower, make the face flex more and create a larger sweet spot. R&D constantly tweaks and adjusts those levers in the name of finding incremental improvement.
For 2025, COBRA has revamped the internal PWR-BRIDGE assembly and has redesigned the SPEEDSHELL cup face, both in a major way.
How low can you go?
Game-improvement irons serve two purposes. One is to provide a big-bodied, wide-soled head with an offset clubface that is easy to hit for mid- to high-handicap golfers. The other purpose is to help those same golfers, who are often distance-challenged, tools to help them hit the ball a little farther.
If you're looking to upgrade without breaking the bank, last year's COBRA DARKSPEED clubs are now up to 30% off
Stronger lofts are part of the recipe but only one part. Perimeter weighting and a low CG improve ball speed, reduce spin and increase launch angle. Next up is a face-flexing mechanism to add even more ball speed giddy-up.
COBRA’s PWR-BRIDGE weighting system is now integral to the club body (it used to be a separate piece), making an even lower CG possible.
“It stiffens the back frame,” says COBRA VP of R&D Tom Olsavsky. “It crosses over from heel to toe and from front to back.”
By itself, PWR-BRIDGE is a design attribute. When combined with a newly redesigned 360 SPEEDSHELL cup face, it adds up to 23 percent more face flex than COBRA’s last two game-improvement irons. It’s COBRA’s largest cup face to date, extending across the entire toe and sole area.
“It’s larger overall,” explains Olsavsky. “We can define the geometry of it a little bit better now so we can cast it without sacrificing feel.”
That foamy sensation
Hollow-body design promotes face flex and, by extension, distance. The problem is that hollow-body irons often sound like crapola. To create better acoustics, and to keep the increasingly thinner faces from breaking, COBRA is getting aggressive with foam microspheres.
“You do need a little bit of support there,” says Olsavsky, “but you also have to match the frequency of response of the materials.”
While foam does wonders to improve sound and feel, it does come with a potential face flex penalty. The foam keeps the face from breaking but it also discourages the face from flexing.
“You’re trying to thin the face out to save weight and make it faster but you have to back it up with foam,” says Olsavsky. “You’re gaining a lot with the face but you’re going to give a little bit back due to the foam.”
Like most game-improvement iron sets, the COBRA DS-ADAPT has a built-in progression, The 4- through 7-irons get all the tech: the fully updated PWRBRIDGE, the new SPEEDSHELL cup face and the foam-filled hollow body. The 8-iron through pitching wedge are still a hollow-body design but with a smaller chunk of foam. There’s also no SPEEDSHELL cup face. The set-matching gap and sand wedges are hollow but without the foam or the SPEEDSHELL face.
Loft-wise, the DS-ADAPT irons are on the stronger side of the game-improvement category, based on a 27-degree 7-iron. Hey, it is what it is: super-low CG, high-launching irons designed to bring distance to those who need it. It’s not so they can brag they hit their 7-iron longer than you can hit your 33-degree 7-iron. The target golfer probably can’t but there’s nothing wrong with giving them a 7-iron they can hit a little easier and a little farther.
COBRA DS-ADAPT MAX
The COBRA DS-ADAPT MAX is pretty much what you’d think it is: same technology, only bigger. The irons are oversized and have all the ingredients for even higher MOI. The blade length is longer, the topline is thicker, the sole is wider and the head has more offset.
The DS-ADAPT MAX irons also follow an industry-wide super game-improvement trend with weaker lofts than its game-improvement cousin. Yes, I said weaker, by two degrees per club.
“One of the feedback points we’ve received is that our irons are really long but the industry is fitting more and fitting better,” says Olsavsky. “Fitters are telling us that anywhere from 30 to 50 percent of their game-improvement fits are into weaker lofts.”
Armed with that feedback, COBRA did a trial with some of its key fitters and found 30 percent of the players performed better with a weaker-lofted head. Typically, those are slower swing speed players who need a little extra help getting the ball up in the air with a little more spin to keep it up in the air.
According to COBRA, the new DS-ADAPT MAX irons launch 1.6 degrees higher, spin 550 rpm more, have a two-degree steeper descent angle, eight yards more draw bias and fly just a wee bit longer than the iron set it’s replacing, the COBRA AIR-X.
COBRA DS-ADAPT irons: Specs, price, availability
COBRA is launching three sets of DS-ADAPT irons: the standard model, the DS-ADAPT MAX and DS-ADAPT MAX women’s model.
The DS-ADAPT and DS-ADAPT MAX irons will be available in 4-GW or 5-SW sets. The stock steel shaft is the KBS Tour Lite (S and R flexes) while the stock graphite is the KBS PGI (S, R and A flexes). A graphite combo set is also available, featuring a 5-hybrid backing up the 6-iron through gap wedge.
The DS-ADAPT MAX women’s set is available in graphite only in a 5-SW set. A combo set (5H, 6H, 7-SW) will also be available but right-handed only.
The steel options will retail for $999 while the graphite options (including the combo sets) will run $1,099.
Presale starts today. The DS-ADAPT will hit retail on Jan. 10.
For more information, visit www.cobragolf.com.
Looking to upgrade without breaking the bank? Last year’s DARKSPEED models are up to 30% off.
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