I have an R5 Draw with the standard MAS-50 shaft in Stiff flex. Chose stiff 'cos the reg flex seemed very whippy.
I have a tendency to slice/fade all of my woods - all of which have stiff flex shafts.
Question 1: would a reg flex reduce the fade and/or modify the trajectory more to the left?
Question 2: has anyone swapped a reg flex Aldila NV65 into their R5? With what results? (I've read the TM blah-blah about how the MAS50 is specially designed for the R5-D etc.)

i have a r5 draw with a pro-launch blue in it and this baby sends it miles, so you may want to consider this shaft also

it all depends on the spinrates your putting on the ball.

Is the MAS sending high and right??
The NV is a lower launching shaft but no shaft is going to cure a slice/fade. Might be worth having a lesson before changing shaft also try and get on a launch monitor as this would give some definate answers.


Or screw it all and do it anyway!!! You can probably get an NV pull on ebay for around £25

1) Yes

2) Never tried. Don't take this the wrong way but a friend has a seniors flex in his R5 D and hits it well. Both myself and another pal have used this club with the old mans flex and the bloody thing goes miles. Further than my G5 and his R7 !

Trouble is finding one is a problem.

For me too stiff a shaft always slices. So I suggest you try the flexier shaft

Andrew, I hope that my experience in playing golf for 54 years(20 of them off scratch or +1) might help. I am 71 now and still hit the ball quite a long way. When I first started playing golf I was very well taught by a brilliant teacher. As far as equipment was concerned he told me always to play with the softest shafts I could play without losing control. Although I have a strong build and a fastish swing I have ALWAYS played with regular steel shafts and I now play with irons AND woods with regular graphite shafts.

If you are pretty sure that your swing is in kilter then if you are slicing or,particularly, hitting your shots straight right and LOW then your shaft is definitely too stiff as it is causing the head to lag behind. Fairly obviously if the shaft is too soft you will hook the ball.

I would recommend either the Aldila NV 65 Regular Graphite OR the NVS 65 Reg which is the soft tip version to give you greater launch.

The other big advantages of a softer shaft is the ability to shape your drives more easily and to obtain much increased FEEL.

Agree with Boanerges re: flex.

As for the shaft, the MAS shaft is crap. It's too light at 50g and it's all over the place in terms of dispersion.

The Aldila NV will be an improvement and will help if you hit it too high. I personally didn't like the feel that much but it's better then the MAS by a stretch.

If you want to retain the high launch that the MAS provides then the Aldila NVS is worth a look but the Prolaunch is better IMO. Less loose in the tip but still high launch.

Beyond those standard upgrade shafts mnetioned there are a plethora of alternatives depending on your budget but that's getting on to another topic really.

Boanerges is spot on here.try a reg shaft and work on your swing tempo...

I hope after 8 months Andrew has finally made up his mind.

(Just to avoid confusion, I'm the original Andrew Wood, not the Andrew Wood 6 who started this post)
I also had an r5 Draw, stiff shaft (for exaclty the same reason!) and am a serial slicer. Tried the NV reg in my r5 - no benefit. Suggest something much softer should be tried, such as the NVS, Prolaunch, YS6+, in reg flex (agree with the comments about stiff = worse).
Ultimately I never got my r5 working with any shaft, except when I really worked on technique. Problem was that it was a 9.5° - too little loft, too much side-spin (as someone said above, it's all about spin rates). You might get more benefit from going to a very low-spin ball (I found the Wilson Staff with those weird, flat dimples really made a difference, esp. the Px3)and it's cheaper than a new shaft.
Be careful before going down the new-shaft(s) route - it's long and expensive and you may just end up junking the r5D (it doesn't fix a bad fade/slice) for something with higher loft etc anyway.
Good luck. And remember that the r5 is a .350 diameter tip and needs an insert-ferrule (counter-sunk hosel) if you DIY it.

Curiously my Honma 400RF 3-wood produces longer distance with less dispersion compared to my Maruman Exim Nano II driver. I think the secret lies with the Honma shafts which are superior.

Why don't you try a Honma driver perhaps. I'm saving up to complete my wood set with the Honma 400RF driver hopefully with 11 deg loft.