The Titleist Pro V1 is the best-selling golf ball of all-time. Frankly, it's not even close. Since it was introduced at the turn of the 21st century, the solid-core ball has been the leading choice of golfers of all skill levels.
Most golfers that play a Pro V1 or Pro V1x -- or any other golf ball, for that matter -- don't know why their golf ball has that name. They only know that it works really well. But we're here to share why the Titleist Pro V1 is called that and how the ball got its name.
How the Titleist Pro V1 golf ball got its name
The Titleist Pro V1 wasn't the first solid-core golf ball Titleist ever made. They had put together a version of the Titleist Professional golf ball -- a ball that was quite popular in the 1990s -- that had a solid core in the middle and a urethane cover.
The problem with that two-piece ball, though, was that moisture would get on the urethane cover and seep through whatever pores naturally occur in a urethane cover. That moisture would then get into the solid core and start to degrade it. Eventually, the moisture would degrade the ball to the point that it would lose distance and not be nearly as effective in terms of flight, spin and distance. That meant Titleist had to go find a solution to fix the issue.
What Titleist discovered worked best is what they still refer to this day as a casing layer. This third layer was designed to be a blocker between the urethane cover and the solid core that would prevent moisture from reaching the core. Effectively, it was a veneer -- which is technically a thin decorative covering of wood, but that's not the point.
So, the ball was the Titleist Professional with a Veneer, and it was Version 1 of the ball. Put that all together, and you get the Titleist Pro V1.
Why is the other Pro V1 called the Pro V1x?
Eventually, Titleist golfers came to the company looking for some slightly different performance characteristics from the original Pro V1. Titleist made that ball and decided to name it the Pro V1x, as opposed to the Pro V2 -- which the company says was never a consideration for the name.
Every two years, Titleist introduces a new Pro V1 formula for both the Pro V1 and Pro V1x. Over the years, the differences between the two balls has changed, but their name hasn't. Given how well they sell, the Pro V1s will almost certainly always go by that name.
