Decathlon Inesis Tour 900 Ball Review

Joel Tadman tests the Inesis Tour 900, a urethane-covered ball on sale in Decathlon for just £19.99 a dozen

Decathlon Inesis Tour 900 Ball Review

Sport retail outlets are another avenue golfers can go down when seeking low cost golf balls. One in particular that peaked our interest was the Decathlon Inesis Tour 900 (opens in new tab), mostly because it has a urethane cover and promises excellent all round performance at a very low price.

We bought a dozen for £19.99 and tested them on the Foresight Sports GCQuad launch monitor before taking them out on the course to assess how they compared with the Titleist Pro V1 (opens in new tab).

The box is bereft of any technological info, other than being a three-piece construction and claiming to deliver the best of everything in terms of performance versus other models in the Inesis range thanks to a urethane cover.

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Off the tee

The Inesis Tour 900 produced some good numbers with the driver. The average ball speed was only just shy of the Titleist Pro V1 although the spin was over 300 rpm higher. This combined with a much lower launch meant the Inesis Tour 900 struggled to get up in the air and stay there, resulting in carries that were around 10 yards shorter on average than the Pro V1.

Iron shots

The lower launch, higher spin theme continued with full iron shots, although it didn’t appear to affect the carry distance this time. The Inesis Tour 900 and the Pro V1 ball both averaged 164 yards, with the extra spin helping with stopping power versus the higher flight of the Pro V1. I will say the ball speed numbers with the Inesis Tour 900 weren't quite as consistent as the Pro V1 with driver or 7-iron.

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Short game

The cover on the Inesis Tour 900 is clearly effective at being gripped by the grooves to generate spin. This is backed up by the lower launch and higher short game spin by over 4000 rpm versus the Pro V1 on a 50-yard pitch shot.

On-course testing

When putting this ball in play out on the course, we were suitably impressed. Into the wind, it struggled a little due to the higher spin, but some drives down wind finished close to where we normally ended up with a Pro V1.

The spin control around the greens was excellent, the bite on the second bounce provides the confidence you need to fully commit to your chip shots, knowing the ball won’t run out too far after landing.

The Inesis Tour 900 has a dull white finish out of the box that is slightly darker than the Pro V1, no visible seam on the cover and a useful thick black line as a sidestamp to assist with alignment both off the tee and on the greens.

It feels softer than Pro V1, a little more like the feel you get from low compression golf balls, which can also feel jumpy off the putter face. But overall, it looks and feels solid, well-made and didn’t scuff all that much during the course of a round.