Grouper is the big fish in Palm Harbor, Florida. It is thick, white, and flaky, not unlike cod, and at ClubTest 2003, it was all over the joint like white on rice: Grouper sandwiches at the clubhouse, grouper filets at the seafood restaurant, grouper omelettes on the room service menu…there was even kung-pao grouper at the Chinese place down the road. So, when I was lucky enough to be invited back to Innisbrook for ClubTest 2004, I knew what to expect. I told my friends in Los Angeles I’d be spending an entire week testing next season’s new golf equipment and eating you-know-what at every meal.

But I was wrong. Somehow during the off-season, ClubTest 2004 evolved into a multi-dimensional experience. All kinds of ubiquitous things were flying around, to the point where the whole thing got dizzying. It’s only now, a full two months after the fact, that I am able to sit down and even attempt to make sense of it all.

See our Top 3 Picks this year. Sam Greenwood

I’ll start with equipment, since that’s what ClubTest is really all about. Each year, one or two micro-trends generally surface at the tests. They’re not everywhere, but they’re interesting enough to stand out. An example of a successful micro-trend would be the hybrid iron/woods that first showed up last year and seem to have found a niche. Less successful were the titanium irons of six or seven years ago. This year, it was graphite-and-titanium composite woods, and although the jury is still out, initial response seems strong. The idea with composite woods is that replacing some of the titanium in a clubhead with a lighter material like graphite gives designers some extra weight they can add to the perimeter, or any area that might need it.

If that just sounded knowledgeable, it’s only because Rob Sauerhaft explained it to us at the opening night dinner buffet (yes, grouper was there; no, I didn’t have any, figuring I’d pace myself). Rob -- or Sowie, as he is known in his highly coveted inner circle -- is GOLF MAGAZINE's Managing Editor of Equipment and the mad genius who created ClubTest 13 years ago. Like grouper, Sowie is also somewhat thick and white, if not flaky -- which is oddly appropriate, because during the two weeks of ClubTest at least, he is the real big fish in Palm Harbor. The testers bow to him because of his endless knowledge of equipment, and the Innisbrook staff bows to him because he runs the week with a Tom Brady-like efficiency. I think he’s also a good tipper, but that’s merely speculation.

For all his omniscience, however, Sowie didn’t really have an answer for my most pressing equipment question: What’s up with the attack of the generic-looking drivers? Just off the top of my head, I remember at least eight of the 14 drivers we tested as being 400 cc’s or more, with black heads and silver faces. That qualifies as ubiquitous. At one point, fellow tester Bob McCarthy asked if the same guy designed all of them. I wonder. I’ll keep the manufacturers’ names to myself, but suffice to say some of the drivers were from industry leaders, and some from industry followers. If you’ve got the number-one driver on Tour, you make it whatever color you want. If you’re part of that second group, it seems as if it would behoove you to break through the clutter. But that’s just me. I don’t know anything about marketing. But I do know that by the end of the week, most of the testers get tired of looking at the same old thing.

Which brings us to Ray Tannenbaum.

I’m not sure if it’s politically correct to be talking about Ray; he’s not a tester, and he’s not an official GOLF MAGAZINE staffer. He’s a golf writer and one of several people Sowie hired to come down for a week and help supervise, which essentially means shepherding testers around and reading questionnaires to make sure our opinions are clear and well thought-out. Ray arrived at a dinner mid-week, when the initial excitement has worn off, the blisters are raw, and burnout is dangerously close. After being introduced to everyone, he announced that he had to eat quickly because it was open mike night at a comedy club down the road. He wasn’t sure if his Brooklyn-based humor was going to fly in Palm Harbor, but he had five minutes of material and everyone was invited to come down and check it out. As testers, we collectively smiled, nodded, then went back to our rooms and fell asleep.

But GOLF MAGAZINE staffer Parie Markowitz went. The next day, she reported that Ray was actually pretty funny and he deserved a nickname. Someone suggested “Royal,” as in the movie “The Royal Tennenbaums”; another suggestion, after Ray pushed his luck on a couple of jokes, was “Tanny Too Far.” Then someone said “O, Tannenbaum,” which is a Christmas carol I’d never heard of. Since it was early December and everyone was in the holiday spirit, “O, Tannenbaum” stuck. I liked it because it was easily shortened to “O.” O, for his part, proved to be not only funny but smart: He quickly realized that in order to understand the testers questionnaires, he would have to hit all the equipment himself.

Maybe that explains the tee shortage. The problem was, these huge-headed drivers don’t really work with standard-length tees, which were plentiful. In order to get that high-flying, low-spinning, power ball flight everybody’s talking about, you need extra-long tees, and I realize now that Sowie’s failure to anticipate O’s driving range “research” could be why we ran out as quickly as we did.

The whole tee issue is a sadder state of affairs than first meets the eye. The regular-size tee is certainly not the most grevious casualty of new equipment technology -- I won’t miss it like, say, the U.S. Open at Merion – but those extra-long jobbers are going for four bucks a bag at Edwin Watts, which is a little pricey. Again, I know this thanks to Sowie. Because I was one of the few testers with a car and he knows he can boss me around, he sent me to restock our supply when it ran out. I took O with me, partly because I needed a few laughs after developing a bizarre case of fairway-wood yips that morning on the range, and partly because O, having broken many long tees with a certain manufacturer’s driver, wanted to see if he could find one on a discount. (Which gives me a chance to do a little myth-busting here: Nobody involved with ClubTest walks off with any free clubs, or even clubs at cost. Seriously. Everything gets packed up and shipped back to the manufacturers).

In any case, O and I walked into the local Edwin Watts to the sounds of Aretha Franklin singing Christmas music. Nice. O eyed the salesmen. “I’m going to tell them I’ve got a regular gig at the Chuckle Hut,” he said, heading off toward the drivers. “Maybe they’ll give me a discount.” I started to laugh, and then suddenly, Aretha’s voice and lyrics became startlingly clear. She was singing “O, Tannenbaum.” This is not a lie. I paused in silent appreciation. At that moment, to me, O was truly ubiquitous.

And finally, what of the grouper? The truth is, it was surprisingly scarce compared to last year. Not that I was all that disappointed, but just for the record, I blame the Atkins diet. I know, grouper fits the profile, but somehow our nation has interpreted “high protein” to mean “bacon for every meal.” Honestly. In fact, now that I really think about it, maybe there was a singular defining theme. Because the bacon was everywhere: Bacon and eggs, bacon-wrapped shrimp, bacon burritos…When you consider Atkins’ surging popularity, it’s hard to find a reason why this should ever change. So, if I’m lucky enough to get the call for ClubTest 2005, I’m going to prepare myself for plenty of pork products. We’ll see how it works out. Jonathan Abrahams writes, plays golf, and writes about playing golf. He lives in Los Angeles.