Chipping

Now the big part of the short game improvement program is to learn to land the ball in the place you want the ball to land. And for chipping I want you to find one area to chip from and then with one club practice chipping until you can consistently land the ball where you want. Once you can do that then change clubs every shot and try to land the ball on the same spot. Use clubs between your 5-iron and lob wedge when doing this.

This is a great exercise to do because it will teach you quickly how far each club will roll the ball. Once you’ve done this then experiment with different chip shots and try different clubs until you find the best clubs for you generally to use on chip shots. For some people that will be high lofted clubs, for others they’ll prefer lower lofted clubs. You’ve got to find what works best for you.

Another great drill you can use to practice your chipping is to make a circle about 3 feet in diameter with golf tees around a hole. Then practice chipping from different spots trying to get each ball to stop within 3 feet of the hole.

Finally, if you’re lucky enough to have a practice chipping green with multiple holes then you should pick one spot to chip from. Then for each shot, chip to a different target. Naturally when you do this you will probably have to change clubs. For example, if you’ve got a 50 foot chip and a lot of green between you and the pin then you’ll do a lot better to choose a lower lofted club like a 5 or 6 iron. Then if you’ve got a pin that is very close to you and not much green then you’ll have to choose a more lofted club. Remember, the goal is to land the ball about 3 feet on the green for each chip shot.

This is a great drill to practice before you play a game as it will quickly give you a feel for the greens that you’ll be faced with out on the golf course (as long as they’re similar to the practice green).

OK, let’s look at some practice drills for…

Pitching

Often when you’re faced with a pitch shot your ball will not be sitting perfectly. So to become a great short game player you have to practice shots from poor lies. So do this, but when you do don’t just give yourself a bad lie for one shot and then go back to giving yourself good lies. Hit at least 10 shots from a particular bad lie so you can learn how best to get the ball out of that spot and close to the hole.

Now with pitching you have to employ a lot of imagination and be able to visualize what’s going to happen with the golf ball very clearly. And a great way of improving this skill is to get one club, e.g. a 7-iron, and place balls around a golf green and hit shots with your 7-iron trying to get each ball as close as possible to the hole. Naturally when you do this you’ll have to make adjustments from your normal setup. For example, if you’re behind a bunker and you’re using a 7-iron you’ll have to open the club up very wide, have a very wide stance and make a long, big swing.

But that’s OK. Doing things like this will help you to have some fun and learn what you can do with a golf club, and improve your visualization and imagination skills. That can only improve your short game.

All right, let’s now turn our attention to…

Distance Wedge Swings

This distance wedge drill involves a fellow golfer. To do this drill simply find an area where you can practice the distance wedge shots and practice hitting shots back and forth to each other. So start at say 50 yards away from each other and with one ball try and hit the ball to your partner so it bounces once in front of them and then they can catch it.

Then they hit the ball back to you trying to get it to bounce once in front of you.

This game is great as it puts a bit of pressure on, which can only help on the golf course. Also, it makes you focus a lot on where you want your ball to fly. And if you don’t fly it were you want then you might get a bit of flak from the person having to chase after the ball all the time.

If you don’t have a person to do that drill you can simply put targets out at different distances and then hit distance wedge shots to each target. Start with your shortest target and then move up to the furthest target. Once you’ve done that then hit each shot to a random target. By doing this it will get you more into a course mentality where each golf shot is different.

OK, now let’s finally look at…

Bunker Shots

To do this first bunker drill you simply have to place the ball on a tee and push the tee down into the sand. Once this is in place then you simply have to swing and try to cut the tee in half with the leading edge of your golf club. If you have trouble getting your club through the sand then you should definitely try this drill, as it helps greatly to accelerate through the sand.

Another great drill to improve your bunker shot technique is to place a ball in the middle of your foot print. Then when you swing simply focus on removing the imprint completely from the sand. This is a great drill if you’re afraid of hitting the sand. Finally, when you’re practicing bunker shots make sure you don’t just practice perfect lies. Give yourself bad lies and learn to get the ball close to the pin from anywhere.

So that’s some ways you can practice the short game. But finally, probably the best way to improve your short game is to practice with someone that is better than you. If you can find someone like that then play games with them trying to beat them in getting the ball closest to the hole.

The first big change in the setup is that the ball should be positioned just inside your left heel.  Next you need to align all of your body to the left of your final target.

Finally, you need to open the clubface and grip the club.  The clubface should be pointing at the flag or to the right of the flag.

It’s very important that you open the cluface first and then grip the club in a neutral position. When you do this it will feel like a weaker grip because of the open clubface…however, it’s the correct way to open the clubface for a bunker shot.

There are no set rules on how much you open up the clubface because all sand is different.  You have to experiment with how much you open up your stance and how open you have the clubface.

Just understand that for the standard bunker shot you should not alter your distance wedge swing at all.  The setup is what makes the necessary changes to help you hit great bunker shots.

Having said that, you must make sure that when you swing you do so along the alignment that you’ve setup, which is open.  Don’t manipulate your swing to swing towards the target.  You MUST swing along your open bodyline.

By doing this the ball will fly to the left of the pin and then on landing spin to the right and roll a little bit.

Now once you’ve mastered the standard bunker shot you then simply need to make your swing either longer or shorter to alter the distance of your bunker shots.  You don’t need to try anything fancy, just swing either longer or shorter and the ball will fly the appropriate distance.

Once you’ve mastered hitting chips, pitch, distance wedges and bunker shots the distances you want from perfect lies. then you’re ready to start learning about the differences in lies and green conditions that will help you to choose the right club and shot for the situation you’re faced with.

But understand this…that knowledge would be next to useless if you can’t hit just a standard short game shot the distance you want.

Now here is a rough generalisation as far as the lie is concerned.  The worse the lie the more descending blow you need to hit the shot effectively.  But by doing a more descending blow it will deloft the golf club you’re using.  So if you’re using a sand wedge but the ball is in a bad lie that you need to hit down on, then the ball may come out on a 6 or 7 iron trajectory.

Naturally, this will mean the ball will also run further than normal.

Now when you choose where to land your ball you should always try and land your ball on the green.  It’s much, much more predictable than landing your ball on the fringe.

Also, the other main consideration you have to make when playing a shot is the green condition.  For example, if you’re playing a golf course with hard and fast greens then obviously the ball is going to run much further than a golf course with slow and wet greens.

So when selecting a shot to hit you need to assess your lie and the green conditions closely.  A lot of this comes down to practicing, experimenting and getting experience from different lies.

OK, that’s the basics on what you need to focus on to improve your short game.  Next I’m going to outline the essentials needed to become a great putter.  So make sure you come back here to read that.

And for a distance wedge shot you should setup as you did for a pitch shot BUT you should have your feet a fraction wider than you did…they should be about the width of your shoulders apart like this:

From this setup position you simply need to swing back so your left arm is parallel with the ground like this:

..and then swing through in unison until the finish of your swing when almost all of the weight should be on your left foot and the club should be parallel with the ground like this:

So that’s the stock standard distance wedge shot that you should master first. Once you’ve practiced that – and have the distances all your wedges fly on average then you should practice either a shorter or longer swing.  But the important thing is that you master hitting the ball the distance you want with this first distance wedge swing I’ve just shown you.

All right, in the next part of this series we’re going to look at bunker shots.

Also, the characteristics of a pitch shot over a chip shot differ. A pitch shot flies longer and higher than a chip shot. And once it lands the ball normally rolls about the same or slightly shorter than the distance it flew.

But apart from those two things everything else is the same as the chip shot. So let’s start by looking at the setup needed for a pitch. To do this let’s start by looking at the golf grip needed.

I believe that with the short game you should have a neutral grip. And I believe this because with the short game you don’t need a lot of power. Having said that, there are some great short game players, e.g. John Daly and Paul Azinger who have very strong grips. But again, I would advise that you use a neutral grip like this:

And you can check this simply by setting up with your feet together and then looking down on your hands. If you can see two knuckles of your left hand then that’s a neutral grip. If you can see 3-4 knuckles that’s a strong grip. If you see 1 knuckle or no knuckles then that’s a weak grip. I suggest you have a neutral grip and that means you should see two knuckles when you look down on your left hand.

Now for a pitch shot you should have the ball positioned in the center of your stance. Also, here’s some other points that you need to be aware of when setting up for a pitch.

Your knees should be slightly flexed and your arms should be relaxed and hanging down from your shoulders. At setup you want your hands to be in front of the ball. Also, your body should be aligned parallel to the target line of your shot. The exception is your feet. Because when you turn your left foot out it will appear as though your feet are open but they aren’t. Also, you should be gripping down on the club almost near the bottom of the club.

So it’s important that when you setup to pitch you…

• grip the club with a normal, neutral grip and grip the club down the end of the grip
• position the ball in the middle of your stance
• have your feet about shoulder width apart
• angle your left foot out about 25-30 degrees and your right foot out by about 10-15 degrees
• align the club directly at where you want your ball to start
• have some flex in your knees
• position your hands so they are in front of the ball
• have your arms relatively straight
• align your shoulders, hips and knees all parallel to the starting line of your shot
• have about 60% of your weight on your left foot

OK, here is a picture summary of the pitching setup you should have….

So from a position like I’ve shown you above you’re ready to pitch. And to do this you must understand that unlike a chip shot, your hands start cocking as soon as you take the club away from the ball.

Also your hands should NOT be holding the club firm. They simply need to hold onto the club and cock the wrists. So as your backswing starts you should start to cock the wrists gradually. Now for a stock standard pitch shot you should only take the club back until the shaft is parallel with the ground.

And then you should follow-through until the clubshaft is vertical with the ground like this…

So that’s the stock standard pitch shot.

Once you’ve practiced that – and know the distances all your wedges fly on average then you should practice either a shorter or longer swing. Now I don’t recommend a lot shorter or a lot longer swing. Just a little bit….about a foot longer or shorter either side from the first pitch shot I’ve shown you.

OK, that’s the basics of pitching covered.  In the next part of this short game consistency series we’re going to look at distance wedges.

And I teach something called chip-putting but before I explain that I need to give you the definition of a chip shot. Because you’ve probably heard a variety of definitions on what constitutes a chip shot….but most of them are wrong. So here is the best definition of what a chip shot is…

Chip Shot Definition…a chip shot is a motion that is very close to the pendulum putting motion as it requires no independent wrist movement.

So a chip shot is not defined by how far the ball flies or rolls, but rather a chip shot is defined by the motion being very close to a pendulum putting action and it requiring no independent wrist movement. So if you are chipping the ball and you break your wrists then you have just hit a pitch…not a chip.

Now for chip and pitch shots I highly recommend you grip the club down the bottom of the grip.

Why?

It’s simple.  Just look at the way you hold a pen.  You don’t hold it at the top because by doing that you’d have very little control.  Instead you hold it down the bottom of the pen so you have more control.

And with short shots like a chip or a pitch you want full control of the clubhead.  You don’t need a lot of power, but more control.

So remember, for chip and pitch shots you should hold the club down the bottom of the grip.

Now the first shot I think you should learn is called a chip-putt.  And what this involves is setting up to a chip shot as though you are going to putt.  So you should use the same grip as you do when you’re putting. Here is a close-up of the putting grip I use to chip-putt with.

Now it’s important when you setup to chip-putt that you…

• align the club directly at where you want your ball to start
• have some flex in your knees
• position your hands so they are in front of the ball
• position your eyes directly over the ball
• have your arms relatively straight
• align your feet, knees, hips, shoulders all parallel to the starting line of your shot
• 55 – 60% of your weight is on your left foot

Once you are in a similar position to what I’ve explained above then you are ready to swing. Now to swing you need to understand that very little should be moving. And I want to go through the parts that should NOT be doing anything as you swing. So here are all the parts that should NOT be doing anything as you’re chip-putting…

• Feet – Nothing
• Ankles – Nothing
• Knees – Nothing
• Legs – Nothing
• Hips – Nothing
• Head – Nothing

All that should be moving to make the golf club move should be your shoulders, arms and wrists.

So to swing you simply have to concentrate on moving your shoulders, arms and wrists and keeping this triangle intact as you’re swinging. So there should NOT be any independent action from your hands. They should be dead.

Here is a picture sequence of swinging the club when chip-putting:

OK, here are a couple of other things that are VERY important.

1. Your follow-through should always be longer than your backswing.

Why?

Because this helps you to naturally accelerate through the ball. You don’t have to try and do it. If you swing through longer than you take the club back you’ll naturally accelerate through the ball.

2. At the end of every shot you should hold your finish until the ball has stopped moving. And while you’re holding your finish position you need to watch the ball and see the trajectory of the shot, distance traveled etc.

OK, so that’s all there is to chip-putting. Just swing your shoulders and arms keeping everything else still, and swing through longer than you did going back and hold your finish.

Now when you setup for a normal chip shot you should position the ball in the middle of your stance.  And your feet should be closer together than for chip-putting.  Also, your feet should be turned towards the target by about 25-30 degrees.  Here is a picture of the chipping setup needed:

Now at address you should still have some knee flex just like you did when chip-putting but you should stand taller than you did when chip-putting. But you don’t need to have your eyes directly over the ball when chipping.

You want the club face to be pointing straight at your target and you also want your wrists to be slightly bowed. To do this you may need to raise the club up so the heel of the club is off the ground. If so, do it. And don’t worry about it because you’ll be striking the ball first instead of the ground so it won’t make any difference as far as the contact is concerned. Also, you should grip the club with your putting grip. Finally, you should have about 60-65% of your weight on your front foot.

So it’s important when you setup to chip that you…

• grip the club with your putting grip
• align the club directly at where you want your ball to start
• have some flex in your knees
• position your hands so they are in front of the ball and bowed.
• have your arms relatively straight
• align your shoulders parallel to the starting line of your shot
• 60 – 65% of your weight is on your left foot

Like with the chip-putting action I explained, at setup you’ll notice there is a triangle relationship formed by your arms and shoulders.  So when chipping this relationship should stay intact as you’re swinging.  Also, your swing must be longer on the follow-through than it was on the backswing and you must hold the finish of your swing when you watch the ball flying and finishing.

OK, so that’s what you need to work on when chipping.  In the next part of this short game consistency and success series we’re going to look at pitching.  Make sure you come back to read that.