SHORT GAME
1
Maintaining your arm structure is the key to consistency – the extension of the arms with the little triangle that gets created. Your grip pressure should be fairly light – about 5/10 (10 being strong) – because you want to feel the weight of the clubhead swinging through the ball. Also, try using a pitching wedge or gap wedge as your stock club.
Basic chip Chip the stick drill
This drill is really effective in helping you to better understand the basic chipping technique that’s required. Plus, it’ll help improve your strike. Put an alignment stick in front of you – the idea is to ‘chip’ the end of it. You should get used to feeling how the sole of the club has to just brush the ground for you to make contact with the alignment stick and get it up in the air. If it doesn’t flick up, something hasn’t been right.
2
I’d encourage you to think of this shot more along the lines of ‘hip height to hip height’ – a half-type swing with the body rotating through and the hands finishing a fraction past hip height. One of the most common mistakes I see is players trying to hit the ball too hard, or the ‘scooper’, who attempts to lift the ball in the air. Let the loft of the club – I’d generally use more loft here compared with the 100-yard pitch – do the work.
60-yard pitch 3 100-yard pitch
...and curtail your follow-through
Although it depends on how far you hit your clubs, I’d generally recommend that you don’t play these as full shots. Take one club extra and make a three-quarter backswing and three-quarter follow-through. Your stance should be slightly narrower than shoulder-width, perhaps 12 to 18 inches apart with your heels. You want the pressure to stay that little bit left to encourage a slightly downward angle of attack. Be mindful not to move your centre away, which is a common fault and results in the swing bottoming out before the ball.