3 min
3 Simple Keys to Improve Your Chipping
2 min
Fat chips. Thin chips. If those are showing up in your game, the problem almost certainly starts before the swing.
Jason Baile breaks it down to three things that most golfers get wrong around the greens - and none of them are what most players expect to hear.
The first is setup. Ball back, weight forward, handle forward - most golfers have been taught all three of those things. But you can do all three and still have your sternum sitting behind the golf ball. That is where fat and thin shots come from. The fix is simple - turn to the left as if someone said hello and you wanted to wave back, then bow over the ball. Sternum ahead of the ball. Everything else follows.
The second is handle travel. A handle that goes too far back in the backswing has a long way to return to the ball, and most players release early to compensate. The result is contact with the ground before the ball. Keep the handle close to the body in a tight hub around the swing center and that problem disappears.
The third is the most counterintuitive - standing up through the shot. Most golfers who struggle with fat and thin contact tries to stay down on the ball. That is exactly the wrong instinct. As the club moves back it wants to move down. The way to counteract that is to stand up and turn toward the target through impact, letting the club exit the ground naturally rather than digging into it.
Jason Baile breaks it down to three things that most golfers get wrong around the greens - and none of them are what most players expect to hear.
The first is setup. Ball back, weight forward, handle forward - most golfers have been taught all three of those things. But you can do all three and still have your sternum sitting behind the golf ball. That is where fat and thin shots come from. The fix is simple - turn to the left as if someone said hello and you wanted to wave back, then bow over the ball. Sternum ahead of the ball. Everything else follows.
The second is handle travel. A handle that goes too far back in the backswing has a long way to return to the ball, and most players release early to compensate. The result is contact with the ground before the ball. Keep the handle close to the body in a tight hub around the swing center and that problem disappears.
The third is the most counterintuitive - standing up through the shot. Most golfers who struggle with fat and thin contact tries to stay down on the ball. That is exactly the wrong instinct. As the club moves back it wants to move down. The way to counteract that is to stand up and turn toward the target through impact, letting the club exit the ground naturally rather than digging into it.
