How to Improve Your Chipping Around the Green

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Transcript Summary-

In this video, I’m going to show you how to consistently improve your chip shots around the green by starting with a basic technique and then adjusting it for different situations. Whether your ball is nestled in the rough, or you need a high shot that lands softly, I’ll walk you through the small tweaks that make all the difference.

We’ll start with the basics. For a simple chip shot, set up like you're putting—ball just ahead of center, stance about a club-width apart, and a slight forward shaft lean. The key is coordination—your arms, body, and club should all move together like in a putting stroke. Aim to bruise the ground with the base of the club. This setup will help you strike the ball cleanly and pop it up nicely.

From here, we can adjust for different lies. If the ball is in a depression or thick rough, move the ball back in your stance, lean the shaft toward your lead armpit, and strike with the front of the club to avoid fat or thin shots.

For a higher shot with more loft, move the ball forward in your stance, add wrist hinge, and let the club drop under the ball for a clean, high shot. I’ll also share a live lesson where a student masters this technique, landing an amazing backspin shot.

If you're new, consider subscribing, and as always, check the description for a free practice guide to reinforce what you’ve learned. See you next week!

Full Transcript- so how do you improve your chip shots around the green you need to make sure that you have first of all a really good simple basic technique but chip shots are different you sometimes your ball's nestled in the rough and you need to get it out of that rough sometimes you need a higher shot that floats and lands Softly on the green sometimes you need a chip and run what do you change in your Technique to make those shots happen consistently in this video I'm going to show uh show you first of all a real basic technique that works every time but I'm Al going to show you how you alter it slightly to create a whole variety of different shots to make you a really great chipper I'm even going to bring in one of my live lessons to show you how he played this an amazing beautiful Back Spin shot at the end of the video but before I do look if if you're new to the channel your first lessons of mine please consider subscribing I these videos like this every single week to try and help you improve your game plus as always you never have to remember a thing I'll always put a free download or practice guide in the description box below

okay so this is the basic Chip Shot I'm going to take you through the entire process so what I take my students through every single time they start struggling with their chip shots the first thing I do is I want them to create a consistent strike so I look at their setup and I look I ask myself are they coordinating the arms club and body together on the way through most of the time if you are struggling with your strike the chances are you've got your knees going your arms are moving over here here there's some yipp going on right I want to get rid of all of that really simply in Step number one so we start with a great setup now that looks like this ball position is just ahead of Center my stance width is just look a club width apart now this is really important for a basic shot I want you to be almost puttting what call puttting with Loft so I get myself into a putting stance where I get the club nice and vertical so the heel of that club is off the ground again in a nice and close here let my arms relax down the shaft is just slightly forward it's not neutral it's slightly forward here my shoulders very very important a fairly level a lot of times when people are are chipping to start with they've got too much excessive Trail shoulder down this creates fats and thins so I get myself very very level simple way to achieve this would be to put my lead hand below my my trail hand then I grip it almost like a putting action just like this my weight is favoring my front foot just slightly and then really this is the ount thing once you've done that once you've kind of got that sensation come and have a look at this I want you on the basic Chip Shot here to get this bit hitting the ground bruising the ground not this bit or this front bit for now just this bit for a basic Chip Shot so I'm getting and I'm making some swings where I'm feeling feeling the base of the club bruising the ground no that would be the front of the club this would be look the back of the club I'm getting the base of the club but as I'm doing this remember I said putting I'm looking at my players and I'm saying are you coordinating this just like putting so notice how as I'm swinging here my hands arms moving my body's moving slightly here and it's going with the club I'm not independently using my wrists I'm not independently using my arms everything look he just putting working on a simple AR backwards and forwards as I extend to the golf ball making sure my club is clean all I'm going to do is make a very simple look putting action and you see how that ball pops up beautifully in the air and almost into the hole now I'm using a 56° sandwich but you don't need to I just want to show you if you use the club correctly that ball will beautifully pop up with no effort whatsoever with simple putting struck now what you could do if you wanted you might feel oh that's a bit scary Landing it all the way there so what you could do instead is grab yourself maybe a pitching wedge or something with slightly less Loft and land it much closer onto the front of the green and this time it will more it will add more roll to the ball so no changing setup whatsoever get myself into the putting stands heel slightly off the ground make some swings feeling the base of the club bruising the ground and I'm making sure that my body's lovely and coordinated I'm not stopping like this and moving that body beautifully

through and you'll see here look at the difference in the roll there that pitching where is rolled up a little bit more it's not landing and stopping yeah so that is the basic chat it's so simple isn't it so once you've got that and you're starting to coordinate the body we can now move on to some slightly tougher shots around the green so here's a typical place where many of my students get unstuck here we have a perfect lie just off the Fairway but look boom now what's happened it's nestled down look into kind of an indentation if you use this the same technique that you've used off the Fairway this is risking a fat or at worse a real thin over the back of the green you need to make some alterations and where we use look the middle section of this golf club what we're now going to do when the balls Nestle down a little bit we're now going to use the front part of this golf club to strike that ball first we don't want any ground interaction um behind that golf ball and the way we do this really simply look at this I'm now moving the ball so now it's gone from just ahead of center now to my back of my stance simple right I'm going to put the club Behind the golf ball I'm now going to move the shaft so it's now pointing just at my armpit here this is getting look the front edge front part of that club now on the ground I'm going to do the same thing as we did before all I'm going to do from here look is make a pudding motion without changing anything keeping that body lovely and coord at I'm not actively going to try and hit down on it I've already achieved that in setup and it looks something like

this and this should release a little bit more because it's coming out that hole but again super simple from a very quite difficult little shot there with just a simple changing setup and using put with Loft suddenly what we've created is a very very consistent technique so we cut that last scene short and army your green Keepers Came Upon Us but I want to show you this sh this is a real typical one but balls nestled down here no green to work with you've got to get height what changes do you now need to make well super simple we started in a putting situation here with the shafts uh very vertical we're going to gradually now move it a bit closer to us this is one way you add Loft to your clubs by the way the other thing we're going to do we're going to move the ball position right off our front heel now okay and we're still going to keep that beautiful coordination of the body going backwards and forwards that's really important but now what we're going to do we're going to add some wrists to this and the wrists are going to add Loft this is important they're going to add Loft but they're also going to add a slightly steeper angle attack to the shot now the way we do this is this we're going to let add the Loft in there so it's just a small little hinge here with both the lead hand and the trail hand there I've just added look Loft this would be incorrect I'm just adding Loft that gives me the motion then all I'm going to do is let the club beautifully flow and drop it back down to where it came from from look and then pick up the motion and the idea here is that what you're doing is is we've used the base of the club we've used the front part of the club and now what you're doing you're using the back of the club to really Loft this ball up in the air so we start from a putting stance we're going to get slightly further away we're going to keep the ball forther forward in our stance here we're going to add the Loft to the golf club here and then we're going to get the sense that the back of the club is just dropping on that ball so go to the ball here nice and relaxed pop it out there look and hey prestor ball pops up within a couple of feet super super simple so I'm going to show you now bring you in on a very very quick lesson with caros who is really struggling with this beautiful lofted shot I'm I'm sure you're going to love it the matter so what I want you to do here is this I don't want you to try and get up in the air okay your job is simply this you've already got the club that's going to get up in the air if your job is to see if you can bring that club back down the simp so right at the same place right underneath that golf ball when it come down here look I mean I like to use from this one here I might use the bit of the fish's tail here look get the fish's tail working and then look at my body I I finish it off I'll show you here so back here

back and through comfortably look over the bag yeah it's not it's just it's it's should be a very straightforward shot there's no grass underneath the golf ball it's just purely about your ability to bring that club back to the base of the ball good okay so help

me just like that so did that ball go over the bunker no so it's gone high but what's what stopped it going over the bunker that I was beneath the ball and well let's let's pause did you strike it no did the ball go high yes yes did it get enough height to go over the bunker yes yes so what was lacking a longer a longer a longer just a longer power power that's it so if you go in the bunker now a lot of people go oh you know the technique's good bad it's going in the bunker well the reality is you just need to swing longer okay or what's the other way of getting extra distance it's the swing longer or have less Loft less Loft yeah so your choice so if you want to if you want to Del so I believe there you delivered more Loft onto that onto the ball than I did so you delivered there I probably delivered about 60 you delivered maybe you were probably about here okay and therefore the ball went a little bit higher and landed softer okay now with that if that impact if you want to do that impact no problem but you've got to swing a lot longer okay okay if you want to swing shorter and still get it of the bunker you've got to have more of this impact where there's now less Loft okay so you hit higher in the ball the ball's going to go further okay okay so you can choose which you want to do a longer swing or less

Loft that is a typical slotki shot yeah yeah brilliant right so so so that's a that you saiding that's a typical shot isn't it right yes okay no problem so here's the thing what I want you to do on this one now is this when you're here okay that one there was very much rushed right it's very short on this one here just swing even longer I want to see this club coming up here okay because when what you'll do is is you'll be able to just let it go when it's short okay you have to force it yeah so let's swing on this next one do you guys swing back for me yes okay pause there that's it I want to get up here okay nice and high cuz then you've got the energy look just to let it drop back down again okay and you're returning it look you're back here you just return it back to there look okay there you go and then from here look off you go okay yeah so the club's going to swing longer here and then you simply return it back to where it started with the with the Loft on the club and where you go okay yeah lovely that already looks a thousand times better there you go there we go makes sense yes makes sense a lot of sense right there we go go on go in the hole go in the hole oh amazing how's that feeling I would never dare to do that why because I would think that with a long such a long I'm going to put the ball in the forest because I don't have the trust that I'm going to go beneath well everything you have explained no yeah yeah and and you do you do and at the end of the day you've got lost in your hands it's not going to go very far if you hit beneath the ball yes yeah you're doing a really good job with that and your shots going over the bag here were brilliant they just weren't long enough yes yeah so I hope this is going to help your chip shots around the grid if you'd love to see or learn how to play bunker shots too check this video out right here of course if you enjoy this one give it a thumbs up share it with a friend and if you're new to the channel press that subscribe button and the Bell I'll put a free download practice guide in the description box below until next week have a wonderful golfing week.