Correct Fat or Thin Chip Shots - Senior Golf Tip (Video) - by Dean Butler
Correct Fat or Thin Chip Shots - Senior Golf Tip (Video) - by Dean Butler

Okay. What we’re going to talk about here is chip shots, expression is to chip and run, a chip. What is a chip? A chip is basically were we want to lift the ball over some sort of rough terrain, land it down on the green and let it run up to the hole. So, this sort of chip and run is basically play from 20 yard, 20 yard up the green and in towards it, slight little angulations. This is where we use most probably…I use an 8-iron for this shot, but you can use a 7-iron, 8-iron, even a 9-iron can play chip and run. This is the club that we actually select to play this and the technique is very, very similar to that of a putt, but what I want to do first of all is just basically give you a few sort of common faults that actually happen with the chip.

What people tend to so, the two bad shots, is they tend to thin the ball. Thin the ball is where the club actually meets the ball halfway up. So, if you kind of think about it, it’s quite logical. There is the ball, I hit it halfway up and the ball will go at a low trajectory, not much control, the ball is rolling all the time. If I catch it fats, I’m catching the ground far, far too far behind the ball and by the time the club reaches the ball it has taken a big chunky divot, it’s decelerating and we tend to kind of flock the ball well short of the green, so it’s completely different sort of things there, but those are the most two common faults in chipping. So, how do we chip? Well, select the club that you’re comfortable with first of all, 7, 8, 9, whatever you feel good with.

Now, we want the ball to stay quite low, so let’s put the ball now just behind center, not in the center, just behind center, put the club down behind the ball, put your hand slightly forward and what I want you to do here is just look at my arm position. It’s like the letter Y. If you look at the letter by your arms and the club, that’s a letter Y and I want you to try and keep that letter Y throughout the swing and the swing is very short, just like a putting swing. So, if I keep my arms in the letter Y and I just swing the club like this, there is the letter Y, there is the letter Y and to keep that letter Y you think how do I do that? Focus on swinging from your shoulders. If I swing from the shoulders, backwards and forwards, you can see there is no wrist activity and on the chip and run there shouldn’t be any wrist activity at all.

The wrist should be very, very silent. It should almost be switched off. The wrist activity will encourage it to get flimsy, scooping it. We don’t what that. This is a chip and run. So, put the back in your stance, put the weight 60-40 on your left-hand side, put your hands forward and from here we want to let the shoulders go back, back and forward. The ball just jumps up in the air and now starts to release up towards that hole and that’s how you play a chip and run. It couldn’t be any easier. It is no different to having a putter in your hand when you’re over that ball and the same thing, shoulders. It’s the same technique. The shoulders are actually swinging the club. And when the shoulder has taken the club away, is keeping the club nice and low to the ground and then when the club comes back, whatever the lot is that you selected, just throws the ball just up over that sort of rough terrain onto the green and then it releases. That’s the very easy way of actually playing a chip shot.

 2013-08-06

Okay. What we’re going to talk about here is chip shots, expression is to chip and run, a chip. What is a chip? A chip is basically were we want to lift the ball over some sort of rough terrain, land it down on the green and let it run up to the hole. So, this sort of chip and run is basically play from 20 yard, 20 yard up the green and in towards it, slight little angulations. This is where we use most probably…I use an 8-iron for this shot, but you can use a 7-iron, 8-iron, even a 9-iron can play chip and run. This is the club that we actually select to play this and the technique is very, very similar to that of a putt, but what I want to do first of all is just basically give you a few sort of common faults that actually happen with the chip.

What people tend to so, the two bad shots, is they tend to thin the ball. Thin the ball is where the club actually meets the ball halfway up. So, if you kind of think about it, it’s quite logical. There is the ball, I hit it halfway up and the ball will go at a low trajectory, not much control, the ball is rolling all the time. If I catch it fats, I’m catching the ground far, far too far behind the ball and by the time the club reaches the ball it has taken a big chunky divot, it’s decelerating and we tend to kind of flock the ball well short of the green, so it’s completely different sort of things there, but those are the most two common faults in chipping. So, how do we chip? Well, select the club that you’re comfortable with first of all, 7, 8, 9, whatever you feel good with.

Now, we want the ball to stay quite low, so let’s put the ball now just behind center, not in the center, just behind center, put the club down behind the ball, put your hand slightly forward and what I want you to do here is just look at my arm position. It’s like the letter Y. If you look at the letter by your arms and the club, that’s a letter Y and I want you to try and keep that letter Y throughout the swing and the swing is very short, just like a putting swing. So, if I keep my arms in the letter Y and I just swing the club like this, there is the letter Y, there is the letter Y and to keep that letter Y you think how do I do that? Focus on swinging from your shoulders. If I swing from the shoulders, backwards and forwards, you can see there is no wrist activity and on the chip and run there shouldn’t be any wrist activity at all.

The wrist should be very, very silent. It should almost be switched off. The wrist activity will encourage it to get flimsy, scooping it. We don’t what that. This is a chip and run. So, put the back in your stance, put the weight 60-40 on your left-hand side, put your hands forward and from here we want to let the shoulders go back, back and forward. The ball just jumps up in the air and now starts to release up towards that hole and that’s how you play a chip and run. It couldn’t be any easier. It is no different to having a putter in your hand when you’re over that ball and the same thing, shoulders. It’s the same technique. The shoulders are actually swinging the club. And when the shoulder has taken the club away, is keeping the club nice and low to the ground and then when the club comes back, whatever the lot is that you selected, just throws the ball just up over that sort of rough terrain onto the green and then it releases. That’s the very easy way of actually playing a chip shot.