Beginner Golf Chipping: What is Chipping? (Video) - by Pete Styles
Beginner Golf Chipping: What is Chipping? (Video) - by Pete Styles

Chipping, similar to pitching, describes a shot that doesn’t go full distance, but chipping is an even shorter version, so I’ve got my full shots, I’ve got my pitch shots, this is now a proper chip shot.

It would happen when I’m quite close to the edge of the green and it would happen when I just need to lift the golf ball over the edge of an object or over the edge of a longer grass onto a green and then roll it down towards the hole.

So, if I’m just to the side of green near a bunker, chip the ball on and let it roll out towards the hole. I would stand really close to together with my feet, even narrow than I might do for a pitch. I would still have the ball in the center of my feet. I would still grip down at the bottom of the golf to ride down towards the base even having one finger onto the metal when you are chipping gives you a lot more control and a lot less power.

I’d now encourage you to actually lean your body weight slightly more into your left-hand side as well for the right-handed golfer. You lean onto that front leg that would encourage you to help hitting down onto the golf ball to actually get a really good clean contact. So, now with my feet down the grip quite near to the golf ball as well, leaning on to my left-hand side and then a very short back and a very shot through swing, and I modify the lengths of my back and my through swing depending on how far I want the golf ball to go; so my swing would vary in height. It would be a chip, a pitch or a full swing, but anyway, in-between those areas, you know, all needs to be fairly transitional, there’s not three different shots and three different distances, so some people get a bit confused between well, was that a chip, was that a pitch, was that a full swing, think about them as very transitional things.

You don’t need to have chip, pitch and full swing too logged in your head. As you get further back from the green, your stance would widen, your grip would come up, your swing would get a bit longer. If you can learn the three basic swings, but then learn to transition them so they are all blending together. Chipping, pitching and full swinging and I hope that works on your game too.

 2012-08-01

Chipping, similar to pitching, describes a shot that doesn’t go full distance, but chipping is an even shorter version, so I’ve got my full shots, I’ve got my pitch shots, this is now a proper chip shot.

It would happen when I’m quite close to the edge of the green and it would happen when I just need to lift the golf ball over the edge of an object or over the edge of a longer grass onto a green and then roll it down towards the hole.

So, if I’m just to the side of green near a bunker, chip the ball on and let it roll out towards the hole. I would stand really close to together with my feet, even narrow than I might do for a pitch. I would still have the ball in the center of my feet. I would still grip down at the bottom of the golf to ride down towards the base even having one finger onto the metal when you are chipping gives you a lot more control and a lot less power.

I’d now encourage you to actually lean your body weight slightly more into your left-hand side as well for the right-handed golfer. You lean onto that front leg that would encourage you to help hitting down onto the golf ball to actually get a really good clean contact. So, now with my feet down the grip quite near to the golf ball as well, leaning on to my left-hand side and then a very short back and a very shot through swing, and I modify the lengths of my back and my through swing depending on how far I want the golf ball to go; so my swing would vary in height. It would be a chip, a pitch or a full swing, but anyway, in-between those areas, you know, all needs to be fairly transitional, there’s not three different shots and three different distances, so some people get a bit confused between well, was that a chip, was that a pitch, was that a full swing, think about them as very transitional things.

You don’t need to have chip, pitch and full swing too logged in your head. As you get further back from the green, your stance would widen, your grip would come up, your swing would get a bit longer. If you can learn the three basic swings, but then learn to transition them so they are all blending together. Chipping, pitching and full swinging and I hope that works on your game too.