Chipping Fundamentals For New Golfers: The Swing

A good grasp of the fundamentals is crucial for hitting any shot, more particularly, the chips. This fact is overlooked by new golfers, who are only too eager to hit long and powerful drives. Research shows that on average, a player will hit less than 50 percent of the GIR (Greens in Regulation). This makes the ability to hit accurate chips a valuable skill to learn. Here, in this article, we discuss the ‘swing’ – one of the vital components of chipping.

Before getting into the nuances of swing, a brief look at the setup would help you understand how the mechanics of chipping works. Place the ball closer to the back leg, this enables the impact to take place as the clubs comes down, and the stance you take must be narrow – just 3-4 inches gap between the feet. The body should be aligned left of the target, and the make sure the club face is square of the target. To encourage the downward stroke (i.e.) hitting the ball before the club gets to the lowest point of the swing arc, transfer your body weight slightly to the front foot. The grip must be neither too tense not too light; the hold must be an inch or two from the top of the club.

he Swing

• As mentioned above it is imperative that the weight shift to the front foot is not too much, the transfer must be very little, just enough to help you with the downward stroke and acceleration through impact.
• The swing arc that is created during the chip shot must have more or all arm and no wrist action. The wrist work is not needed because with chipping you don’t need the higher flight and spin like that of pitch shots. The position of the wrist (i.e.) the hinge that you make at the setup must be maintained throughout the swing.
• By maintaining the pivot all through the swing, the body helps the clubhead with rotation. This makes it very easy to hit chips of different distance with minimal change to your stance and setup.
• Make sure that the length of the follow through is the same as that of the backswing. Similarly, the club head must never breach the height of the hands.
• Again, the swing must be short and the follow through of similar length. If the chipping swing is long, there is good chance of deceleration of club and loss of spine angle.