vj: Your thoughts on developing a great short game?
 

vj: I get the feeling that you are a bit of a Stan Utley short game guru on the quiet :D . Your putting advice has transformed my performance with the short stick and now I want to do the same thing with my short game. My short game is reasonable but this is down to lots of disorganised practice. I would like an insight how an organised professional golfer goes about training a great short game. I would like to see a specific programme of drills and tasks that develop distance control and touch and feel. I have read up a little on Stan Utley and see short game shots as mini full swing where I have the same kind of ball position as I do on full shots , swing on plane and plane is boss . Hit with a flat left wrist and have lag. This is for chips and pitches . I tend to hit the ball on line OK but my distance control is not up to what I want it to be. I am looking for a professional short game training regime to follow so that my practice is more organised and efficient. At the moment I just turn up on the course in the evenings and drop about 15 ProVs down in different situations or from the same spot and hit them towards the pin. The results are good if I am with it but if I am out of sorts the results can be erratic. I am looking for something a little more organised.vj, Yoda,Brian and others :I would very much like your thoughts on the points raised.

Great Topic!
 

This is a fantastic question IMO. We talk all this swing stuff which is great. But let's figure out how to get it in the hole.

Thanks for getting this one started.

:D

Let's look at the shots around the green. Setting into impact fix and moving number 1 (the right forearm back and through) is the hitting chip. Setting into impact fix and using pivot power (number 4) is the swinging chip. Different hinges can be used to control the layback of the face which in turn will gives us different trajectories and travel.

Now let's look at the cut-shot and the lob shot. Two separate shots outsided the chip or basic pitch which can be used for exaggerating high shots. The trouble is these high shots are needed more and more around modern day greens.

So work on these four shots independently. Separately on different days. Better yet someone pick a shot from the above and let's define them out component by component so our practice can be even more intense.

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By the way I teach the full swing all day long. At the very end of my playig mini's I Monday qualified for a tour event. "Take the blinders off" I told myself. "Let's really watch these guys and see what their ball is doing different than yours." I had played with this caliber player before but more as a performer than a researcher. So I sat back and watched and what I saw were nice "tight swings" with lower, boring ball flights in great balance. What I saw from my swing was a swing which lacked extensor action, a high ball flight, and good balance. So that started my journey to G.O.L.F.

I will do all I can to take Homer's work and put it into the short game.

Just a thought combining hue, VJ and Pelz (short game handicap from Pelz SGB):

How about defining a TGM shortgame protocol that also - in a way - determines TGM shortgame handicap?

Might basically be a list of different PP's, hinges & loadings combinations from a number of distances. Make up shots to cover the most common 75% of all shortgame shots you'll have in your life. The resulting score (as in Pels SGB) would be a TGM shortgame handicap.

Example:

1. Hit 10 #3PP "hit" chipshots from 15 ft. Get a score as in Pelz SGB.
2. Hit 10 #4PP "swing" chipshots from 25 ft. Get a score as in Pelz SGB.
3. Hit 10 ...... from 20 ft over a bunker to a tight pin
etc

Now if you are able to make up & down (i.e. within 3 ft) on some 50% of those shots you should have a a scratch TGM shortgame hcp. Or something like that. Must re-read Pelz to look up some numbers.

Ask me and its a brilliant idea.

Now tear me apart 8)

VJ,

Thanks. Could we start with the Hitting Chip and Pitch? Particularly as it relates to distance control?

Thanks!

B

I would love to see a video demonstration of the shots vj describes on the "LBG Classic Movies" section.

I'll line up eagerly at second and hope for a lob shot discussion :)

My advice....

learn to SWING chips/pitches first focussing on that karate chop motion into the back of the ball and making sure you hit DOWN.

Master than, then i'd suggest moving on to a hitting type chip/pitch.

I'll see if i can copy/paste the chipping lesson i gave someone through a PM a while ago.

Jim : Do you see the swinging chip as a pivot motion and the hitting chip as a zero pivot motion hand and arm shot?

Jim,
I wish I had kept the PMs you sent me awhile back. I know I started with the swingers pitching motion for awhile. When I started see good results and gained in confidence, I switched to a hitters motion (right forarm back and through) The results have been great, I get up and down much more often and have alot better distance control in chipping. This I contribute to using extensor action to control distance and also the addition of two new eidolon wedges. Thanks again for the great tips Jim.