Stop Chunking and Skulling Your Chip Shots

Your Action Plan: Utilizing Bounce and Weight

What: Commit your weight to the lead (front) foot and maintain a smooth, rhythmic tempo that allows the club’s bounce to glide through the ground, rather than trying to lift the ball.

Why: Setting up with weight on the back foot encourages the club to miss the ground, leading to poor contact (chunky or skulled shots). By establishing your weight forward, you ensure the club makes solid contact with the turf before the ball, utilizing the bounce for a clean strike.

How to Execute the Chip:

Use a tempo where the follow-through is actually smaller than the backswing. This shows that you are relaxing through impact and not pushing the club, allowing the weight of the club to strike the ground.

Forward Weight Setup: Place almost all your weight onto your lead foot (left foot for right-handers) and stay there throughout the entire swing.

Strike the Ground: You must allow the club to strike the ground properly. When done correctly, the club won’t dig but will glide right through because of the bounce.

The Swing Motion:

Maintain a solid right wrist/fist (for right-handers) to prevent excessive hand action.

Focus on a nice turn of the body, keeping your rhythm and tempo smooth.

Tempo and Finish:

Avoid the common error of aggressively “pushing” the club through the ball to avoid deceleration.