By Keely Levins

When you’re practicing your short game, are you just dropping a bunch of balls and hitting the same chip, with the same club, over and over? Be honest—a lot of people do it. But what it leads to on-course is you just grabbing that trusty club and trying to make it work for whatever shot you may have. Golf Digest’s Chief Digital Instructor Michael Breed says it’s not the right tactic. “Limiting yourself to one technique around the greens won’t lead you to success,” says Breed.

Instead, put your focus on evaluating the situation at hand. Ask yourself a few basic questions: How far do I want the ball to fly? How far do I want the ball to run out? How fast is the green?

If you have a ways to hit it and a lot of green to work with, Breed says to grab a mid-iron, like your 7-iron. Use a smaller swing and let the ball come out low and run. This type of shot will lead to a lot more success than grabbing that 56-degree wedge you love so much, taking a half-swing at it and trying to get it to fly and stop near the hole.

If there isn’t much between you and the green, you’re going to need to hit a shot that goes higher than the bump-and-run, and that lands softly. Breed has a few moves that make this scary shot easy: First, open the clubface — it’ll get you more loft and launch the ball with more trajectory. Next, stand farther away from the ball than you usually would. This will help you get it up in the air. And finally, as you come into impact, the handle swings through staying close to your lead thigh as the clubhead whizzes by and hits the ball.

These tips are just a small part of a larger video series hosted by Breed called Michael Breed’s Playbook which you can access here. There are three lessons in the series, covering how you should practice your driving, your short game, and putting so that when you’re on the course, you’re ready to find the fairway, knock it close and make the putt.

Originally published by Golf Digest

Golf Digest

Fix Your Grip By the Weekend

By Matthew Rudy

Fundamentals are called fundamentals because if you get them wrong you’ll have a hard time hitting good shots.

The grip might be the most basic fundamental–it’s the only link between you and the club–but it’s the one thing many players get totally wrong.

There are plenty of elaborate descriptions about how to put your hands on the club, but top New York teacher Michael Jacobs uses a simple comparison familiar to almost everybody to get his students doing it right.

“Stick out your left hand and hold the club like you would a heavy suitcase,” says Jacobs, whose new book, Elements of the Swing, was released last week. “If you picked up a suitcase, you wouldn’t take the handle diagonally across your palm. You’d let it rest in the creases of your fingers where they attach to your palm.”

Next, add your right hand to the grip slightly palm up, running the handle along the top crease in your palm and curling your fingers around the underside. You can rest the little finger of your right hand either on the left forefinger or in the channel between the forefinger and middle finger, or interlock the little finger and forefinger together, Jacobs says. Using a ten-finger grip, with all ten fingers on the handle, isn’t as common, but that works just fine as well.

“Not every ‘classic’ golf tip you hear is necessarily still relevant now, but this one is still true–there’s no reason not to have a great grip,” says Jacobs, who is based at Rock Hill Country Club in Long Island. “If you start with a bad one, you’re going to have to make compensations in your swing from the beginning. You want to be able to transmit the force you create with your body as efficiently as possible to the clubhead, and a good grip is an important part of that.”

Originally published by Golf Digest

Golf Digest

5 quick tips to conquering the downhill chip

By David Leadbetter

Usually the area around a green is level with or lower than the putting surface. But sometimes you’ll find your ball on a mound near the green, leaving you with a downhill chip. Sure, it was a lucky break that the hill kept your ball within chipping distance. But now what? This atypical lie presents a challenge for a lot of golfers, because it drastically reduces the chance of popping the ball up and landing it softly on the green—especially if you have a tendency to try to help the ball in the air with a scooping, wristy action. You need to make some adjustments to pull off this shot.

First, you can’t afford to make contact with the ground behind the ball, or you’ll blade it across the green. So play the ball slightly back of center in your stance. Another thing that will help you make ball-first contact is to lean the handle a little toward the green, so your hands are closer to the flag than the clubhead. I also recommend gripping down on the club—your most lofted wedge—for more control.

Next, the way you swing is important, too. Maintain flex in your knees throughout the swing (above). Remember to keep the shaft leaning forward through impact and abbreviate the follow-through. A time-honored swing thought for this shot is to swing down the slope with the clubhead.

All of this might seem like a lot to remember, so boil it down like this: Ball back, hands ahead, and swing down the slope. Do that, and you’ll get just enough loft on the ball to stop it near the hole. — with Ron Kaspriske

Originally published by Golf Digest