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I have found that when I recap a round of golf I realize that I could pick up several strokes a round if I could just chip better. I have found so many ways to miss the green that I have learned to hate the short game.
During the summer of 2006 Matt (I) took a series of lessons from Tim McElhinny (golf pro and proprietor at Painted Hills Golf Course).
After there first lesson Tim immediately realized that I was a 'feel' golfer and what was needed in my game was to develop a series of 'mechanics' to help create 'consistency' in my game!
First off let us define 'feel'. A feel golfer relies on instincts to control the golf shot. For example to make a 50 yard chip shot the amount of swing is dependent upon the amount of muscles used to make the shot. Tim immediately realized that I varied each shot depending upon the results from previous shots.
As a starting point Tim introduced what we will call the shot clock.
This is used to demonstrate the theory...the distance of the backswing MUST equal the distance of the follow through! For example if you swing the club back to 9:00 then the follow through MUST go to 3:00 and stop!
The following photo shows my starting position (before lessons) and the changes can be seen that coach Tim wants to make.
The first thing Tim changed was my stance. I stood with both feet parallel to the line of the swing. This was changed to an open position (left foot back half a step). The next change was the weight. I always spread my weight evenly on both feet. Tim said to put most of the weight on the left foot. This accomplished a couple of things. First, it keeps the body more still through the swing. Less movement during the swing helps to improve consistency! Secondly, weight on the left foot allows the me to hit 'down' on the ball which will create backspin and in turn make the ball stop quicker! A ball that stops quicker on chips is always a good thing! And lastly, after these changes were made my shoulders seemed much more level. The next photo shows these changes having been made.
Now that a theory has been put in place a whole lot of balls need to be hit to learn the new technique as well as to gather consistency and knowledge about how far each swing will hit a ball. After 7 days of hitting balls ranging from swings of 8:00 to 4:00, 9:00 to 3:00, and 10:00 to 2:00 on the clock seen above I started to develop some consistency not only in direction but also distance. For those of you who have practiced at the driving range at Painted Hills you know that there are 3 different 50 yard markers (one located in the middle of the range and one on each side of the range). If I hit balls from either the far left mats or the far right mats, then I found that an 8:00 to 4:00 swing hit a ball very close to the 50 yard marker directly in front on me. Then the middle 50 yard marker was the 9 to 3:00 swing and the far side marker was the 10:00 swing.
Finally, watching the video animation below another BONUS is realized when compared to the before video animation above: My head moves very little now, which again will contribute to more accurate shots. Gratefully, thanks to Coach Tim, I have a newfound technique that seems to show promise, but unfortunately, I have a whole lot of practicing to do to perfect it.