Better golf 3 of 8: Chipping in the garden
20 min Calm
One club, one landing spot, twenty minutes. Chipping is a small swing done with intent, and you can learn it on any patch of grass.
Een chip is geen afgeslagen slag maar een gestuurde stuitering: de bal landt op een plek, rolt verder, en als die landing klopt, klopt de rest ook. De meeste golfers ontdekken dat ze jarenlang hebben gezocht naar gevoel in de swing zelf, terwijl het gevoel eigenlijk zit in het kiezen van een stipje op het gras, twee meter voor de pin. Dat stipje is het enige wat telt op het moment van raken. De swing is al klaar voor je de bal ziet bewegen.
In de tuin, met een handdoek op drie meter, wordt dat abstract idee plotseling heel concreet. Je ziet meteen of de bal te ver vliegt, te vroeg stuitert, of precies rolt zoals je het voor je zag. Twintig minuten met één club leren je meer dan een uur op de baan, omdat je het patroon zelf terug kunt brengen naar de volgende slag.
Put a towel three metres away. Chip ten balls with a pitching wedge, ball back in the stance, weight left, hands ahead.
Suggestion: The towel is the landing spot, not the target.Move the towel to six metres. Same swing, slightly longer.
Suggestion: Let the loft do the work. No scooping.Change club: a 9 iron to the same towel. Watch how much further the ball runs.
Suggestion: Write down the run-out per club.Ten chips with your eyes on the landing spot until the ball lands.
Suggestion: Trust the swing, watch the flight.Pick the club you trusted most. That is your go-to chip for the course.
Suggestion: One reliable shot beats five okay ones.Next
Better golf 4 of 8: A driving range session with a plan
Related playbooks
Better golf 7 of 8: The mental game between shots
Four hours on the course is mostly walking. What you do with your head between shots decides how you swing on the next one.
Better golf 5 of 8: Course management on paper
Take strokes off without touching a club. Plan your home course hole by hole: where to miss, when to lay up, which tee shot is not the driver.
Better golf 2 of 8: Putting on the carpet
The putter is the club you use most. Ten minutes of short putts at home, every evening, does more for your score than a bucket of drivers.
Better golf 1 of 8: Grip and setup in the mirror
Most bad shots start before the club moves. Fifteen minutes in front of a mirror to fix grip, posture and ball position.
Better coffee 6 of 6: Your house coffee
Settle it: one coffee, one recipe, one way of buying. Then you can stop thinking about coffee and just drink good coffee.
Better golf 8 of 8: A practice round with a scorecard that counts something else
Play nine or eighteen holes and score fairways, greens and putts instead of strokes. The numbers tell you what to practise next.
Better golf 6 of 8: Bunker and short game hour
Thirty minutes in the practice bunker and around the chipping green. Sand stops being scary when you hit it on purpose.
Better golf 4 of 8: A driving range session with a plan
A bucket of balls without a plan is exercise. With a plan it is practice. One hour, sixty balls, four blocks.
Better coffee 3 of 6: Espresso at home without the frustration
If you have an espresso machine, most bad shots are grind and dose. A method to get to a good shot in five tries instead of fifty.
by PlayTryBe team