The Secret To Chipping No One Is Teaching You

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Transcript Summary- I came across a really fascinating stat from Shot Scope this week. It said that if the average golfer improves their tee-to-green game by 10%, they only shave off about 0.02 shots. But if they improve their short game—within 50 yards of the green—by just 10%, they can take off 4.9 shots! That’s a huge difference. It just shows how important it is to understand how to play chip shots around the green.

Now, this week I had Mike come and see me, and honestly, his chipping was a bit of a disaster. Full of anxiety, stress, and frustration. You might’ve seen this before—fatting shots, thinning shots, and just not knowing what to do. All he wanted was a technique he could trust. Something reliable that would guarantee clean contact, so he could actually start enjoying this part of the game again.

So I introduced Mike to a concept I actually got from a friend of mine, Joe Mayo. Now I’ve always been confident helping people with their short game, but since Joe showed me this, the speed at which my students improve has gone through the roof. It’s honestly brilliant, and I can’t wait to share it with you.

Before I show you the technique, though, there are two key things you need to understand about chipping. First, for most chip shots, you want a descending blow—you want to hit the ball first, not the ground behind it. That means the bottom of your swing arc needs to be after the golf ball. Second, you’ve got to control how deep that arc goes into the ground. If you go too deep, you’ll start fatting it. So if we can control where the arc bottoms out—and how deep it goes—you’re going to be a far better chipper.

The first step is setup. Most people stand way too far from the golf ball. I like to get much closer. This reduces the wrist angle and helps stop the club from digging too deep. I also raise the hands a little and move the ball back in the stance. Some people say that’s old-fashioned, but trust me—it works. Then I get the handle forward, and I make sure your nose is ahead of the golf ball. All of this shifts the bottom of the swing arc forward, making clean, ball-first contact so much easier.

Now, here’s the magic move—Joe’s concept that really changed the game for me. I want you to tilt your body slightly toward the target, like you’re crunching your love handles. This naturally gets the club working up the right plane—like a ferris wheel rather than a merry-go-round. From there, just let the club drop back down to the ball. A great swing image here is to keep your thumbs pointing down throughout. That keeps the wrists quiet and avoids adding loft or flipping at the ball.

Once Mike started practicing this slowly, he saw a huge improvement in strike—clean, consistent contact every time. After about 30 minutes, his short game had completely turned around. He even asked me, “What if I need more elevation?” Great question. All you do is move the ball slightly forward in your stance and maybe open the face a touch. But everything else stays the same—keep the thumbs down, crunch the love handles, and trust the strike.

Look, if you’re struggling with chipping, I promise you this will help. Start small, build up the motion, and you’ll gain confidence in no time. Huge thanks again to Joe for this one—go give it a go, and let me know how you get on. And if you want to take this into pitching—those slightly longer 30 to 80-yard shots—check out the next video right here. Don’t forget to grab the free downloadable guide in the description. Until next week, have a great golfing week!

Full Transcript- I got a really interesting stat from Shot Scope this week that said "Look it for the average golfer if you improve your Tee to green game by 10% you will improve your score by only 0.02 shots but if you improve your short game within 50 yards of the green by 10% you'll knock off a whopping 4.9 shots off your score that is how important understanding how to play chip shots around the greens is." Now this week I had Mike come and see me and chipping was a disaster form of anxiety stress frustration you've probably seen it often fatting often thinning completely not knowing what to do all he wanted from me was a chipping technique that would guarantee contact time and time again just something that he could do so he can start enjoying this part of the game so I introduced him to a concept that I actually got from a friend of mine Joe Mayo now I was pretty good at sorting people's shot game out but once he introduced me to this concept the speed at which I was able to improve my students went up immensely it's absolutely incredible and I can't wait to share it with you because it will transform your chipping from all shots around the green but before I get into the golf lesson if you're new to the channel and this is one of the first lessons of mine please consider subscribing i release golf videos just like this one every single week to try and help you improve your game plus you never have to remember remember a thing everything I do here I'll put into a free downloadable practice guide in the description box below so before I share this technique with you which I know you're going to absolutely love there's two things you need to know about chipping to start with for most chip shots around the green to make solid contact you want a descending blow on that ball you want to make sure you avoid the ground behind the golf ball and catch that ball solid it's where you it's just guaranteed strike and gets you a nice bit of spin to do that we want the bottom of the arc of the swing look here after the golf ball a lot of times people have shift this kind of bottom of the ark too far behind the golf ball and start grounding out way way too early the other thing you need to do you need to control the depth that this arc goes under the ground so you could get the bottom of the arc here there but it could go too deep under the ground if that happens we could start to catch the ground too deep and you start fatting it so the two things we need to control are the bottom of your arc if we can get that consistent and the depth of your ark you're going to be a much much better chipper to do that you're gonna need this technique so the first thing I'd like to say is look if you are one of those chippers that struggles with the short game and gets a little bit anxious you're gonna This is really really going to help you massively really really will and it certainly did for Mike so Mike like a lot of players if you're string with chipping the core element has generally comes from a golfer almost re thinking that they've got to get a lot of elevation on their chip shots and they as a byproduct that to some level you get a swing that tends to work around too much it tends to work a bit out to the right too much it tends to work under too much and that causes a whole host of problems thins fats you name it once you fatted it once you then avoid the ground then you start thinning it and it's just a whole hodgepodge of lots and lots of different bad shots leading to lots of anxiety so how do we then create consistent contact time and time again great chipping starts with a great setup now what I want you to do is this most people are standing way too far away from the golf ball i like to get very very close to the golf ball and I do this for a a couple of reasons if you're too far away from the ball this angle here in your wrist between the forearm ultimately the problem is if you got a lot of angle here that angle can come out here in the golf swing if that angle comes out it can go deep under the ground right because you're extending look the radius of your circle with your rack so it can go under the ground so the very first thing I do with players is get them much much closer to the ball i get the hands um raised up much much more here so the shaft isn't vertical but it's much much higher you can see here look my wrist is ve much much flatter it's not got this angle in here that's a huge start the next thing I'll do is I'll move the ball back now a lot of people have frowned upon that so if you move the ball back that's old-fashioned you're going to fat it it isn't it's one of the best ways of guaranteeing great contact so my ball goes back in my stance my handle goes forward and my hands are up that's simple as that then I'll make sure that this section here the upper part of their chest or even better still get their nose looking look this side of the golf ball here so they they're rather than most people that are back here are then get their nose looking ahead of the golf ball all these things are doing what they're doing they're shifting the bottom of the golf swing look so it's guaranteed to be after the ball so you guarantee strike this is the first thing you need to do at setup you do that you tick the first box you're almost there and I say almost because the next stage is this you can still screw it up from here now you'll see I put a little stick here this stick here is basically going to monitor the plane or the arc that I swing on i like to see ferris wheel style swings i don't like to see roundabouts this helps to improve my angle of attack going into that golf ball here if I start to go under this here I then start to swing out to the right i then start to flick the club around the corner in order try and get it back to target a whole host of things start can start to happen so how do we naturally now keep that club working up this kind of plane line here so got my ball set up here handle high from here all I'm going to do is I'm going to tilt my body towards the target here almost like I'm crunching my love handles in here and I've got a shoe crunching in here that takes the club look beautifully up this plane here from here all I'm going to do very very important is allow the club to come straight back down to the golf ball now a great image that Joe gave me here and it really is super super cool is to keep the thumbs feeling feeling like they're pointing downwards so I'm not cocking up i'm keeping them pointing downwards again if I [ __ ] up too much I'm increasing this kind of angle here which can then come out makes it complicated if I just keep those thumbs down here and tilt this club works beautifully at the line and come straight back down into impact and that's all it is so let's start by hitting i'll show you a couple of shots and then I'll show you go through a couple of questions that often my students ask me while I'm doing this

and can you see the check on that ball there and see the backspin guarantees strike every single time now when I'm doing this this is really important so when Mike did this to start with I said to him do it really slowly first so the first thing it is just try to do it with his arms i don't want you to do that all we're doing here look you're setting the angle here we're crunching the love handles and we're going to do trace it up and then get the thumbs making sure they're pointing downwards here trace it up point the thumbs down keep the thumbs pointing down all the way notice this there's not loads of rotation going backwards all I'm doing is it's I'm tilting back crunching those love handles pointing my thumbs down and you see maybe even my body's almost coming up slightly as I'm striking this but I'm guaranteeing that ball first contact now after about half an hour of practicing this Mike's short game and strike ramped up immensely it was so so good to see but like always he would ask me questions like "But what happens if you need a little bit more elevation Danny?" It's a great question isn't it because you do need more elevation around the greens well you don't need to change very much again keep it incredibly simple so if I wanted more elevation all I would do is simply what is elevation it's a little bit more loft so I would start to move the ball position maybe a little bit further forward i might even open my face but nothing else changes from here look all I'm going to do is the same principle i'm still going to sense crunch those love handles back allow the thumbs to come down here but because I'm going to catch it slightly later in the ark there's more loft that ball will pop up a little bit higher so it's not huge but you don't need lots of elevation in golf right so I've pushed the ball a little bit further forward in my stance i've opened the face a little bit here i'm gonna work on this motion backwards and forwards thumbs down and away we go and you can see there look just pops up a little bit comes up with a little bit more spin that is as simple as that this is how I want you to chip most of the time around the greens you need to work on a system that's going to guarantee strike when you guarantee strike it's going to build up your confidence you're going to enjoy chipping and Mike is well on his way now to being a good chipper of course he's going to require practice with this but start small with this huge thanks to Joe for introducing to me this a few years ago um absolute legend but go and give it a try you'll absolutely love it if you want to learn how then to take this moving to pitching so from maybe 30 to 80 yards click this video right here if you enjoyed the video give it a thumbs up maybe share it with one of your friends and of course look if you're new to the channel press that subscribe button down here i'll put a free download practice guide in the description box below but until next week have a wonderful golfing week.