Work On Your Short Game

If you’re looking to shave strokes off your handicap, one of the surefire ways to do so is by making an effort to improve your short game. While everyone would love to drive the ball further, pounding hundreds of golf balls on the driving range is effective only to a certain point. If you can’t get the ball in the hole when you near the green, all that hard work will be for naught. By eliminating disastrous three-putts, duffed chip shots, and skulled sand saves, you’ll certainly be on pace to set a personal record. Putting There is nothing more important that you can do before you play a round of golf than practice putting. The best golfers in the world routinely make the so-called “gimmes” to the point where they don’t think twice when they’re lining up anything less than three feet away from the cup. And yet, this is where so many shots are lost in a round. If you can get to the point where you feel confident that you will make the vast majority fo these putts, it takes the pressure off longer putts because you can tell yourself that all you need to do is putt within three feet of the hole, and you’ll almost certainly guarantee yourself a two putt. Two putts usually don’t hurt your scorecard. Three putts do. So, when you’re lagging a 30-foot putt, don’t worry so much about dropping it in the hole – this is where you can get needlessly aggressive and blow the putt by 10 feet or leave it way short because you’re trying to be delicate. Instead, imagine a three-foot radius surrounding the hole, and work on hitting it there. Even the best golfers don’t routinely make these long putts, but they also rarely leave themselves with much work on their second putt. A good drill before playing a round is to lay your putter down on the green with the head of the putter in the hole and then place a tee at the end of the shaft. This should equal close to three feet. From this tee, force yourself to make 10 of these putts in a row. It’s also important to make sure that this is a straight putt. You don’t need to worry yourself about reading these short putts right now. The goal is to get a feel for the speed of the greens that you’re about to play and to get your putting stroke compact and where you want it. After you’ve made a handful of these putts, you’ll feel confident in your stroke and can carry that with you into the round. Chipping Another important component of your golf game to practice before a round is chipping. The goal here is similar to your putting drills. You want to get a feel for the greens, and if you are confident that you’ll make everything within three feet, it takes some pressure off you trying to hit the perfect chip. Remember, a chip and a tap-in won’t hurt your score. Leaving yourself with a needlessly long putt after an approach, might. It’s also always a good idea to simplify things. You might see the professionals on tour hitting high arching flop shots or greenside approaches with tremendous spin on them, but for the average golfer, it’s much smarter to make things easy. Take a lower lofted club, narrow your stance, choke up, and mimic a putting stroke if you have green to work with. Let the ball run once it hits the green and read the approach like you would a putt. The margin for error on these shots is much less. Some courses won’t let you chip on their practice green, but there are ways around this. At the first tee, while you’re waiting to tee off, drop a ball and chip at the tee marker. You’re just trying to hit a couple of these shots off your iron that feel good and give you confidence that your stroke is where you want it. Practice Above all else, take the time to practice your short game. Plenty of people go to their local golf course to hit balls at the range, but fewer go up to the course just to putt around. This is in many ways a wasted opportunity, however, because the practice green is free to use and can pay immediate dividends in your round.