Re: Chippers and Putting Wedges
The reason why most, if not all, those that struggle with chipping don't succeed is a lack of practice. A friend of mine who doesn't play golf sometimes tag along for fun. He can't swing, he can barely hit the ball. One day last summer, we were hanging out in another friends yard, swinging golf clubs, goofing around. The guy that can't play golf started chipping all over the place, continued doing so for a couple of hours. Later on the evening we took a round on the course. His swing was still atrocious, but his chipping was leaps and bounds better. Much better than two other friends that plays off a 35-36 handicap.
It only took this person without a single golf lesson a couple of hours to improve his chipping by dimensions. Imagine the effect this would have if a player with an established handicap had done the same thing, maybe even practiced it every day, or every other day, or every day he or she went to the course. Not the routine-ish fifteen minutes before a round, but really practicing it. Playing around with different lies, out of the rough, fairway, deep grass, different clubs etc. Hour after hour spent on the range, but little effort done to chipping. The irony of it all is that a good chip shot is a smaller version of a full swing. People usually make the same mistakes in the full swing as they do when chipping. Learning to hit down on the ball and hit the ball first is something a lot of the golfers could achieve by practicing chipping more.
