What Do You Do When You’re In Between Clubs?

[bkuehn1952]

What Do You Do When You’re In Between Clubs?

Hit it in the front bunker. 

Truthfully, I tend to take the longer club unless the hole location is really back.  

[OB left]

You should "Vultee" it. Take more club, choke down, take a 2/3 swing, and excellerate through the ball. 

[Patch]

I take a longer club, choke down on the grip a little more, and use my regular swing.

Just keeping it simple.  

[mclaren4life]

I go with the longer club and try to take some off it. Most of the time it doesn’t matter because I’m screwed the same amount if i hit it short or long. I just know using the shorter club and trying to muscle it never results in anything good for me. 

[ScottF]

Choke down a bit on the longer club, take a full swing.

[Antneye]

I always lean to the longer club because I miss short mostly. I also don’t try to hit it harder or softer. I prefer to try to control distance by adjusting my backswing. I’d rather hit a 75% backswing 7 iron than a full 8 iron because I have more control with my shorter backswing. 

[pganapathy]

Technically I don't do either.  I picked longer club.  My solution is take the longer club, grip down and hit normally

[Uncle Peter]

Most of the times a longer club and try to abbreviate the follow through. Always something I take time to practice at the range though.

[RFKFREAK]

On 8/16/2020 at 1:40 AM, Shindig said:

Grip down, not choke down.  Don't get in the habit of thinking you're choking during a round of golf  

Haha - that's my old baseball terminology coming out. 

[Release]

A shorter club will never get to the target.   

[Bucki1968]

Not sure which way to vote. It depends on where the pin is. I do both.

[darthweasel]

I get matched up with a lot of randoms. I am a mediocre golfer...Ghin has me sitting on a 13.8 currently, up a smidge from my earlier peak of 12.8 a month or so ago. Time and again I listen to people at my skill level or worse talk themselves through this scenario, pick the shorter club to step on it or muscle it up...and come up 30 yards short. Or shank it 90 yards left of their intended target. Then frustrated, blade a chip over the back and walk away with a generous "I got a snowman".

Just anecdotal observation but it does seem to match up the research that says most mediocre to poor golfers come up short the overwhelming majority of the time. I monitor my distances using Golfpad and find I have a much better idea of my average distance than most people I play with. ("Wow, usually I can get there from 150 with my PW". Uh...no. I haven't seen you hit 150 with an 8 yet, but whatever.) With that said, take say...my 8i which s of this morning is 160 on the dot (121 shot history). if the flag is 155 (or, in my case, center of the green as I pay very little attention to flag location...my goal is get on and 2 putt or less, so middle of green is my goal), lets see how my last ten shots would do:

150, 193, 168, 133, 163, 148, 200, 85, 166, 188

Clearly, I am all over the board. 4 of those would be far too long, 2 would be a little too short. the other 4 are close enough for me at current skill level and should be on the green.

 

Now lets dip to my 9i which currently averages 142 (95 shot history).

164, 81, 137, 139, 142, 148,90, 151, 103, 134.

I am trying to conceive of the circumstances where someone at my skill level is going to be advantaged stepping on a 9i. I am far more likely to have that 81 yard chunk or 164 yard blow by than I am to hit that magic perfect adder shot. I don't have the club control at my skill level to add or subtract subtle variations. I need to keep me regular swing, pick the miss that isn't sticking me in trouble...barring something like wide open in front and water behind, I am taking the longer club and normal swing approximately 100% of the time.

 

If I become more skilled and can make subtle adjustments...maybe I stand on a 9 but...if I could hit it 155 accurately I would already be doing that. I have noticed my already suspect accuracy gets much worse when I try to alter my swing. I have no doubt there are outliers out there who score equal or worse to me and can stand on a shorter club or shorten a longer club at will and maintain accuracy...I have just never been fortunate to be matched up with them.

 

I always, always, always wish they would take the longer club.

[RyanG94]

I tend to take the longer club and commit to it 100%, but with a swing length maybe close to 80% and focus on a really solid impact as if it was a full shot.

 I used to be a firm believer of tearing the skin off it with the shorter club, believing if I absolutely murdered it and caught it pure I might get the desired result, obviously the macho approach 9 times out of 10 doesn’t give you the results you want. Think this was largely down to the fact that my alternative used to be that  I used to try and control these shots with a longer club and hit it with a much slower swing speed which was just a lottery, fat, thin, chunk, up looking for the ball before I hit it cause I was out of sync. 
 

Grip down, keep my chest over the ball, commit to it and just take a touch off my swing is the way I find works best for me

 

play smarter, not harder 🙂

Edited August 17, 2020 by RyanG94
Missed info