The Rule of 12 - Chipping Tip for Golf

as far as technique goes chipping is probably the second easiest thing right behind putting to master I mean there's not a whole lot to the technique all you doing is you're trying to create a slightly descending blow and make some solid contact little waving your left foot hands a little forward brush the grass and you've got the technique more or less mastered with a little practice so how are you going to get good at getting the ball close to the hole so as you can have more up and downs well a lot of people figure I'm going to go practice and I'm going to play a lot of golf and I'm going to probably do that practicing and all that chipping on the golf course with one club I did too and Phil Mickelson did it too but his teacher convinced them otherwise and that's what I'm going to try to do with you I'm going to show you how if you use multiple clubs you're going to be able to have more flexibility in your chipping and you get a lot more of them up and down when I first started playing my favorite chipping Club was an auto Palmer pitching wedge and I would play it basically from everywhere around the green now one of the first things you learn about the short game in general if you take some lessons or read a good book or watch the Tour players is they're always trying to make the shot which in this case is up you know 25 20 feet chip shot trying to make that shot as small as possible by getting the ball on the green as soon as possible and that's often be called in golf instruction in books and videos safety spot or safety landing zone I like about a yard on the green I'm about a yard off the green right here if I went one more yard and and I go ahead and take out a tee and put that just off line so it's not going to prevent me from hitting my shot toward the hole that's a good safe spot for me to land this shot on line with the pin and and have it run out so okay great I read that in the magazine and I decide that's the thing I want to do and I take my favorite little pigeon wedge and I go ahead and try to do that if I land the ball anywhere near that tee with that pitching wedge that ball is not going to get anywhere near the pin not going to run out far enough but most golfers think is I hit the ball too easy but they didn't because that what they're trying to do is actually hit the ball to a spot and they did that very well the trick is to do the math which club will you use if you've got these two you know parts of the equation you know set in stone the ball isn't going to move your landing spot you can move but we determine that's probably your safest close to spot pitching wedge doesn't go far enough let's try some other clubs in the bag and see how far they go just to start let's say let's take out eight on two less clubs and loft and land this ball right here a little brush technique same same exact technique and you can see how the ball rolls further about twice as much further but still doesn't run far enough to the hole which club am I going to need to get it all the way to the hole well pitching wedge went there it went there so seems to me maybe a six might work so I've got my spot and and one thing you want to do with your spot you'll see all the good players do this on TV when you have your spot make your practice swings away from your ball looking at your spot how hard do you make this little downward brushing technique how hard do you do that so that your ball flies today I don't try to lift your ball up to that spot once you've got to feel for how far a swing that is and how far that spot is how much energy you need then you can just look at your spot make your swing and watch the ball run out in this case it hit a couple things along the way but I've got a two-footer and I'm probably going to get up and down and go to neck so very happy so great Brian if I get to try all of my clubs every time I'm chipping around the green I can figure out which one I can play this safe land and have it run out well it's actually an easier way as a ratio that was developed long ago made popular by Paul Runyon who was the Wizard of the short game for many many years and a great teacher and player in his own right and he called it the rule of eleven well it's changed a little bit for modern times here it's now the rule of twelve because manufacturers due to popular demand have made their golf clubs a little stronger Lofton and the rule of eleven and the rule of twelve basically worked on a simple principle when you're hitting a shot okay what shot it is a tee shot but in this case we're hitting a chip shot the ball flies to one spot and then the ball runs out to another always say it's one part carry unless you hit a car pass it'll be at least one more part carry depending how many times it hits on the car path so what we have right here is my one part carry is two yards that one yard to get to the fringe and one more yard to get to the tee so I have two yards is one part carry so two more yards one two is one part roll and on and on and on so as I stand here or back up from my you know from my area so I get a little different view I can say I've got one part carry one part roll to where I was standing one part carry two parts roll one part carry three parts rule for part roll and then at some point maybe about six parts rule for this 6-iron ah you see that's the trick you take the parts rule and you subtract that number from 12 that's the wise the rule of twelve and the number you'll be left with is the club to pick so in this case it's a 6-iron it's one part carry six parts rule I get here I make my practice swings I hit my shot and I've got a one footer now Brian it's great what if though I'm either closer to my spot or often cases further away from my spot now that 6-iron that was perfect for this shot from where I was right here two yards away if I fly it make it my practice swings looking at my spot if I fly it up to that T that ball is going to just lucky hit the pin run way over the green into a bunker some other trouble so because I've changed this first part I have one two to get back to the ball three four to get to my spot one part carry is now four yards so that roll is going to be proportional one part roll one two three four yards two part roll so this shot right here is somewhere between two and three parts rules so let's just say I want to be aggressive and give myself a chance at getting it to the pen three parts rule 3 minus 12 is none I take out my 9-iron here look at my spot take my practice brushes and then try to land it on line with the pen even with my spot and amazingly we said we wanted to be a little aggressive the ball ran out about 4 feet past the hole giving me a really makeable shot and I want to be aggressive maybe I wanted to give myself a chance at you know getting the ball at least to the hole you'll find that it doesn't take you long to start seeing all your shots around the green this way whether it's a chip shot or any other kind of pitch and I promise you you just like Phil Mickelson we'll find out know how no matter how good you are with that favorite Club if you can just do the math find your safe spot pick your club make your practice swings at your spot and execute your technique you're going to have a world-class short game because you're going to be able to chip it close and get up and down from almost anywhere practice with multiple clubs for chipping precision and accuracy use the rule of 12 to determine best Club for chipping around the green

Channel: Richie3Jack

Views: 774,349

Rating: 4.6506696 out of 5

Keywords: Golf, The golfing machine, TGM, Homer Kelley, Chipping, Brian Manzella, Paul Runyan

Id: OTCpkYqF8Ig

Length: 8min 46sec (526 seconds)

Published: Sat Aug 29 2009

Reddit Comments

[u/mike00mike]

I implemented this strategy this year, and it has helped tons. After a while, you won't need to count anymore and it will be more of a feel type thing.

[u/thelastcookie]

I've had a chance to practice with this now, and tried it out on the course today... makes a lot of sense, and seems to work as explained here. I think perhaps I should have been more flexible about having my first bounce be close to the fringe... at least until I work on a lighter touch when chipping with my long irons! Before I used only 7-9i mostly for chipping. I was doing something similar to this on a small scale but not understanding why it worked when it did. Still not crazy about using the wedges. Will work on it though... I don't like putting from the fringe so much as I do.

Good stuff anyway... made me understand some of the problems I was having understanding what caused the ball to roll out more or less.