It’s always important to have an understanding of how to hit speciality shots when facing tough situation’s on the course. It’s not often a student specifically asks to learn how to approach these shots, yet more often than not, when facing a scenario where we face a tough shot to salvage a score on a hole, we don’t have the knowledge or necessary skills to produce the shot required, maybe we’re faced with a heavy lie in the rough or have short sided the flag. The number 1 importance in these situations in not to bite off more than you can chew, sometimes its worth just taking your medicine for hitting a bad shot by just getting it on the green and giving yourself a chance to salvage a score with a lengthy putt rather than putting yourself in more trouble (Relative Article link). Decision making and shot selection are critical factors here, but we are going to talk about some fundamental principles that can prepare you for executing speciality shots like a pro! The two shots we are going to focus on are the ‘flop shot’, and how to control a ball that’s sitting down in the rough but in close proximity to the green, specifically how to get the ball up in the air without loosing control. When attempting these shots, we’re effectively trying to hit a controlled ‘duff’ or mishit.

Flop shot

*For the purpose of simplicity i’ll be referencing a right handed golfer*

The flop shot is a great tool to have in our shot selection bank when faced with a short sided pitch or the need to get the ball in the air quickly and to land as soft as possible. Now i’m sure many of you have attempted this shot and have found it’s a hard shot to execute and control, especially on a consistent basis, but why so? All we are doing is opening the club face in order to create additional loft. There are a number of factors that combine in order to hit this shot correctly, and the difficulty comes in because the margin for error is so small, let alone this shot normally only comes out when we are in trouble around the green, say pitching over a bunker or to a tight pin. We’d mostly be using either a sand wedge or lob wedge with this shot but we can apply this method to a variety of clubs if needed. Sometimes a lob wedge may have too much loft which may result in the club sliding right under the ball or simply not getting enough distance despite the effort put into the swing, so experiment with the sand and maybe even gap wedge (I personally recommend learning this shot with a sand wedge (54º-58º)). Just like the pitching series we begin with a sound set up/address that doesn’t differ very much from the set-up we discussed earlier, in fact it doesn’t differ at all with the exception to direction of the club face. To begin, the number 1 rule to remember is that ball position is always relative to our alignment and stance, never to the target! What I mean by this is, if we take an address position as previously discussed (in the address article) with the ball position inside the front heel, and alignment at the target, simply opening our stance by swiveling in the same spot will inadvertently move the ball position back in our stance. (Figure x) Trying to hit a high shot from a back ball position does not match what our desired outcome is, and is likely to result in a poor shot. Lets get set up right. Pick a target 2-4 yards left (open) of the flag, we only need to open our stance slightly to get effective results, so don’t open the stance excessively as this will only make the shot harder and the ball strike less consistent. If you need more loft bump to a lob wedge, but be aware of what I talked about ealrier. So we’re set up to hit a conventional pitch shot 2-4 yards left of the flag. Knowing the ball position and weight are good its time to align the club face back to the target. Simply maintaining this body position, allow the club to open up in your hands until the face is facing the flag (Figure X). The weight and balance of the clubbed in this position may create an un-natural feel that your not used to. I don’t recommend opening your hands as they will want to return to a neutral position at impact which will consequently close the face back up and hit the ball too long and left. Now swinging the club, this is where many people struggle as they will want to do one of two things. Either they’ll try and swing towards the target, or they will try and over manipulate the club face in-swing as the brain is identifying that the club face is not aligned to what we are used to. It’s important to focus and swing normally as you would along the line of your feet (as if we’re hitting a regular pitch shot to our ‘left’ target). The ball will travel in the direction where the club face is pointing, which has been pre-set towards the flag. Of course due to the smash factor of the strike being much less efficient we need to swing as if the flag is an additional 30-40% past its actual position, but there is going to be a good amount of feel required here to accurately control the distance, which can be developed through experimentation and practice. Simply put, the swing principles and characteristics are identical to that of the topics discussed in the previous articles for a traditional pitch shot, all we are doing is opening the club face of a normal shot to produce the additional height, from here its just a matter of ensuring the alignment of the club face is directed at the target in order for the ball to go towards the flag or where we want the ball to land. 

Delicate Shots Out of Heavy Rough

Iv’e always found a shot that is not talked about enough is a green side pitch/chip shot to a tight flag where the ball is lying in some heavy/thick rough. This is a very tough shot because naturally we want to approach this shot with delicacy and touch yet a poor lie often restricts the amount of soft hands we can use, as it’s likely to result in a mis-hit, where too much grass gets between the ball and the club face and the ball doesn’t create enough velocity off the club face and only travels a foot or so forward. So how do we approach this shot? We’re trying to create enough speed to ‘pop’ the ball out a tough lie, yet getting it to land very softly without having it come out too hot and fly across the green. First and foremost getting set up to the ball as we’ve previously discussed (Link to Article). The in-swing techniques are going to be quite different to anything previously discussed and will require a good amount of practice in order to develop trust and confidence. So lets talk about some of the scientific/technical aspects of this shot. Gravity is key with this shot, as discussed earlier, if gravity is the primary cause of acceleration on the club it will make contact with the ball at it’s maximum velocity. For instance, if you were to drop a ball from shoulder height the ball would accelerate at a constant speed of 9.81m/s², and with the relatively short distance the ball would need to travel it would reach its peak velocity when it makes contact with the ground. The same is going to apply with the club head when hitting this shot. Taking the club back to around ‘arm parallel’ is ample amount of back swing to produce the necessary speed in the club, from here we effectively want to let the club drop naturally to the floor using gravity. Once we get to the top of the backswing we want to feel as if we lose all pressure in our hands and wrists, effectively making the club dead weight, allowing the club to make a direct, accelerated motion towards the ball. Our follow through is going to be non-existent with this shot, but you must trust this, and maintain the light/loose grip pressure throughout the swing and post impact. The main responsibly of the hands and arms is to control the club head in order to establish a solid contact on the ball. Allow the club to do the work. The more you try and manipulate the shot the more likely and error or a poor shot is going to happen. Remember we’re only trying to hit a shot of minimal distance out of a poor lie. Power is irrelevant at this point. This is a, tough concept to grasp and I recommend reviewing the lesson video to get a better visual perspective and the cues required to produce this shot.