Chipping and pitching: two shots, and a real argument about one of them.

Directions here are for a right-handed golfer (lead side left, trail side right).

Chip or pitch?

Jon Tattersall, a GOLF Top 100 Teacher, separates the two shots like this (GOLF.com, July 2024):

Chip

A low shot from around the edges of the green that rolls most of the way to the hole. It is played with the ball back in the stance and the shaft leaning forward.

Pitch

A slightly longer, higher shot that uses more of the full swing's fundamentals. The ball is near the centre of the stance with a little more weight on the lead leg.

Tattersall would rather his students pitch most of the time. He calls chipping a very specific technique that does not carry over to other shots, while pitching builds the fundamentals of the full swing.

The 2005 biomechanics review by Patria Hume, Justin Keogh and Duncan Reid adds two general points for chipping accuracy: grip lower on the club, and use a slower, shorter backswing.

The standard chip: weight forward

Phil Mickelson

Phil Mickelson, a six-time major champion, says chippers should keep their weight forward, because leaning forward helps drive the club down into the ground (GOLF.com, April 2023). If the hands fall back and the clubhead passes them, he warns, the leading edge rises and the bounce hits the ground first.

Mickelson decides before he swings whether the shot is low or high. A low chip is played off the back foot and a high one off the front foot. A ball in the middle of the stance, in his view, gives neither enough forward weight nor enough loft, so players end up flipping their hands to help it.

Mike Bury

Mike Bury (GOLF.com, February 2023) places the ball back near the inside of the trail foot and starts with about 60 percent of his weight on the front foot. Too much weight on the back foot, he says, moves the low point of the swing back and causes chunks or blades. He also wants the body to keep turning and shifting weight through the chip: when the arms take over and fold, the result is inconsistent and often bladed.

The alternative: centred ball, true loft

Coach Jonathan Yarwood disagrees with the standard advice (National Club Golfer, 2016, updated 2023). He argues that the traditional "ball back, hands forward, weight forward" formula makes the strike too steep and de-lofts the face, which limits control of spin and trajectory.

His version plays the ball centred, below the sternum, with the weight even, a gently leaning shaft, a shallow U-shaped arc and a wrist hinge that is allowed to release. The aim is to deliver the club's true loft to the ball.

The sources give no single right answer. Which suits you depends on your strike and the shots you need, and that is a question for a coach who can watch you.

Pitching distance: the Pelz clock

Dave Pelz, the former NASA scientist who became a short-game and putting instructor, died in March 2025 aged 85. Australian Golf Digest's report credits him with data-driven methods used by players including Phil Mickelson.

His best-known wedge method is the clock system. Backswing length is described as a position on a clock face, for example 9 o'clock when the lead arm is parallel to the ground. The golfer then records how far each length sends the ball with each wedge, building a personal chart of distances. Not everyone likes the approach: some golfers find it mechanical and say the distances from different wedges overlap at shorter swings, though those views come from Golf Monthly forum discussion rather than research and are unconfirmed.

Pelz also argued that golfers carry too many long clubs and too few short ones, and suggested replacing 2- and 3-irons with gap and lob wedges to narrow the distance gaps where they matter most.

Thinking about the club, not the arms

Research on attention used pitch shots as its test. Gabriele Wulf and Jiang Su (2007) describe an earlier study by Wulf, Lauterbach and Toole (1999) in which beginners practising pitch shots who focused on the pendulum-like motion of the club were considerably more accurate than those who focused on their arm swing. Wulf and Su's own experiments found the same pattern in beginners and in expert golfers. The practice page covers that research and the study that disagrees with it.

Other options around the green

Kellie Stenzel, a GOLF Top 100 Teacher, suggests two alternatives. A hybrid can be used for a putting-style bump-and-run, with a narrow stance and a grip down the handle. And on days when your chipping is off, she suggests putting from farther off the green, matching your short-game choices to what is working that day.

For shots from sand, see bunker play. For wedge types, lofts and bounce, see wedges.