Struggling with pitching

lewisbeardwell · July 13, 2018

When I'm greenside chipping I'm good because I can see my landing spot & outside of 50 yards I'm good because I have yardages for my wedges.

It's just the feely ones that you can see a landing spot for I'm struggling, like I said especially to back flags.

How do people approach them? I had a bit of success tonight practicing using a PW over my 52 degree, gives me more consistent results in terms of judging spin/roll

jslane57 · July 13, 2018

Visualization and imagination. Imagine you see the landing spot...

5.2k · July 13, 2018

On the other side of the coin are those of us that do not see a landing spot. I have never done that even though I've tried. I see where the flag is and I hit the ball to the hole not a spot. I can imagine the effort it takes to "throw" the ball the distance to the hole. Just like throwing a base ball to a guy standing there.

I practiced these pitches for hours and hours until I had a natural technique to do it. I started with a less lofted club, as low as an 8 iron and worked my way to a 52 and now even a 56 to accomplish the shot. I found that I could not produce a mechanical swing. I had to find what to me was a natural way of pitching the ball to the hole where I only needed to think about the distance, not the swing.

Is it natural for you to pick a spot? or would it be more natural to pitch the ball to the hole?

MadGolfer76 · July 13, 2018

Under 50 yards and using pitching wedge? Imagining myself doing that I would be getting a pretty low flight (basically chipping it) if I wanted the ball to stop before I ran out of space. It isn't that this is necessarily bad (assuming I have things right), but you might want to experiment with a little more hang time in the air vs. running it out too much.

PowderedToastMan · July 13, 2018

A lob wedge and a lot of practice. The landing spot pretty much becomes right beside the hole most of the time.

lewisbeardwell · July 14, 2018

Under 50 yards and using pitching wedge? Imagining myself doing that I would be getting a pretty low flight (basically chipping it) if I wanted the ball to stop before I ran out of space. It isn't that this is necessarily bad (assuming I have things right), but you might want to experiment with a little more hang time in the air vs. running it out too much.

I'm talking where you are maybe 10 yards short of a green to a back flag with of green lots to work with