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    2 Most Common Causes Of Penalty Strokes

    Aside from knocking your ball into a hazard or out-of-bounds area, the two ways most commonly found to pile up the penalty strokes are from lost balls and unplayable lies.

    When you hit the ball in a wooded area on the side of the fairway, and the location is not considered to be out-of-bounds, you can dig around and try your best to find the ball. In doing so, one of the following three things is bound to happen:

    1. You may find the ball and then attempt to hit it onto the fairway.

    2. The ball might be located in an unplayable lie, which means that there is no chance to make a shot. You're only two options are to pick up the ball and move over by two club lengths or hit the ball again from where you originally took your last shot. Either way, you pick up a one-stroke penalty.

    3. The ball may not be easy enough to find, and can be declared lost. This means that you have to go back to the area where you hit your last shot, shoot over, and take a penalty stroke.

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    How To Play A Chip Shot – The Professional Way (1)

    By Foursome | May 28, 2009

    Open Up Your Lower Body

    Usually when you hear about opening your stance it’s a reference to your entire alignment. With a chip shot, however, that’s not the case. This shot is used with such a short swing that you couldn’t possibly affect the “shape” of the ball flight, which is the normal reason for opening your stance.

    In this case, we simply want to help you feel more comfortable over the ball and make it easier to get the club moving in the manner you want. So here’s what we want you to do:

    1) We want you to pick a target and set the lead edge of the club square to the target.

    2) Next, step in and set your body square just like any other shot: shoulders, hips and feet parallel to the target line.

    3) Now open your feet and hips ever so slightly – aim them a little left of the target line. Keep your shoulders parallel to the target line and the clubface square to the target.
    Play The Ball Back In Your Stance

    You want to strike every chip shot with a descending blow. This means you want the club moving down, not up, when you strike the ball. When you play a chip shot there is no need to attempt to lift the ball into the air. You want it in the air only for a few seconds, and the club can do all the work here.

    Note: To take this point a bit further, there is never a situation in golf where you should try to lift or “help” the ball into the air. Your setup and your club can always get the  job done for you.

    One of the things you want to be conscious of when playing a chip shot is that the club needs to make contact with the ball before it makes contact with the ground. The easiest way to do this is to move the ball back in your stance.

    You do not want to use your feet as a reference point for ball position since the width of your stance with your feet varies from shot to shot. What we want you to do here is to play the ball to the right of the center of your body – about midway between the center of your chest and your right shoulder.

    This will help you make clean contact. This is especially important because you are naturally going to take a more narrow stance with your feet when playing a chip shot.

    Topics: General, Short Game, Tips & Practice | No Comments »

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