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Mike looks at the fundamentals of chipping. What to focus on and how to practice.

CHIPPING OVERVIEW

Joe's backswing helped set up the body to move the club effectively and naturally.  Hear how you can use this in your swing.

JOE'S BACKSWING

JACK NICKLAUS ACADEMIES PARTNER VIDEO

I spent a lot of time as a kid at Nibley. Learn how I got to add elements to the course.

THE EIGHTH GREEN AT NIBLEY

GOING TO SCHOOL

Your do-over this week and Malaska Golf Mulligan Monday is about improving face control. 

Hold a wedge or similar club and drop the ball onto the clubface. Practice bouncing the ball continuously on the clubface without dropping the ball. Hold a golf club in the other hand and hit the ball over to that club. Practice going back and forth. 

This drill is excellent for hand-eye coordination and is really going to help you connect with the clubface.

MORE FACE CONTROL

Choking down on your grip almost to the end creates a counterbalance, making it easier to control the club. This will help you hit the ball farther.

CHOKE DOWN ON THE GRIP

The ladder drill is a great exercise to learn to gage distances while chipping.

DISTANCE CONTROL

When your toes move, your body knows it is unbalanced. Practice your natural standing position.

POSTURE

"Golf is an interesting sport because when you talk to the golfers, they have all these positions they are trying to hit. The most important (or even the only) position that matters is the position of the club at impact.

Why should we use impact as our primary position? In my opinion, we've been teaching the game of golf incorrectly. We have taught from address (setup) to transition (top) to impact. I believe we should have been teaching from impact to transition (top), and back down to address (setup). When we use impact as our starting point and work from impact back, we can start to identify what impact feels like. When I ask golfers to show me where they think they are at impact, the vast majority of them twist their bodies. This is because they have this perception that impact requires a twisting motion of the body.

What is impact position? If you don't understand what impact is, you probably won't have much success in this game. When I set up to the ball and go to my impact position, my lead leg (left) moves the lead hip (left) out of the way. The lead shoulder (left) raises a bit and my trailing shoulder (right) drops. This causes my trailing arm (right) to drop and align directly behind the shaft and now my lead arm (left) is above my trailing arm (right).

What does impact feel like? This drill helps you identify the proper position at impact. Once you can look in a mirror and identify what impact should look like, then you can make some small swings and train yourself on what impact should feel like. As you perform this drill, your swing will get better and it may even change dramatically just because you have a better understanding of impact. By using the Full Swing Impact Drill you will come away with a proper understanding of what impact should look like and also what impact actually feels like."

IMPACT DRILL - FULL SWING

Rotating your forearm will open the face.

TAKE-AWAY AND ROTATION

Kory Budinger joins Mike Malaska at Superstition Mountain for a one-on-one lesson.

HOW TO PUT YOUR HANDS ON THE CLUB

Once your shoulders are working properly, swing level as though you are moving the club along a table.  This will ensure an uncomplicated face rotation, avoiding hooks and slices.

LEVELING YOUR CLUB

Rescues make it easier to hit the ball in the air.

RESCUES VS IRONS

In this lesson with Billy Fitzgerald, the focus is on refining the backswing by addressing the hand and wrist positioning at the start. The student explains that their normal backswing tends to go straight back, with a higher arm position and less wrist engagement. Mike emphasizes the importance of setting the wrists early, allowing the swing to flow naturally without having to adjust mid-swing. By engaging the hands and wrists at the beginning, the golfer can simplify the overall motion.Mike explains that improper wrist and arm movement can misalign the body, leading to issues later in the swing. When the club moves in one direction and the body tries to offset that momentum, it can cause the golfer to get stuck. The goal is to set the wrists and arms correctly from the start so that the golfer can turn and swing smoothly without needing to compensate for misalignment.The lesson continues by focusing on the timing of the transition. If the wrists and arms are set early, the golfer can change direction at the right time, allowing the club to shallow naturally. Mike explains that changing direction too late forces compensations from the upper body, which can lead to inconsistent shots, especially under pressure. Proper setup and timing prevent these compensations and ensure a smoother, more consistent swing.Mike also highlights the opposite movements in the backswing and downswing. In the backswing, the handle moves outward while the club moves back. In the downswing, the handle comes in, and the club moves out. Understanding this opposition helps the golfer better coordinate the two parts of the swing, leading to improved consistency and control.Finally, Mike touches on the importance of grip. Many golfers open the face and cup their left wrist, which needs correction. A proper grip, with the hands working together, immediately improves swing mechanics. He clarifies that a slightly closed face isn’t necessarily a problem if the clubface is aligned with the spine angle at the top of the swing, emphasizing the importance of proper rotation for achieving a square clubface.

MASTER BACKSWING AND DOWNSWING

What are the common misconceptions for golf students.

BIGGEST MISCONCEPTIONS

Start by teeing balls up. Set up with the same grip and face alignment, Make the first ball curve to the left. Then make the ball curve to the right. Lastly make the ball go straight. Once you have this down. Then you go to path. Start by making your arms reroute so that the ball starts way to the right. Then make the path be less and less to the right. Until you find your ideal path. Then combine path and face to get the shot you want.

CONTROLLING CURVE & PATH

Speed comes with control. Practice getting comfortable with the shots you are good at.

FINDING A SHOT YOU ARE COMFORTABLE WITH

Set up five balls. Find a tempo that works for you and maintain it. While maintaining that tempo hit the first ball no specific target or distance. Maybe 10 feet. Then the next ball roll the line but make the ball to 13 feet or past the first ball. Then hit another ball and make it go 16 feet of past the second ball. Now come Back and hit the third fourth ball between the first and second ball. Then hit the fifth ball between the second and third ball. Repeat the drill up hill and side hill.

PUTTING CHALLENGE

The&nbsp;Ashley Huizing Player Lesson Series&nbsp;with Mike Malaska is a comprehensive journey into improving golf mechanics, tailored for players of all levels. Across four detailed lessons, Mike addresses the critical aspects of the swing, emphasizing practical adjustments, personalized techniques, and simplifying complex concepts.In the&nbsp;first lesson, Mike explores two contrasting approaches to golf and debunks myths perpetuated by professional legends. He critiques the impracticality of replicating Ben Hogan’s intricate swing method for the average player, stressing the importance of balance, control, and adaptability over rigid adherence to elite techniques. This sets the foundation for Ashley to develop a consistent and reliable swing that suits her individual strengths.In the&nbsp;second lesson, the focus shifts to Ashley's swing mechanics, particularly hip movement, hand coordination, and sequencing. Mike introduces drills that emphasize proper hip rotation to avoid early extension and reduce strain. By syncing the hips, arms, and club, Ashley begins to build a smoother, more powerful swing. This lesson highlights how small adjustments can create a solid foundation for overall swing improvement.The&nbsp;third lesson&nbsp;dives into refining Ashley’s short game with chip shot drills designed to improve hand-club coordination and swing efficiency. Mike simplifies the mechanics, teaching Ashley to maintain a square clubface and promote natural motion through small, controlled swings. These drills build muscle memory, minimize over-rotation, and create a more consistent short game.Finally, in the&nbsp;fourth lesson, Mike introduces Ashley to grip refinement and advanced swing adjustments. He emphasizes proper club placement within the fingers and demonstrates how a correct grip improves control and power. Mike also redefines the concept of "release," focusing on directing club momentum forward rather than relying on wrist unhinging. With these refinements, Ashley achieves better alignment, reducing compensatory movements and increasing accuracy and power.

ASHLEY HUIZING-PLAYER LESSON

This Ask Mike comes to us from John DeFrancisco. By the way, Matt Baker, hello! Matt does a lot of great work. He’s over in England, and he’d be here today, except the flight was a little too long. So, hey Matt, how are you doing?This question is one that gets asked a lot. It tends to annoy me a little, which is great because I like being annoyed—it gives me a chance to be annoying back! The question is about the Look Cool Drill and how the clubface actually works through the ball. I’m going to take this one because I hear it so often, and it’s about exaggerations and putting circles together.All right, let’s get into it. You guys are going to have to move so I can demonstrate. The Look Cool Drill looks like this.When I’m doing the Look Cool Drill, if you watch the clubface, the face goes from here, comes down to there, and then moves up to here and over there. Through this movement, the face is rotating more than it would in my normal swing because my body isn’t moving. But this little action here—the clubface—is doing exactly what it should. It’s here, here, there, and there.The difference is that the handle of the club isn’t moving very far, so it looks like there’s a lot more face rotation. But if I take this same action and start moving my body—like in my full golf swing—the face does exactly what you want to see. When I take my body out of it and just swing my arm, you’ll see the handle pivoting, which makes it look like the face is twisting faster. However, the face is staying close to a 90-degree angle to my swing arc.The biggest issue I see with the Look Cool Drill and the L-to-L Drill is that people don’t fully understand the wrist movements. For example, when you go from here, your left wrist is flat. Now, if I use only my left arm and move to the other side, what does my left wrist do? It cups.When you add the right hand, on the backswing, your right wrist is in extension, and as you go through the swing, it moves into flexion. During the backswing with the Look Cool Drill, the left wrist is flat, and the right wrist is bent. At impact, and then as you follow through, the roles switch—the right wrist flattens, and the left wrist bends.When you do this with one hand, sometimes there’s more rotation than you want. If I overdo it, yes, the face rotates too much. The goal of the Look Cool Drill is to let the weight of the club drop and pivot naturally. See what I’m doing here?This doesn’t require strength—I’m only holding the club with two fingers. The idea is to let the club’s momentum do the work. As the club pivots, the face naturally moves through the arc. If I let it flip too much, the face closes. But the goal is to feel how loose your wrists need to be and how the club’s weight creates the pivot.If I do this with my left hand and let it flip back, the face might close, but that’s an exaggeration to help feel how much the club’s weight contributes to the swing. The drill teaches you how to relax the wrists and let the lever system work effectively.As simple as this looks, most students struggle to do it correctly when starting. They can’t figure it out because they’re too tense. This motion—this pivoting action—is the same as throwing a ball, serving in tennis, or any similar movement.The Look Cool Drill is all about using the weight of the club to train your hands, relax your wrists, and get the lever system working naturally.

SWING BETTER WITH THE LOOK COOL DRILL

THE CLUB UNLOADS AWAY FROM YOU

Understanding the relationship between your club face and your right wrist is key to helping players at all levels find their swing. When you know the angles in your swing and what creates them, you'll be more consistent and straight.

RIGHT ARM. RIGHT WRIST

Here is a review of methods and techniques you can try practicing in your short game.

TECHNIQUES TO IMPROVE YOUR SHORT GAME

Hitting a base ball is an exact duplicate of hitting a golf ball. With only a couple of small exceptions. One when you hit a baseball it is infront of your lead foot by about 6 inches. In golf the ball is more in the center of your body. The ball is also lower than in baseball. But the transition of the body and how your lead leg stops the forward motion and then becomes a stablizer before it pushes back and away from the forward motion of the bat. That is what one causes acceleration and tow keeps your head looking like it stays still or moves backwards through impact. The other difference is that the shaft of the club is not the bat. The bat is the face of the golf club. 

CROSSOVER SPORTS

Pivoting the club is about the lever system and how it works with and without your body.

PIVOTING THE CLUB

Joe Nichols, one of Mike Malaska’s mentors who helped him throughout his career, always said that if you are putting inside of 10 feet, assume the put is dead straight. 

Follow this philosophy unless the green dictates otherwise. Make the ball break out of the hole and not into it. When you get up over the put and question it, just play it straight. Because if you hit it straight and straight at the hole, it should go in. So, assume straight inside of 10 feet, unless there is something that tells you otherwise.

PUTTING INSIDE OF 10 FT

Before you start to swing, your grip must be correct.

GETTING YOUR GRIP RIGHT

The ability to see the correct line and start the ball down the line is critical in putting. Practicing on a chalk line to learn how to start the ball down your intended line is a basic skill. Once you can do that. Then it is how well do you see line when the line is not there.

SEEING THE CORRECT TARGET LINE

“Golf’s Biggest Secret is the Swing You Cannot See” Unleash the M.A.G.I.C. in your golf swing. I talk a lot about the natural forces at play in your swing – Momentum, Acceleration, Gravity, Inertia, and Centripetal Force. These natural factors make the golf swing work. Even though you cannot see them. You can feel them. You can develop them and learn to control them to get greater distance and consistency without putting more stress on your body. Golf is a human development game – one of the best ones out there. Let’s get started and see what it can bring out in you. Add 15-Years to Your Game!

INVISIBLE SWING

Old teaching taught forearm rotation. Modern teaching allows the wrists to release in the way they do for every other sport.

THE 'MODERN' RELEASE

Check your aim if your tendency is to twist.

AIM LEFT IF YOU'RE TWISTY

How does force actually move through your feet and what helps it work.

HOW DO YOU MOVE FORCE THROUGH YOUR FEET

When your hips begin to work correctly, you are on your way to being a really good player. 

GETTING YOUR HIPS WORKING CORRECTLY

Get a feel for how to hit the ball by breaking it down into three parts. First, swing with your right foot back, then your left, and finally, with both feet together.

ADJUSTING YOUR FEET WHILE PRACTICING

Gott Golf uses numbers and technology to fit clubs that work with different player's swings.

THE STATISTICS BEHIND FITTING A DRIVER HEAD

Learn to use path and face in combination.

WHERE THE BALL GOES

This Mulligan Monday, Mike discusses developing putting tempo on the green.

Golf swings are all about finding a tempo and Tour Players are masters at maintaining tempo under pressure. Tempo is the pace at which the swing works, and rhythm is the sequence. Timing is what holds it together. The key is finding the tempo and maintaining it. If the tempo changes, the sequence changes, and then the timing changes.

Mike is developing tempo on the putting green by making swings. He counts out 1 and 2 and then putts the ball. Whether Mike is putting a two-foot putt, a twenty-footer, a fifty-footer, a chip shot, or even a drive, the tempo remains the same. The only difference is that the club is swinging in a larger arc.

PUTTING DEVELOPING TEMPO

Flop shots from the bunker with focus on release.

BUNKER FLOP SHOT AND RELEASE

The topic of this Quick Fix Friday is to get a feel for how your hands work.

According to Mike, the idea that you should take your hands out of the swing is simply ridiculous.

Mike motions with his right and left hands to illustrate how they work. He uses his club to swing back and forth, switching from his left to right hand as he makes a swing. He then uses both hands to hammer home the point, basically the "L to L"  Drill. 

This is your golf swing.

HOW THE HANDS WORK

A Malaska Golf Member makes an observation about practicing with alignment sticks. He realizes Mike needs to use the sticks to hit dead center into the screen.

Mike explains that having the sticks down while practicing helps you know where you are aiming, where the ball is, and where you want the ball to start. This enables you to see the right picture.

Mike also makes easy swings and doesn't try to hit the ball hard. He is not in a big rush to hit it far. Trying to swing too hard makes it difficult to feel what's happening. Mike swings with enough speed to feel the momentum of the club. The key is to feel and sense what the club is doing. At this point, it's not about speed.

It is essential to feel the club's momentum and get it in the correct arc. You can increase speed once you feel how you are moving to offset the momentum. That is easy to do because more speed creates more force. The key is to sense the force and know how to react to it. You are constantly offsetting the forces of the club with your body.

PRACTICING PROPERLY

Mike and Milo discuss their 7 years teaching together.

TEACHER TO TEACHER - MIKE & MILO LINES

A Malaska Golf Member has been having problems with the mental side of golf and reached out to Mike for some advice on how to get mentally tougher.

The first topic Mike talks about is strategy on the golf course. He doesn't like words such as lay up, go for it, and play it safe. Mike had played with Jack Nicklaus in several events and recalled in one instance that on a par 5, Jack decided to hit a ball short of the green instead of going for it.

Mike quizzed Jack as they were going down the fairway on why he laid up his shot. Jack replied that he didn't lay up. Bewildered, Mike asked what do you call it? Jack's answer was profound; he said that he just changed his strategy.

Jack doesn't like to use words such as lay up or play it safe because those words mean there is danger out there. This leads to anxiety, and Jack wants everything to be positive when he approaches golf. Jack changed his strategy and was very aggressive about the shot he took.

If you are over a shot and feel like you are not committed to hitting it, step back and assess the situation. Don't second guess yourself; just back away and aim at a target where you can be aggressive.

For a par 5, when Mike is in the fairway, he asks himself, can he hit the ball over the green? If this is the case, then Mike isn't going to go for it unless it is a wide-open green.

Mike looks at his lie and asks himself if he had 10 balls, could he hit 7 or 8 on the green? How many would get out of play if he missed the green? If Mike feels confident about his odds, he will probably go for it. If Mike isn't hitting the ball well and his lie is suspect, then it's not worth the risk. Mike then finds a distance to hit, usually about 100 yards, and then he can get onto the green.

Approach the shots with a mindset of strategy rather than thinking of laying up or playing it safe. The key is to find a shot where you are comfortable. What is that shot? There is no right or wrong answer.

Make a practice shot to get a feel of what that looks like and replicate that shot. The biggest problem Mike sees with players is they get up over the ball and start thinking about how they will make the shot. This is something you should have already figured out in your practice swings. It's about duplicating the motion once you decide to swing.

Afterward, assess how well you did or did not hit the ball and learn from that. The key is to review what you had intended to do and get that mental picture before going on to the next shot.

Mike reiterates that it is more about the process than the outcome. Once you start doing this, you will start playing better golf.


NO LAYUPS IN GOLF

You lose control and flip the club when you remove your pinky.  This is is exactly what you want in these kind of shots.  It's not commonly known, but tour players use it quite a bit.

REMOVE LEFT PINKY

Balance, as it applies to your body in sports, is when both of your feet are flat on the ground, you're standing with most of your weight on the balls of your feet, but your toes are not engaged - "they are quiet".

BALANCE & THE BALLS OF YOUR FEET

Set three or four balls on the green with lines around the ball. Set up to the ball. Line the line on the putter if you have one with the line on the ball. Then just make a stroke and make the line roll with no wobble. Then once you can do that then do the same thing making the ball go different distances and at different targets. 

ROLL BALL

Mike tells a story where he was fortunate enough to have Moe Norman hit balls for him. Mike had the pleasure of watching him hit balls for 45 minutes. It was when Mike was just starting out, and it was one of the most impressive things he had ever seen.

Regarding setup, Moe Norman wanted you to have your club more in a straight line with your left arm. The member wants to know if this is ok relative to what Mike teaches.

Mike loves what Moe teaches about this aspect of the setup. What happens when you swing the club is that the weight of the club pulls your arm out.
Moe’s philosophy was, if that is going to happen when you swing, then why don’t you position your arm in a straight line and start there?

Then Moe wanted you to set up with clubface back from the ball on the tee. This was because the takeaway killed most people, so he took that out of play. This is how he swung and hit the ball, and he would pipe it every time.

There is some misunderstanding about Moe relative to his grip. That setup, where your arm and hand are flat, and you start back from the ball, is definitely ok. The key is to have the club in your fingers. Moe had really big grips, and his club often appeared to be touching his palms more. This was just due to the circumference of the grips.

If you swing like Moe Norman, just don’t put the club in the palm of your hand.

MOE NORMAN AND SETUP

The target line is a very important factor when it comes to club fitting. Learn how your swing can impact the putter that best fits you.

EXAMINING TARGET LINES WHEN CLUB FITTING

When you set up to the ball your trail wrist is at a 90 degree angle to your swing arch. As you swing back to waist high your trail wrist is still at a 90 degree angel to the swing arch. As your arm swings to the top of your swing your trail arm externally rotates in your shoulder socket. That rotation makes the club face look as thought it has opened up. Then as you swing down the arm internally rotates back so that at waist high the wrist is back to a 90 degree angle to the arch. It then stays in that same relationship until waist high on the follow through. At that point your lead arm continues to externally rotate. 

SWING ARC

This Quick Fix Friday finds Harry Hooker in the bunker.

Harry's solution is to stand on his left foot, aim a little more left, and let the club drop down into the sand.

Stand on your left foot. Feel like your head's in front of the ball and back in your stance. Don't swing back and from the inside because it won't work. 

Harry makes a swing and gets it out of the bunker and onto the green.

HARRY HOOKER BUNKERS STAND ON YOUR LEFT FOOT

Get a feel for your backswing by starting your initial swing at the follow-through position. You will feel the momentum of the club and the arc of the swing.