Master the uphill chip shot

The Uphill Chip Shot or Pitch shot. This is the shot I used to struggle a lot with when I was younger. The reason I used to struggle is I used to fight the slope, leaning my body weight into the slope using my 58 or 60 degree sand wedge. The nature of setting up this way, with this club, is that at impact, the leading edge of the club will drive into the slope. This didn’t give me much margin for error. If I happened to hit a few millimeters behind the ball, the club would drive into the slope, I would get a stub shot that only goes a few feet in front of me.

What I started to realize is that I needed to play this the same way I would play a flat, off a flat lie, using the sole of the club to contact the ground, not fighting the slope, going with the slope, and swinging with the slope. This way, the sole of the club will contact the ground, giving me a little more margin for error.  If I happen to hit a little heavy, the sole of the club would resist with the ground. It would skid through rather than driving into the ground. I could still get a reasonably good shot.

Now if you start playing it this way, you will get a better contact, but what you’ll need to take into consideration is that, we’re already on a 10 to 15 degree slope, maybe sometimes more. If you are using a 58 or 60 degree sand wedge, suddenly you’ve got over 70 degrees of loft. And if you play this shot with the same length of swing and the same speed of swing as you normally would, for this length of shot, the ball will go higher and come up short. So you’ll need to make a bigger swing if you continue to use the same club.

For me, starting to make a bigger swing, creating a solid contact, becomes a little more difficult. And controlling your distance consistently becomes more difficult. So what I find, is if I switch club, I’ll switch down to 9 iron pitching wedge.  This way I can make the same length of swing as I normally would to this length of shot. It’s a little easier to create a consistent impact and control my distance. I’ve already got some in-built slope, so I don’t need to worry about the ball going too low and running too much. So I’m going to use a nine iron, go with the slope, and swing with the slope, using the sole of the club, not the leading edge of the club.

I believe in most situations, that’s the easiest way to play the shot around the green, when you’re in uphill slope. But to be a great short game player, you can’t be one dimensional. There will be situations perhaps when you’re in a little bit of rough and the ball sitting down. You will need to use your sand wedge.  You will need to use the leading edge of the club, so don’t think you need to play it like this all the time. I would just say, as a basic rule, this is the easiest way to play this shot.