Stop Chunking Chips: 3 Aids, $140, 2 Weeks

I chunked a chip so bad last summer the ball went backwards. I had a perfect lie 15 yards from the pin and I hit the ground four inches behind the ball. The ball dribbled two feet. My playing partner looked at the sky like he was checking for rain. I wanted to throw my wedge into the pond.

I was shooting in the mid-90s and losing at least four strokes a round to bad chipping. Driving was fine. Putting was fine. But every time I stepped over a chip with a wedge, I had no idea what was about to happen. Clean contact or a crater. Fifty-fifty.

I spent two weeks drilling with three training aids in my backyard. Total cost was about $140. By the end of week two, I was making clean contact on roughly 8 out of 10 chips instead of 5 out of 10. The catastrophic ones stopped. Three training aids, about $140 total, and two weeks of backyard drills is what it took.

Why You Chunk Chips

Chunking a chip is not a mystery. It happens for three specific reasons, and you probably have at least two of them.

You flip your wrists at impact. The most common cause. Instead of maintaining your wrist angle and letting the club’s loft do the work, you scoop at the ball with your hands. The clubhead bottoms out behind the ball. The ball goes nowhere. Same root cause produces the skull, when you flip early and catch the ball on the upswing.

Your weight is on your back foot. Weight hanging back at impact means your low point is behind the ball. The club hits the ground before the ball every time. You can tell yourself “keep your weight forward” all you want, but without feedback, your body ignores you.

Your low point is inconsistent. Even with your weight forward and wrists stable, you don’t know exactly where the club bottoms out. Some chips you catch clean. Some you hit an inch behind the ball. The difference is invisible but the result is enormous. You need objective feedback on where your club is hitting the ground.

YouTube advice tells you to “keep your weight forward” and “don’t flip.” That advice is free and worth exactly what you paid for it. What you need is a tool that tells you the moment you do it wrong. Training aids earn their money here.

The Aids That Fixed My Chipping

1. Tour Striker Smart Ball ($40-$45)

The Smart Ball is a foam ball on a lanyard you wear around your neck and tuck between your forearms. It looks like a kid’s pool toy. It is the single best $40 you can spend on your chipping.

The ball creates a physical connection between your arms. If you flip your wrists at impact, your forearms separate and the ball drops. You cannot cheat it. The feedback is instant. The ball drops. You pick it up. You try again. After about 20 chips, your body starts maintaining the arm-body connection on its own because it is tired of the ball falling out.

The drill: Set up with the Smart Ball between your forearms. Hit 20 chips to a target 10-15 yards away. The ball must stay in place through the entire stroke. If it falls out at any point, that rep does not count. You are training your body to stop scooping.

Time commitment: 10 minutes, four times a week for two weeks.

What it fixed: My wrist flip disappeared. I stopped scooping and started compressing. The skulls and chunks from wrist action were gone by the end of week two.

2. WhyGolf Chipping Plate ($40-$60)

The Chipping Plate is a flat plastic board with a slight lip on one end. You stand on it when you chip. If your weight stays on your front foot, the plate stays flat. If your weight shifts back, the plate tilts and you feel it through your feet immediately.

This is feedback you cannot get from a mirror or video. You know within half a second whether your weight was forward or back at impact. No guessing. The plate tilts and you know.

The drill: Set up with the Chipping Plate under your lead foot. Hit 15 chips keeping the plate flat through impact. Focus on feeling the plate pressed to the ground. If it tilts, you moved your weight back. Reset and hit again.

Time commitment: 10 minutes, three times a week for two weeks.

What it fixed: My weight transfer became automatic. After two weeks I stopped thinking about my weight entirely. My body learned the feeling of forward pressure through impact because the plate gave me a consequence every time I got it wrong.

3. Divot Board ($40-$60)

The Divot Board is a mat covered in small sequin-like flaps. When your clubhead strikes the surface, it flips the sequins to show exactly where the club hit the ground. You can see in one second whether your low point was behind the ball, at the ball, or in front of it.

The board tells you the truth about your low point. You think you’re catching the ball clean every time. The board disagrees, and the board is usually right.

The drill: Place a ball on the Divot Board and hit 10 chips. After each shot, look at the board. The sequin pattern should start at or just in front of the ball position. If the pattern starts behind the ball, you chunked it. Adjust your weight forward until the pattern consistently starts at the ball or ahead of it.

Time commitment: 10 minutes, twice a week for two weeks.

What it fixed: My low point stopped being random. I could see where my club was actually hitting the ground, and the fix was simple: move the low point forward.

The Two-Week Plan

Do not use all three at once. Stack them.

Week 1: Smart Ball only. Fix the wrist flip first. It is the biggest cause of chunks. Ten minutes, four times this week.

Week 2: Add the Chipping Plate. Keep doing Smart Ball drills, then add 10 minutes of Chipping Plate work. By the end of the week, add the Divot Board once to check your low point.

Total time is about 30 minutes spread across your week. You can do all of this in your backyard with a few practice balls and a target. That is less time than a single range session.

What I Would Skip

I considered the PuttOut Pressure Putt Trainer as a chipping target. Chip at the ramp and it pops the ball back. It is fun for five minutes, but it does not tell you why you chunked. It only tells you that you chunked, which you already knew because the ball went two feet. Save your $40 and buy the Smart Ball.

FAQ

Q: Can I fix chunking without spending money?

You can try. Lay a towel on the ground four inches behind the ball and chip without hitting it. That drill costs nothing and works for low point control. But it does not fix wrist flipping or weight transfer. The Smart Ball and Chipping Plate give you feedback on two problems the towel drill cannot address. For $140 total, you are buying three kinds of feedback that would take months of lessons to learn by feel alone.

Where to Buy

• Chipping Training Aids — Check price at Amazon

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