The Single Most Important Habit
of a Highly Effective Golfer

What separates those that can play golf well from those that can't? It's a great question and it's fair to say that depending on whom you ask you're bound to get many different points of view.

The bottom line is the score makes the difference! When all is said and done the golfer who can find a way to score lower on a consistent basis will win more often. This is exactly what Tiger Woods does every other week on the PGA tour. Tiger has found a way to score lower even though his scoring ways are somewhat unconventional. What do I mean by unconventional? Well, Tiger spends a lot of time off the fairway and many times doesn't find the green in regulation but has the ability to consistently make par or better.

A good example of this unconventional golf was in the recent Buick tournament in La Jolla where in one of his rounds he hit just one fairway out of fourteen and yet found a way to score seventy one, which kept him in contention for the tournament and ultimately led to him winning that event for the fourth time.

So why does Tiger play so well when it's obviously more challenging to score lower when you're in the rough more time than you'd like to be? Well in his case he hits the ball a long way from the tee leaving him easier shots because he's often using shorter irons that he can hit higher out of the long grass and stop on the greens.

For the rest of us this strategy probably won't work unless you can hit the ball more than three hundred yards from the tee, which few of us can do. But what we can do is get better at the parts of the game that produce lower scores. Most of us already know that we use more shots from within one hundred yards of the green than from outside this distance. This is precisely where Tiger is brilliant, Tiger can get the ball close to the hole from anywhere around the green consistently and because he hits the ball closer to the hole the percentage of putts that he makes is higher.

So if you want to lower your scores by making more putts then it follows that you have to learn how to hit your short greenside shots closer to the hole more often. Imagine for a moment that you're just off the green's surface and the hole is twenty feet away from you, the green is relatively flat and the ball is sitting down in the grass enough that you can't use your putter. What shot will you play that would guarantee that you hit the ball within three to five feet of the hole more than sixty percent of the time?

It's been my experience that this relatively simple chip shot brings more people undone than many of the other shots that are played from greenside. This is a shot that you should be able to hit close to the hole simply because the stroke you employ is not much longer than a long putting stroke. So by virtue of its length it should be easier to play more consistently, however this is not the case.

Let's go back to the Buick tournament for a moment and if you were fortunate enough to watch the playoff you would have seen and example of a chip shot gone wrong. Rookie Nathan Green from Australia was in the rough just off the green surface on the first play off hole and needed to hit his ball close to the hole to stay in the play off. Nathan addressed the ball and proceeded to hit the ground and grass just behind the ball barely moving the ball forward, ultimately sealing his fate.

You see even the very best golfers can be brought undone by one of the easiest shots to in golf to execute. The chip shot can be played with many different clubs in the bag from many different places around the green and it's a shot that you just have to get better at if you wish to score lower in your rounds. It's not quite as exciting as a tee shot but is probably more valuable in terms of turning a bad score into a good one. Can we ever forget Tigers chip shot at the 2005 Masters?

The little insignificant golf shots can make the most difference to your scores and you need to devote more time to improving the results you get with them. Technically it's one of the simplest shots to learn and requires very little energy, just time spent perfecting the carry and roll elements. When you play chip shots always think in terms of reducing the time the balls spends in the air, in other words get the ball rolling across the green as early as possible.

Think of a chip shot a putt with a hop in it, watch the pros play them and notice how this simple stroke is executed. The ball is played opposite your rear inside ankle bone with your hands positioned opposite your front inside thigh. Your shirt buttons are positioned slightly towards the target in front of the ball which shifts your bodies' weight towards your front leg. Holding down on the handle about two inches create a stroke that is no longer than the height of your ankles during the back swing phase and the forward swing phase with the club head always accelerating through the golf ball.

If you spend more time on this simple yet highly effective golf shot you will score lower simply because the majority of shots you use are actually played from around the green more than from anywhere else. Putting is a huge chunk of your score and the chip, pitch and sand shots come next. Work your way from the edge of the green outwards and makesure that you learn each shot well before you move on and you will start to notice a reduction in your scores over time.