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Set Up And Shape

The finesse wedge is one in which we are intentionally trying to be "weak" instead of "powerful". The steps for creating a weak set up position are:

  • Start with your body stacked up and your shoulders more level
  • Have your upper body rotated slightly more toward the target than your lower body
  • Have your feet narrow, but your lead foot turned flared toward the target
  • Place your right hand in a weak position (hand turned counter clockwise, or v pointing more toward your chin.

Plane is very important for solid contact. Any movement that you do can add a steepness or a shallowness to it, but if you have movements that balance each other then the club will swing on plane. Most of the set up positions create a "steep", so we will balance those positions with "shallow swing". The swing will include:

  • The upper body shifting toward the target in the backswing
  • The forearms and shoulders working more around instead of hinging
  • The timing of the movement will be a "Throw from the top" and a "catch at the bottom"

Tags: Chip, Beginner

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In this Fineswege drill video, we're going to go over the keys to the setup position and

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understanding the overall swing book and understanding steep and shallows. A lot of my

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wedge instruction has come from conversations with Stan Utley, James Seekman and some

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other guys out there who've kind of studied the similar pattern. When I grew up in somewhere

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to most people that I've talked to, we were all taught the same chipping style or a

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finesse wedge style where you have a narrow stance, you play the ball extremely far back,

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like so and you basically hold your hands ahead and then you just turn and hold onto it.

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Now that technique works fine for a limited number of shots. Like I could actually

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probably get away with using it here. The problem is as you get better and as you play

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nicer golf courses, you're going to get tighter fairways, you're going to get firmer

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greens and it's going to be much more difficult for you to control that swing versus

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what I'm going to teach you today. So the setup for this finesse swing is going to

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involve a little bit of a hand release. It's going to involve a little bit of a

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body pivot but it's not going to be this block and hold that completely exposes the

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leading edge or the dig side of the club because that dig side of the club when you get

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nervous under pressure, if you're on really tight lies, you can get you in a lot of trouble.

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So instead of having the shaft leaning way forward in the ball way back, we're going to

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play the ball anywhere from center of my stance to middle of my foot. We're not going to

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play it all the way back on the heel although it's possible with this technique. Just

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because I think you get a little bit cleaner contact and you can do the same shot with it virtually

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off the toe. But by adjusting where it is in the setup, we can control how much loft we get

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as well as how much roll. Instead of trying to get the shaft to come in with a whole lot of

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lean, we're actually going to try to get the shaft to come in relatively vertical like so.

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The way that we're going to do this is our setup position is going to create kind of a

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steep angle of the tax so that our swing can be shallow. Essentially the way that we're

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going to do that is we're basically just going to bend forward so that our chest would

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be pointing slightly out at the front of the golf ball like so. With an iron and a driver,

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you'll often have your chest pointing behind the golf ball but with this short swing, if

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your chest is pointed behind the golf ball, as you saw there, the club will bottom out behind

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it. It's roughly going to bottom out in front of your chest. So for this finesse swing,

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this chip style technique, you're going to have the ball in the middle of the stance with

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the shaft virtually straight up and down or leaning just slightly forward. In order to use

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the bounce of the club and allow the face to rotate with the path in the backswing, you're

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going to have your right hand grip a little bit more on top or in a weak position where

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this is pointing kind of where the V in your right hand is pointing more straight up and

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down the shaft. We'll get into that in the release video for the finesse swing but by doing so,

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it allows you to set the club on a proper path which allows you to release it on the way

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down. You'll understand when you watch that other video. The third thing, so we've got

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their sternum head of the golf ball and pointed out here in the backswing. This was one

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of the big revelations for me. James Seekman describes it as the energy is always moving

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towards the target. What I see when I'm doing 3D evaluations is that even the guys who

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look like they have a very flippy swing, they kind of finish like this but they're like,

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hey, don't worry about my chipping, I get up and down from everywhere. They all tend to have

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this common pattern which is during the backswing. The upper body is going to move about

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3 inches closer to the target than when it started. You heard me right. So from setup, the upper

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body is going to drift forward in the backswing as the arms go back. This allows me to have my

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arms initiate the downswing or to have this proper sequencing and not hit behind the golf ball.

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What I realized was if you were to try to set up 3 inches in front and then had a little shift

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back where you would still have a normal kinematic sequence because the upper body or you would have

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a normal energy flow, your body would basically lead the club down and you would get too much

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shaft length. So the reason that the better players figured this out is by leaning this way,

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now my arms almost have to start the downswing instead of letting my body do it.

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My arms are going to start the downswing and then my upper body is just going to catch it. So I call

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it from James Seekman, I call it the throwing catch. He talks about supporting it, I like the

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throwing catch model. So basically you get to hear, you just let your arms drop and then your upper body

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will turn with it so that you can get into this file through position. In the old style,

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block and hold the chipping technique, you would play the ball way back and we would finish with

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our hands kind of way out in front like so which works for specific shots. But if I was to turn the

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face the camera, you can see basically I held off and didn't let my arms release at all.

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In this kind of new school finesse swing, when you go into this finished position so I go left,

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when I go into my finished position which looks relatively normal, from here you want the shaft

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virtually pointed at your belly button. If your hands get like this, well you got a little bit too

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much speed and emphasis from your hands. But the big thing is when it went here, you just didn't

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support it with the chest. Some extent so if your chest stays pointed at the golf ball the whole time

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and I have no movement of my body, you are going to tend to overrelease the hands which will just

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give you spin in contact issues. So let's go through the summary real quick. You are set up anywhere

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from middle to middle of your foot. Starting leaning left or what James Seekman's doctor rose

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called a twisted spine, basically compared to your hips, your upper body is going to be open.

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Like so, bent forward just like this and then in the backswing your upper body is going to drift

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forward as the club comes back. You forgot one little weak grip with your setup as the upper body

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goes forward when the club comes back and then you simply have to just let your arms drop down

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onto the golf ball, catch it with your upper body to go to the finished position. We'll have drills in

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this section that will help you learn these different pieces but this kind of goes over the overview

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of the setup and the technique. With a little bit of practice you'll find that this is much

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easier and much more superior to the block and hold technique.

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