Click here and enter your email address to watch the full video
Tyler Ferrell is the only person in the world named to Golf Digest's list of Best Young Teachers in America AND its list of Best Golf Fitness Professionals in America. Meet your new instructor.

Subscribe now to watch the full video.

Swing Adjustments For Slopes Around The Green

Learn simple adjustments for varied lies. Here are some suggestions:

  • Downhill - widen stance, slide lower body forward and lean upper body forward into front thigh so pelvis and torso match the slope. Choke up if needed, and take more lofted club.
  • Uphill - normal width stance. Slide lower body forward, but keep your upper body in the middle of your stance. Take less lofted club.
  • Ball above stance - choke up. Stand slightly more vertical by bending knees instead of hips. Aim right to account for the change in face angle.
  • Ball below stance - squat down and aim more left than normal. Your swing will be slightly steeper because of the lower body restriction from the squat position. The "catch" part of the "throw and catch" will be more dificult
  • Athletes applying rotary upper body force from the top

Tags: Poor Contact, Chip, Beginner

00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:06,000
In this drill video, we're going to look at adjusting for slopes around the green.

00:00:06,000 --> 00:00:13,000
So the simple thing is, whenever you're trying to hit shots and the slope is changing,

00:00:13,000 --> 00:00:21,000
you're going to use your body to try to recreate a flat, but basically the same impact

00:00:21,000 --> 00:00:23,000
conditions that you would have on the ground.

00:00:23,000 --> 00:00:29,000
So essentially, if the ground is wet, well below my feet and the club would be sitting

00:00:29,000 --> 00:00:34,000
like this, I'm going to do everything I can in my, you know, basically everything I can

00:00:34,000 --> 00:00:38,000
was set up in swing in order to get the club to still strike the ground the same way.

00:00:38,000 --> 00:00:42,000
Conversely, if the ball is way above my feet, this is a tough shot to do, so I'm going

00:00:42,000 --> 00:00:48,000
to do everything I can with my set up in swing in order to make the club work properly.

00:00:48,000 --> 00:00:50,000
So there's four possible combinations.

00:00:50,000 --> 00:00:57,000
I could have the ball below my feet, ball above my feet, uphill shot, or downhill shot, and any

00:00:57,000 --> 00:00:59,000
combination of the two.

00:00:59,000 --> 00:01:04,000
Well, the simple thing is your legs work as great shock absorbers.

00:01:04,000 --> 00:01:11,000
So if you can make use your legs to essentially create the same alignment you had as if it were

00:01:11,000 --> 00:01:14,000
a flat shot, that's the easiest way to hit these shots.

00:01:14,000 --> 00:01:17,000
So here I have the ball below my feet, right?

00:01:17,000 --> 00:01:24,000
So the ball below my feet, if I were to just set up normal, well, I'm above the golf wall.

00:01:24,000 --> 00:01:27,000
So I have to get down in one way or another.

00:01:27,000 --> 00:01:30,000
There's a couple, there's a couple easy ways to do it.

00:01:30,000 --> 00:01:36,000
First one I like is if I widen my stance a little bit and kind of sit into that front leg,

00:01:36,000 --> 00:01:40,000
now that brings me back pretty much into the same alignment that I just had.

00:01:40,000 --> 00:01:47,000
So now all I have to do is make sure that I have my reference frame in my brain is based

00:01:47,000 --> 00:01:50,000
on this wide stance that of my normal narrow stance.

00:01:50,000 --> 00:01:51,000
So I'm still going to get open.

00:01:51,000 --> 00:01:52,000
I'm still a little ahead of the ball.

00:01:52,000 --> 00:01:57,000
I'm not going to use my lower body very much during the shot and I can execute my good

00:01:57,000 --> 00:01:58,000
finesse wedge.

00:01:58,000 --> 00:02:06,000
So now I'll turn and face you and now we've got the ball above my stance.

00:02:06,000 --> 00:02:10,000
So here I can obviously get a little bit closer to the golf wall.

00:02:10,000 --> 00:02:18,000
I can, or sorry, you can stand a little bit further away to get the club, uh, soling a

00:02:18,000 --> 00:02:23,000
little bit better or you can get closer if the ball's sitting up enough and you can kind

00:02:23,000 --> 00:02:29,000
of take some of it out of it and do more of your block and hold style chip shot.

00:02:29,000 --> 00:02:34,000
The other thing is you need to be aware that because the club is going to be angled

00:02:34,000 --> 00:02:40,000
this way, it's going to affect where this face is pointing more so than the downhill shot.

00:02:40,000 --> 00:02:46,000
So when you're hitting the shot in the ball, I'll get it on to more of the slope.

00:02:46,000 --> 00:02:51,000
So when you're hitting the shot and the ball is above your feet, just know that if you

00:02:51,000 --> 00:02:56,000
came through normal, this club face is going to be pointing more left.

00:02:56,000 --> 00:03:01,000
So typically you'll have to open it up just a little bit more to counteract that, which

00:03:01,000 --> 00:03:05,000
means the ball's going to go a little higher, which means you probably have to take either

00:03:05,000 --> 00:03:11,000
less loft, like a less lofted club or make it slightly bigger swing.

00:03:11,000 --> 00:03:15,000
Our other options would be uphill and downhill.

00:03:15,000 --> 00:03:20,000
So downhill, I'm going to make the major adjustments with my lower body.

00:03:20,000 --> 00:03:24,000
I'm going to take a wider stance because that gets me a little closer to the ground and

00:03:24,000 --> 00:03:28,000
that gives me some room to lean into this lead foot.

00:03:28,000 --> 00:03:33,000
So now my pelvis, because I'm leaning into this left leg, is going to be level with the

00:03:33,000 --> 00:03:40,000
slope and now I'm just going to keep my lower body quiet as I make my normal finesse wedge

00:03:40,000 --> 00:03:41,000
swing like so.

00:03:41,000 --> 00:03:42,000
There's not much I can do.

00:03:42,000 --> 00:03:46,000
The ball is going to come out low, but because I'm leaning so much forward, I'm going

00:03:46,000 --> 00:03:51,000
to have a pretty steep angle of attack and it's going to have a fair amount of spin.

00:03:51,000 --> 00:04:00,000
You can open the club face and you can narrow, you can kind of choke up just a little

00:04:00,000 --> 00:04:05,000
bit and that will help counteract if you need to hit a shot that has a little bit more

00:04:05,000 --> 00:04:07,000
height to it.

00:04:07,000 --> 00:04:11,000
The big thing for this downhill line is you want to make sure that you go wide.

00:04:11,000 --> 00:04:16,000
The biggest mistake I see is players getting narrow like so and then they'll kind of fall

00:04:16,000 --> 00:04:19,000
backward and end up bleeding the shot or chunking it.

00:04:19,000 --> 00:04:23,000
So then the last one would be the uphill shot.

00:04:23,000 --> 00:04:28,000
Now I'll have to turn my back to you when we go through this.

00:04:28,000 --> 00:04:35,000
But the tendency here is to kind of hang back on the slope or the tendency here is to stick

00:04:35,000 --> 00:04:37,000
the club into the slope like so.

00:04:37,000 --> 00:04:38,000
I'll demonstrate that.

00:04:38,000 --> 00:04:45,000
So if I'm you'll either fall backward on that back foot and hit it too high too short

00:04:45,000 --> 00:04:50,000
or you will because the slope is straight up like so you'll just stick the club in the

00:04:50,000 --> 00:04:53,000
ground often just stuffing the shot.

00:04:53,000 --> 00:05:00,000
So the easiest way I think to work on these uphill shots is to take less loft and do

00:05:00,000 --> 00:05:06,000
more of kind of the dead hands type swing and just make sure to put your lower body

00:05:06,000 --> 00:05:08,000
sort of insument.

00:05:08,000 --> 00:05:13,000
So you're going to basically shift slightly forward.

00:05:13,000 --> 00:05:15,000
Still get your upper body open.

00:05:15,000 --> 00:05:18,000
That's one of the other things is anytime that it causes you to tilt back you'll want

00:05:18,000 --> 00:05:24,000
to close your upper body which brings the bottom of the swing back behind the golf ball.

00:05:24,000 --> 00:05:27,000
So uphill stance still slightly open.

00:05:27,000 --> 00:05:32,000
Lower body doesn't really do anything and you'll just do a little bit more of kind

00:05:32,000 --> 00:05:39,000
of more power source from that arms which kind of matches the finesse wedge so.

00:05:39,000 --> 00:05:44,000
So those are the four basic ways to adjust for uphill downhill slope with short game.

00:05:44,000 --> 00:05:46,000
It's all about creativity.

00:05:46,000 --> 00:05:50,000
So get used to using different clubs, play from different lies, play from different shots

00:05:50,000 --> 00:05:54,000
and it will help you tremendously when you're facing one of these shots on the course.

Subscribe now for full access to our video library.