The Golf Swinger Doctor

Updated: November 28, 2024

How to hit a pitch shot from 20 yards

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Sean is the co-founder of My Golf Tutor, the top golf instructional blog helping weekend golfers play better golf. He played on the Irish National team that produced major champions like Rory Mcllroy, Graeme McDowell, Padraig Harrington, and Darren Clarke before playing professionally for 5 years around the world.
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Have you ever found yourself 20 yards short of the green?

Perhaps you’ve hit two great shots just short of a par 5, or you have miss-hit your second shot to a par 4.

You have a tight lie and you would like to have the ball land on the green and run out to the hole.

How exactly do you execute a pitch shot that rolls up close to the hole and leaves you with a potential birdie putt or the ability to save par?

Zach was recently in a similar situation and asked:

Hey Sean, I have been having a lot of issues with my 20-yard pitch shots around the green. I have a tendency to catch them heavy or thin. Do you have any techniques that will help me be more consistent?

Pitch Shot Setup…

The most important part of getting more consistent with these 20-yard pitch shots is getting in a good setup from the start, and then establishing a good routine to help you repeat the same set-up over and over again.

First, let’s talk about ball position. For these shots, I would like to see you set up with the ball in the middle of your stance, pretty much opposite your sternum.

Second- open up your body slightly; this will create room for the club to travel around you after you hit the shot.

Now when you open up your stance, it may seem like the ball is opposite your right foot.

However, this is more of an optical illusion than anything.

If you were to square your stance back up, you would see that the ball is pretty much in the center of your stance.

Third- where you position your weight is another important part of the setup.

You should definitely have a lot more weight on your left side than your right side. I would like to see you place about 70 to 75 percent of your weight on your left side.

Angle of Attack…

Once you feel comfortable with the setup, the final thing I would like you to concentrate on is your angle of attack. Having a shallow angle of attack will help improve your consistency and quality of strike.

The same thing goes for the clubhead. We don’t want to hit down too steeply into the back of the ball, as this will result in big divots and chunk shots.

Consequently, players will often try to compensate by “scooping” or pulling out of the shot, which will result in thin shots.

One More Thing…

There is one more thing I want you to watch when hitting a pitch shot – make sure your hands don’t get too far ahead of the clubhead at impact.

Why?

Because we don’t want to expose the leading edge of the club too much for these short shots.

If the hands are leading too much at impact, this will increase the chances of sticking the club into the ground, resulting in a chunk shot.

So, next time you are on the golf course follow these simple steps and you will be hitting your pitch shots next to the hole.

Have you ever made a pitch shot from around the green? Let me know in the comment section below what club you used when you did this.