Chipping Circle
Ages 8 and up · A wedge or 9-iron, several balls, a target circle (a hula hoop, towel, or chalk ring) 5-15 yards away, grass to chip from
The chipping circle (chips landed into a marked circle, scored) turns golf's highest-value skill into a backyard game: shots inside 30 yards are where junior scores actually bleed, and the circle drill trains the fix, a repeatable little chip aimed at a LANDING SPOT, over and over, with a scoreboard attached.
The landing-spot idea is the drill's brain: good chippers aim where the ball should LAND (then let it roll), not where it should finish. The circle marks the landing zone, the technique stays small and simple (weight forward, hands ahead, a putting-like stroke with a lofted club), and the scoring makes fifty reps feel like a game.
How to run it
- The setup, checked every session: narrow stance, ball middle-to-back, weight favoring the front foot, hands slightly ahead of the ball, eyes on the landing circle once before the shot.
- The stroke: a firm-wristed putting-style motion with the lofted club, brushing the grass, the ball popping onto the landing circle. No scooping, no big swing.
- Ten chips at the circle from one spot, landings inside counted.
- Move the spot: closer, farther, and to angles, re-aiming at the same circle. Ten more.
- Games to finish: circle streaks, "around the clock" (make one from each of five spots), or par-two contests (chip plus putts against a parent). Log the daily circle percentage.
What to say
Common faults and fixes
Scooping (hanging back trying to lift the ball, thin and fat shots alternating).
Re-set weight forward and hands ahead, and the brush-the-grass image: the club's loft does all lifting. One session of exaggerated forward-weight chips usually retires the scoop.
Aiming at the flag or finish instead of the landing spot.
The circle IS the target, said aloud pre-shot ("landing there"). Watching where good chips land versus finish for ten balls teaches the roll-out lesson permanently.
Big swings for short chips (power with no clock).
The putting-stroke framing shrinks it: same rocking motion, lofted club. Distance comes from stroke size, exactly like the putting ladder; connect the two drills aloud.
Make it easier, make it harder
Bigger circle, shorter carries, chipping off a tee at first for clean contact confidence.
Smaller circles at varied carries; different clubs from one spot (learning trajectory-and-roll menus); uphill-downhill lies; the up-and-down game on a practice green; one-ball pressure rounds where the day ends on a made circle.
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