Top 6 Drills to Cure Chipping Yips

The chipping yips are one of the most severe handicaps in golf, afflicting many world-class players, including the legendary Tiger Woods himself.

It’s like most golfers “have to” face this brutal aspect of the game at some point or another. Some of them also give up the game entirely solely because of this trouble. Fortunately, there is a cure to all golf ailments, and chipping yips are no exception!

Some believe that the underlying issue of the yips might stem from the brain. However, physical execution is ultimately what makes the difference. So we’ve come up with some drills to cure chipping yips so you can stop the recurring pattern of your embarrassing yips once and for all.

6 Best Way To Cure Chipping Yips

The Triangle/ ‘y’ Drill

It’s not only a drill but also a chipping tip that can single-handedly fix chipping yips in just one day’s practice.

Conceptually, it’s straightforward. As you practice chipping, find a way to create a lowercase y shape with your arms and your club’s shaft (imagine looking at yourself directly).

Your front foot should bear about 60-70% of your body weight, and you should hold this position with your upper body throughout your swing.

It would help if you swung the club using only your upper body and not your arms or wrists. By doing so, you will strike the ball downward, allowing your club to launch it for you.

This simple chipping yips fix eliminates your worries about slicing the ball out of bounds for good. It produces a lower, more accurate chip shot, ideal for shorter chips around the green.

Read: The 10 best chippers for you

The Hula Hoop Drill

You can do this fun chipping and pitching drill at your club’s practice facility, in a public park, or your backyard. The more chips you can consistently place within a hoops distance from the hole, the greater your chance of succeeding. The key to eliminating yips with this technique is concentrating more on your target than your hand motion.

Here’s how to beat chipping yips with the Hula Hoop Drill

1. Obtain a hula hoop (or create a similar-sized ring from a string)

2. Place golf balls at 5-yard spacings from the hoop. Eight balls at 5-40 yards.

3. Begin with the nearest ball from the hoop. Then chip it, and try to make it land inside the circle.

4. After each successful chip, make your way to the next ball farther from the hoop.  When you miss one, you start over.

This chipping drill tests your ability to execute multiple types of chip shots. Test how far you can get from the hoop before you need to restart.  It’s a handy way to monitor your progress and keep you motivated as you overcome each stage.

The Trail Hand Releasing Drill

A great golf coach of all time, Butch Harmon, designed this chipping drill, which can be an excellent chipping yips cure.

Butch observed that most chipping “yips” occur when the leading hand (left hand if you are right-handed and vise versa) stops right before impact, with the trail hand flipping. The reason is that golfers try to send the ball flying instead of letting the clubface do its job.

So, if that’s the case for you too, the following drill can be of help.

Here’s how to cure chipping yips with the trail hand releasing drill.

1. Put yourself in your regular chipping stance – narrowed feet, the ball off your back foot, and 60-70% of body weight on the front foot.

2.  Chip usually, but release your trail hand just before the impact.

3. Make sure the lead arm swings directly into the target.

Whenever you struggle to make chip shots or occasionally have yips, go to the range and put this drill to work. Golfers with yips habitually flip their trail hand just before the impact, so this training physically prevents them from doing so.

The Chip-a-Coin Drill

This one might be the best way to cure chipping yips that you can practice within the convenience of your home. The act of chipping a coin will sharpen your contacts with your chip shots and help you feel more confident when chipping a golf ball.

It works because it makes you stay down into the chip, ensuring you have the most refined precision with the wedges.

You can do this by placing a few coins on your living room carpet and then trying to get clean contact – then throwing them into the air. If you want, you can also place a cup at the center of the floor and try to chip nickels into it.

One more thing – try using an old wedge to practice this drill, for the coins can eventually start making dents on the clubface.

The 10-by-10 Chipping Drill

The ten-by-ten chipping is an excellent technique that boosts your confidence by eliminating yips and helps you manage your game from 10-100 yards. You have a greater chance of being accurate and winning a tournament if you can execute it correctly. And just like the hula hoop drill, you must concentrate on your target firmly.

Here’s how to cure chipping problems with the 10 x 10 drill.

1. Make a 10-yard line from 10 to 100 yards using yard makers.
2. You should try to place your shots in the yard at the exact distance.
3. Find out what swings you need for each shot between 10 and 100 yards. For instance, a 25% swing yields 15 yards, and 50% yields 30 yards.
4. You will notice a dramatic change in your overall ability to shoot on the golf course by practicing this drill for 3-4 days.

If you’re poor at chipping, this drill will help reduce the extra strokes you take on and off the green while curing the yips. By working on this drill daily, you will drastically improve your game.

The Par 18 Putting Game

Including games into your practice routine can be one of the best chipping yips solutions. The following game can make your practice routine more engaging and prepare you to play under pressure with your buddies. The chipping game is perfect for improving your scores around the greens.

1. Around the green, pick nine tee boxes at different distances and angles.
2. Play one ball at every spot as Par-2, so you create a Par 18 course.

The game works on all your short game facets, including putting and chip yips cure. You get immediate feedback on how your short game progresses, and it’s much quicker than playing a complete round of golf. Try to practice this once a week and keep track of scores; they won’t take long dropping.

Frequently Asked Question (FAQs)

Why do I have chipping yips?

Usually, you get the yips when you don’t believe you can play a good chip shot. The thought of hitting fat or a thin shot leads a golfer to think about the worst possible outcome, and this negative mindset results in a disappointing result.

Symptoms of the yips can appear in various ways, such as trying to guide the golf shot onto the green through deceleration (often resulting in poor accuracy) or raising the head, causing a sub-par outcome.

Is there a cure for the yips?

Sure there is. As you work on perfecting your stance, body rotations, and swing techniques, continue to practice the drills we’ve shared.

How do I stop my chip shots from decelerating?

Shortening the backswing is the key to solving deceleration issues when hitting chip shots. It’s almost always true that too-long backswings before the shot cause deceleration problems.

If a backswing is too wide, shots will surely go far when you accelerate through the ball. Therefore, it’s crucial to slow the club down as it moves towards the ball.

What are the chipping yips?

These are inadvertent wrist spasms or sudden prods that generally occur when golfers are putting; it causes them to miss easy short putts and chips. Golf chipping yips are more of a mental issue than a technical difficulty that confuses you when gauging your shots.

How did Tiger overcome chipping yips?

Tiger Woods had yips mainly because he let the handle widen too much during his backswings. During that motion, the head doesn’t quite swing; instead, the entire stick starts moving. Then, when the grip accelerates during the downswing, it comes through the impact, ruining the whole swing physics.

Tiger overcame this issue by using the bounce and by setting and releasing the club earlier. When using the bounce, lies become less frightening. So, his wedge is hitting the turf and skidding.

Here’s an exciting read that’ll help you learn more about his entire cure process from Golf Digest.

Thoughts…

Having chipping yips shouldn’t mean you have to sacrifice strokes on the course. You can dramatically improve your game if you dedicate at least one hour a week to improving your chipping for the next three weeks. Just imagine what it will be like to know that you can save more pars, shoot more birdies, and convert those round-ending triple-bogeys into manageable bogeys the next time you play.