Adapting your short game to summer conditions

Now that the days are longer and summer is here, golf courses are becoming much and firmer and less forgiving. To be able to successfully adapt, we need to understand how these conditions can affect how the club interacts with the ground and how the ball reacts on the green.

Listen in to hear how I alter the 3 Releases for these different situations!

I hope you like this video and be sure to like and subscribe…

My in person coaching is fully booked for 2024, but are still lots of ways I can help you with your golf:

Online Lessons: https://skillest.com/app/profile/dani…
3 Releases best selling book: https://amzn.eu/d/4KBfMlC
3 Releases: Online School: https://daniel-grieve.mykajabi.com/of…

Book me on cameo to do a personalised video for your friends or family
https://www.cameo.com/dangrievegolf

Follow me:
Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/dangrievegolf/?hl=en
TIkTok:https://www.tiktok.com/discover/Dan-grieve?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc
YouTube: www.youtube.com/@DanGrieveGolf

0:00 – 0:22 Intro
0:23 – 2:54 Club Selection
2:55 – 4:07 Mini Release 2 Shots
4:08 – 5:23 Grip Pressure
5:24 – 7:30 Bunker Play
7:31 – 9:22 Severe Slopes
9:23 – 10:59 Pitching
11:00 – 12:54 Hard Pan
12:55 – 15:17 The Rough
15:18 – 16:10 Putting off the green
16:11 – 16:36 Outro

right summer has finally arrived the conditions have got firmer the courses are playing quicker but how do you adapt for these conditions this is what this video is all about we’re going to run through the changes you need to make to your set up and swing to to still get the ball close from these summer conditions okay I’m out here on Dutchess course at Wen Golf Club where we’re going to run through some situations and help you improve your Shore game so the first thing I want you to consider is Club choice now when the greens are really slow and soft you need to be using a stronger lock generally to make sure the ball speed increases and it runs out to the hole okay one thing that really frustrates me in Winter and soft conditions is when the ball goes in has too much spinning it comes up short however when the greens get quick like we have here on on the first hole of The Duchess it’s downhill this chip there’s quite a bit of green to work with your eye might think well I’ll use something like a 79 here because I can land that across of the way and the ball will run out and that’s really good thinking I do encourage you to do that however when the greens get extreme extremely quick and downhill the danger of using a 79 with your chip and run release one style and you play a nice shot make a good contact you can see how that ball can just suddenly race away so that’s an example of my strike being 10 out of 10 but really my IQ you see that ball is chasing on my IQ was just a little bit low I didn’t anticipate that how quick that shot would be so I know some of you say well I like to stick to the same Club around the greens and there’s some mer in that you can kind of get used to it but when you have quick shots like this you are making life more difficult for yourself so rather than using a 7 IR in these firmer quicker conditions particularly when it’s down bit of a down slope just put a little bit more Loft in your hand so I’ve got a 52 Dee here 50 52 54 even would be a good choice here don’t need to change the shot type you’re still going to do a release one chip and run but very simply by using a bit more Loft the ball’s going to check a little bit more on the first and second bounces and then run out a little bit softer so this would be the wrong Club if we were doing this back in February because it would be too soft but now we’re out here in in the summer conditions we have to think about using a bit more Loft but I changed nothing absolutely nothing at add dress it’s the same shot you can see how that ball checks and it’s very very softly creeping towards the hole it’s not wanting to get away from you you can see soft it’s death going in just missed on the right side you can see it’s softer we’re not getting that ball racing away and that’s the danger so don’t be one of those players that says I just want to get a contact the 79 is saf here without doubt it’s safe but to get up and down just put a little bit more Loft in your hand see that bit of Spin and you can see how it very very softly creeps towards the hole that’s a much better way of approaching these quick firm downhill shots so following on from that the shot choice is really important so here there’s only about 15 ft of green we know the Green’s really firm and really fast can’t really put it it’s a little bit long to put through um so you could just stick to your release one with something like a 54 upwards 54 56 58 give a little bit of check but even then it could still run out a little bit too much you give it a little bit too much it chases out a bit so what you can do here I’ve got the 56 I’m going to do a mini version of a release too so it’s just going to work this way through the ball so obviously a lot of you consider release two to be a longer swing and a higher shot and absolutely that’s that is a shot but you can do manyi versions of it just there just to increase the spin and really soften that first bounce so good to uh protect yourself on on short shots like this in the summer so little mini release two this time you can see how that softens a lot more and in the hole okay so there’s a lot more finesse in there because I’m just releasing it this way it’s a release two but it’s a mini release two good for when you’re short sided from an okay line and to finish with if you make sure you take one point from this video make sure you relax over the ball make sure your grip pressure is softer if you grip it tight the ball wants to jump off the club face if I was playing up a big two tier green and I want to really get that ball up the green I need lots of speed I’ll grip it tight so I’m gripping this 10 out of 10 playing the shot and you can see how that ball has just jumped off the club face there’s no finesse and grip pressure is something that people generally have very little awareness of you know people don’t know that they’re gripping it tight so you got to get awareness of it just actually just feel actually on reflection how how tight am I actually gripping that and if you’re really tight and you feel you got your arms dead straight and locked you’re not going to be get to get any finesse around the greens it’s very important that you just let your arms hang naturally if you let your arms hang Naturally by your side you see they’re folded okay no one’s arms hang dead straight let your arms hang soft and that’s how they should sit on the grip with soft arms and soft grip pressure particularly your thumbs you don’t want your thumbs squeeze in the grip too much nice and relaxed with the thumb pressure and when you get nice and light suddenly you get finesse in the swing you start getting control you start getting some Spin and you can start getting the ball close like that so really grip pressure is something that is so important all the time but particularly in the summer so I talk often about how the importance of reading the Line in the Sand is it deep sand is it compact sand is it sort of a standard depth of sand the depth is the key thing now you’ve still got to assess that some bunkers will have less sand in so if there’s less sand in there you do need to make sure you do more of a release one using the front edge very important you do that but generally in the summer the sand is softer okay we don’t get as much rain it’s softer so you can see here obviously you can see how much softer that sand is okay that means you want to be using more of the bounce so more of the back Edge of the sole to Splash through here I can tell as I’m walking in I can tell visually there’s quite a lot of sand around that ball if I was to use the winter condition technique where I’m going to come in more this way great for when it’s more compact if I do it out of that lie the ball will barely get out of the bunker okay or not at all because I’m getting too much sand I’m displacing too much sand by getting too steep when there’s lots of sand in the bunker and it’s dry and fluffy you want to be using More Bounce but you also want to feel like you are skipping it you need your divot to be level from front to back you got to skip it more so let’s play the ball position on the left heel handle in line with the back of the ball but really focus now on releasing the club to a two or even a three right somewhere right on the belt bookle or even the the trail hip that’s really going to engage the bounce and keep turning through it as well when there’s a little bit more sand you need a little bit more pace so you can see that Splash through any difficulties look at how the div up there is the same depth from front to back which means we can Splash through very easily let’s do that again and there we go we’re popping them out really making sure we’re using the bounce we’re not driving the handle use the bounce release the club and that’s how we get the control in the spin okay so that’s how you deal with Summer lies in the bunker More release so when you’re playing in summer you are going to get quicker shots you might miss the pin on the wrong side like I have here it’s downhill and there’s a lot of right to left break on it now what I see a lot in amateur golfers is they don’t really pay that much respect to the brake on chip shots if they were putting from here they’ probably have a really good look at it and take their time and read it but with chips it’s more about getting a contact and less about actually reading it because I see a lot of players actually hitting nice shots but because I didn’t quite read the break at the end suddenly it’s gone from being stoned dead to maybe having to whole of four Footers simply because they haven’t read the brake so in this situation there’s a lot of break because it’s downhill and because it’s quick and the greens are firm more break is going to play this time the year than we do this in in the winter so I need to aim out here I think almost 15 12 to 15 ft right of the pin and I’m going to visualize it just dying at the top and then the the slope then takes it down to the hole so visualizing and seeing the shot is really important in the Summer where in the winter you can kind of just blast it the pin a little bit more so think about the first bounce predict what the first bounce will be like and how firm it will be have your practice swing and really focus on on the line have a little look at the pin but really your main focus is on your start line for the brake you can see I’ve just dyed that at the top down it goes got the brake pretty much spot on and I fit out to about 3 ft so I’m quite happy with with that one a lot of golfers you see wouldn’t have really seen that break that’ have aimed way too straight play quite a nice shot like I have done there now it C catches the low side of the slope and that has now gone you’ve now got getting on for 15 ft there okay so just read the brake let the brake take it down to the hole and visualize a better start line okay and respect those slopes on those firm summer greens right so we’re here we got 65 yards to the pin so we’re now into pitching and in the winter video where I was discussing pitching I was saying good idea is to play the ball a little bit further back a little bit more sharlean to sort of trap the ball a bit more to help you get ball first Contact off the Soden lies now it’s drier now the grass has grown the ball’s sitting up nicely it’s firmer we can afford to use more of the bounce and try and get a little bit more spin by using a release two action just letting the club slide under the ball a bit more to try and get a little bit more height and spin so let’s try that but just so we’re clear actually when the pin is further on if the p was never 15 yards on I would still want to play a release one to make sure it was running up the green but because the pin is near the front it’s a good idea here to try and spin the ball because you don’t really want to land the ball short you don’t quite know what you’re going to get so I’m going to be quite aggressive here and throw it most of the way if I can get that nice contact with the the release to you can see how that’s flown in there and stopped really quickly little bit of divot there but still didn’t drive too hard I it’s trying try and clip this one a little bit more carry a little further that was clipped a bit more and let have more spin this one there we go so that’s how you play the pit shots the release two a little bit more in Winter not to say that you know this sort of lower back foot Drive you’re on that is a great shot but it’s more the shot towards the back of the green rather than the front so little bit more release on these pit shots in the summer if you really want to spin it so one of the lies you will find yourself in the summer are these hard pan baked lies particularly amongst the trees where the moisture has been sucked up by the pine trees here and you can see this is absolutely bone hard Dusty lie now you got two options here one option would be to use your most lofted Club trap it back in the stance and just try and get that Leading Edge into it and hope the rough takes a little bit of the speed out of it but that’s a danger you know that can happen uh but hopefully get down in another two from there the shot I would plays a bit more of an advanced one so again see where you are of you game if you want to attempt this but if you’ve got a nice modern uh lob wedge here with the toe relief where it’s shaved down I’ve got my 70 degree high toe here so there’s lots of relief in the toe I can put the toe down nice and low that’s going to help me nip under this hard pan lie I we a little bit left here cut across it and I’m hoping it’ll come out with quite a bit of spin here and give me a chance of landing on the green and stopping it within 6 ft or so so toe down swing across nip it and there we go hit that to about three fet we see to spin on the ball and even though it was hard pan I still nipped under it absolutely fine because I was using the the toe of the club so you know this shot isn’t to be too scared of if you as long as you got the right equipment you can just play this shot and just work across it and you can see the spin and the softness you can get just hit the down slope there but played it beautifully so that’s a serious option okay on the hard pan tow down across or put it back in your stance there and just trap it but it say that first one you can see it’s not easy to judge this one trap it Andre I got that one oh lipped out so that is another option as well so look at it are you going to go in low are you going to play the toe and cut across of these hard pan summerizes so what you do get in the summer is thicker Lusher grass is growing a lot so you are more likely to get lies that are really sat down in a Ru I mean that is totally buried and this one here is half buried so they are the lies you’ll tend to get in the winter the grass doesn’t grow you don’t tend to get this as much it’s more the fact it’s damp is the main concern so it’s got a dry underneath here but really thick grass now the toe down shot I went through off the bare lies with you is a good option if the LI is say half down you could open the face you could aim a little left and work across and it slides through there really nicely and that works really well through that sort of lie it it’s a slight question mark whether it would work as well through here because it is so thick and the toe might struggle to get through it if it was as thick as this I’d play it slightly differently I’d go down the grip and start to really get on my forward side which gets me in a steeper position going to steeper my attack allow me to pop into it just behind the ball the golden rule is don’t hit the ball first in these lines try and hit just behind it got my 60 it is an emergency okay I’m strong in my left hand as well so I don’t want the club to turn and this Ball’s going to come out and run quite a bit so I just want to land this just on the edge of the green so we’re going to go for a little hinge pop it that way come out a bit left and you see it’s got a lot of tops been on it okay quite a tough shot that actually let’s try that again but I’ve hit the green the Golden Rule when you’re in the Rough Around the green it don’t chip twice let’s try that again I’m going to hold on even tighter here cuz that really did grab it that was better you see how I really held the Loft on more and got more control out of that one so really just think about these lights if it’s half down you can definitely have a go with a toe sliding side shot great shot to have you can get some amazing control when it’s really buried get wider get down the grip really lean on your left side early hinge and POP Hold The Loft really stay in this left side here and it can then pop up okay but set your expectations if it’s totally buried just don’t chip twice just get the thing on the green avoid the disaster and move on to the next so one of the things you will get in the summer are these really tight lies so the green staff have cut it nice and tight here on The Fringe and The Fringe extends around about seven or eight yards before a another 15 yards to the PIN and if you feel a bit edgy and you don’t fancy chipping off these tight lights there’s nothing wrong with using the putter I’m not going to hold that against you if you are going to use the putter from off the green there’s nothing wrong with just adding a little bit of wrist into it which will just help the club have a little bit more speed on these really long putts if you do just stick to your perfect pendulum stroke I find it quite difficult to feel it when you have a putt as long as this hitting through a little bit of Fringe as well so just allow the wrist to set a little bit more and it help you get the feel for the putt you see I’ve used a bit of wrist there it’s helped me get the ball up there towards the hole and stone dead right so who says you can’t use the putter off the green so Hopey that’s helped it’s giving you a little bit more information about how you need to adapt around the greens from Summer conditions so remember short game is all about having a good technique of course but having good golfing IQ so get out there enjoy your golf this summer if you want a little bit more of help I’m available for online lessons and also so the online three releases course is out there we’ll go into a lot more detail and that might help some of you as well enjoy your golf this summer speak to you soon