The Ultimate Guide To Perfect Wedge Play – Short Game Simple Golf Tips

How Close Should You Hit Your Wedges in Golf? The results might surprise you.

So you’ve smashed a great drive and you’re holding a wedge… ready to attack the flag? Not so fast. In this video, we dive deep into the truth about wedge play, and some of this proximity data will surprise you.

You’ll learn:

✅ How to hit your wedges in golf with more precision
✅ Key setup tips: ball position, stance width, pressure shifts, and shaft lean
✅ Smart drills to improve your wedge strike and distance control
✅ Why most golfers miss greens even from 100 yards
✅ How scratch vs. 15 handicap players compare (with real stats)
✅ Plus a special guest test featuring Rory and his infamous wedge struggles!

Whether you want to lower your scores, improve distance control, or stop chunking wedges from 80–100 yards, this is one of those golf lessons you won’t want to miss.

Want better wedge play? Start here.

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so you’ve hit a great drive You’ve got a wedge into the green It’s time to attack Let’s attack Attack But wait stop The truth about wedge play might just shock you In today’s video I’m going to show you the truth about wedge play How close you should hit your wedges And some of this data is going to really shock you I’ve also got a real treat for you at the end of the video where I’ve done this huge test with a special guest whose wedge play is a little bit should we say infamous I’m also going to share with you some of my best tips to help you hit your wedge closer Now if you like the information in today’s video hit the like button hit the subscribe button while you’re down there and also look in my description I do a free weekly newsletter with loads of free golf tips So let’s start by checking out the Aros database when it comes to your wedge play So the first thing we notice is around the 100yard mark a scratch golfer they are averaging around 30 ft proximity 15 handicap golfer they’re averaging 48 ft proximity That’s an 18 ft further from the hole from the 15 handicapper to the scratch handicapper which we would expect As the shot distance increases what we see as you’d expect is the gap in proximity widens And I mean the gap between a lower handicapper and a higher handicapper So as in the lower handicapper are much better at flatlining their line on this graph from 50 to 54 to 100 to 104 yards where we see a steeper increase in distance away from the hole as we go up to a 15 handicapper And we see the same as we go up to 20s and higher handicap golfers The scratch golfer as you would expect is more consistent How could we make you more consistent as well so let’s do some housekeeping Let’s do some good wedge basics To begin with let’s start with ball position So I want you to feel your ball position is somewhere opposite your buttons on your shirt So the middle of your chest is a great way of feeling where your ball position is Now you should with your wedge practice hitting balls from your back foot even up to your front foot You should really experiment with your sweet spot of ball position within that playing field because you will hit some wedges where you do want to knock it down back and you might hit some where you want to send it up in the air But a good basic starting point for lots of golfers is getting that ball position somewhere near the middle of their stance But basically opposite the buttons on my shirt is where that ball is nicely positioned So let’s think about width of stance and where your pressure should be in the ground So common problem I see with wedge players is they stand like they’re hitting a driver really wide This encourages kind of big swaying movements often which makes it really hard to get the contact with the ground nice and consistent So just bring that whitford stance in So basically I am more getting the middle of my feet in line with almost the middle of my thighs I’m just narrowing that stance off cuz I want to reduce any kind of temptations to really start swaying around Then with my pressure so where I feel I’m leaning in the ground So am I on front foot or trail foot what I’m going to do with that slightly narrower start is feel before I hit the ball that my pressure just gets to my lead foot So as I pull that club back I’m going to feel like this pressure is around kind of 70% into lead foot We’re going to go I’ve got a great drill on pressure which we’ll come to a bit further on in the video And then the last thing let’s make sure we get some handle lean I see lots of amateurs start with the wedge very straight in a pitch shot So I want you to try and make sure that you’ve got this shaft lean set as you then establish your hold The easiest way to do that what you’re going to notice as I set up see how I’m just pushing that handle up towards lead leg and then getting my grip assigned to that club Try not to start with that grip all dead straight This is not so good for delivering that club to the ground in a way that’s going to create those crisp strikes Ball somewhere towards the buttons Pressure getting up to lead foot with a narrow stance Handle up towards lead leg And you’re ready Start ripping those pitches in there As you would expect from the Aros data as well what we can clearly see from these charts is the scratch player hits the ball closer Shock horror We know I’m sure most of you watching of course they do But we also see from all groups that hitting the golf ball close to the hole on approach shots is the best strategy for most golfers And we’re going to challenge this idea with a special guest who is known for struggling with their wedges and has also personally challenged this idea of getting closer to the hole But what the graphs clearly show is that the closer you are to that hole from all handicap groups your proximity tightens The further away you get from the hole it is widening Now we see again that steeper slope off with the higher handicappers where the scratch handicappers have a shallower or not as steep incline into further away from the hole from the grass So what can we do extra to really dial in maybe strikes and how you play your wedges so just tighten them up a little bit more So let’s get these strikes dialed right in Next tip this one’s really killer Like this one absolutely transforms golfers When I get on my force plates what I notice is I actually start my swing with more pressure on the trail foot Now I know earlier I said get that pressure forward but what happens is I get my pressure forward as I start my swing So basically I’m 6040 so 60 trail to lead and then I’m literally pushing the pressure forward as I simultaneously pull the club back So basically I’m kind of going this way as the club goes that way So it’s almost like doing this And what happens when I do this with students is we see a real good changing of their timing and how their pressure moves through the swing then in turn how they strike the ground feeling more ball than ground often with this movement Because when you start with your pressure on the lead side what golfers then start to do as they start their back swing is they push off their lead side So I know it’s counterintuitive So you want to start with your pressure on lead side but you want to get it there during the start of your swing is a really good tip for anyone trying to really crisp up those strikes So the best way to do this feel a little bit shift in the ground So you can feel that your trail and lead side with your pressure and then start a little bit more on this foot and as soon as you think you’re going to instigate the back swing just push that pressure forwards up onto that lead foot It’s so good for crisping up strikes and making sure we get that lovely ball then ground contact Next tip is fantastic for distance control as well as strike Practice getting in the habit of feeling that when your shoulder turn stops your arm swing stops So what I do see from a lot of amateurs is kind of arms just burying on beyond how far they’ve turned their shoulders So I would feel a distance If I wanted to hit 50 yards I’m turning my shoulders that far If I wanted to hit 100 yards I’m going to turn my shoulders fuller And the arms are almost going along for the ride What happens is it gets all the twitchy feelings out the arms Makes you feel like you’re controlling it more by a rotation and a rotation And I do find when I do this with students it’s really good for helping them get their distances dialed in And like I say you can use it for different distances is if I wanted to hit it 30 yards I’m turning my shoulders this far and then 60 yards I’m about here So I actually have a system for my wedges which will be coming to a website that I’m doing really soon So stay out for that class cuz I did classes myself and my wedge play is like transformed for distance control But using your body to try and sink up to your arms for distance is a great feeling for crisper strikes and for controlling that distance And remember just try and feel when your shoulders stop that your arms stop too Get them connected up And the last one this one is game changer for striking Trying to post up on lead side into impact Absolutely influences how close or far away the club gets to the ground So not only influences low point as in is it forward or back it also influences if the club is coming higher or lower And to give you an example of that two lies here This lie is nice on the fairway It’s just next to the divot I just hit This uh shot what I’m going to be doing is really posting up on my lead side So feeling like I’m getting this lead knee to straighten up into impact I’m really pushing up and out of the ground It’s a great feeling for getting that club into the back of the ball Now if I was to put the ball in the divot here where it’s down this is where I might now stay a little bit more in lead knee as I hit the ball because I’ve got to get down to this ball a bit more So playing with how you post or not on lead side on different lies is fantastic for strike So any shot where you want to stay down a bit more downhill slope stay in that lead knee as you hit the ball and then you’ll come up after any lies where you want to just really get that crisp ball and divot kind of feel So flatter eyes really nice tight fairway lies Try and feel that your lead leg is straightening before you hit the ball Really feel like you’re pushing up through lead foot And you should try and get that to work as your standard shot So for this shot here I’m 112 yards slightly out of distance but for this club I’m really going to try and get posting up onto that lead side And it just delivers such a crisp strike every time This is something I measured on my force plates It was really noticeable with the better strikers to the worse Worse strikers were just constantly in this knee Better strikers were using a combination of vertical pressure basically out of this lead knee and staying in it subject to what I asked them to do Give this one a practice Your strikes will change Now let’s get the fun on the way Special guest time Big experiment 50 to 100 yards You’re going to enjoy this So special guest time We got Rory Good old Rory who used to play on my channel and you’ve seen him a bit on our channel recently Um got him hitting some balls from 50 and 100 yards I got him to hit 30 this from on the course from 50 and 30 balls from 100 yards And we were comparing his proximity to test his ideas of does this work for him Remember Rory is someone who from these distances in certain times of his golfing life he not had the yips but he’s an extreme case of someone who could fat the ball not very far in it you know be exceedingly poor with his wedges compared to the rest of his game Now I did this test in two places as well I did it indoors at the car I got an amazing indoor studio which connects their bar It’s pretty cool And we also did it on the course cuz I wanted to see the difference The two differences that I was seeing first off on the golf course his proximity with his wedges from the two distances floated kind of between a 15 and 20 index That’s not good enough considering his full game would float much further down towards a five to a scratch at time index Hence he balances around 7 8 9 10 from the indoor studio where it’s friendlier off the mat He was 15 and just beating his 15 index numbers for proximity So something to understand for when you’re practicing you are going to be tighter proximity inside often than out because of the variations of lies as in slopes and the club reacting with the ground from the mat to the grass can be very different You can hit ones off a mat where you would fat it on the ground but it bounces and it actually goes okay indoors Something to watch out for But what we noticed is Rory just fitted into these graphs Even though he is an extreme case he was noticeably better when he was closer to the hole than further away He also resembled the steep curve of drop off as he got further away As someone who would lay up to holes try and hit distances I showed him this data and asked him what does he think about laying up for a certain distance Now yeah And to be fair like I having you know spent lots of time on social media and obviously working with you and watching lots of golf on TV reading lots of stats I knew that was the answer anyway But because I’m so scared of how bad my striking is with these clubs I tend to run away in the wrong direction when maybe I should be running towards what I perceive to be the trouble And then finally I asked him about how this challenges his feelings because Rory would be someone who wouldn’t be looking at data prior until I did his test with him And what does this make him feel now that we’re just presenting the actual data and taking all the feeling which is what he would play with normally away from his golfing situation Yeah And also like I think it it almost puts your mind at ease because it makes decision- making a little bit easier on the course doesn’t it instead of thinking oh I might have to hit seven iron back to a full yardage I can just get to a par five or a par four and be like I know what the answer barring any crazy trouble that I might hit it into I just need to get the ball down as close to the green as possible as often as possible and then try and work it out from there And obviously strike plays a big part in that as well But like I said if I’m kind of duffing shots around the green that’s not as bad as duffing them from back here Like I’ve got what 120 yards from here And if I duff one I’ve just got the same shot again and then I’m getting panicky If you enjoyed the information in this video and you love the data as well you’re going to love this video if you want to find out how far you should be hitting your