2026-08-26 · Birdia Blog

Why Do I Hit Chips Fat or Thin?

Weight back moves your low point

A chip is a descending strike: the club should contact the ball first, then the turf. For that to happen, the low point of the arc has to be ahead of the ball. And that low point is decided mostly by where your weight is at impact.

If you start with your weight evenly split and don't shift it — or worse, hang back onto your trail foot to "help" the ball into the air — the arc bottoms out too early. Then one of two things happens:

• The club reaches its low point before the ball, catching grass or dirt first. That's a fat shot.
• Your body senses it and instinctively pulls the arms up to avoid digging in, so you catch the ball at its equator. That's a thin shot or a top.

Fat and thin are two sides of the same coin: weight that isn't where it needs to be.

The number: 60-70% on the lead foot

Short-game teaching agrees on a clear weight distribution for the chip: between 60% and 70% of your weight on the lead foot from address, and it stays there. Dave Pelz insists on a narrow stance, ball slightly back and weight to the target side; Stan Utley describes a chip where the chest and weight favor the lead foot and the club works down with quiet wrists.

That lead-side weight does two things at once:

1. It pushes the low point of the arc ahead of the ball, guaranteeing ball-first contact.

2. It reduces the temptation to flip the wrists, because you don't need to help anything into the air — the loft of the wedge already does that.

Harvey Penick sums it up with his classic image: play the chip like a long putt, no tricks. Think of the chip as a pendulum motion with your weight already "sorted" before you start.

How to check it (and fix it)

Set up with your weight already on your lead foot and a mental line falling just ahead of the ball. Make short swings, trying to get the divot — or the mark on the grass — to appear after where the ball was sitting. If it shows up behind, you're still hanging weight back.

With Birdia you can film your chip from your phone and see whether your center of mass stays static or drifts back on the downswing, plus spot the wrist flip at impact. That's exactly the detail that's hard to catch by eye: the camera tells you if your weight never shifted and if your low point ended up behind the ball.

Once you've got it, Birdia compares your impact to a clean descending pattern so you don't fix one mistake by making another.

Fuentes

• Dave Pelz — Short Game Bible.
• Stan Utley — The Art of the Short Game.
• Harvey Penick — Little Red Book.

Frequently asked questions

Should I shift my weight to my lead foot during the swing, or start with it already there?

Start with it already there. The chip is too short to transfer weight in time, so set it at address (60-70% on the lead foot) and keep it stable through the whole stroke. Trying to shift weight in such a brief motion is exactly what causes the flip and inconsistent contact.

Are fat and thin shots fixed the same way?

Yes, almost always with the same adjustment: weight forward and low point ahead of the ball. Although they seem like opposites, both come from the same error of having the arc too far back. The thin is usually your body trying to rescue a shot that was going to be fat by lifting the arms at the last second.

Ball forward or back to avoid the fat shot?

Slightly back, in the center-back of the stance. With the ball too far forward, the club has already passed its low point before reaching it, so you tend to catch turf first or flip. Ball back and weight forward promote the clean, descending contact you want on a chip. {{fig:bump-vs-pitch}}