As things stand Matt Fitzpatrick is the current leader on the FedEx Cup rankings and the World No. 3, behind only Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy. After his victory in the Zurich Classic alongside his brother. Alex, he has now won three of his last four starts on the PGA Tour as well as finishing runner-up at The Players.
This time last year his game was in the doldrums and a place on Luke Donald’s Ryder Cup team looked unlikely but he’s turned everything around and, form wise, a second Major could be just around the corner.
Where Fitzpatrick differs from his peers is that he chips cross-handed. It’s something that he has done since the 2017 PGA Championship at Quail Hollow and something that he has stuck with ever since. This season he is ranked inside the top 25 for SG: Around The Green and for Scrambling.
For some pros they will tinker with the left-below-right method but, for the Englishman, the fairly unique method isn’t going anywhere.
Why did he switch?
I started off using it for just basic chipping. I had issues when I would break my wrists too much so I would take the club away on the inside and then the ball would fall off the face and you wouldn’t get the correct flight or the correct strike.
So I was getting one that would come up short and one that would go too far without any spin. This was always a practice drill going back that I would use with Mike Walker and Pete Cowen.
They would use it to sync up the body because, if you don’t, then you end up shanking it. So this makes me chip it correctly otherwise it will come off the hosel.
The biggest thing that I’ve noticed is it feels like there’s always a straight line from my shoulder all the way to the clubhead so, with that, you’re always keeping the radius the same. When I was going with the normal grip the radius would get really narrow whereas with cross-handed it’s always staying the same and it’s an arc.
Is it one-dimensional?
I always felt comfortable with it but I think doing this now it definitely feels like I’ve got more variety. I first used it in 2017 I practised and practised it and I missed one left on number one and I looked at my caddy and he was like, well you’ve been practising it, you may as well give it a go.
Originally I started doing it just out of the rough because again, when you’re in the rough, you kind of need the speed and you need the correct technique. If you take the club away on the inside it’s going to grab it even more and there are going to be huge inconsistencies.
With this it forces me to keep the clubhead effectively in line with my shoulder all the time so that way it’s going to be much better contact, it’s going to be square the whole time and you’re going to have a much better outcome.
What about the low chips?
I don’t hit that many chip-and-runs but, if I do, I would still do cross-handed. I’m so used to going cross-handed now that going the other way kind of feels a little bit awkward. If I really want to lob it I know I can just open it up massively and just literally make the same movement.
What distance does it go up to?
I’m trying to build it up to about 50 yards because I know it’s really consistent and the flight and spin are so consistent. With a normal grip that is a lot harder and the good thing is I control the distance using my body rather than just my wrists.
Now and again, if the ball is above my feet for example, it might be easier to go conventional. I used to use this technique in practice for pitching and half shots. It helps to shorten my swing and to keep things really connected.
How does it work with the spinny ones?
At first these were trickier but, the more I’ve done it, the more I kind of I’ve almost put a bit of a natural kind of touch on it where I can manipulate things a bit more. To start with it was obviously feeling very stiff and now it definitely feels a bit more that I mix things up. Technique wise I don’t need to work on it because it just happens because of the grip. The thing to improve is to get used to different clubs and lies.
And bunkers?
That will be conventional as you can’t get the speed and it’s hard to get the angle into the sand. I’ll have a little bit of wrist set but you need much more in the sand.
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