Many golf shots excel at inducing anxiety: flop shots off hardpan, drivers off the deck, Jordan Spieth . . . well . . . [insert shot here]. But surely no shot is nervier than a chip off a green. Thankfully, we don’t often bear witness to such derring-do, because (1) rare is the need for such a shot, and (2) so high is the degree of difficulty that no one with a handicap higher than, oh, plus-4 or -5 would or should even think about attempting such risk-taking.
That brings us to Rory McIlroy, who in the opening round of the Genesis Invitational at Riviera on Thursday found himself stymied by the bunker that sits in the middle of the green on the par-3 6th. Riviera’s membership is not permitted to hit wedge shots off the 6th green during regular club play, but that rule does not apply when the pros come to town.
So McIlroy grabbed a high-lofted club and clipped his ball off the putting surface with a surgeon’s touch. The ball flew about 30 yards, carried the bunker and landed about 20 feet above the hole before gently trundling down a slope to tap-in range. “That’s magic right there,” said a voice from the booth.
It was magic, which isn’t to say McIlroy pulled the shot out of his hat. He’d practiced it. A lot. After his opening five-under 66 that gave him a share of the lead, McIlroy explained that he hones his short game at the Bear’s Club in South Florida by chipping off greens. “It really helps me control my low point and find the low point,” he said. “If you can chip off of a really tight lie or a green like that, you can basically chip off any lie.”
He added, “The superintendent probably doesn’t like it too much, but it helps.”
Paul Azinger used to practice the same way. Same goes for Luke Donald, who a few years back posted a tutorial on Instagram about how chipping off a green can help you use wedge bounce effectively. “Body and club rotate together thru the hit,” he wrote among other tips. ”Notice how my body is facing my target at the end even though it’s a short shot & my club is matching with my spine.”
Sounds tricky, and it is. When Gary Woodland chipped from one side of Pebble Beach’s 17th green to the other in the decisive moments of the 2019 U.S. Open — and nearly holed out — Curtis Strange, who was calling the action for NBC, said, “That might have been the best executed shot of his life.”
McIlroy’s chip shot at 6 wasn’t his only dazzling strike of the day. Thanks to the wet and windy conditions, his full (and still evolving) arsenal of shotmaking was on display, namely sawed-off, low-spin iron shots and bullet drives that stayed under the breeze, like the rope he hit on the par-4 18th.
“For some tee shots I just don’t like getting the ball in the air,” he said. “If I feel if I can keep it low, it keeps it in front of me. … Obviously the hill [on 18 is] about 20 yards further away than it was a few years ago, so when I hit the tee shot I was like, ‘Oh, go, go just a little bit.’ It was fine, but it’s a nice shot to have in the bag.”
As of this writing, McIlroy was two under through four in his second round and seven under overall, two back of Xander Schaufelle’s lead.