A pitching wedge will typically have a loft of somewhere between 44˚ and 48˚. Clearly the distance you are able to hit the ball will dictate how far you can hit a full-ish pitching wedge.
But while the biggest hitters may now be able to hit the best wedges on the market 140-150 yards, for most golfers, 100-110 yards is more realistic. It is that length of shot and below that we focus on here.
These pitches may sometimes be your second shot on a short par 4 or your approach to a par 5 to potentially set up a birdie chance.
But they will often also be required when you’ve mishit your tee-shot or second shot, got out of position or can’t reach a long par 4 into the wind. Your mission then is to try and save par.
So, how should you approach these pitch shots such that you are able to get up and down more often to retain momentum and keep the scorecard intact?
How to hit a pitching wedge: Weight forward
The first thing to note is that you should adopt a narrower stance than you would for a normal full swing, keeping the weight fractionally more towards the front foot – around 60 per cent.
Narrow your stance with the ball a little back of centre and your weight favouring your left side
(Image credit: Mark Newcombe)
You should then keep that extra weight on your front foot throughout your swing rather than transferring it back and forth as you would in a full swing with other clubs.
This also gets the club coming back down fractionally steeper to help guarantee the ball-then-turf impact needed for crisp contact and added backspin control.
Keeping your weight favouring your left side will help to promote the ball-then-turf contact required
(Image credit: Mark Newcombe)
Three-quarters back and through
With a pitching wedge it’s rarely wise or necessary to swing flat-out. The objective here is distance control and accuracy rather than out-and-out distance and that’s easier to achieve when you’re not swinging flat-out. If you need to hit it further, you can always go up a club or two!
Think of the pitching wedge swing as a pendulum. Make a rhythmical…
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