Hitting out of the rough

I am sure that many of you had an opportunity to watch Justin Rose’s win at the US Open. It was great to see the professionals have such a tough time on such a short golf course and it was obvious that the rough made a relatively short golf course play MUCH longer.

With this in mind, I want to give you some important information to help you hit a pretty good golf shot out of the long, tall and thick rough without hurting yourself.

*Determine the distance of the shot and determine the club you would select if your golf ball were in the fairway. For the sake of discussion, the shot remaining is 160 yards and your normal club is a 6-iron.

*Take one extra club. By this I mean, use your 5-iron instead. This will allow the ball to travel close to the same distance as the shot from the fairway. The reason being, when the club returns back to impact the ball, the clubhead speed will be slowed down significantly by the thick rough, thus not allowing the ball to go as far.

*Use the same set up, but open the clubface. Your grip, alignment and set-up will remain the same as a shot from the fairway. The difference will be in the way the club is used starting at the address position. There are approximately three to four degrees of loft difference between the 5 and 6 irons. Therefore, to achieve optimal results out of the rough and to cut through it, turn the clubface slightly open, creating more loft on the club. This will accomplish two important results with the golf shot: first it will turn the 5-iron into the 6-iron and secondly it will allow the club to slice through the thick rough easier. This in turn will get the club under the ball and lift it out of the rough like a normal golf shot

* Overcome the rough‘s normal tendencies with the open clubface There is a tendency for the ball to come out of the grass lower than normal. This is why you open the clubhead on the 5-iron. The heel of the club will make contact with the grass and not only slow the speed down but also close the head down as well. This will result in the golf ball not traveling as far. By compensating for this with the use of the 5-iron, your goal will be accomplished.