As a former PGA Tour player and now a PGA instructor, I know a good takeaway is an important part of a successful golf shot. Many golfers struggle to have good rhythm when they hit their shots. This tip should help that and get you in position to be more consistent.

(NOTE: Lefties please turn left and right around in this tip)

During my competitive career, I had a number of chances to win tournaments and developed a few keys that really worked well when I was coming down the last few holes with a chance to win.

One of those keys was to concentrate on getting my left shoulder to my chin (note-I did not say getting my chin to my left shoulder) and to make sure to get my right shoulder to my chin on the forward swing.

Before I go any farther, make sure your posture is good and that your chin is not down in your chest at address. You want to have your knees only slightly flexed and tilt to the ball from your hips-back and neck in a straight line.

In your backswing, con ...

As junior players, college golfers and PGA Tour Players, my brother Tom and I worked extremely hard on our fundamentals-a good grip, posture, stance, alignment, ball position, tempo, takeaway, backswing, forward swing-not to mention the short game. Doing all these things well makes it easier to hit the ball well as possible and become top-flite players.

My time on the PGA Tour was a fantastic experience even though it was cut short due to injuries. I learned a lot from competing with the best players in the world. One of the things I realized was: the great players spend a lot of time on their short games-putting, chipping, pitching and sand shots.

Many of the established PGA Tour Players spent a lot of time practicing the chip-and-run shot with a 6, 7 or 8 iron -even though we would not hit the chip shot very often during our round. I first thought-WOW what a waste of time, but I finally figured out that those chips shots were not only sharpening their short games, but helping them to hit all their shots better-short shots and full swings.

On the chip and pitch shots, your weight is on your left side, your right foot/knee begins the forward motion in your stroke, and hands are ahead of the ball at address, and impact-just like you do for 90% of your full shots.

One of the our favorite drills at our Academy for chipping an ...

The way to hit the ball stronger and more consistent is by developing good fundamentals. In our tip today, we want to concentrate on one of the most important keys-having a good weight shift back and through the ball.

Having a good grip, good positions on the back swing, and a good weight shift which is created by good extension in your swing. The swing is basically the same today as it was when my brother Tom Purtzer (voted Best Swing on the PGA Tour by Golf Digest/his PGA tours peers in the 1990’s) and I first went on the PGA Tour-you saw a good  and good extension then and you see it now in the top players on the PGA Tour, Champions Tour, and LPGA Tour.