The Loop

A guy who chips with one hand just made it to the European Tour

November 06, 2014

If you suffer from that dreaded sickness known as the yips, here's some inspiration: 30-year-old former-yipper Jason Palmer has just earned his European Tour card.

Palmer suffered from such a severe case of the chipping yips that he was on the verge of quitting the game, but staged a comeback after he decided to start chipping with only his right hand. Palmer still putts with both hands, but when he's off the green or in a bunker inside of 50 yards, he opts for only his right hand. Palmer switched while he was playing on the Alps Tour in 2010 when, according to the story he told the BBC, "every time I missed a green in regulation it resulted in a bogey."

But that was before his new technique. Here's a selection from the BBC article describing how it all came to be:

"I was practicing with my friend Neil Chaudhuri and told him that I'd had enough as my short game was diabolical. I then showed him that I was fine with one hand.

"The strike was there. It was crisp, ball then turf every time, and consistently going where I wanted it to go. He said the decision to go one-handed was a 'no brainer.'

"I was at rock bottom so I thought I'd give it a go - things couldn't get any worse. It freed me up instantly. All of a sudden I enjoyed missing greens and enjoyed the challenge of getting it up and down. I embarked on a great run of form and finished second on the Alps Tour that season."

Palmer took the technique to the Challenge Tour, where in the last two weeks he finished first at an event in China and second in an event in Oman. In the process, he earned enough money to move comfortably inside the top 15 on tour's money list with one week remaining on their schedule, all but securing his European Tour card for 2015.

His decision to go one-handed was obviously vindicated as his solution seems to work pretty well. Golf Channel's Ryan Lavner unearthed a video of Palmer using his one-handed technique:

So yippers everywhere, there's hope for you yet!