We’ve all been there. You’re standing over an important shot, thinking about everything that could go wrong. Before you know it, your grip tightens, your muscles tense up and the free-flowing swing you’d grooved on the practice range is a distant memory.
Tension is one of the biggest obstacles to playing good golf, particularly under pressure. Most golfers know the standard advice: Take a deep breath, relax your hands or make a few practice swings to loosen up. Those are all useful techniques, but there’s another simple trick I learned from my performance coach, Jim Fannin, that I wish I’d known during my playing days on Tour. It involves something you probably have in your kitchen: a potato chip.
What your jaw reveals about your golf swing
When we get anxious, we often clench our jaws without even realizing it. That tension can extend into the rest of the upper body, affecting the shoulders, arms and hands. Think about the last time you faced a difficult shot. Were you relaxed, or were you grinding your teeth?
That’s the idea behind the “potato chip” drill. Take a regular potato chip and gently hold it between your teeth before addressing the ball. Then make your normal golf swing, trying to complete the motion without breaking the chip. If it breaks, you may be clenching your jaw during the swing. If it stays intact, you’ve likely done a better job of keeping your jaw relaxed.
We use this drill at our Zone Golf Schools because it gives students immediate feedback about how they respond to tension. It also helps them recognize the difference between swinging with tightness in the body and making a more relaxed, natural motion. For safety, use a small, thin chip and start with slow practice swings before attempting the drill at full speed.
How to apply the ‘potato chip’ drill on the course
You don’t need to carry a bag of potato chips around the course to benefit from this drill. The goal is to become familiar with what a relaxed jaw feels like so you can recognize when tension starts to creep into your swing.
Before your next important shot, take a breath, soften your jaw and relax your hands. Rather than trying to force a good swing, give yourself a chance to make a natural motion. You may find that paying attention to something as simple as your jaw helps you manage tension and swing more freely when it matters most.
