By Terry Koehler, The Wedge Guy

Terry Koehler has been in the golf industry for over 30 years and currently spends his days as the President of EIDOLON Golf, a small premium wedge company in Victoria, Texas. He's been blogging for over 3 years and has written hundreds of articles ranging from golf tips to equipment issues. His blog will appear on ClubSG twice per week. You can reach Terry to have your golf questions answered at askme@thewedgeguy.com.

First of all, thank all of you for the emails with your questions. I received a number of them that should make good posts in the coming weeks, but I encourage you to keep sending in your ideas for things you'd like to see me write about in the future. Today's was selected from that batch, and Keith H. is going to win a new EIDOLON wedge for his inquiry about playing downhill lies:

"I'm fairly comfortable with uphill lies and sidehill lies, but always seem to dread a downhill lie. I make a point to maintain balance but think I'm under/over compensating for the downward hill grade trying to keep my shoulders parallel at address. I had one of these last time I played, but was in luck, the ball was on a tuft of grass and a 6 iron away from the green. There were trees in front of me, but I should have been able to get the ball up and clear those easily as the ball was sitting up nice and pretty. The ball resulted going more forward than up, and the ball bounced within the trees and then into OB. I'm not sure, but I think I may have scared myself out of making the shot.

Well, Keith, let's dissect the downhill lie and see if we can’t give you some thoughts and techniques on how to improve your results when you have one again.

First of all, I think it’s a good idea to relax your expectations anytime you have a lie that is less than good-to-perfect. The same shot that you can execute from a clean fairway lie becomes measurably more difficult as you deal with more difficult conditions – uphill/sidehill/downhill, rough, insecure footing, etc. When you face a tough shot, expect that your best effort will be no better than an average effort from a clean fairway lie, OK?

But let’s take that downhill lie in particular and analyze the challenge. Most agree that to handle downhill (or uphill) lies, you want to set your shoulders parallel to the ground, so that your swing plane can adapt to the angle. That will obviously result in a lower launch angle for the shot, so you want to consider that when you choose your club. With the swing plane set according to the slope, that 6-iron you pulled to hit the shot over the trees is now going to launch the ball on a trajectory more like a 5-, 4- or even 3-iron. Would that still have cleared them?

And because of the lower launch angle, the ball is likely to fly a little further and land hotter, with less spin. Did you take that lower launch angle into account when you planned that shot you described? Was trying to hit it over the tree from the downhill lie really a high-percentage shot?
The second thing about a downhill lie is that with your shoulders and swing plane set with the slope, it is harder to get a good weight shift and full turn back, up into the slope, and your turn through the ball is very likely to shift your weight more forward than with a level lie. Most also agree that you want to play the ball slightly further back to help get a clean impact with this adjusted swing plane.

If you get a chance to practice this shot a bit, try these tips and see if the results don’t get better. And I hope you enjoy your new EIDOLON V-SOLE wedge.


* The Wedge Guy's views and opinions are his own do not necessarily reflect those of SkyGolf.

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Terry Koehler is "The Wedge Guy" and President of SCOR Golf- The Short Game Company.

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