by Charlie King, New Rules Golf School at Reynolds Golf Academy

Take your 58-degree wedge, your 52-degree wedge and a pitching wedge and hit enough shots to get a good working knowledge of how far the ball’s going to go with a half swing.

Don’t try to perfect a bunch of different lengths of swing until you perfect one of them. There’s no need to get ahead of yourself.

I want you to learn your half-swing distance with three clubs, then start to fill in the gaps.

Take three identical half-swings with three different clubs. If you want, you can use a 58-degree wedge, a 52-degree gap wedge and a pitching wedge. Perfect the same 9 o’clock swing with each club.

Take the club back halfway, arms parallel to the ground, then make solid contact, with a 3 o’clock follow-through (matching the backswing). Observe how far the ball travels with each club. Once you’ve hit enough shots, that knowledge should become second-nature.

Once you’ve perfected your 9 o’clock swing, you can work on other distances and longer and shorter swings. But won’t it be nice to know exactly how far the ball will go with your half-swing? That’s knowledge you can take to the course.