BY JOE FRITZ, PGA Golf Instructor
O
ne common misconcep-
tion most golfers have
when they are in a
greenside bunker is that they
have to "hit the ball" out of the
sand. Instead, we should actually
be thinking about removing the
sand from underneath the ball in
order to accomplish our objec-
tive. This can be done mostly
with the setup as well as a slight
adjustment to your swing.
THE SETUP
Assuming we have a relatively
flat lie and the ball is sitting level,
we will do the following:
With a sand wedge, place your
feet slightly wider than shoulder-
width apart and lean forward
with your lower body so your
weight is distributed about two-
thirds to the front and one-third
to the back.
From here, you can open the
club face slightly to help get the
ball up in the air with some spin.
But be careful. If you open the
face too much, the club will not
dig deep enough to remove
enough sand from under the ball,
and you'll be hitting shots over
the green.
THE SWING
Now that you're set up, the
swing path is going to be slightly
outside-in through impact, with
the major key being to accelerate
through the shot, even if small.
When practicing, hit a few
bunker shots without the ball,
and try opening and closing the
club face to feel how less or more
sand will come out with each
swing.
This is how you can learn dis-
tance control out of those green-
side bunkers.
SUCCESS IN THE SAND
How to get it up and down from greenside bunkers
GAME IMPROVEMENT
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