How Do You Hit Out of a Greenside Bunker?

The short answer: open the clubface before you take your grip, set the ball forward with most of your weight on your lead foot, and make a long swing that splashes the sole of the club through the sand underneath the ball. The bounce on the bottom of your wedge is what gets the ball out. The leading edge digs like a shovel and stops the club, and once your technique is right, the type of sand barely matters.

The one shot where you don't hit the ball

Every other shot in golf asks you to strike the ball. A greenside bunker shot asks you to strike the sand, and the sand throws the ball onto the green. On a good bunker shot the clubface never touches the ball at all.

That is why instinct lets golfers down. They try to help the ball up or pick it clean, and the club either digs in or catches the ball first and sends it over the green.

Keep your expectations honest. Even tour players only get up and down from greenside bunkers around half the time. Your first job is to get out in one shot and leave yourself a putt.

Bounce versus the leading edge

Look at the sole of your sand wedge. The back of the sole sits lower than the leading edge. That angle is the bounce, and it is the whole reason a sand wedge works in sand.

When the club enters the sand on its bounce, the sole skims and rebounds through the sand like a flat stone on water. When it enters on the leading edge, it acts like a shovel. It knifes down, the sand stops it dead and the ball stays in the bunker.

A square face with the hands pushed forward and the ball back brings the leading edge into play. An open face with the shaft fairly vertical brings the bounce into play.

So open the face a lot, more than you think. I see far more golfers with too little open face than too much.

"Won't it go right?" No. With this much loft, the ball goes where your swing and the sand are travelling, not where the grooves point. You do not need to aim miles left to compensate. Set up roughly at your target and let the open face do its job.

Open it, then grip it. Turn the face open first, then take your grip. If you grip it square and twist your hands open, the club simply returns to square at impact and digs.

The setup that does the work for you

Most bunker problems are solved before the club moves.

• Ball position: on the inside of your lead foot, much like a driver.
• Weight: most of it on your lead side, and keep it there through the shot.
• Upper body: stacked over the ball. Hang a club from your shirt buttons; it should point at the ball. That puts the bottom of your swing under the ball.
• Stance: wide and low. Work your feet into the sand a little for a stable base. The rules allow this as part of taking your stance.
• Arms and shaft: arms soft, shaft close to vertical, never leaning towards the target.

One rule to remember: under the Rules of Golf you cannot touch the sand with your club in the area right in front of or behind the ball, during a practice swing or in your backswing. Hover the club.

Forget "two inches behind the ball"

You have probably been told to hit a set distance behind the ball. I don't want you thinking about that. If your ball position and upper body are where I described, the bottom of your swing arc is already under the ball. The club will naturally enter the sand behind it and exit after it. Your job is to commit to the swing, not to measure a spot.

Speed is the missing ingredient

Most bunker shots that stay in were not hit too heavy. They were hit too slow. Plenty of golfers take exactly the right amount of sand, then decelerate because they are scared of hitting it too far.

Sand is heavy. You need a long swing back and a long swing through, with the clubhead swinging high on both sides. Feel the head of the club being thrown through the sand rather than dragging the handle. Finish with your weight forward and your lead knee still flexed.

Distance control: change the club, not the swing

This is the part that changes most golfers' bunker play. Instead of learning a dozen different swings, keep one technique and change club.

• Lob wedge (58 or 60 degrees): short shots and tight pins.
• Gap wedge (around 50 degrees): the same swing launches lower and carries further.
• 9-iron or 8-iron: for a long bunker shot with plenty of green to work with. The ball comes out low and runs like a chip. If you play cavity-back irons, a pitching wedge or 9-iron is the safer choice.

Same open face, same setup, same long swing. Once you start trying to rip a lob wedge 30 metres, strike quality falls apart. Let the loft of the club do the work.

Does the type of sand matter?

Far less than golfers think. With a sound setup and enough speed, firm, soft and medium sand all play much the same.

• Soft, fluffy sand: the club meets more resistance, so add clubhead speed.
• Firm or wet sand: feel a slightly more up and down swing, cutting a little across the ball, so the club works down into the sand rather than bouncing off it.

Hard bunkers don't create bad bunker players. They expose a low point that was never under control.

Drill: The Line in the Sand

Use this in a practice bunker.

1. Draw a line in the sand at right angles to your target, with no ball.
2. Set up with the line just inside your lead foot and your shirt buttons over it.
3. Make five swings with an open face. Each splash should start just behind the line and carry on well past it.
4. Once that happens five times in a row, place a ball on the line and hit it.
5. Rake, step forward a little and repeat along the line.

Pass standard: 8 out of 10 balls on the green. Then move on to the club ladder: one target each with your lob wedge, gap wedge and 9-iron, using the same swing.

Common mistakes I see

• A square face, so the leading edge digs
• Ball back in the stance with the hands pushed forward
• Weight hanging back to try to lift the ball
• A short, decelerating swing out of fear of thinning it
• Gripping square and then twisting the face open

Want to escape every bunker?

My Escape Every Bunker course takes you through setup, speed, distance control, plugged lies and slopes step by step. If bunkers are the reason you are stuck above a score like 90, read how to break 90 in golf next. Start at perform.golf.

Kerrod Gray is a PGA of Australia Professional, Advanced in Coaching, and the founder of Perform Golf.