How to Hit a Bunker Shot in Golf: Part 1

Video Transcript

"Hello! On behalf of expertvillage.com, my name is Bryan Pemberton and we are here at the Reserve at Spanos Park. We are going to talk about hitting bunker shots; the dreaded bunker shots. We are going to get you so that you are actually hitting shots more effective, much more easier to get out and you will have less stress in getting his ball out. Next time you are in a bunker, let's go through these shots and make these a lot easier. Shot work is the ability to get this club right here and you will see what we call a bounce here and with this flange in the bottom, the thicker and the wider this flange right here you will actually have a club that is designed to actually hit in the sand or anywhere and actually slide. Next time you are hitting this shot if you open your club face a little bit that adds a little bit of this flange in the bottom and actually makes it slide a little bit easier. One of the things I like to do with a drill is I will get in a bunker and I will have a player take a couple of drills for me first and take a couple of tests for me and what I will do is draw 2 lines like this. What I ask this player to do is actually get an open club face and actually take a swing where he misses this club or he misses this line and takes this line out. So you are gong to take a little bit more of a full swing and the only objective here is to actually miss the back line and actually take this line out in front. Again you want to make sure this line is out in front. One of the things you can do is take the club a little bit steeper rather than a long shallow swing. It would be a little bit easier to actually miss this line and take this one out. So again this is one of the drills that I have to do. Obviously you can't do this when you are out on your round but this is a good way to practice your shots. What I will look at is if I see a player that is hitting this bunker shot and he is hitting the back line, obviously he is landing too far behind the ball. So again what you want to do is take a club length and draw a line, take a couple of practice swings. Again you are going to take a little bit steeper swing. You are going to be very handsy and again you are going to open the club face a little bit to your target and acts like you are almost cutting it across it again. What you are trying to do is get this club to actually dig down maybe ½ inch or so and then slide. If you actually have a closed or square club face, what you will find is the club will want to continue to dig into the sand and there the ball will actually have a lot more sand between the club face and the ball and the ball probably won't get out of the bunker. So again we are just trying to take a little bit of light sand at the top and the way we do that is open the club face and create a little slide motion. So again next time you are in your bunker drop a couple of lines when you are practicing this shot and make sure that you are missing the back line and taking the front line out. If you are having problems doing that, you got to work on that before the ball will actually come out. Now we are going to actually take our shot here; we are going to leave the lines her "