Ball Against Back Lip of Bunker: Super-Steep Swing, Golf (Video) - by Pete Styles
Ball Against Back Lip of Bunker: Super-Steep Swing, Golf (Video) - by Pete Styles

I’ve set myself with a little practice exercise here to practice those rare occasions when you get stuck up against the back of a bunker. So if you're in a big bunker and you're up against the back lip, it can be very difficult to get the ball out and forwards because you could imagine the back lip of the bunker is very, very steep and you can't make your normal swing. You just hit into the lip. So here I’ve taken a standard range bucket and I placed it around about 18 inches back away from the golf ball so just 18 inches away and I’ve still to try and get this ball up and forwards off my range mat. Now if I take my normal stance and setup even with my most lofted club, my lob wedge, this is just going to be a swing that goes straight back into the bucket and if I was to try and come down, I would catch it very heavy on this backwards slope here. So I need to change my setup quite a lot but I still need to try and get this ball up and forwards.

Our setup is going to be that I would stand with the ball a long, long way back in my stance. I would take my body and my chest well in front of the ball. The problem there is I’m de lofting the golf club so I need to work hard to keep the face of the golf cub nice and open and shift well into my left side. I’m then going to work on picking the golf club up as steeply as I can using my wrists so very, very much up and outside the line and then dropped back onto the golf ball. It's not a normal turn around your body here. This needs to be very aggressive, very steep, almost feel like you're chopping wood. Then focus on staying still with your body just to make a good contact. There’s no point last minute looking away from the ball and turning up, down, nice and steep. Focus on popping under the ball and if you've kept the loft on the clubface, this ball will come out and forwards so loads of open face. Ball is well back, very, very steep in my swing now. I can chop down on the golf ball and the ball has moved out and forwards. That would work in a bunker as well. I can appreciate my follow through there is very, very short and curtailed. It's purely because the club is coming down so much it just bounces into the floor and the same in a bunker. It would dig into the sand and just stop. I wouldn’t be able to hit into that ball and come out on the other side as normal. I would just hit straight in and stop very, very quickly. So next time you're up against the back lip of a bunker try having the ball back, the body weight forwards, keep an open face and then just use your hands and your arms like you're chopping logs. Hopefully that will help you get the ball up and out of those difficult to play bunker shots.

 2012-09-17

I’ve set myself with a little practice exercise here to practice those rare occasions when you get stuck up against the back of a bunker. So if you're in a big bunker and you're up against the back lip, it can be very difficult to get the ball out and forwards because you could imagine the back lip of the bunker is very, very steep and you can't make your normal swing. You just hit into the lip. So here I’ve taken a standard range bucket and I placed it around about 18 inches back away from the golf ball so just 18 inches away and I’ve still to try and get this ball up and forwards off my range mat. Now if I take my normal stance and setup even with my most lofted club, my lob wedge, this is just going to be a swing that goes straight back into the bucket and if I was to try and come down, I would catch it very heavy on this backwards slope here. So I need to change my setup quite a lot but I still need to try and get this ball up and forwards.

Our setup is going to be that I would stand with the ball a long, long way back in my stance. I would take my body and my chest well in front of the ball. The problem there is I’m de lofting the golf club so I need to work hard to keep the face of the golf cub nice and open and shift well into my left side. I’m then going to work on picking the golf club up as steeply as I can using my wrists so very, very much up and outside the line and then dropped back onto the golf ball. It's not a normal turn around your body here. This needs to be very aggressive, very steep, almost feel like you're chopping wood. Then focus on staying still with your body just to make a good contact. There’s no point last minute looking away from the ball and turning up, down, nice and steep. Focus on popping under the ball and if you've kept the loft on the clubface, this ball will come out and forwards so loads of open face. Ball is well back, very, very steep in my swing now. I can chop down on the golf ball and the ball has moved out and forwards. That would work in a bunker as well. I can appreciate my follow through there is very, very short and curtailed. It's purely because the club is coming down so much it just bounces into the floor and the same in a bunker. It would dig into the sand and just stop. I wouldn’t be able to hit into that ball and come out on the other side as normal. I would just hit straight in and stop very, very quickly. So next time you're up against the back lip of a bunker try having the ball back, the body weight forwards, keep an open face and then just use your hands and your arms like you're chopping logs. Hopefully that will help you get the ball up and out of those difficult to play bunker shots.