You're Correct!

If you are playing from a bare lie, this simply means there is not a lot of grass underneath the ball. It does not look lush at all and you basically are on the bare ground and the surface of the soil.

This tends to happen a lot in the summer when golf courses are in full sun for the majority of the day and the grass gets scorched and is not getting enough water. It is very common if you play on a links golf course and it is nothing to be scared of. It is simply a lie that does not have a lot of grass underneath it.

The key to hitting from a bare lie is to strike the ball cleanly. Do not strike the ground first. Make sure that you strike the ball and then the ground and if you have got this downward striking action on the ball, with the club head, you will easily hit the ball into the air off this bare lie.

A great drill to practise doing this, and to practise getting this downward strike, is to set up as you normally would for your golf shot and then instead of hitting the ball, replace the ball with a coin. A coin is only a few millimetres high, so if you strike down on that coin, you are going to be very accurate on the ball, which is an inch or so high off the ground.

Place the coin on to quite a firm surface, like an Astroturf mat at the driving range, or carpet at home and then practise striking down on to the coin, so that you clip the coin off the mat and that will encourage you to make a downward strike on to the coin, or on to the ball, as the coin is representing the ball. If you strike down with the club head before you get to the coin, you will catch the mat and then bounce up off the mat and over the coin. You will clearly see that you have not made a downward strike on the coin. You have actually struck down on to the mat and then bounced and made an upward strike towards the coin. Similarly, if you have not hit the ground at all, you will not move the coin because the club head will just be in the air and not striking downwards.

Practising striking down on the coin really will improve your downward striking action and that will massively improve your ability to hit better golf shots from bare lies.

Deliberately catching the ball thinly is a very risky process and will result in a severe lack of control of accuracy and distance.

The act of flicking your wrists will create an upwards strike into the golf ball which is the exact opposite of what is actually required.

If you catch the ball on your up swing, you will take the ball cleanly – provided you have not hit the ground before the ball. However, catching the ball in your up swing, means you will strike the upper part of the golf ball, catch the top of the ball rather than the bottom of it and as a result you will hit a low shot, that travels less distance.