Golf Bunker Shots, Should I Wiggle My Feet In Bunkers (Video) - by Pete Styles
Golf Bunker Shots, Should I Wiggle My Feet In Bunkers (Video) - by Pete Styles

Should you wiggle your feet when you’re in a golf bunker? Now the answer to this is definitely yes, and you only have to look at the world’s best players to realize that it’s kind of the common trait they all do it. So the wiggly feet thing looks a bit funny sometimes because they line up to the shot and then they do a bit of this. “What’s he doing there, looks like he’s got windscreen wipers for toes, his feet go backwards and forward”. And what happens now is I’ve dug myself two little trenches from my feet. Now there’s a number of reasons why that’s actually quite a good idea. The first reason is, I’m not legally allowed to test the surface of the sand, that means I’m not allowed to scrape it down with my toe, I’m not allowed to move it with my club or even rake it with a rake to determine how deep or how shallow, or how soft, or how hard the sand is. But when you get good and proficient at wiggling your feet, your feet will tell you a huge amount. You wiggle your feet in and you can feel an awful lot within the sand; how deep, how hard, how soft, how shallow.

Then as I’m setting up to my golf ball you got to understand as I hit this ball I’d like to be a couple about well, maybe an inch or half an inch underneath the ball as I hit it, the bottom of my swing arc will be lower in a bunker than it would be off the grass. So if I can bring my feet down about the same depth that I once build on that golf ball I don’t need to make an adjustment. I wiggle down by an inch, I then swing down by an inch, and the ball splashes out nicely. The one other reason to wiggle your feet in that is simply to give you a better stance and a better grip in your stance. So if you stand on nice and soft fluffy sand and make a swing, there is a risk that your feet will slide and move and you can feel a little bit unbalanced. But if you can anchor your feet down into a nice firm stance here during your swing your feet won’t move too much. So that’s the three reasons where you’ll often see good players doing this. We want to anchor our feet, we want to lower the club down to the right level, and we want to be able to test the surface of the sand legally by using our feet. Practice the wiggle, play bunker shots like a pro. 2014-11-12

Should you wiggle your feet when you’re in a golf bunker? Now the answer to this is definitely yes, and you only have to look at the world’s best players to realize that it’s kind of the common trait they all do it. So the wiggly feet thing looks a bit funny sometimes because they line up to the shot and then they do a bit of this. “What’s he doing there, looks like he’s got windscreen wipers for toes, his feet go backwards and forward”. And what happens now is I’ve dug myself two little trenches from my feet. Now there’s a number of reasons why that’s actually quite a good idea. The first reason is, I’m not legally allowed to test the surface of the sand, that means I’m not allowed to scrape it down with my toe, I’m not allowed to move it with my club or even rake it with a rake to determine how deep or how shallow, or how soft, or how hard the sand is. But when you get good and proficient at wiggling your feet, your feet will tell you a huge amount. You wiggle your feet in and you can feel an awful lot within the sand; how deep, how hard, how soft, how shallow.

Then as I’m setting up to my golf ball you got to understand as I hit this ball I’d like to be a couple about well, maybe an inch or half an inch underneath the ball as I hit it, the bottom of my swing arc will be lower in a bunker than it would be off the grass. So if I can bring my feet down about the same depth that I once build on that golf ball I don’t need to make an adjustment. I wiggle down by an inch, I then swing down by an inch, and the ball splashes out nicely. The one other reason to wiggle your feet in that is simply to give you a better stance and a better grip in your stance. So if you stand on nice and soft fluffy sand and make a swing, there is a risk that your feet will slide and move and you can feel a little bit unbalanced. But if you can anchor your feet down into a nice firm stance here during your swing your feet won’t move too much.
So that’s the three reasons where you’ll often see good players doing this. We want to anchor our feet, we want to lower the club down to the right level, and we want to be able to test the surface of the sand legally by using our feet. Practice the wiggle, play bunker shots like a pro.