Uphill Bunker / Sand Shots
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As you learned from the Short Game DVD, hitting shots out of the bunker is very easy once you learn the few basic fundamentals. But what happens when faced with an uphill lie? As you'll see in the video, the same fundamentals apply, you simply need to understand a couple more things that will make this shot much easier. The swing is the same, only the setup is slightly different.
- Uphill bunker shots are handled using the usual sand techniques: Drawing the box, striking the match, acceleration, etc.
- The only difference is in the setup - if you have a clean lie, your shoulder angle should match the slope
- Balance your weight as best you can and make your normal bunker shot
now we're going to look at uphill bunker shots and like the downhill bunker shot the critical thing is following the three keys you need to take out that box of sand you need speed you need loft you still have to do that here you still also have to match your spine and your shoulders to the angle of the slope so the more slope back this is the more that my spine is going to start leaning further away from the target now what this tends to do it's a little bit different than the downhill bunker shot because what tends to happen the more uphill the slope is the harder it is for you to match your spine to the slope and keep the club from digging that's the critical thing and the downhill slope on the downhill bunker shot the club's always trying to work its way out of the sand on the uphill shot it's doing the exact opposite there's tons more sand in front of the shot here in front of the club so what it wants to keep doing is once it enters the sand just wants to stay in the sand and so it's really really easy to leave the ball in the sand or get it to chunk out and take out too much sand so I'm going to give you a couple little keys here they're going to help you work through this the first one is don't try and help the ball out it's the worst thing in the world you can do what you want to do is release the club releasing the club is the critical key the secret the pros know to getting the ball to come out of the sand and keep the club from digging in and what I mean by that is most golfers they get into the sand like this they get this uphill bunker shot they know that you know it's a tricky shot although it can be very very simple and they start trying to kind of push with the right arm and that's what gets that club to continue working down and instead of letting it bounce through the sand and work back out that's what you're really trying to do is get that club to enter the sand and still take a nice clean shallow divot well how are you going to do that if you're pushing the club down you won't and then you're going to have this shot where just digs in ball doesn't go anywhere it has no spin on it so what do we got to do release the club if you look back at my flop shot I talked about in that video how I weaken my grip a little bit and that allows me to release the club with some speed and still keep the loft on the club which is critical in the bunker shot they're basically the exact same shot so when I have an uphill shot I do the same I actually weaken my grip a little bit so I get a little weaker right hand a little weaker left hand and then you can hear how the club just slapped off the back of the sand now why did it do that because as I was coming into impact I let my wrist release and allow the club to bounce off the back using all of the bounce and even the back that's why you hear that little slapping thumping sound is because this is actually smacking the sand as I come through now if I didn't have a normal grip the club or if I had a normal grip club's going to want to dig with that leading edge and D loft coming through I want to release it with almost feeling like I'm trying to get the top of the toe of the back of a club face to hit the sand first a weird feeling weird thing to think about but I'm literally thinking about leading with the back edge of the club face to get it to slap into the sand and that's going to make sure that it's impossible for this club to dig so let's take a look everything else is the same ball position is the same spine angle is the same it's okay to move the ball back in your stance a little bit on the shot we're still going to be releasing the club which is going to help add loft but if you have the ball way up in your stance like you would on a normal bunker shot or a downhill bunker shot it's really hard to work your way up that slope and so the tendency is to hit a little bit too far behind it so to make it easier on yourself easier on your body move the ball back just a hair you know so I may have it back off that left heel just a little bit lay that when you're practicing especially lay the club face in the sand and almost try to get the toe the top of the back of the toe to be sitting in the sand first now as I come through I can swing as hard as I want ball doesn't have to go anywhere as long as I want to put a lot of spin on it I can swing as hard as I want without any fear of the club digging and that all has to do with my release now if I want to hit a little further I will either swing harder or I will start taking some of that loft out so now I'll take a little bit more loft out now you see it's not laying on its back of its toe it's laying a little bit more normal now got a lot of speed through there ball stopped instantly but the same thing the same feeling is true as I'm trying to release the club through the sand not try and push it through I'm trying to let the club release past my body release past my hands and that is the secret to uphill bunker shot
Brad
Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Loran
Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
Terry
R.J. (Certified RST Instructor)
David
Craig (Certified RST Instructor)
russell
Chris (Certified RST Instructor)