Bunker sand

I never considered myself as a good bunker player although I've improved a lot of late with some coaching. The course I play has lovely sand in the bunkers, grainy with a fluffy top, just perfect for opening the blade and popping the shot out onto the green.

I played a different course for the first time at the weekend. The course was fairly long with small greens protected by bunkers and I ended up in three greenside bunkers during the round. The sand was quite compacted and crusty on top but I went ahead and executed my normal swing only to find that I thinned each one and sent the ball flying over the green and into the bushes the other side.

By the third time I was pretty hacked-off as it ruined my score. As the course was pretty quiet I asked my playing partner, who has a lovely touch from the sand, to take a couple of shots as well. He did exactly the same thing!

After a big of trial and effort we worked out that we had to open the blade less and take a bit more sand than normal to get a good result. It seems that the bounce of sand wedge caused the club to skim off the crusted sand and catch the ball thin. The next day I read an obscure tip from a pro explaining the exact same thing.

Another little golf lesson learned.

Youre quite right. You can also swing down a bit sharper or look at picking it out with your L Wedge or P Wedge. On hard sand the bounce from a sand iron really comes into play and an awful lot of shots get wasted you see it every week.

Wet sand often plays like hard sand and its easy to determine, when you set up for a shot and bury your feet you know how deep and how soft the sand is so it helps you determine the sort of shot you need to play.
Sounds silly but I'd rather be in a bunker than 20 feet off the green chipping.

In wet sand I tend to take the gap wedge rather than the sand wedge. I find the sharper leading edge cuts into the surface better and pops the ball out a lot easier. You have to be careful with power tho since the ball also comes out a bit hotter. I personally prefer to be out anywhere than still in the bunker.

D.

Thanks for the helpful feedback guys. Next time I'm in a bunker I'll think about it a bit more before automatically picking out the SW.