Whenever your ball lands in a bunker, and no matter how good you are at playing bunker shots, your chances of getting out of trouble unscathed can be a bit of a lottery. Often, the difficulty of the shot is determined by a few key factors including your lie, the location of the ball and the height of the dreaded lip.
The walk towards the sand can be daunting, but as you contemplate your escape from the trap there are some key tips you could be focusing on.
In this video and article, Golf Monthly Top 50 Coach Alex Elliott takes us through what he classifies as the 'three hardest bunker shots you could face', and explains using his expert knowledge how to play these tricky shots...
1. Top Of The Bunker (Feet Outside The Sand)
So, you have arrived at your ball and realised it's sitting right at the top – ultimately looking pretty perilous. The ball is therefore going to be below your feet, so you need to make one key compensation.
Bring your hands up the grip, so that your pinky finger is almost hanging off the end of the butt, which means you can save your knees from having to make a really exaggerated bend to get the club down to the ball.
Take a nice wide stance, sit down into the shot and try to avoid having the face too open. Concentrate on digging the club into the sand and fully commit to the shot. As you can see in the video, I managed to get the ball out first time, and I advanced it towards the green, so use these bunker tips to prevent you wasting shots in the sand.
2. Back Of The Bunker
I'm going to be honest... I hate this one. You practically have to do the splits in order to play the shot, so flexibility and mobility is going to be important. Being so close to the back edge of the bunker means you have practically no room to get your club up and back to the ball in a natural movement, and all your weight tends to be on your lead side.
You can start to counter-act this by really digging your front foot into the sand, as you see me demonstrate in the video above. Open the clubface before taking your normal grip. This is going to feel a little more 'up and chop', but that is dictated by our position in the bunker so can be forgiven.
Take your most lofted club (you will need it) and keep the speed up for this one. Use a steeper backswing and thump the club down into the sand with real conviction. Again, in the video the ball comes out first time, and while it doesn't quite reach the green, anything outside of the sand is a great result from this position.
3. Face Of The Bunker (Feet Inside The Sand)
Sometimes you can be really unlucky on the golf course, for example when a shot that looked great in the air can come up a little short and plug in the face of the bunker. It might only be a few inches from being fantastic, but now you are faced (pardon the pun) with a very hard par save.
In the same fashion as the shot above, make sure this time to get your back foot really solidly planted into the sand to provide a stable base. You will need the face closed for this shot, or at least closed relative to how you would play a normal bunker shot.
Take a normal backswing, look to make contact with the sand around a ball behind your actual position, aiming to stun the ball with plenty of speed and commitment. As you will see on the video, I only managed to get one out of three on the green from these treacherously tough positions, but three out of the sand is a result we can all live with.
