Bunker Shots: Distance Control

How to Control the Distance of your Bunker Shots
Golf Bunker Shots – Part 4

A lot of golfers are probably happy just to get the ball out of the bunker first time and land it anywhere on the green…

But if you’ve spent even a relatively short amount of time practising the bunker drill with a good bunker shot setup, you’ll appreciate that shots out of the sand aren’t particularly difficult.

You’ll have a lot more confidence that you can get the ball close enough to the pin, wherever it is on the green, to give yourself a good chance of making the putt.

In theory, there are 2 ways you can control your bunker shot distance…

You can make the same length swing each time but take more or less sand. Or, you can take the same amount of sand but shorten or lengthen your swing.

See the video below for the one I recommend:

Bunker Shot Distance Control – Video Summary

  • Use the same amount of sand for bunker shots (2 inches behind the ball)It’s much easier to control how the ball flies by taking the same amount of sand on every length bunker shot and varying your swing length.

  • Control the distance of your bunker shots with the length of your swing, not with the amount of sand you takeMost amateurs feel they have to take a full swing to ensure the ball gets out. But this is because they usually take too much sand. When you take the right amount of sand you can make short, controlled swings for those close, tricky pin positions.

  • Make sure that your follow through is longer than your backswing for bunker shotsSo that you avoid the common mistake of decelerating in your downswing, make your follow through twice the length of your backswing – i.e. one third backswing, two thirds follow through.


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