Fixing a club that never enters the sand

What is actually happening

The low point arrives at or above the centre of the ball, so the club strikes the ball directly instead of the sand beneath it. The result is the low screamer that clears the green or buries itself in the face, and it comes from the same fear that produces the fat one.

The fix

Drills

Work through them in order. Each one says what it needs before you start.

1. 1

   Tee under the ball

   In a practice bunker, push a tee straight down into the sand until its head is level with the surface, and sit a ball on it. Your job is to send the tee flying out with the ball, which the club can only do by passing under the ball through the sand. Look at a spot an inch or two behind the ball and hit ten. Success is the tee coming out on eight of them with the ball landing on the green. Then push the tee in until its head is just covered and hit ten more. When those pass, take the tee away and look for the same shallow cut under every ball.

   Needs Tees

2. 2

   Two splashes, then the ball

   In a practice bunker, draw a line in the sand at right angles to the target line, long enough for three swings side by side. Make two swings without a ball, each entering on the line and throwing a shallow slice of sand forward. Then set a ball an inch or two in front of the line and make the third swing exactly like the first two, looking at the line rather than the ball. That is one set. Do ten sets. Success is eight sets in which the cut under the ball starts at the line and matches the two beside it. Then drop to one practice splash before each ball, and finally to none.

   Needs nothing but a club

3. 3

   Firm sand, face check

   Find firm or damp sand, such as a practice bunker after rain. Draw a line, set a ball an inch or two in front of it, and hit five with the face opened wide, then five with it only slightly open, making the same swing each time. Before raking, compare the marks. A skid that skips over the line, or a mark that only starts at the ball, means the club did not get in. A shallow cut starting on the line means it went in. Success is finding the setting that gives four of five cuts starting on the line. Repeat in soft, dry sand, note which setting works there, and on the course use the one that matches the sand you feel underfoot.

   Needs nothing but a club

4. 4

   Rehearse beside the bunker

   On the course a practice swing may not touch the sand, so the routine has to work without one. Build it in the practice bunker: stand just outside, make one rehearsal swing that brushes the grass at the length the shot needs, then step in, work your feet into the sand, pick a spot an inch or two behind the ball and hit the shot looking at that spot. Hit ten, walking out of the bunker between each. Success is eight balls on the green with cuts that start behind the ball. Then use exactly this routine for every greenside bunker shot on the course, high lips and tight flags included.

   Needs nothing but a club

Browse every drill on the site

Checkpoints

What to look for to know whether the change has taken.

• Before raking, a cut in the sand starts an inch or two behind the hollow where the ball sat.
• A spray of sand leaves the bunker with the ball, and the strike sounds like a soft thump rather than a click.
• The ball climbs clear of the lip and lands on the green instead of shooting low across it or into the face of the bunker.
• At address your feet are worked into the sand and your hands are about level with the ball, not pressed toward the target.
• In firm or wet sand the face sits nearer square than it does in soft, dry sand.

Feels

A feel is not a description of what the club does. It is whatever gets your body to do it, and a correct change usually feels exaggerated long before it looks correct.

• You are swinging at the sand, and the ball happens to be sitting on it.
• The club pulls a rug of sand out from under the ball, and the ball leaves with the rug.
• Your chest is still turning toward the target while the sand is in the air.

Symptoms that lead here

Each of these can resolve to this cause. If the page above does not match what you are seeing, start from the symptom instead and let the questions narrow it.

• Blading the ball out of the bunkerThe club catches the ball instead of the sand, sending it out low and fast across the green, into the face, or into trouble beyond.The usual cause of this
• The sand is rock hard, or soft and fluffyIn wet or firm sand the club skips off the surface and blades the ball, and in deep powdery sand it digs, loses its speed and leaves the ball in the bunker. The shot that works in normal sand fails both ways.
• The long bunker shot, 30 to 80 yards from the sandFrom a bunker well short of the green, the normal splash can never reach the flag, and trying to pick the ball clean sends it over the green or into the lip.
• Plugged lie or fried egg in the bunkerThe ball has buried itself where it landed, sitting in its own crater with part or all of it below the sand, and your normal bunker shot either leaves it there or sends it out low and hot.
• Bunker shots finish short or run way pastGetting out is no longer the problem: the ball leaves the bunker every time but finishes nowhere near the hole, dying on the fringe or racing off the back of the green.
• Short-sided in a bunker and the ball won't stop near the flagThe flag sits just over the lip with little green to land on. Trying to hit it softly leaves the ball in the sand or blades it, and a clean escape comes out with no spin and runs well past.

What this rests on

• 40+ TrackMan Parameters ExplainedTrackMan, accessed 2026
• The Physics of GolfTheodore P. Jorgensen, University of Nebraska, 1999, second edition; Springer reprint 2013

Discussion

Golfers who have worked on this fault, on what helped and what did not. Read it as experience rather than evidence.