It’s good for your game

How to rescue a buried ball

By T.J.Tomasi

Being a good sand player involves adjusting your technique to the lie you are dealt in the bunker.

In a normal sand shot, you need to make sure you finish with a high follow-through that keeps the clubhead moving through the sand. But with a ball that is half-buried in the sand like the one below, you do just the opposite -- take a lot more sand with limited follow-through.

Because this action spits the ball out low and running, you must keep in mind how much green you have to work with. If the pin is tight, you need to suck it up and play away from the hole into the center of the green.

In the photo below, Luke Donald found himself buried in a bunker because he had about 30 feet to the pin and had planned to blast-and-run-it directly to the hole. His ball ended up fried in the sand after he got aggressive and hit a towering short iron that fell out of the sky when it caught a gust of wind.

Here is what you can learn from Donald's mistake: When the wind is blowing in your face and you're coming in over a bunker, take care to hit enough club. Otherwise, your ball will balloon and come straight down into a buried lie.

To get out of the trap, Donald must first consider the texture of the sand. Wet sand can fool you since it's compacted and heavy with water. It transmits energy to the ball very efficiently, so if the sand is wet, he could use his regular smooth, easy-does-it swing style of the splash shot.

It's just the opposite when you're faced with dry, heavy beach sand that absorbs the blow, forcing you to blast your ball out. Donald is on the beach here, and will have to blast it.

He positions the ball off the logo on his shirt with his spine inclined toward the target to promote a downward strike. He anchors his weight on his front foot so he can swing the club up steeply and drop it firmly behind the ball. When you do this, you should feel like both your head and your weight are ahead of the ball.

The trick is to hit down into the sand to make the ball pop out. If you try to help the ball out with a lifting motion, the ball will stay in the bunker.

Things to note:

― Donald's hands and arms are moving directly across his body as if they were trying to get into his left pocket.

― His left arm is pointed at the ground and won't travel any higher than it is now.

― His right arm is fully extended.

― He is taking a large amount of sand.

-― His forearms don't roll over.

Tomasi writes for Universal UClick.