Fairway bunkers and pot bunkers: getting out in one on British courses

Club golfers spend their bunker practice on the splash shot around the green, yet the sand that wrecks British scorecards is often out on the fairway. A drive that trickles into a bunker 150 yards from the green tends to end one of two ways: thinned into the face, or struck so heavy that the ball moves thirty yards. Both come from the same error, treating sand like turf.

On a links, the stakes are higher still. The Old Course at St Andrews alone has 112 bunkers, according to an ESPN guide written for the 2005 Open, and many have names and reputations of their own. Seaside pot bunkers are small, deep and often revetted, with near-vertical faces built from stacked turf. From many of them, the green is simply not an option.

Most of the improvement here comes from decisions, not technique. A golfer who changes nothing in their swing but chooses the right club and target will save more shots than one who practises the shot and still tries to reach every green.

Read the face before the yardage

Before you check the distance, look at the front lip and how far your ball sits from it. Choose the club that clears the lip comfortably, not the one that would reach the green on a perfect strike.

The maths is lopsided. A 7-iron that clears the lip and finishes twenty yards short leaves a pitch and a chance of par. A 5-iron that catches the face leaves you in the same bunker, often in a worse lie, with the same lip in front, and a double bogey or worse ahead.

Build in extra margin. From sand you make a shorter swing and usually catch the ball slightly thinner, so it launches lower than from grass. A club that would just clear the lip from turf may not clear it here.

Distance from the face matters as much as its height. Ten yards back from a steep lip is one shot; two feet from a revetted pot-bunker wall is another, and often the only sensible option is a wedge out sideways or even backwards.

Club up, swing three-quarters

You want a controlled three-quarter swing, which carries less than a full one. So take one club more than the yardage suggests and shorten the backswing, rather than taking the normal club and swinging hard.

A full-effort swing needs a stable base, and sand does not give you one. Your body feels that and compensates by sliding or rising, which is how the club ends up hitting the sand an inch behind the ball.

Set-up: the opposite of a greenside bunker

This is where greenside habits hurt. Around the green you dig your feet in and want the club to enter the sand. From a fairway bunker, you want the ball first and almost no sand.

• Feet: shuffle in just enough to feel steady. Rule 12.2b allows you to dig in with your feet to take your stance.
• Grip: go down the grip about half an inch to allow for standing slightly lower.
• Ball: fractionally back of your normal position for that club.
• Weight and legs: quiet. This is an arms-and-body shot, not a leg drive.
• Club: hover it above the sand at address.

Hovering is not just good technique. Rule 12.2b says that before a stroke you must not touch the sand with your club right in front of or behind the ball, in a practice swing or in your backswing. You may remove loose impediments from a bunker, but grounding the club is still a penalty.

Contact is everything

On grass, a slightly heavy strike costs a few yards. In sand it can cost fifty, because sand absorbs the energy of the club. That imbalance is why the technique changes.

Keep your height through the shot. Most fat fairway-bunker shots come from dipping into the ball, usually while straining for distance. Keep the chest level, the head steady and let the arms swing. A clean three-quarter strike beats a full swing that catches sand first, every time.

British sand and British weather

Sand varies enormously from course to course, and in Britain the weather varies it again from week to week.

Wet or compacted sand after rain behaves more like a firm lie. The club skids rather than digs, contact is easier and the ball can come out hotter than expected. Consider a little less club.

Soft, dry, fluffy sand in a summer dry spell is harder. The ball sits down, your feet sink and the margin for a clean strike shrinks. From a poor lie in soft sand, the realistic choice is often two clubs more than the yardage or a wedge back to the fairway.

Links sand blown by the wind can leave balls in footprints or tucked against the face. And on an exposed links, a low ball flight out of a fairway bunker also helps keep the ball out of the wind.

Know when to take your medicine

If the ball sits down in wet sand, lies on a downslope, rests against the back edge or sits close to a steep face, take a wedge and play out to a comfortable full-wedge distance. Accept the bogey.

Ask yourself one question before choosing the hero shot: could I pull this off four times in ten? If not, it is not a golf shot but a gamble with strokes you already have.

If the ball is truly stuck under a pot-bunker face, remember the unplayable options. Rule 19.3b allows you, for two penalty strokes in total, to take back-on-the-line relief outside the bunker. Sometimes that is cheaper than two failed attempts to get out.

One session fixes the fear

The technique is simple. What most golfers lack is confidence, and one short practice session can change the shot for years.

1. Draw a line in the sand. Without a ball, make swings that brush the sand just after the line.
2. Place a ball just ahead of the line and hit five shots with a 7-iron, thinking only about clipping the ball first.
3. Then hit five with a hybrid from a good lie, to learn what the longest sensible club feels like.

Once you have felt a clean strike from sand, the shot is no longer frightening, and fear causes most of the bad outcomes.

Where to practise fairway bunker shots in the UK

Your own club. Many practice areas have a greenside bunker but no fairway-style one. Ask the professional or the secretary whether you may hit a few shots from a course fairway bunker at a quiet time, such as early morning or a winter evening, and rake it thoroughly afterwards.

A short-game lesson. Practising in a real bunker with a PGA Professional is worth far more than range balls for this shot. The PGA Play directory lets you filter for professionals who specialise in the short game.

Before visiting a practice facility. Ask whether the short-game area includes a bunker and whether it is open; not every range has one. For the greenside splash shot, our separate bunker guide covers the technique.

Panxis Golf has no commercial relationship with any facility, coach or organisation named here.

Your fairway bunker routine

• Check the lip and your distance from it first. If in doubt, add loft.
• One more club than the yardage and a three-quarter swing.
• Feet barely dug in, grip down, ball slightly back, club hovering.
• Stay tall and hit the ball before the sand.
• Bad lie, downslope or steep revetted face: wedge out and take the bogey, or consider the two-stroke unplayable option.