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25 Handicap Golfer Learns Bunker Basics From Short Game Pro Dan Grieve
Sep 12, 2025
In this video, short game guru Dan Grieve gives 25-handicap golfer Richard Baker a lesson on bunker shot basics. Richard really struggles to get out of the sand consistently, so was hoping that Dan could work his magic and give him some pointers that will ensure he can get out on the first attempt every time.
View Video Transcript
0:00
Hi, I'm Dan Greve and I've teamed up with Adidas Golf to help three lucky golf monthly readers
0:05
improve their short game. Let's get started. Right, Richard, great to have you here in the bunker
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Thanks very much. Tell me about your bunker play. You're saying you're playing off 26
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Yeah. And you don't like the bunkers? No, I either end up staying in the bunker or thinning it way over the bank
0:24
Okay, not a good combination. No. Right. Can I just watch you at two shots first? Yeah
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See what's going on? I'm giving you a nice lie. We're going for this pin over here. Okay
0:38
That's the heavy one leaving the bunker, yeah? Yep. Again. And there's a thin one
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That wasn't perfectly done for camera by the way, that was that was that's sort of typically
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the shots you get. Yeah. Okay, right, stand this side. okay two very different shots but the same fault okay so really for you your your setup isn't where
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it needs to be so you're not you're not creating the platform that you need to play good bunker
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shots bunker shots really for me a 90 setup 10 swing and your setup is quite narrow yeah and
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you've actually got the majority of your weight on your right side i know it's quite a tall lip this
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your brain's saying i've got to get back to try and get this thing up and as you're coming down
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you're leaning back a bit there's quite a lot of right hand here and you're just hitting way back
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on it but sometimes you'll actually lean back even more and you'll hit up on it and get that ball first
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so i think if we get your setup correct i think the whole thing will just chain react much better
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okay so i'm going to set up this one i'm going to put my footprints in the sand you're going to stand in my footprints and you're going to tell me what you feel okay so i'll put a line there
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for the club face as well i'll dig them in so there we go so come and stand put your right foot there
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and your left foot there and then put it flat behind the ball and then open the face on that line just gonna make a couple other little tweaks before you tell me what you feel I want your pelvis to come forward a bit more A bit more There we go Okay Hang on Right There we go
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And then I don't want that shaft to lean too much. Do you want it open? Open and straight
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There. Let's have a look at your foot. Hips forward again. They've come back. Right
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Now that looks really good. Yeah. It probably feels very different. Feels weird. Tell me what can you feel is different
2:23
Hands are low. Lower hands. And the weight's definitely on the left. More on the left
2:27
Yeah. What about distance from the ball? It's further away. Further away, which helps you get lower hands
2:32
But my eyes are almost over the ball. Okay, yeah, you're more over it
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So what you've got there, you've got a setup that hopefully feels like you're less likely to move around too much
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You feel like you've got a bit more rooting down? Okay, great. Now, while we're going to concentrate on the swing here, keep your pressure here at all times
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Take a back swing. I want you to feel like you're turning this right side and actually getting a bit of a turn there
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Really turning here. Keep your weight here as I say. Now as you come down, you must keep your weight forward
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Now come down, the end of the club swing and release, and I want you to focus on your chest turning
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and finishing somewhere like here. Can you get there, Drek? Yeah, just about. That's going to allow you
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But you can see you've kept your weight here at times. Okay, that looks good. Yeah. So let's not worry too much
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about getting the perfect shot. Let's just focus on, can we just get some stability in your legs
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Okay, and that's great. Let's hit one from there. Very, very good shot. How did that feel? Much better. You looked a lot more stable
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Yeah. A lot more stable. I mean for you, if you can just get it out and two putt
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your handicap's coming down isn't it? Yeah. Yeah. And again, it's further away from the ball
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Don't get too open, you're aiming a bit too far left there actually, so aim a little bit more at
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the flag that's really good pelvis forward more fine oh now that is world-class okay you moved your chest better on that one the
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previous one and it had some spin and it stopped it stopped really quickly yeah but that was a proper bunker shot yeah that right I think I just and run That came out with height and spin Yeah And really we just got you set up Yeah
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Feels good, right? It does. It does. Right, and again. I can do that every time
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Well, let's see if we can do two in a row. Here we go. So pelvis forward, hands back a little bit
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Open the face. Right, pelvis forward a bit more. Come on, forward. Right, keep it forward, turn your chest
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Very good, well done. That's fantastic, isn't it? I'm going to give you one extra thing
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If I'm not pushing it, come this side. So, setup's transformed. Body movement is transformed
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Can you do one extra thing, which is just make sure as you come through that the loft stays on the club face a bit more
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You did it quite well on the nice high one you hit. The other two, it's turned over. See how the club's turned over? A bit like you might do that in a full swing
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Yeah. but you know in short game you've really got to make sure that loss stays on this way
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okay and that's with the hands it's with the hands when the chest moves more it's going to
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help you do that but yeah just feel like the don't overthink it get the club face looking
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back at you yeah and let your instinct do it okay nice and wide again pelvis forward that's good so as you're coming through it's going more like
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that yeah not that way yeah okay as you turn your chest
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now that's much better heighten spin yeah you got some awareness of that yeah now as it comes
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through if you do that you see the lock and bounce stays on yeah and that's how the ball gets out the
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bunker it's how you work the sand the sand goes under the ball or sand lifts the ball out the
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the bunker yeah when your face turns over it you see how it will dig in yeah and it won't protect
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the sand high enough to get the ball out yeah and the big difference is i'm not thinking about where
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am i hitting the ball no because i'm set up right for it now good where it's not normally you'll be
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thinking how many inches with my head where do i need to hit yeah you don need to worry about any of that stuff I never look at the sand behind the ball Never think of that Most good players would never think of that Just trust it
6:19
From that set-up, if you're releasing the club properly, you're turning properly, and you've got your weight sufficiently forward
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the club will just bottom out one to two inches before. If I try and hit two inches before
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I'll hit four inches before. It kind of just comes back. So yeah, just look at the ball
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Perfect. on it genuinely I could not play it any better than that did you see the spin on
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the picks that's the spin rate really gone up that means you can play that to
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a short-sided pin and you can actually control it and get some spins so yeah
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just got to get those concepts it's all about getting world-class basics there's no reason you of 26 can't be world-class over the ball yeah okay
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there's no reason at all and you can see there just by getting a set it right how it's chain reacted in terms of how you move and you're hitting better bunker
7:03
shots brilliant I'll leave you to practice that. Thank you, thanks very much. Great pleasure
7:08
So before I came here today my short game was a bit of a lottery, the occasional good shot but
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lots of duffs and lots of fins. I asked specifically to work on the bunker shots today and that was
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fantastic you know the focus on how to set up right and let the swing take care of itself was
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really really helpful so even on Saturday this week I took three shots to get out of a bunker
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and the third shot was thinned right over the back of the green it just ruins your whole round
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and I really had no idea what I was doing wrong so being able to reliably now hopefully get the
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ball out of the bunker and get it into play is going to make a huge difference to my rounds
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The real benefit of spending time with Dan is getting the feel for what a good setup feels like
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So watching the videos, hearing what he tells other people is great, but actually feeling it for real
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and then experiencing the impact of getting it right is just so much better for the memory
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