Cristie Kerr Golf Tips

Green side sand shots can be very intimidating and they take a great deal of practice. It is one of only a few areas in golf where you are trying not to hit the ball first. In these first two pictures, we are looking carefully at Cristie’s set-up. She tries to play the ball forward in her stance with her weight left and shoulders level. You should notice that the shaft is actually leaning slightly away from the target.

This helps Cristie use the bounce on her wedge as she enters the sand. The bounce helps the club splash the sand rather than dig into it. From the target line view, we make sure that she has enough knee flex as her tendency is to have her legs too straight. A great drill to do is a right arm only swing as Cristie is demonstrating.

This should help to give you the feeling of the club splashing the sand. It is important to do this with a long swing. Notice how in the pictures Cristie has a full finish.

Speed through the bottom of the swing is critical to get the ball out because in many cases you have to displace a lot of sand. Another great drill is to practice hitting the sand between two lines roughly ten inches apart. If you can displace the sand consistently you will be on the road to getting out of the trap.

If these shots are particularly troublesome for you, remember that even the best sand players in the world only get up and down just over half of the time. Make it your goal to get out of the trap in one shot and down from there in two.

Golf tips provided by Cristie Kerr in collaboration with Cristie’s coach Bryan Lebedevitch. Bryan Lebedevitch is a Lead Master Instructor at the Jim McLean Golf School at PGA WEST, where he works closely with Cristie Kerr - LPGA Tour, Len Mattiace - PGA Tour, Dave Schreyer - Hooter's Tour, and Scott Hebert - Hooter's Tour. Recently Bryan was ranked as one of the Top Instructors in the West by Golf Magazine.

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