Who would dump a truckload of sand on a nice golf course? Worse, who would dump multiple loads, putting sand on or along every hole on the course?
That would be like stocking fire ants on your property or hanging a sign on your front door saying: Attention Burglars. We are on vacation this week. The door is unlocked. Make yourselves at home. The silver is in the drawer of the china cabinet in the dining room.
Sand on a golf course? That’s crazy. Golf is difficult enough without all the white granules of the Sahara Desert embedded along the fairways and beside the greens.
They say, as duffers, we should practice our sand shots. That’s like practicing having strep throat or practicing acid indigestion. Who wants to get in that mess for any reason?
It is said the many pros actually aim for the sand traps around the greens. The pros, they tell me, prefer sand to high grass. They can control their shots better. For them, it’s easier to get out of sand than from the second cut. Not me. If there was a pen full of hungry crocodiles on one side of the green and a deep bunker on the other, I’d go for the crocs and hope for the best.
Anytime a golfer is faced with a shot described as a “blast”, that should be a red flag, right there. Who wants to have to “blast” out of anything?
Yet, for precisely that purpose, Taylor Made and other manufacturers of weapons of mass destruction for golfers, make something called a sand wedge. Sand wedges, they say, are designed to negotiate a golf ball up and out of a bunker in an efficient manner. For duffers, a cherry bomb on steroids is a better choice. Stick that sucker about two inches behind the ball, light the fuse and hide behind the golf cart. Hey, it works. I tried it once. Parts of the ball made it up onto the green. My three golfing partners at the time – who no longer invite me along – suggested I should have warned them in advance of any pyrotechnic displays. One of the men, who was lining up his putt at the time, is now in therapy. His psychiatrist is thinking about shock treatments to help him get rid of some serious “yips.”
I once asked a teaching golf pro about a sure fire way to get a golf ball out of a pile of sand. He said, and I quote, “If you accelerate and continue accelerating through the ball, I guarantee you’ll get it out of the trap.”
I tried that technique the next time I found myself in that predicament on the front nine at Meadowcreek Golf Course. I dug my feet in the sand, sneered like a bull getting ready to charge a matador and accelerated with all my might. The ball came out, all right. It sent my partners scrambling for cover and ultimately went through the windshield of a golf cart somewhere on the back nine. It was a Pro V I, too!
My advice on sand is to stay the hell out of it. If you have to practice anything, do it on the 19th hole with a Stoli’s on the rocks.