One of the biggest issues I see with players struggling to get out of the sand is that they are trying to help the ball get in to the air. This motion of “helping” is what’s keeping the ball from getting airborne. Golf is a game of opposites in this respect. If you are trying to hit up on the ball it will stay down and if you hit down on the ball it will go up. The green side sand shot is the only shot in golf we don’t want to hit the ball, that means we are trying to hit this shot “fat”. We can be aggressive with a downward blow behind the golf ball.
A great way to practice this feel is to hit bunker shots without a ball. Get in the bunker and take a good bunker set up – weight on front foot, hands slightly forward of club head, club face open to path. Practice getting sand to fly out of the bunker in the direction of your intended target. If you can get sand to fly out on a consistent basis then getting the ball to come out shouldn’t be an issue.