What kind of grease? I'd try alcohol first. Regular ol rubbing stuff on a dish rag.

I think it's something like French fry grease or something from lunch. I'll try the alcohol! Thx.

I'd use a solvent (probably acetone or dichloromethane) to try to get a lot of it off than sand to a fresh surface before finishing. Methanol or isopropanol might well do it, but won't have quite the same ability to dissolve long chain greasy molecules.

Acetone as in nail polish remover?
And where do you pick up dichloromethane?
Thanks!

DCM (aka methylene chloride) used to be sold at most hardware stores, it's been recently banned from most paint strippers, so I don't know about current availability. Acetone is used as nail polish remover, a pint can from the hardware store is a lot cheaper.

Acetone from the hardware store also doesn’t have perfumes, etc that nail polish removers have.