Golf fitness exercises and golf specific workouts explained
We spend countless hours on the driving range in an effort to improve our golf swing. Hundreds or even thousands of dollars are spent on golf lessons. It all adds up to a lot of time and money spent on improving the golf swing. Unfortunately, for many golfers their scores never improve, and they find themselves frustrated and asking “what do I have to do?”.
If this is you and this question has crossed your mind, the answer to your question could be as easy as looking in the mirror. The failure of improvement may have absolutely nothing to do with your new driver you are swinging or the professional teaching pro helping you with your swing. It could all do with the man in the mirror – you! Yes you, the physical body swinging the golf club.
Golf fitness exercises and golf specific workouts explained
Keep in mind the golf club does not perform the mechanics of the golf swing. It is you and your body executing the mechanics of the golf swing together. And for every action, there is a reaction. The point to make here is your body directly affects the mechanics of the golf swing. And no matter what you do in terms of practice or instruction, these alterations will not go away until you address them. Just as you address swing faults, you must address your flexibility faults.
In the golf swing the body must move through an extended range of motion for an efficient swing to occur. Much is contingent upon the ability of the body to coil and uncoil certain muscles that are involved in the golf swing, and as we age, these muscles become “tight” and will directly effect your golf swing. One such set of muscles is your hamstrings.
When we are performing almost any activity the hamstrings are essentially helping to hold your hips in place. In addition to bending the knee and stabilizing the hips, your hamstrings help with the rotation of your leg internally and externally.
Loss of posture is defined as any significant alteration from your body’s original set up angles during your golf swing. You have a hard time staying “in your posture” during your golf swing. You have taken many lessons and your golf instructor keeps telling you “you are coming up and out of your swing.” But what good is that if your physical limitation is the direct cause of this happening?
Golf posture requires a bending at the hip joints versus the knee joints, which puts a strain on the hamstrings and lower back. If your hamstrings are tight, they will send a message to your brain saying “I can’t hold this, get me out of this uncomfortable position.”
The other message your hamstrings might send is a strength issue. “I’m not strong enough to hold this position; I’m going to bail out.” This is a very common cause of “loss of posture.”
If you are not aware that this is the cause, you will continue to take lessons and hear the same thing over and over again. You could have saved yourself time and money by stretching and strengthening your hamstrings with golf fitness exercises.
Additionally, “tight” hamstrings place an undo amount of stress on the lower back. Large amounts of stress on the lower back cause fatigue and increase the risk of lower back fatigue and possible injury.
Through education and experience we know there is a definite correlation between a golf swing and your physical issues. Golf stretches enhance the flexibility of your body in relation to your swing. Golf stretches return muscles that are “tight” such as the hamstrings to their proper length. This results in the ability of your body to perform the proper sequence of the golf swing correctly.
If you are one of many golfers who are not finding their golf swing improving through practice and instruction, take a moment and look at the body swinging the golf club. This very well may be the root of your swing problems. Fix your flexibility faults through golf specific stretches and golf fitness exercises and find yourself on the road to more consistency, less back pain, lower scores and more enjoyment of the game.
Chris Ownbey
Certified Golf Fitness Instructor through the Titleist Performance Institute.
Questions? Go to https://chrisownbey.com/
Or call 214-457-9684
