For this Fitness Drill, Dustin Johnson’s trainer, Joey Diovisalvi, has created a compound exercise that will get you to move like DJ at the top of the swing and help you hit it further.
Start training this weekend grab a set of 3 resistance bands from Athleema you’ll be hitting the ball further in no time.
Athleema Set of 3 Loop Resistance Bands
Having trouble activating your glutes? Tried dozens of different glute activation exercises and nothing seems to work?
If you’re someone who can already turn your glutes on, then you’re already able to do this. If you’re NOT already able to do this (and thus can’t activate your glutes) we’re going to teach you how.
In this video, lead coach Kenny Nairn demonstrates how to strengthen your glute muscles to gain maximum distance off the tee.
Golf Fitness Fundamentals to get your Game in Gear
The goal of the golf swing is to strike the ball in order to achieve maximum distance with a high level of accuracy. There is a kinesthetic sequence that will allow an efficient and effective golf swing.
All great golf strikers have an identical sequence of generating speed and transferring energy through the kinetic chain. Each segment of the body builds upon the previous segment: lower body – torso – lead arm. The six phases of the golf swing are set up, backswing, transition, downswing, impact and follow through.
The set up position is an athletic address of the ball. Proper balance and grip will lead to consistent swing. Improper set up will lead to re-routing of the club, poor sequencing, and swing faults, poor mobility and stability is common for a bad set up.
Back swing is when you meet the club in the correct position during the back swing the body begins to recruit energy that will be transitioned at the top. Some joints will rotate while some joints will be stable. This will create torque and store energy in the muscle to be released at impact. Difficulty in the back swing are commonly caused by mobility and stability issues.
Transition is when you begin the forward movement your weight shifts from the inside right foot to the inside of the left foot. The lower body moves first and the torso uncoils. This requires a high level of flexibility, balance and strength.
In the downswing the weight shift continues generating torque and the power is transferred from lower body through the body then into the club. The torque is generated from the glutes, legs, and core created by the lower body.
The downswing is complete when impact occurs with the golf ball. A golfer lacking physical strength, power or flexibility will struggle to develop the speed to transfer the stored energy during this phase.
Impact is the part where energy created by the body is transferred into the golf ball. The purpose of impact is to hit the ball in the correct direction. During impact 80-90% of the left foot is supported by the golfer’s weight. The release of hands with correct timing will transfer the power to the club head. You must shift weight correctly to sequence the transfer of energy. Physical limitations such as poor mechanics and improper equipment affect impact. Lack of power will show up at impact to the ball flight and distance direction.
Follow through is essential to the deceleration of the body after contact with the ball. This is completed through the body rotating when the club head is behind the golfer. This requires high levels of flexibility, balance, and strength within the kinetic chain.
Hidden Lower Body Energy Powers Golf Shots
Believe it or not, your lower body holds all the energy needed to smash golf shots like a PGA Tour Pro. During our golf swing, players harness energy from the ground up, which places a heavier burden on our lower body than any other muscle group.
George Gankas golf training highlights the stark variances in our body structures while tying together absolute swing fundamentals, which has grown to be known as the GG Swing Method.
The GG Swing Method has taken hold in an entire generation of golfers, most of whom have taken to social platforms to voice their support and success through George Gankas golf instruction.
One of the major teachings that George drills into his students champions the use of our lower body to power our golf swing.
While many novice golfers confuse the process as having more reliance on our upper body muscle group, it has been shown that even the smallest players are able to match or exceed that of larger players simply by using their hips and legs for swing strength.
During your swing, the force created while from pushing ourselves off of the ground radiates vertically through our hips, legs and feet.
This force then transmits through our entire upper body until reaching the golf club through our arms.
Energy created by situating ourselves firmly on the ground can be measured from address all the way beyond striking the golf ball at impact.
When in motion, most golfers will recognize the shift in body weight in the direction of their intended target, usually when pushing their body vertically during the swing.
The force that we push downward into the ground with while swinging the club will also show a variance in the distance that we drive the ball, as the varied amount of pressure in play will have an influence over our club speed.
Like most things in life, too much of a good thing can often turn into a nightmare.
In regards to the power harnessed in our lower body during golf swings, overworking our hips, legs or feet can result in pulled, missed, sliced shots that have worse results than if we had never tried to harness lower body energy to begin with.
Many players will fail to reduce the speed in their lower body momentum during their downswing, which will greatly reduce the amount of force transferred to the upper body as a result.
As our hips and legs pull too much during the downswing, our upper body will fail to catch up before impact, which creates drastic reductions in the energy that our golf club delivers when striking the ball.
In our backswing, the energy of our lower body adds a sound foundation for our upper body to wrap around, as the upper body dictates how our hips and legs react during this motion.
When our lower body motions independent of our upper body during the backswing, our swing base experiences instability that will lead to a missed shot or even injury in extreme cases.
One thing to look for when determining if we have created this sound foundation will be the appearance of a triangle being formed by our legs.
During address, feet, hips and knees should all align to the inside of each other and create this triangle shape, a clear indication that our swing has achieved the desired amount of foundation stability.
Golfers must sustain this triangle for the entirety of their backswing in order to harness the optimal amount of force, stability and symmetry in their golf swing.
Stretching Your Golf Game Out
Golf can be one of those sports you love, and one you love to hate. Almost every golfer is looking for that one way of increasing his or her abilities, of figuring out how to be a better golfer, how to improve the game. What if the answer was something as simple as stretching?
Your golf game will improve dramatically when you are stronger and more flexible. Flexibility for golf is often undervalued. Take a look at the basic golf movements: your golf swing uses your hip and knee joints, your shoulders, elbow and wrist joints. A smooth swing is a result of smooth movements through these joints, which comes with greater flexibility.
Flexibility is the ability of your body to move in a smooth range of motion. Our bodies are great mechanical devices. And like any machine, requires routine maintenance to keep it at optimum performance. Golf stretching is essentially part of the maintenance process. It warms up the muscles and lengthens the connective tissues that attach to the muscles. As a result, you have more movement through your joints. This can have an enormous change on your golf swing – you’ll have more strength, greater control and an improved range of motion.
Without proper golf stretching, you’ll notice a distinctive “tightness” in the areas of your body that are affected as you swing your golf club. These muscle groups are large muscles – the lower back or core muscles, hips, hamstrings and shoulders. If you haven’t stretched these muscles on a consistent basis, or warmed them up prior to the game, the tightness that happens naturally keeps your golf swing from moving in a smooth pass.
As a result, your swing suffers.
In golf, the power of your swing is a direct result of the range of motion as you move through the swing plane. The greater your range of motion, the greater the power you can generate while swinging. This increases your club head speed, which also increases the distance of your drive.
It seems only logical that if you want to improve your golf game, you need to start with some golf stretching exercises. While it’s great to warm up before the game with some static stretches, a consistent routine of dynamic stretches will add great flexibility for golf. These exercises can be done at home, without a lot of expensive equipment or a huge investment of time. Just 10 minutes a few nights a week will improve your flexibility, your range of motion and make you a winner on the golf course.
Nancy Rishworth, grew up dancing and became a qualified Aerobics and Fitness & Personal Trainer. She is also a qualified Naturopath having studied various healing modalities through healthy eating, herbal remedies, vitamins, massage & exercise. Her flexibility Plus Workout Program improves flexibility, strength and overall health.
Golf Fitness – High Pulls for More Power
We all want power in the golf swing, and power starts from the legs pushing to the hip drive, and working up the body. In this video, we go over the high pull, and how we can learn the high pull to help us improve our sequencing, to get the legs going in our golf swing!!!
Check out Larry Cheung Golf for more golf swings and Larry’s Instagram page for more cool things!!!
Use the Ground for SERIOUS Power in Your Golf Swing
My 3-part full-swing training series that will help you tap into a level of power and consistency you didn’t know you had. And the best part? It’s completely free!
There are lots of ways to add power to your golf swing. In today’s video I’ll show you one you might not have seen before… how to use the ground to add club head speed and distance to your swing.
Strength Training Exercises for Golf
Different types of core exercises exist. Many of you are probably familiar with an exercise such as the sit-up, which is a great exercise that can be utilized to train the core. If you have read any of our other articles, you are well aware of what the word core means, and its relation to the golf swing. Let us do a quick review for your benefit, and introduce the types of core exercises to perform for your golf swing.
The core is an anatomical region of the body. It can generally be defined as the part of your body between the hips and chest. It in encompasses many muscles groups on the front, side, and backside of the body. In general the core consists of the muscles that make up your; abdominals, lower back, obliques, and hips.
The core region is important to the golf swing for many reasons. The core is essentially called the “engine” of the body. It is the area that “drives” the body for most any human movement, including your golf swing. It is primarily responsible for the capacities of: balance, stability, and power development within the body. For these capacities to occur efficiently it is necessary to train the core for improved performances.
Core Training Concepts
Many of us correlate core training to only the abdominal section of the body. In order to develop the core correctly for the golf swing, we must train all areas of the core equally. This means to address the obliques, hips, and lower back with the same number of exercises and repetitions as you do for the commonly trained abdominal region.
A quick note from experience: More times than none, the majority of individuals have what are termed “imbalances” in the core region. This statement means that certain muscles or muscle groups are weaker than others. The key for optimal performance in golf is to have a balanced core when it comes to the strength, endurance, and power levels in the muscles within this area of the body. Keeping this thought in mind, many times the lower back region is “weaker” than the abdominals (imbalanced core or not balance core as we like to say). If this is the case, additional attention / exercises are needed for the lower back, to bring it “up to speed” so to speak, in level with the abdominals.
Moving forward, knowing that we must train the entire core and create balance between all the muscles. It is time to discuss what type of exercises to utilize in training the core region. To develop the core region for golf you will want to perform exercises in the following categories: stability (balance), strength, endurance, and power. All four of these categories are necessary for an optimal swing. Leaving one of the categories listed above out of your training program is like building a boat with a hole in it. It will not work!
Let us define the different training categories of a “golf specific core program” to help you better understand the purpose behind each category. The categories of core training are incorporated in golf training are: 1) Stability (balance) training, 2) strength training, 3) endurance training, and 4) power training.
Stabilization exercises are exercises that develop the balance capabilities of the body. A large portion of your balance capacity is directly related to the core region of the body. We know that if you are unable to maintain your balance through out the golf swing. The efficiency of the swing, contact with the ball, and club head speed, will be compromised. For example, when you swing your driver and are not able to maintain that perfect “finished position”, the problem may be related to you ability to balance.
Balance training develops the integration of your neural and muscular systems. Improvement in the function of these two systems of the body and integration of these two systems will result in a better swing. Follow the logic and it will all make sense. If you improve the ability of your body to balance, then the ability to maintain balance within your golf swing will become easier. Implementation of exercises into your core program that improve your balance (stabilization) capacities then a direct transfer into your golf swing will result.
The golf swing requires that certain body parts remain in a stable position, while other body parts are moving. These actions occur simultaneously. To perform a powerful golf swing, the body must have the capacities to perform this action.
In order to perform the above activity it is required to develop the strength parameters of the core. If you have a weak core then the ability to maintain a posture, keep a posture, and perform this over a period of time will be compromised. To repeat, the core region of the body is involved in the stabilization process of the body. To improve this capacity, we must train the body to be more efficient at stabilizing itself during the golf swing. Strength exercises develop and improve this capacity within your body for the purpose of improving your golf swing.
The golf swing is a repetitive movement performed by the body. You are doing the same activity over and over. An efficient golf swing and good scores require that you perform the same swing on the 18th hole as you do on the 1st hole. If you are unable to repeat your swing mechanics of your swing will suffer, as will your scores. To eliminate this situation it is necessary to develop the endurance capacities of the core region. Endurance exercises allow the body to perform the same activity over and over without getting fatigued. As a result of the golf swing being a repetitive athletic movement, endurance training will enhance the ability to maintain your optimal swing mechanics over an extended period of time.
Power Exercises are geared towards improving the power outputs of the body. The core region of the body is directly related to torque development in the golf swing. Power can also be defined as torque (rotational power) when discussing the golf swing. In order to create high amounts of club head, it is required of the body to create large amounts of torque. Creating greater power in the golf swing is the result of inputting power exercises into a comprehensive core training program.
Summary
In this article we have describe the core and how to train the core specifically for the improvement of your golf game. A few points to keep in mind from this article: 1) the core is a region of the body that includes all muscles from your hips to your chest, 2) you must develop the capacities of stability, strength, endurance, and power within the core for a benefit in your game, and 3) the development of the core must be balanced in terms of all muscles involved, and in all the training components (equal amounts of stability, strength, endurance, and power) within the core.
