If a doctor or scientist set out in a laboratory to create an activity to destroy a test subject’s spine, they might have him perform a repetitive, one-sided, ballistic twisting motion, topped off by having him hold a long rod - weighted at the end - to add even more torque. Sound familiar?
The golf swing is an unnatural movement for the human body and can wreak havoc on your back, shoulders, knees, elbows and hips UNLESS you proactively prepare your body. This goes double for golfers that spend most of their time sitting at a desk. The good news for golfers is that it doesn’t take a lot of work to prepare your body for golf AND you’ll likely avoid pain and injuries while playing better as well.
How Your Body Needs to Move
In order to produce a great swing that doesn’t damage your body, you need good mobility in the hips, shoulder and upper back; baseline strength in the core and glutes, and decent balance to maintain position throughout the swing. If you’re lacking in one or more of these areas, problems arise in your body and your swing.
What Happens When it Doesn’t
Deficits in any of these areas will lead to compensations that will negatively impact your swing and almost always lead to pain and injuries over time. For example, if you have limited shoulder range of motion or upper back flexibility, you might compensate by rotating too much through your lumbar spine (low back). Since your lumbar spine isn’t designed to rotate very much, you’ll damage the joints and discs over time, leading to injuries such as disc herniations or arthritis along with the accompanying pain. In addition, limited shoulder mobility can limit your ability to shallow the club, leading to steep inconsistent swings among other swing faults. Similar injury and swing-fault patterns occur when deficiencies in any of the previously described areas occur.
How do you fix this? If you’re over 30, you need a two-pronged approach:
- Establish baseline strength and mobility in the areas outlined above.
- Spend a few minutes before your round preparing your body.
Baseline Strength and Mobility (aka Getting Fit for Golf)
Contrary to common belief, you don’t need to spend a lot of time in the gym or gain a lot of muscle mass to get “fit for golf.” You don’t have to train as much or as hard as Scottie Scheffler but you do have to train. Left to their own devices in the gym, most golfers do very little to help themselves get fit for golf. They tend to focus on muscles that don’t matter as much (think bench press) and neglect the ones that do. Additionally they spend little to no time working on active mobility that translates to the golf swing.
Training to get fit for golf doesn’t require much effort, just the right plan. It can be done in about 20 minutes – a few times per week – and requires no heavy weights. The key is to be focused and efficient with your training time. The typical session – which can be done even with just resistance bands, should focus on:
- Warm up with active mobility drills that take your shoulders and hips through their active range of motion.
- Add a few targeted exercises for the shoulders, glutes and core – paying attention to hit all sides of the core, not just the abs.
- Incorporate a few full body rotational movements.
- Finish with a balance drill or two.
That simple framework will prevent most injuries and pain associated with the swing and improve your fluidity, power and speed.
Pre-Round Warmups
Even when you have great strength and range of motion where you need it, it’s still critical to take a few minutes to warm up your body before you swing the club, especially if you’ve been sedentary for most of the day. A quick warmup will increase blood flow to the areas that need it, lubricate your joints, and re-boot your neurological system for the highly coordinated movement pattern that is the golf swing. A great warmup can be done anywhere with no equipment in about five minutes.
Golfers need to think of themselves as athletes. Golf is an athletic sport. Think of it as a way to stay connected to the game you love when you aren’t on the course. There’s so much you can do to improve your golf game right at home in very little time. You’ll feel a lot better on and off the course as well.
- Dr. Jeremy James, DC, CSCS, Founder & CEO, GolfForever