Flexability and Stretches

Hi,

I've recently started some strength and Cardio training to help me complete full rounds of golf without thinking i'm going to collaps.
Im trying to improve my flexibility especially in my shoulders. Can anybody recommend good stretches to help in this department.

Thanks

Darren

Hi Daz,

As no-one as answered this I thought maybe this club head speed document may help.


Ian.

Interested in seeing that doc once it gets approved...

I'll second that, and add

"search out Pilates for Golf"

Not exactly an answer to your question but....I have a TotalGym 3000 which I use all the time, and I have found it to be great at increasing flexibility and strengthening the shoulders and upper back.

Hey guys,
I am looking for a 5 minute warm-up for my back, that I can use before a game. Especially my lower back, since it is not very strong. I try to do some trunk twists, but I need more than that.

I try to warm up before every game. Just using a pitching wedge and hitting some mid range shots seems to work good for my back, but sometimes I don't have the time or the range balls to warm up.

Bruce

some links:
http://www.golfonline.com/golfonline...484811,00.html
and pilates:
http://exercise.about.com/cs/abs/l/blyogapilates.htm

I have a back problem, too. My tips for flexibility and stretching are:
1) Do stretching 2 times every day - not much, just to get the stiffness away. You can do passive stretching with duration from 30 seconds to 2 minutes per muscle/movement or active stretching -> just use your own muscles and do a stretch as tight as you can - with out extra help - like gravity. (Bumping movements are not recommended.)

2) Just before a game - start from your legs and go up to your neck. Lower back has lot of joints and muscles and core is connected a long way. Find your stiff areas by doing your swing on "slow motion", but big as possible. When you feel a tight muscle - stretch it - actively or passively.

3) Find some "check up" movements. I do "hagging the sky" and "arm rotation" that I learn in martial arts. I do the movements every morning and some Tai Chi, too.

Stretching is like finding a swing - you can copy movements from others, but you have to feel what is good for you. My two cents are: Stretch tow times everyday - at least the muscles that need it the most.

Hannu

You may want to check out www.exrx.net I am a certified personal trainer and use the site frequently. In the drop down menu go to Exercise and Muscle Directory. I will list muscle groups, exercises and flexibility for each group. Hope this will answer some questions.

Darren,

To stretch your shoulders specific to golf, put your hands together as if you're gripping a club. Make a backswing and stop. Let go with your left hand and take your right hand as far back as you can while maintaing your golf posture and not tipping yourself over to get there. Now do it again, but this time take your right hand off and take your left as far back as you can, while maintaining good form.

Do the same on the follow through, but taking each hand of and taking that position as far as you can go.

This is a simple (no equipment) way to improve your shoulder flexibility specific to your golf swing.

I am responding to Ian's word doc about where distance comes from...I had an experience over 20 years ago that changed my thinking about where distance comes from. I had a 5 time world wrist wrestling champion, yeh, big dude, prison physique, muscle bound, no flexibility, stongest person I had ever met, asked me if I would train him so he could be a long drive champion..this is back in the days of Big Cat and some cash was just starting to be made hitting it long. Anyway took him to a driving range, never had he ever hit a ball. He literally smoked it over 300 yards with zero technique, right out of the box with just raw strength.... To say that strength, arm and hand strenth is not one of the keys to hitting it long is nieve. Trust me, Powell is strong...to hit it deep you've got to be strong....I personally don't put much faith in the x factor and the idea of turning or spinning of the hips through impact for distance...All you need to do is hit some balls off a chair are watch someone hit it 300+ yards without legs to realize where the main source of power and distance comes. Check out this site...I think this guy has "scientific research" on the power source topic..www.kuykendallgolf.com

Hi,
about flexability - I think that in sporst the prinsiple real name is S.A.I.D, but I call it - "What You Do, Is What You Get". You need two kind of flexability - active and passive. Passive is long static stretching that will increase your "basic" range of movement. "Active flexability is when your muscles can actually do this in sports."

Just an example about active flexability would be using 2 - 3 clubs and doing your normal warmup swings. This will also stretch your muscles.

So if you want flexability for golf, do the same moves as you would do when playing - just start easy. I liked very much "golftrainers" exercise. I would add a relaxed "throwing" or wave like back and forward rotation from your waist - so that arms will follow passively. Just work your waist so that your arms will do your normals swing - to both sides.

------

Just a comment on strength - we have to use what we've got. Most of us have a relatively strong torso and legs. We can get faster results by learning a good technic and using what we have, than building new muscles.

and sometimes we will get better results not even trying to hit a long drive, but just hitting the fairway...

wow,

I have never seen a tour player with this type of swing, there was a thread a few months ago about this unusual way to swing a club folding the left arm on the backswing.

Power certainly comes from flexability in the torso, combined with the late releasing of the wrists, the quicker the hips release the more torque generated between the upper and lower body, just the same torque generated on the backswing only in reverse.


Wow

Ian.

try to stretch the hole body before play a round of golf. Not just the shoulders. you can get cramp by doing that i've done it before.
Liam,

I have had some horrendous and very serious lower back problems (bulging disks, cracked vertebra, spina bifida) and know all to well about very severe back pain. Fortunately, I have been able to find a way to eliminate that pain and play golf pain free. Proper flexibility training is a part of that equation.

To most golfers flexibility training is synonymous with static stretching. There have been books, videos and all sorts of contraptions developed to promote static stretching routines. Unfortunately, static stretching is perhaps the least efficient strategy for improving golf-specific flexibility and "warming-up".

Static stretching is insufficient to develop the full range of movement, power, strength, stability and mobility required by golf. Part of the reason for this is because static stretching elongates the muscle over a gradual time frame, but the golf swing is completed in under a second. If a muscle is trained to gradually stretch over 30 seconds (static stretching), but really needs to stretch in a half second (golf swing) then it is easy to see why static stretching does very little for golf specific flexibility.

In the end you get what you train for. If you stretch in a static state, you get static flexibility. If you stretch in a dynamic state, you get dynamic flexibility. Static stretching does little to improve active joint mobility, which is by far the most important flexibility quality needed in golf. Since golf is a dynamic movement, you want to spend most of your time focusing on dynamic stretches to optimize your golf specific flexibility and warm-up.

I do static stretching in the morning. (Best time would be in the evening or even two times per day to get to best results.) Static stretching will stretch also joints and tendons and even nerves, not only muscle fibers.

Static stretching in decrease your muscle strength if it is done before golf. (I do not know how long is the effect, but it might be an hour?)

So active stretching - movements , maybe same moves as in golf, but slower or with bigger Resistance are more effective than stretching over 30 seconds.

But it's better to use both methods - just do not use static stretching if some part of your body is too flexible.