Golf Drills Inside of Your Workout

Lately, I have been experimenting with some different things inside of my training sessions with my golf clients.  One of those things is to add golf drills as part of my tri or quad sets. 

First of all let me say that I am not talking about swinging dumbbells like they are a golf club.  That's for idiots.  If your trainer has you doing that, run away.

A quick review:
A tri-set is an upper body exercise paired with a lower body exercise and a dynamic stretch. 
A quad set is an upper body push, an upper body pull, a lower body exercise and a dynamic stretch.

In the past, I would always leave the golf drills up to the pros, mostly because that is their job and they know it better than I do.  But lately, I have been working closely with Paul Kenney from Scarsdale Golf Club in my studio.  I am able to watch him give lessons and see the drills/homework he gives to his students.  He has been teaching me the whys and hows of those drills and I have been taking them and putting them into my client's fitness routine.

Because we just started doing this, we only share one client, so it's still a work in progress.  Here is what I have been doing:

Paul gave my client Pete some homework do do.  Pete is supposed to practice swinging on the 6-inch foam rolls with the flat side up, the rolls perpendicular to his feet and on the balls of his feet.

Basically, he needs to maintain his balance while swinging.  In the gym, I have added this drill and a variation of it to our strength sets. 

So today, for the first strength circuit we did:

Quad Set A
Alternating Chest Press
Prisoner Squats
TRX Rows
3-D Hamstring Stretch
Golf Drill- Swings on the Foam Rolls

For Quad Set B, I did a variation of the Swings for the golf drill.  I wanted to work on balance with the Foam Rolls, but without replicating that pattern.  I chose to have him stand on the rolls while I threw some balls at him to catch.  He still has to maintain good balance while working a completely different pattern as well as some coordination.  I am hoping to enhance balance without him just trying to figure out the one pattern.  Hopefully this will help him conquer Paul's drill much faster.

Quad Set B
Cable Pulldowns
Single Leg Deadlifts
Pallof Press
Hip Stretch
Variation of Foam Roll Drill

One of the reasons I am doing this experiment is because I am able to work with Paul a lot more since he is in the facility with me.  That way I learn and see the drills first hand.  I think it's helpful to know why he is prescribing the drill also.
The other reason is because I listened to Physical Therapist Gray Cook talk about the importance of working a movement pattern after a stretch or soft tissue work.  He feels that you will not make progress with your stretching or tissue work unless you work that movement pattern dynamically to the ranges of motion we just achieved.  Otherwise, the tissue goes back to the length it was. 

It makes sense to me.  I am looking forward to working with Paul this winter to come up with a library of drills and variations.  I'll keep you posted.

Comments

[GolfGuy]

Great advice. Those foam rollers are the bomb,and especially for the average rec golfer, who is core strength challenged, the combo drills help speed up learning AND fitness .. keep up the good work.