Lifting Weights During Golf Season - Advice needed

[cardoustie]

I’m a full body guy three times a week, right tennis elbow slowing me down a little from some chainsaw work 3 months ago .. I am 56 … still swinging almost 110

 

i do a routine of 5x10 for these exercises at my course’s gym here in Florida 

 

- bicep dumbbell curls .. right arm can only do 20’s vs 40’s on left right now 

- shoulder press

- bench press

- assisted pull ups

- leg press / leg extensions 

- back extensions

- lat pull downs, wide grip

- hip abduction and adduction

- seated torso twists … both left and right 

love to foam roll out the t-spine, 3 spine surgeries 20 yrs ago

I’m 30lbs too heavy but working on it.  Walk the course 4 times weekly 

[BombinJim]

I lift heavy 5 days a week and would suggest not altering your lifting regime but rather focusing on recovery and warmup for your golf workouts. I do alot of lacrosse ball soft tissue work for recovery and some activation/stretching prior to every round if golf. It definitely helps and I’ve gotten used to being relatively sore when I play golf, so I think you’ll get used to it too.

[AmateurAmateur]

41 minutes ago, bluedot said:

Correct in every respect.

 

One good example of an improved knowledge base about the golf swing and workouts specific to it is the increasing emphasis on relatively slow, controlled eccentric movements; that generally will be less weight and fewer reps, but research shows that the gains are significant.  So, for instance, an inclined single arm dumbbell bench press; fast to the top, a 3-5 count coming down, and a 10 second hold at the bottom; you can’t do that with a lot of weight or a lot of reps, but the shoulder strength gains are very real.  
 

There is a lot of stuff like this; farmers carry with kettlebells for spine stability, various med ball throws like a kneeling two hand chest pass, and so on, and all of it is designed to build on the basic compound lifts.  I’d also add that the specifics of ANY workout for a particular sport are best when they are structured around the needs of the particular athlete; again, college and professional strength coaches have been doing this forever.  So if a particular golfer can only internally rotate his hips 15*, or can only rotate his thoracic spine 65*,  or can’t externally rotate his shoulders to beyond his spine angle, that determines part(s) of his workout.  

First and foremost I think it’s important to establish that workouts that have value for athletes that predominately focus on sports that aren’t golf, will also have value for athletes who predominately focus on golf. 
Track athletes with short distance sprints will benefit golfers, as increasing fast twitch muscle fibres is only achieved by moving fast.
If we look at muscle fibre type and their density in certain athletes we know that track athletes and power lifters have a higher density of fast twitch muscle fibres than endurance runners and cyclists. Where does golf fall in that category? Traditional thinking believed golfers were best suited to focus more on endurance training (slow muscle fibres) than the more current thinking of fast twitch muscle fibres. As training methods have developed and stats have become a more influential part of the game (thank you Mark Broadie) competitive golfers focus more on fast twitch than endurance.

Accomplishing a healthy blend of increasing fast twitch, increasing strength, and increasing mobility is the main focus of workouts for nearly every sport. 
Jumping on a decline bench and doing 100 sit-ups to increase core strength is impressive: but it doesn’t offer any practical benefits to the golf game compared to a Pallof Press or a sumo deadlift. 

Without trying to prove anecdotal evidence as a factual conclusion: when I played hockey in college the workouts we did were incredibly similar to the workouts we did on the golf team as well. More plyometric based, but the overlap amongst all exercises was marginal and to anyone who didn’t have a physical copy of the workout plan they wouldn’t be able to tell the difference (outside a couple workouts). 
Hockey being the sport that transfers best to golf is something else I studied and I believe it was TPI that has the most in-depth research on it.

 

The fundamentals of an athletic workout plan are the same amongst most sports: Get stronger, get faster, get more mobile, get more athletic. The specifics of doing that is largely irrelevant as long as it doesn’t cause injury to the athlete. 

Edited March 25 by AmateurAmateur

[bluedot]

1 hour ago, AmateurAmateur said:

First and foremost I think it’s important to establish that workouts that have value for athletes that predominately focus on sports that aren’t golf, will also have value for athletes who predominately focus on golf. 
Track athletes with short distance sprints will benefit golfers, as increasing fast twitch muscle fibres is only achieved by moving fast.
If we look at muscle fibre type and their density in certain athletes we know that track athletes and power lifters have a higher density of fast twitch muscle fibres than endurance runners and cyclists. Where does golf fall in that category? Traditional thinking believed golfers were best suited to focus more on endurance training (slow muscle fibres) than the more current thinking of fast twitch muscle fibres. As training methods have developed and stats have become a more influential part of the game (thank you Mark Broadie) competitive golfers focus more on fast twitch than endurance.

Accomplishing a healthy blend of increasing fast twitch, increasing strength, and increasing mobility is the main focus of workouts for nearly every sport. 
Jumping on a decline bench and doing 100 sit-ups to increase core strength is impressive: but it doesn’t offer any practical benefits to the golf game compared to a Pallof Press or a sumo deadlift. 

Without trying to prove anecdotal evidence as a factual conclusion: when I played hockey in college the workouts we did were incredibly similar to the workouts we did on the golf team as well. More plyometric based, but the overlap amongst all exercises was marginal and to anyone who didn’t have a physical copy of the workout plan they wouldn’t be able to tell the difference (outside a couple workouts). 
Hockey being the sport that transfers best to golf is something else I studied and I believe it was TPI that has the most in-depth research on it.

 

The fundamentals of an athletic workout plan are the same amongst most sports: Get stronger, get faster, get more mobile, get more athletic. The specifics of doing that is largely irrelevant as long as it doesn’t cause injury to the athlete. 

We probably agree on more stuff than we disagree about; I could have written your 2nd, 3rd, and 4th paragraphs.  Later today when I go to the weight room, I'll be doing not only Pallofs (kneeling with a 10 second hold at full extension) as well as deadlifts.  We also agree completely about the similarities between hockey and the golf swing, fwiw, and I don't think it's much of a stretch at all to think that the workouts would look pretty similar.  I know teaching pros consider teaching hockey players to play golf is like stealing; there are WAY more similarities between a slap shot and hitting a driver than almost any other two movements in different sports, including baseball.

 

That said, I think it's safe to say that the strength coach(s) where you played college hockey have continued to read current research and tweak workouts for both hockey players and golfers continually; if they don't, they need to have their resumes updated and ready to send out.  That doesn't mean that there aren't still many more similarities that differences, but I think you're actually arguing FOR sport specific workouts, including golf, rather than against them, when you mention the similarities between the workouts for these two sports, as well as the benefits of things like Pallofs and deadlifts vs things like situps. 

 

And my greater point, I think, is that a good workout is also tailored to the particular individual and their strengths/deficiencies; this only becomes more true as we age.  So I do a TON of hip mobility stuff when I work out; I didn't need to do that stuff when I was a college tennis player in the early 70's, but as a golfer in MY early 70's, it's critical.

[tigerfan23]

Ive been lifting almost every day... Ive played 5-6 rounds.

ZERO Effect on my swing or golf game.

 

I feel great lifting ... I will not stop during the season.  Probably will not lift on golf days but that leaves 4-5 days a week to lift.

 

I'm hooked.

 

[phizzy30]

7 minutes ago, tigerfan23 said:

Ive been lifting almost every day... Ive played 5-6 rounds.

ZERO Effect on my swing or golf game.

 

I feel great lifting ... I will not stop during the season.  Probably will not lift on golf days but that leaves 4-5 days a week to lift.

 

I'm hooked.

 

Good to hear.  Just remember to take breaks every now and then to give your body and CNS time to heal/rest.  I'd recommend 7-10 day breaks for every 10-12 weeks you lift. 

[tigerfan23]

21 hours ago, phizzy30 said:

Good to hear.  Just remember to take breaks every now and then to give your body and CNS time to heal/rest.  I'd recommend 7-10 day breaks for every 10-12 weeks you lift. 

 

Just took a 6 day break went to the masters.  But walked 25k steps a day golfed 4 times and drank a bottle of Burbon a day so it wasn't much of a break lol.