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Saturday, June 30, 2012

Fitness and Golf

I posted this on a golf instruction forum and thought it would be applicable here.

I cringe anytime I read about someone wanting to work on golf specific exercises.


I know tons and tons of stuff about physical training from personal study and experience. I'm not a physical trainer or anything like that but I have a background in the stuff that would top most "certified" trainers that work out of local gyms. In my opinion trying to follow or develop a golf specific fitness program is a waste of time and can actually lead to a decrease in performance. If you want evidence look at the training that is done by athletes in other sports. Basketball players don't follow programs that are basketball specific. They follow programs that develop overall strength and endurance and movement in all directions.

Most of your really good athletes in any sport were also really good in other sports.  I believe this is true because playing more than one sport develops a balanced athlete and they learn to move their bodies in any direction not just the directions needed for their primary sport. This has been proven over and over again by people a lot smarter than I am.

I'm experiencing really, really good results working with a program that stresses overall improvement in strength, athletic development, and movement. I've also started some mobility work that shows a lot of promise. I didn't develop either of the programs and I'm not affiliated with them in anyway. It's free for anyone to follow but it's very difficult if you have no background in physical movement. I'm not comfortable posting the link here because this isn't my website and neither is the one that post the workouts. If you want to find it do a search for cross training and you'll get pretty close. If you want specifics you can PM and I'll give you the links to the two programs I'm following.

I'm also not going to be so bold as to say what I'm doing is the best programming on earth but it's the best I've found so far. The key is balancing improvements in strength, movement, and endurance.

It would be a very good idea to work with a trainer for a little while that can at least teach you correct movements so you don't hurt yourself. Just don't tell them you want a program to improve your golf game.

This is my blog so I'm not afraid to say that the programming that I'm currently following is outlaw crossfit and I also use mobility WOD.  You don't have to be a super athlete to follow the mobility WOD site.  In my opinion the mobility WOD is something everyone should follow regardless of age or physical ability.

Monday, June 25, 2012

What I've learned...so far

I've followed tons of different fitness programs.  Over the following few weeks I'm going to try to summarize some of the programs I've followed and what I've learned about myself following these programs.  There are a few things however, that are universal to all programs.  I'll go into more detail on these points later on.

1.  Your diet is almost as important as your program.

2.  Your program is almost as important as your diet.

3.  Supplements won't fix your problems.

4.  You need to know what results you want before you start a program or diet.

5.  You have to follow the program!

6.  You don't need a lot of equipment to get in great shape.

7.  The only excuses are the ones between your ears.

8.  Write down everything!

This might be the most important one.  I have fitness journals going back over 10 years.  I can look back at these journals and see what programming I was following, how much I weighed, what my maxes were, etc.  This is extremely important for several reasons.  You need to know if you are making progress.  You need to be able to look for trends to see what works and what doesn't work for you.  It keeps you motivated.  If you aren't tracking something, anything, you will fail.  I'll write a much more detailed post later on about the importance of tracking workouts.  For now get a notebook of your choice and a pen and start writing things down.

9.  Write down what you eat.

I wish I had figured this out and done it a long time ago.  Diet can have a huge impact on your results.  I didn't pick this habit up because it can be a real pain in the ass.  There are lots of free sites on the internet now that make it very simple to keep track of your diet.  All you need is a computer and a small scale to weigh your food.  After a while you won't have to way everything because you'll have a good idea of how much you are eating just by looking at it.  This will even work in restaurants when dragging a scale along in impractical.  You can use measuring cups to determine how much you are eating but they don't work as well in my opinion.  Not everything fits well in a measuring cup.  Frozen fruit comes to mind.

10.  Don't quit.