Creating Power in the Golf Swing
This week we are discussing the phases of power training for golfers (and other rotational athletes for that matter) regardless of whether we are starting in rehab phases or directly from a performance perspective. Either way, the same system needs to be followed. First, we must address mobility and asymmetries. Even for the golfer in pain we always will address this, even if the site of the mobility loss is distant from the actual pain. It is often the case that these asymmetries and mobility issues are causal mechanisms in the generation of pain, while also being major performance limiters. Next steps include looking at motor control and stability throughout key regions and joints in the body, baseline strength, and then re-integrating movement quality and power training. Let’s take a closer look at these components to a powerful swing.
Mobility and asymmetry
Think of this like the foundation you build the house on. We must get this right. When we have missing mobility, we ask other joints to pick up the slack. This is a major killer for maintaining the kinematic sequence and timing, posture and positioning, and a leading root cause for injury. Therefore, we must assess for and address mobility limitations in the golfer.
Here's more on the kinematic sequence…
There are several joints in the body that can be lacking the proper mobility that is required to be efficient and consistent in the golf swing. Check out the previous blog articles and podcast that discuss the topic of mobility at specific joints and how we can start assessing and going about fixing these problems. Also, see last week’s article about the differences in joint mobility Vs. tissue extensibility and why it is important to distinguish the two in treatment.
What is limiting your mobility? (article)
What is limiting your mobility? (Youtube podcast)
What is limiting your mobility? (Spotify podcast)
Stability and motor control
We also must address areas of missing stability. In the golf swing, there are a few key areas and muscles we require stability from. The glutes, the core, and the shoulder complex. Of course, we need to be able to create stable and accurate motion from every joint in the golf swing, but these three areas are commonly limited in their abilities to actively create the proper motion we want.
For an example, we will use the glutes and the pelvis. We assess this in the pelvic tilt test. Check out one of the first podcast episodes on this assessment here…
So, if we are to focus on motor control of the pelvis, we look to see if we can do the pelvic tilt test and get clear and discernable movement into frontward and backward tilting. This same motion is required from the pelvis through the golf swing. If we cannot create this motion intentionally, then we can be sure there is compensation happening throughout the swing. We can also look at the glute bridge with leg extension test to examine our ability to recruit the glutes before the hamstring to control the pelvis and extend the hips. Again, this is vital for the swing and avoiding swing characteristics like the dreaded early extension.
There is much more to be said about assessment and treatment for motor control in the golf swing, but we cannot tackle all of it in one article. Here are 3 exercises we use to help start the process of creating stability in the shoulder complex, core, and pelvis.
As we address stability, we incorporate motor control. What this means is we first need to make sure we have strength and at least minimal coordination to effectively stabilize joints in static or unmoving positions. Then we can progress with motor control training. This will mean more movement around the joint that is challenged under loaded Conditions. Here are some great examples of motor control training on top of stability.
Strength
We can’t go much further now without acquiring raw strength. We need mobility first, then stability and the ability to control the joint motion, and then pure strength. We will leverage our strength in the next phases as we harness it for speed and power. In this stage, we often build in strength movements that continue to hone and improve our previous goals, like mobility. There are endless examples of this, so I will focus on one, the split squat. The split squat is great for addressing unilateral strength (one leg at a time) in the quads for knee extension and glutes for hip extension. Both are vital in the swing for controlling the pelvis, creating rotation, and creating vertical force in the swing.
Now how can we use the split squat to continue working on our earlier mobility and stability goals? Well, if the golfer is missing internal rotation in either hip, we can modify the split squat in a few ways to help encourage and use more internal rotation from that leg. Assuming we have already opened up and improved the golfer’s internal rotation in previous sessions, we can now challenge the body to use this internal rotation under load, hence continuing to improve and now use while being challenged. We do this by putting the golfer in a bent forward position and staying there while performing the split squat. We also place the load in the opposite hand from the forward working leg and can even ask the golfer to slightly rotate his pelvis and trunk towards the working side leg prior to and throughout the lift. This creates more and more use of internal rotation of that working side front hip. Here is an example of the bent over split squat…
Again, we can create sets and rep schemes that help improve strength in the lower body while ALSO introducing constraints and modifications to the lift that help with our other goals based on what the golfers needs are!
Translating to power
Now we need to start translating our mobility, motor control, and strength into power. We also want this to translate directly to the golf swing. So, we need to make sure we are working on vertical, rotational, push, and pull power production. These can be demonstrated and tested in the vertical jump test, seated med ball chest pass, baseline shot put throw, and the sit up and throw.
After getting this data, we know what we need to focus on specifically. Otherwise, here are a few example exercises and drills that start to translate our mobility and strength into power.
Translating power to the golf swing
We now want to make sure we can utilize our improved power production in the golf swing. This can mostly translate just from practicing, but there are always things we can do to help transfer from what we worked on in the clinic. This strictly depends on the patient in front of us. If hip mobility was an issue, then we would have spent time creating more mobility at the hip, then creating strength and stability through that range of motion, creating motor control and mastery of that range, and then being explosive yet still technical enough to use that new mobility for the swing. The last thing we would do is then incorporate swing drills that help influence the golfer to feel the hips in the swing and feel the strength and mobility when they are needed. Here are example drills I could recommend someone near the end of their treatment when we want to translate our work in the clinic and gym floor to the golf course.
Again, these are two examples we might use and prescribe for a golfer who was dealing with missing hip internal rotation or stability at the start of our care. Towards the end of the treatment plan, we need to help him or her learn to use these new hips of theirs in the actual swing. These are some examples of how we can go about doing that. Otherwise, when it comes to very technical and the overall swing mechanics, we save that for the golf professionals.
Conclusion
To create more power in the golf swing, we first need to address the body’s ability to achieve the necessary golf positions. After addressing mobility, we can begin incorporating stability and strength into our training. Then we can we use our bodies new mobility and strength to create rotational, vertical, push, and pull power. Last, we make sure the golfer has the ability to use these new mobility, strength and power characteristics in the actual swing sequence itself.
If you want to learn more about Integrated Rehab and Performance Center’s golf specific treatment, check out the website at www.integratedrpc.com
-Dr. Nick DC, TPI, CSCS
If you would like to learn more about your body, pain, and performance, send Dr. Nick an email at contact@integratedrpc.com or call at (585)478-4379, or schedule a FREE discovery visit at Contact.
