Santa Teresa Golf Club

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Ultimate Golf Fitness Guide

John Snopkowski

Ultimate Golf Fitness Guide
Ultimate Golf Fitness Guide
Coach John here …

Last year I took the family on a vacation in Hawaii. We stayed at the very nice Maui Marriott which offered a unique benefit package for its guests. During the Monday orientation, Marriott and White Tiger Fitness introduced a wellness program using Martial Arts stretching, Yoga and under water fitness training.  Four cla sses per day at $25.00 each or you could take advantage of Marriott's special offer of $99.00 for the week for two guests. 

How can you turn down an invigorating start to the morning in one of the most beautiful places on the planet?

We signed up.  I took the 8 and 9am Martial Arts stretching and Yoga classes for my back and my wife took the 10 and 11am under water exercise classes.  I will never forget sitting on my mat under the tall palm trees and just yards away from the blue ocean.  It was just perfect. 

Much to our surprise we found that we absolutely loved the way a little bit of morning exercise brightened up the morning and set a great tone for the entire rest of the day. For less than a hundred bucks we had a healthier, happier, more enjoyable vacation, and I'd do it again in a heartbeat.

But what surprised me – something I wasn't even looking for – was how the exercise also helped my golf game!

With the morning exercise I was able to turn better, my swing felt freer yet paradoxically more powerful, and I had more energy all through the round.

By the end of the week I could tell the difference that little bit of exercise was making in my game. Then it occurred to me that if this kind of exercise helped my game, there was every reason to expect that it would help my students.

You see, I am committed to helping golfers improve their game – whatever it takes. It could be swing mechanics, it could be the mental game, it could be exercise, it could be nutrition. Doesn't matter. If there is a way I can help you with your game, I'm going to find it and make it available to you.

Well, I have a suggestion for your golf-specific exercise.

It's taken me awhile to find something to recommend. Most exercise books are not targeted to golfers, so they are not that helpful. The books that are targeted to golfers usually involve a gym.

But I have a recommendation for you called "The Ultimate Golf Fitness Guide" that I think will help.

The Ultimate Golf Fitness Guide is written by Mike Pedersen, an exercise specialist and a golf fanatic. He has been specifically focused on golf and exercises for golfers for more than 20 years.

Mike has taken all his formal physiology and kinesiology training, put it together with his real-world experience with thousands of every day golfers, and developed a golf-specific exercise book that will help just about every golfer.

What's nice is that the exercises involve the whole body, not just specific muscle groups, because that is what is required in the golf swing.

What's also nice is that Mike is one of those guys to "gets it" that we don't all have the ability to carve an hour a day out of our schedule to get to the gym. So he has all these exercises that you can do in 10 to 15 minute breaks, any time of the day and any place – even the office!

What's more, you don't need all the equipment in the gym to do the exercises. Mike is pretty handy about suggesting common items to use to help with some of the movements and exercises. That's part of what makes this book so easy to use.

I recommend that you check out The Ultimate Golf Fitness Guide and add it to your library. It is an electronic book, so you can download it instantly and start learning how to get in better golf-specific shape.

Here are some of the great things about The Ultimate Golf Fitness Guide:
  1. It was developed by a golfer, for golfers
  2. Because it is golf-focused, the exercises are treated holistically. It's not just weight training or flexibility training. It is an integrated approach to golf fitness.
  3. The workouts are intelligently structured the workouts to fit into anybody's schedule. There are exercises you can do throughout the day in 10-15 minute chunks, or you can structure one complete workout.
  4. If you are on a budget, you'll love this book. You don't need a gym or expensive equipment. All the exercises use low-budget , high impact, high return.
Here are some of the great things you will learn in The Ultimate Golf Fitness Guide:
  1. Why weight training alone, or stretching alone, are not as good as combining the two.
  2. Why combining weight training with lots of rotational elements will "kill two birds" by strengthening your core at the same time.
  3. How to create a workout schedule that works for you.
  4. The one problem with the book is that there are so many exercises that it is difficult to know which exercises to put into your own unique workout plan. It would be nice to have several "sample" workout sessions designed to focus on specific areas. For instance, if I had a weak left side and had a hard time pulling the club through, perhaps I'd like to have a sample program for that. Or lower back pain, or hamstring tightness.
  5. Why you need to strengthen your core in 3 planes – Frontal, transverse, and sagittal (if you don't know what these are, read the book!).
  6. Why the more you can put your body through the same movement as your golf swing, with resistance (weight), the more beneficial your workout will be for your golf game.
  7. The two types of stretching (dynamic and static), and which one is better for your game (and why).
  8. What to do in the middle of the round to avoid fatigue and maintain flexibility to finish on a strong note.

I hope you'll take a moment to check out the site at The Ultimate Golf Fitness Guide.