Tom Stickney is one of the world’s best golf instructors.
He’s won recognition from Golf Magazine and other prestigious publications for helping hundreds of people each year improve their game. This month, he lets The Vidanta Traveler in on some expert tips for the perfect golf body.
Finding your pace is an essential part of effective cardio.
Cardio and Resistance Training
1. Upgrade your heart with the Karvonen Formula
Your body has a need for stamina in order to reproduce the same swing over and over without strain, and cardio is essential for building it. No matter what your preferred form of cardio—biking, running, or swimming—you can take your routine to the next level with targeted heart rate training. Stickney recommends calculating your optimal heart rate using the gold standard Karvonen Formula, and spending at least half of your exercise time in your ideal range. Burning fat? Try to maintain a heart rate 50-60% of the way to max. Building stamina? Kick it up to 60-70%! Determine your optimal heart rate with this calculator.
A lot of golfers balk at strength training, but they shouldn’t!. Stories about ruined symmetry and off-set balance are way overblown—gentle strength training can absolutely better both your drive and mid-game. There are two essential tricks to making strength training work for you.
2. Save the Iron for the Green
Use resistance band training to hit your muscles with low-weight, high-rep exercises. Keeping weight low helps tone your muscles without building huge bulk that can throw off your swing.
3. Target Your Swing Faults
If you want to get the biggest advantage from your routine, you’ve got to be hitting your problem areas. Toning your problem muscles can change the forces acting on your swing, mitigating your bad habit. This is where Stickney recommends getting a golf professional to help develop a personalized routine.
Flexibility
Veteran golfers know the importance of maintaining flexibility, but it needs to be noted that flexibility is important at ANY age—you do not have to be older for it to help your game! Any person at any age will play better if they are more flexible! Here are three simple, at-home exercises Stickney recommends for players of all ages.
1. Standing Rear Deltoid Stretch
While standing with feet shoulder-width apart, pull the elbow with your opposite hand across your body until the stretch is felt in the upper shoulder area.
In this stretching motion we are focusing on the Rear Deltoid, which is instrumental in allowing the arms, specifically the forward arm, to work across the body during the backstroke. This motion will allow your shoulders to lead and power your backstroke instead of your arms to the top, thus increasing your backstroke turn
2. Hamstring Stretch
Lie on the floor, and place your palms down at each side of you. With one knee up and the foot flat on the floor, extend your opposite leg straight up toward ceiling.
For extra tight hamstrings, wrap a rope or towel around your foot and pull gently. When the hamstrings are stretched you will find that your address posture will improve; when the hamstrings are tight there is little flexing of the knees at address or faulty posture from the waist. These two factors together will allow the upper and lower body to move out of sync back and through the impact zone, allowing there to be excessive hand action through impact.
3. Hip and Low Back Stretch
Lie on the floor and extend one leg out, pull the opposite leg to your chest with a bent knee—gently pull this leg across your body toward the floor.
The motion between the upper and lower body to the top is vital for the production of torque and distance. The more flexibility you have between the upper and lower halves of your body the more you can wind up, increasing your X-Factor, and the farther you will hit the ball. If you are tight here, then you will see poor hip actions to the top and faulty right knee actions.
With these six tips, you’ll be ready to step to the tee with confidence. And the next time you’re at Nuevo Vallarta, head to the Jack Nicklaus Academy of Golf for a personal lesson from Tom himself. See you on the green!
