#golfstrength

Elevate Your Swing: Elite Golf Power & Performance Training

At I Will Train, we help golfers of all levels improve their strength, mobility, and performance. Led by Golf Power Coach Brian Baker, our personalized programs are designed to add distance, consistency, and confidence to your game. Located in Evanston, IL, we provide professional golf fitness, strength training, and performance coaching trusted by PGA Tour champions and competitive golfers.

Street Address: 900 Chicago Ave, Evanston, IL 60202, USA

Service Area: Evanston, IL and the greater Chicago North Shore area

Website: 🌐 https://www.iwilltrain.com/

Google Business Profile (GMB): https://maps.app.goo.gl/5XPFMn2vqp6qbdnEA

Business Email: [email protected]

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Business Category: Golf Instructor, Golf Fitness Trainer, Physical Fitness Program

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Sand traps can be a golfer's worst nightmare. But with the right combination of technique and power, you can escape bunkers with confidence and get back on track to a lower score.

Why Power Matters in Bunkers:

Unlike shots from the fairway, bunker shots require you to hit the sand before the ball. This demands a forceful swing that can generate enough energy to lift both the sand and the ball out of the bunker. Explosive power, particularly in your hips and core, is essential for executing this effectively.

Exercises to Boost Your Bunker Game:

Kettlebell Swings: This dynamic exercise is a powerhouse for developing hip extension and core strength. The explosive movement mimics the power needed to drive through the sand.

Medicine Ball Side Throws: Improve rotational power with medicine ball side throws. This exercise targets your obliques and core, essential for generating force in your swing.

Box Jumps: Increase lower body explosiveness with box jumps. This plyometric exercise builds the leg power needed to generate force from the ground up.

Plyometric Push-ups: Don't forget about upper body power! Plyometric push-ups enhance explosiveness in your chest and shoulders, contributing to a faster swing speed.

Putting It All Together:

Incorporate these exercises into your golf-specific strength training program 2-3 times per week. Focus on explosive movements and proper technique to maximize power development.

The Science of Explosive Power:

A study in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research demonstrated the link between explosive training and improved bunker performance. Golfers who incorporated plyometric exercises into their training showed significant improvements in clubhead speed and sand shot distance.

Simply put, mobility is the most important aspect of the golf swing, with increased mobility; you’re more likely going to the scores on the golf course.

The body is made up of mobile and stable joints. If the mobile joints become stiff, the body will instinctively look for a more comfortable alternative, often leading to other areas becoming painful.

Check out the video which will give you a few exercises to do at home, guaranteed to increase the mobility in the ankles, hips and spine.

Let me know your thoughts, Enjoy!

Flexibility is an area that professional golfers often target the most; it can be the secret ingredient to a better swing and better scores. Flexibility is “the ability of a muscle or joint to move through a full range of motion”.

You don’t necessarily have to be the biggest or strongest to hit the ball a country mile. If you take a look at the top players in the world; particularly Rory McIlroy, Dustin Johnson and Justin Thomas, these guys have effortlessly average drives 300+ yards, and it’s largely responsible to their flexibility. Having a certain degree of flexibility can allow the body to find the correct positions, directly influencing face angle, consistency and club head speed. Best way to improve it? Massage!

Massage can be expensive, but here is some cheap alternative which will get you swinging freely in no time. Self myofascial release (SMR) is the home version of a deep tissue massage with the added bonus of stretching, it enables you to realign the fibers, increase blood flow and increase the length of the tissue, ultimately improving the flexibility of the muscle. While stretching alone will increase the muscle length, foam rolling importantly works to adjust the tone of the muscle.

So, grab a foam roller, a hard ball (We use a rounders ball) and roll along the length of the muscle fibre from bottom to top for 10-15 passes. Check out the video demonstrating how to target the major muscle groups.

Firstly Happy New Year to all of you. I hope that you all enjoyed the festive season and with the New Year in full swing have found renewed vigour to prepare for the 2017 season.

This article is going to give some ideas on how best prepare your body for training or playing. The previous articles (Flexibility Part II) & (Part I) outlined the initial soft tissue preparation, today we are going to discuss how to mobilise the specific joints, in order for us to move and swing most efficiently.

Simply put, the body is made up of mobile and stable joints. The diagram below highlights the major joints that are used in our training and practice. 

“The body will seek the easiest method of movement, and this is often not the best.”

If joints intended to be mobile are stiff and have reduced mobility the body will seek the easiest possible alternative which is not necessarily intended to move that way. For example if the hips become stiff then the body may look to the lumbar spine or knee for rotation. Neither of which are intended to perform that degree of rotation. This may ultimately result in lower back or knee pain, which is very common for golfers of all ages and abilities.

The video below gives a comprehensive full body mobility warm up. Targeting ankle, hips and thoracic spine to improve mobility and function of these joints.

If you read the last article then you will be up to speed on self myofacial release. Following a good roll I like my athletes to stretch. Research indicates that there are good and bad times for static stretching. Before training stretching can lead to a de-sensitisation of the muscle and therefore be detrimental to force and rate of contraction. That said I personally ask my athletes to stretch for a maximum of 10 seconds. This will not affect the tissue length but will help mobilise the joint and musculature around it. If we are looking to increase tissue length then we hold a stretch for 1 to 2 minutes. This sounds like a long time and can be painful for some (depending on the pliability of the muscle) but will yield greater results. For stretches of this duration we carry out stand alone flexibility sessions or include them as fillers or at the end of sessions. For example on a lower body day we may include a lat stretch in between our single leg exercises.

The video below includes some example stretches that you can start implementing in your warm ups or sessions.

Thanks for reading. Please like and retweet and stay tuned for part III.