Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Fitness for the Average Golfer

Fitness for the Average Golfer

These days, a more careful look at the professional golf ranks will reveal many well-conditioned people. Such conditioning is needed to perform consistently well at a high level. After all, it isn't often noted, but the golf swing is an intensely athletic motion. Some professional golfers don't look like athletes, the fact remains that golfers are athletes.

Given that fact, even the most casual golfer who incorporates the simplest of exercises can help himself or herself shave strokes off the handicap, and maybe a few inches off the waist.

A golf analysis company based in Germany, Golf Biodynamics, conducted a study using twenty-eight weekend golfers. They were introduced to an eight-week, “five-column” workout plan. The five columns were different sets of exercises that concentrated on five different fitness-related aspects of golf – coordination, balance, strength, the swing itself, and flexibility.

The results of the study were overwhelming. The group as a whole experienced an increase in upper-body rotation and an 80 percent gain in upper-body strength. The stability of their hip rotation also increased, resulting in a more controlled swing, and their collective clubhead speed increased by 9.4 percent. Think they’re having fun knocking their drives past their playing partners now?

As with any workout regimen, the older a person gets, the harder it is to see results. Younger golfers and women, all with lower handicaps, saw more immediate results on the golf course. But seniors and bogey golfers can take heart; the sport is a game of inches. The slightest change any golfer makes can have a significant impact in her game, and will help avoid back pain, knee pain, and other health problems many middle-aged to senior golfers experience.

Golf Ball Speed And How It Effects You

Golf Ball Speed And How It Effects You

Everyone wants to hit the golf ball farther.
The golf instructors understand the relationship between distance and golf ball speed and are turning to launch monitors and other types of golf ball tracking technology. Golf launch monitors can be simple and affordable to very complex and cost thousands of dollars.

Learning about golf ball speed, depending on the launch monitor the club fitter is using they can also learn information about the spin rate of the golf ball, launch angle and carry distance. Doppler radar is used in some of the least expensive units to track the flight of the golf ball.

The Golf ball speed is determined by a simple equation. The easy equation is that your golf ball speed is equal to one and a half times your club head speed. For example if you have a golf swing speed of 100mph then your golf ball speed will be 150mph. Another example would be the television announcers over the weekend said the PGA Tour average club head speed is 112 mph. This equates to 168mph golf ball speed.

What is going on have you lost distance?

Every 25 degree drop in temperature the ball will fly approximately eight yards shorter than before.

With all of the new technology available to the golf world, it has never been a more interesting time to try to improve and learn about your game. A great way to do that is through a golf club fitting with a launch monitor. Since the technology is becoming more affordable, golf players are purchasing a personal launch monitor to help themselves with improving their very own game.

Golf Swing Tempo vs Golf Swing Speed

Golf Swing Tempo vs Golf Swing Speed

Is that your golf swing too fast?
It's not the speed, but the tempo, Golf Swing Speed and Golf Swing Tempo are fundamentally different.

Quite often a golfers swing can appear extremely fast, because they don't have the correct swing tempo. They usually have a very deliberate take away and back swing, where they are trying to 'Place' the club head in the correct position. There may even be a deliberate pause at the top.

About Golf Swing Tempo, that start to talk about components of the swing. Swing plane, take away, ball position, alignment. These are fundamentals and separate parts of the swing. These are the individual parts that you learn, which when combined, give you a complete golf swing.

The Golf swing tempo, is the glue that holds all of these constituent parts together. In fact, the more you swing, with the correct swing tempo, the more stable all of those swing components become.

So what is Swing Speed? Well it's simply the amount of time you take to get from the start of your takeaway to the point of impact. But let's say for simplicity sake, that for you, this takes 4 seconds. If you take 2 seconds getting to the top of your back swing and then 2 seconds getting the club head to the ball, you really are not going to generate any club head speed.

So what is Swing Tempo? Let's take the same 4 second swing,

This time you take 3 Seconds getting to the top, but 1 second on the way down, and what do you have? Well you have a very slow swing, but you have PERFECT Golf Swing Tempo.
Why?
Because all PRO's swing at this exact tempo ratio. 3 To 1. So you can swing as fast as you like. As long as you do it using the 3 to 1 ratio. Now all you have to do is achieve this tempo using one of the many training aids available. Most of which are audio cue devices. When you do what you will find, is that you will swing faster than you ever have, but with a tempo and a consistency, that is going to stay solid throughout your next round of golf. Also, when you use one of these aids, your mind tends to focus on waiting for an audio cue, which eliminates those mind games you tend to start playing when you are addressing the ball. You know, the ones that get you all tensed up and anxious, the ones that took away any chance you ever had of a good smooth swing tempo.

Golfing Success

A Life Learning Experience

The golfing success is a life learning experience. You can learn a lot about life when you play golf. In particular, you can learn a lot about yourself from golf. If you cheat or blow up when things are not going your way, such as getting a bad break, you will most likely demonstrate similar behaviors in life. Therefore, golfing success reflects your life learning experience.

A life is a game, and so is golf. You have twists and turns (In life) and you just have to meander your way through; likewise, in golf, you also get good breaks as well as bad ones, and you just have to learn to deal with them. Golfing success mirrors your life learning experience.

If you can begin another day - not to mention that you can play on the green. Accept the fact that during the day, you may have joys, disappointments, and surprises. Learn to accept what is being offered to you, and embrace the good as well as the bad. This is the way of Zen, and this is how you should play Zen golf, which brings about golfing success.

If you regard playing golf as a life learning experience, then you will learn and improve your sport. Golfing success is within your reach.

In golf as in life, to achieve anything, you need to set goals. For golfing success, set some smart learning goals. In golf, there is the 80/20 rule: 80 percent of your improvement comes from only 20 percent of what you have learned or improved. In other words, you don't need to know everything to attain golfing success. It is like driving a car - you meed to know the basics of driving, but you need not know how a car engine operates.

To improve your game for golfing success, focus on only a few major areas. Like living, if you worry about everything or worry too much, you will end up not enjoying your life at all. Living becomes stressful. Similarly, in golf, if you strive to analyze every situation, or worry too much about how to execute a stroke, analysis will become paralysis.

Get yourself a good address position. You maintain a good stance and proper posture. Then you turn away from the ball on your backswing that stores up energy. Finally, you release your stored-up energy with a good forward swing that propels the ball to the target. To play good golf all you have to do is grip it, turn it, and release it.

But you become your own coach. As you continue to play, if you are mindful of your need to know and to learn the basics, you will improve your game. You will ultimately attain your golfing success.

A good instructor can do only so much: you have to learn on your own, especially how to master golfing techniques for golfing success. Naturally, a good instructor should tell you what to do and why you should do it in that particular manner. Then the instructor should be able to demonstrate to you how to do it properly. Finally, your instructor should allow you to "experience" the feel of that newly acquired technique.

Therefore, playing golf is always a life learning experience if you are made aware of what you need to do. After all, golf is a 80/20 game for golfing success.

Handicapping for Casual Golfers

Handicapping for Casual Golfers

The Golf handicaps are used to make the game of golf more competitive for golfers with different skill levels.

There is a standard system of handicapping that is used for tournament play on all golf courses. This system is quite complicated and takes into account the golfers average score, the course ratings (total par for the course) for the courses played and the slope rating (course difficulty) for each course played. Computer software is used for this calculation and this system is always used to establish your official handicap.

Non-tournament golf play where the players have not established an official handicap,

The unofficial system that quite useful:

1. Keep track of your score and the course rating (total par for the course) every time you play golf.

2. Take the difference between your score and the course rating.

3. Calculate the average of the 10 best of your last 20 differences (or the best half of the differences you have recorded if less than 20) and multiply by 96% (drop everything after the 1st decimal place). The maximum allowable handicap is 36 .4 for men and 40.4 for women

4. Compare the result with the other golfers who are playing.

5. The lowest average receives no handicap. All other golfers have a handicap which is the difference between their average and the lowest average.

6. Each player subtracts their handicap from their total score to determine the winner

7. The group could agree on whether to do the above calculations using the gross score or adjusted gross score

The gross score is the total strokes for 18 holes. The adjusted gross score places a cap on the number of strokes counted on any hole for handicapping purposes to eliminate the effect of a disaster hole when calculating a handicap.