If you’ve been following this blog for a while you know that I am quite passionate about strength training and its benefits.
I truly believe that anyone over 40 should incorporate strength training into their overall fitness plan.
However, there is often a lot of pushback from golfers regarding the merits of strength training.
A few of the concerns and comments I’ve seen just in the past week on social media:
- I don’t want to get bulked up as it may affect my swing
- Squats are terrible for the knees
- Deadlifts are bad for the back
- Lifting heavy weights is bad for your joints
So let me address these issues.
I don’t want to get bulked up
Ryan Steenberg – Long Drive Competitor
The concern about getting bulked up is that too much muscle will interfere with your swing.
I’ve held that concern myself, and even as recently as a few weeks ago when Tiger appeared for his Hero World Challenge.
My bias was based upon my experience playing golf with a few former football players. They were a bit tight and unable to produce a long swing.
I thought after seeing some video of Tiger that his swing seemed a little short, but that was just one swing. And, he is unable to turn as much into the right foot since the car accident.
Well, the fact is, a lot of muscle will not get in the way of a good, powerful swing if you also work on flexibility and mobility.
See that fella to the right? That is Ryan Steenberg, a top ranked long drive competitor.
The reality is, however, if you are over 40 and training for strength, you won’t build a tremendous amount of muscle unless you eat a lot of food.
The older you get, the more this becomes a reality.
It becomes more difficult to eat enough to put on 20 pounds of muscle mass as you head past 50.
While you’ll definitely put on some muscle, if just eat normally, you won’t be looking like Ryan Steenberg.
Squats are terrible for the knees
Low bar squat
Actually, they aren’t.
However, squats done wrong can surely hurt your knees.
The squat variation I recommend for any golfer is the low bar squat.
This squat requires a more horizontal back angle as you squat, and engages the hips and lower back more as you drive the weight back up.
A high bar squat, which has the bar resting on top of your traps or shoulders has you squat with a more vertical back angle, which requires more force produced from the quads, and thus more pressure on the knees.
Therefore, you have to be sure you squat with good mechanics to be sure you don’t hurt your knees.
With any lifts where you have the potential to lift heavy weight, proper form is critical.
Deadlifts are bad for your back
Jon Rahm sumo deadlift
The reality is that deadlifts are the absolute best exercise for STRENGTHENING your back.
I’ve had a bad back for years, starting with a herniated disc nearly 20 years ago.
I deadlift to strengthen my back, hamstrings, glutes, etc.
In my view, the deadlift is THE best exercise for golfers given the muscles it trains, and the muscles used in the golf swing.
Again, however, if you exercise with bad form, you stand the risk of injury.
Lifting heavy weights is bad for your joints
This is the general advice provided by the medical community, most of which does little strength training.
Unfortunately, many people who trained heavy at a younger age also feel like they should only train with lighter weight.
I believe this is more a function of them knowing how hard it is to train with heavier weight compared to light weight. They just don’t want to train that hard anymore.
The fact is, one of the adaptations the body makes when you start lifting heavy weight is that it strengthens the tendons, and the muscles around the joints.
This is particularly the case if you train with movements that are similar to what the joints and tendons are supposed to do naturally.
These adaptations provide MORE STABILITY to the joints, rather than weaken them.
The best exercises for building strength fast
The four best exercises for building strength fast are the squat, deadlift, bench press and overhead press.
These are the best exercises because they are compound movements that train the entire body, and they are based on natural human movement patterns.
These four exercises work in tandem to systematically build strength by sending signals to the central nervous system to cause the body to adapt.
With proper programming, there is no better way to get stronger quickly.
Unfortunately, most people avoid them because, once you’ve added significant weight to the bar, training these exercises becomes HARD.
However, you’ll get your biggest bang for your buck by training these four exercises.
