Golf Fitness Exercises to Prevent Injury

Here are 5 golf fitness exercises I recommend, to help prevent you from getting injured out on the course.

One of the keys to keeping your golf game sharp is maintaining a proper exercise regimen – especially during the off-season. Fitness is one of the most often overlooked aspects of preserving a solid golf game and keeping up with strength exercises and conditioning is one of the most essential aspects of preventing injures, keeping up good flexibility, and maintaining health.

Performing the following 5 essential golf fitness exercises will keep you in shape, reduce the risk of injury, and is one of the key golf swing tips I can offer that will help maintain your flexibility and preserve your swing during the off-season.

Five Essential Golf Fitness Exercises – Video

The instructor demonstrates five excellent golf strength exercises that will keep you in tip-top shape and help improve your golf swing. Each of these exercises focuses on an essential part of the core muscle groups that come into play during the golf swing. Each exercise can be accomplished with little or no extra equipment or even very inexpensive equipment or household items.

Golf Fitness Exercise #1 – Figure 8’s

Using a simple 10 lb dumbbell, the trainer in the video performs a series of simple figure-8 motions with his arms extended. Although the trainer is using a square dumbbell, this is not necessary as the important part is that the weight is providing resistance as he moves his arms. This exercise keys in on the core muscle groups responsible for executing the golf swing. What’s more is that any object with some mass can be used to perform this first exercise. There is no reason to purchases expensive exercise equipment.

Golf Fitness Exercise #2 – Seated Russian Twists

This exercise is similar to a sit-up except that the person executing this golf fitness exercise doesn’t actually perform a sit-up! Instead the person performing this exercise gets into a half-sit-up position on a fold-up exercise mat, takes a dumbbell (I like to use a 10 lb medicine ball), and twists, alternately, right to left and left to right while maintaining the half sit-up position. Check out the video above for an excellent demonstration of this second golf fitness exercise.

Golf Fitness Exercise #3 -Trunk and Torso Stretching

Lying flat on your back on an exercise mat like this one, this exercise requires the person to take each leg (one at a time) and cross it over their other leg and hold it there for a short period of time. For example, the golfer lying flat on his back will take their right leg and cross it over and above their left leg and hold this position for as long as possible. Then perform this same exercise using the alternate leg and continuously switch legs back and forth.

Golf Fitness Exercise #4 – Shoulder Stretch with Core Rotation

As you can see from the golf fitness video above, the instructor uses a large exercise ball to perform this exercise, however it is also possible to achieve a similar result by grabbing your right elbow with your left hand and assisting the stretching of your right arm towards your left shoulder. Essentially, your opposite hand will be performing the same effect as the exercise ball in the video.  Basically, assisting the stretching of your opposite shoulder. Shoulder stretching exercises help golfers with their backswing and follow-through.

Golf Fitness Exercise #5 – Lower Back Extension

This exercise also incorporates the same large exercise ball that was used in Exercise #4 and is an essential exercise for strengthening a golfer’s lower back. This exercise is basically a reverse sit-up. Although the instructor in the video is performing this on his exercise mat, this exercise may also be performed on a flat workout bench as long as your feet are secured.

When performing this exercise, the person doing the lower back extension should try to secure their feet or have a spotter hold their legs in place. Then, extend your torso over the end of the bench and lift yourself at the waist – basically perform a reverse sit-up. In this position your lower back is being worked out as opposed to your abdominal muscles.

Conclusion

As you can see from the video and examples above, the golf fitness exercises that are most appropriate for keeping your game in shape and preventing injuries are those that focus on flexibility and that work out the core muscles, including the lower back and abdominal muscles.

Other key exercises essential for golf fitness are abdominal crunches, hamstring stretches, and other exercises that work the obliques. As with any exercise program, there is a lot more to it than just performing a few simple exercises and then hoping for the best.

A good exercise regimen includes exercising consistently and regularly and incorporating a healthy diet, as well as cardio conditioning – things that can help round-out any complete fitness program. Additionally, you can also perform hip flexor stretches to improve golf swing rotation.

As a guest of BeginnerGolfSwingTips.com, you have access to excellent free golf articles that can help you whether you are interested in starting your own fitness program or you simply want to learn how to swing your golf club better so that you can enjoy golf even more, shoot lower scores, and have more fun out on the course. Keep in shape, stay flexible, and…

Happy Golfing!