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The key to strength and fitness in golf starts at the bottom

For Dee Tidwell, the owner of coloradogolffitness.com and trainer to PGA Tour’s Wyndham Clark, the ideal fitness regimen looks like a pyramid.

There’s a big, wide base — flexibility, balance, and core strength — upon which the rest of a good fitness regimen rests. A big mistake that golfers can make when they start a fitness regimen is to try to head straight to the top of the pyramid: going to the weight rack for some heavy lifting.

That is how injuries happen during training. And with the current fascination —  especially among young golfers — with driving the ball off the tee 300 yards and more, Tidwell is urging players to remember the pyramid as they work toward their golf-fitness goals. Strength is fine, but without flexibility and stability, it can even do more harm than good. “The longest drive doesn’t equate to the best scoring,” he said recently from his facility in Denver Technology Center. “I think it’s a problem in that it doesn’t help people play better golf. It’s not really golfing; it’s long-driving on a golf course.”

Tidwell teaches fitness programs under the auspices of the Titleist Performance Institute. “This isn’t about golf fitness; this is about increasing your ability to move well or better,” he said.

Phase 1: Work on your posture, stability, flexibility, and core strength. This is the foundation of the pyramid and makes everything possible that comes.

Phase 2: Next, add drills that can help prepare ligaments and tendons to bear more weight. Those drills often look a lot like lunges, squats, and wall holds.

Phase 3: With the base set up properly, now is the opportunity to add weight training. “Injuries come from over-use when they haven’t prepared the body from the ground up,” Tidwell said.

This especially is true when it is ultimately time to work on woods or drivers. (Come onl this isn’t knitting. Of course the goal will include the strongest tee shots possible.) Those long-club swings can put as much strain on a person’s nervous system as advanced squats.

“Now your body is prepared to endure more external weight,” Tidwell notes. “So many guys who are gym training… they invert the pyramid; when you invert the pyramid that’s when you get hurt.” Every player is different but Tidwell said over his 30 year career he has seen several general traits for golfers.