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Posts Tagged ‘Trainer’

A Narrow, three-foot-long tube of rigid foam may be one of golf’s most versatile and unsung training aids. Standing on it improves balance, while lying on it helps your posture and core stability. Plus, it’s like a per­sonal massage therapist, restoring elasticity to inflamed muscles to increase range of motion and power. Here are four golf-specific exercises you can do with the roller :

A) Balance Surfing

GOLF BENEFIT: Improves balance and pro-prioception (an awareness of where your body is in space), helping you swing the club faster and with greater control.

HOW TO DO IT: Stand barefoot on the roller, balancing for up to 30 seconds. When you can do this without falling, try a squat or standing on one leg. (Put both hands on a wall when starting out until balance improves.) Read the rest of this entry »

Most of the short-game shots, including the chip, is to get the club-head to hit the ball first and bottom out on the target side of it. If you do that consis­tently, you’ll have excellent distance control. When playing a normal chip shot (more roll, less carry), make sure your shoulders are level at address.

(Sometimes it helps to feel as if your left shoulder is pointing toward the ground.) Amateurs often tilt their left shoulder upward, as if they were playing a full shot, which causes the club-head to bot­tom out behind the ball and hit it fat or thin. Place the ball slightly back in your stance and shift your weight to your left side. This will promote a steeper, more descending down­swing and the proper ball-turf contact for a solid shot. Read the rest of this entry »

GOLF DREAMS: WRITINGS ON GOLF by John Updike.

No other writer brings the pain and the pleasure of golf to life as intensely and as exquisitely as John Updike. In this compilation of pub­lished essays and excerpts from his works of fiction, Updike portrays himself and his characters as morose, gloomy and immersed in a futile, maddening pastime (a topic addressed in “Is Life Too Short for Golf?”).

While it has an indisputably male perspective, Golf Dreams is worth reading for the beauty and originality of its language—Updike’s description of making a great shot in “Tips on a Trip” should be read aloud. Our favorite chapter is “Women’s Work,” a fascinating glimpse into a man’s thoughts on watching women compete, origi­nally published in the program for the 1984 U.S. Women’s Open. While other great writers of the 20th century didn’t bother to veil their misogyny, Updike writes of his awe of the players, whom he compares to Amazon warriors “doing authen­tic battle.” Read the rest of this entry »

I don’t always hit the fairway with my drives. But rather than muscle a 5- or 6-iron out of the rough, I prefer to use my highest-lofted wood (7-wood) and play a long punch-and-run shot, landing the ball short of the green and letting it run up.

There are several advantages to hitting a wood or hybrid from the rough. A wood is lighter, so you can generate more club- head speed—crucial to getting the ball out of the deep grass; it has a wider sole than an iron, which allows the club-head to glide through the grass more easily; and the shallow clubface and lower, deeper center of gravity make it easier to launch the ball into the air.

Try using a wood the next time you find yourself in moderate rough more than a 9-iron distance from the flag. Make sure the front of the green is open and try to land the ball about 20 yards short of the green, chasing it up toward the hole. Read the rest of this entry »

The kids, being kids, overslept. Last season’s expected teenage tussle between U.S. phenoms Paula Creamer, Morgan Pressel and Michelle Wie never materialized and the threesome combined for a grand total of zero victories.

But Americans got off to a fast start in 2007, winning five of the first nine tour­naments. Creamer, 20, set the tone at the season-opening SBS Open at Turtle Bay when she grabbed her third tour victory, but the first since 2005. Read the rest of this entry »