Everyone is talking about Rory these days… and with good reason!
The kid is on fire. He’s won three of his last four tournaments.
To be successful on any of the Tours, you’ve got to have three foundational elements in place:
1) Killer Golf Skills – full swing, flat-stick, course management, etc.
2) Solid Mental Game – the ability to deal with adversity, and maintain an optimal mental/emotional state
3) Golf-Specific Fitness – enabling your body to fully actualized your golf skills consistently, and minimize injury
Today I’d like to focus on Rory’s incredible 16 month physical transformation – how and why he did it, the benefits he has experienced with his golf game, and how YOU can follow similar principles and take your game up a notch, or three (even if you’re 40 years older than Rory and have a busy life).
When Rory first came on the professional scene about 5 years ago, he was what I refer to as “skinny-fat”. That is, he was small in his physical stature, but rather soft as well.
Rory went to visit The Titliest Performance Institute in Oceanside, CA to get direction from one of my mentors in golf fitness, Dr. Greg Rose.
He also enlisted the services of a well-known British sports scientist named Steve McGregor. And the results have been dramatic.
Rory talks openly in interviews about his fitness and diet regimen, in direct contrast to Tiger, who would keep such things confidential.
Here are some highlights:
Steve made balancing out Rory’s right and left sides of his body a top priority. This is accomplished by focusing on single arm and single leg exercises. The golf swing will create imbalances in your body, due to the repetitive single-side rotation. As trainers, our job is to keep that imbalance from getting too far out of control. With a better strength ratio between the right and left side of your body, you will create more stability (a prerequisite for power) and reduce your risk of injury.
NOTE: Rory has always appeared to have a great deal of flexibility. My guess is that he does modest work to maintain his range of motion throughout the year. For many of you out there, Flexibility and Mobility will be your first and TOP priority.
After creating balance and stability, Rory was progressed to more strength training, and eventually power training. The important point here is that he was taken through a proper progression – Flexibility/Mobility, Stability, Strength, Power. Top-notch physical trainers like Steve know that even world-class athletes need to respect this protocol, or suffer the consequences – sooner or later.
As for what Rory has to say about how his professionally designed workouts and nutritional plan has changed his game:
“I feel like I can hit it harder without losing balance. I just feel I don’t have to go after it as much to get the length. I didn’t have a strong enough core or lower back and glutes to stabilise my pelvis.”
“I’m the same weight as I was when I started, around 164 lbs, but I’ve gained quite a lot of muscle or lean mass.
“To be a top-class athlete, you have to train hard, you have to eat right, you have to get enough rest.”
“I feel the way golf is going nowadays, you have to treat yourself as an athlete.”
“Maybe golf isn’t one of the more physically demanding sports but you’ve still got to do your bit and train like it is.”
As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, you don’t have to be in your 20s or a PGA Tour player to benefit from these exact same principles. I hate to be the one to tell you this, but going to the gym a few times a week and doing whatever your buddies are doing will be of little benefit to your golf performance. Don’t get me wrong, it can be a great social outlet (which science shows is vital to overall health and happiness), and some kind of exercise is almost always better than being sedentary.
However, the best path to exercise that will actually improve your game would be to locate and work personally with an experienced golf-specific fitness professional. My recommendation would be to start with The Titliest Performance Institute, which has a Golf Fitness Professional Search HERE
Of course, working one-on-one with an advanced trainer can be a large investment of time and finances (if you even have someone in your local area).
As an alternative, I’ve spent the last 8 months developing my pet project:
The Power Golf Fitness System: Drive Crushing Workouts For The Time-Crunched Golfer
This System consists of a Detailed Manual and Videos taking you through all four phases of The Power Golf Fitness System, just like the tour pros (but modified to fit into the schedules of people with “real lives” and commitments). Each workout can be done in about 30 minutes from the convenience of your own home.
If you would like all the details on this system, simply Click Here
