There is a trend these days to have compound exercises fix just about everything in one movement.

In most cases, this is just not physiologically possible. Movements are repetitive patterns that take quite a bit of time to change, and even more so with the golf swing. What you can do in the gym does not always equal what you can do on the range of the course. And, there can be more than one cause of a mechanical fault.

Take for example, the exercise featured on the Colorado Avid Golfer web page. It claims this exercise with a weighted stick will increase club head speed and consistency. Unfortunately this is a claim with no research substantiation or even rationale.

From the article: “This training aid has evenly distributed weight, and forces the golfer to adjust their backswing accordingly. Once she has reached the top of the swing, the weight of the training aid then forces Elizabeth to drop the stick along the same path in which she brought it back. The repetition of this simple vertical swing drill with the Siri Stick will help make the swing plane more consistent and increase overall swing speed.”

Golfer beware, if it sounds too good to be true, it is not true! Tour players now hit the gym 5-9 hours per week, so if this one exercise and anything like it was all you needed, the gym would be a bygone training requirement.

The most important factor is you can’t build pure strength from functional movements, period. If that were true then every golfer would look like Popeye in their forearms! Research performed by the American College of Sports Medicine demonstrated the best strength routines are 80% regular exercises and 20% functional exercises. This is especially important for older golfers who should have maintaining muscular mass as their first priority.