Rory performing a trap bar deadlift
As professional golfers have been ramping up their swing speeds in recent years, more attention is being paid to fitness.
At present, Rory McIlroy is probably at the forefront of the current movement as he has added significant muscle over the last ten years and is generating more ball speed than ever in his career.
Even older tour players such as Padraig Harrington (54 years old), Justin Rose and Adam Scott (both 45 years old) are generating ball speeds over 180 mph.
This was unheard of for players over 40 years old just five years ago.
So, how are they doing this?
What we are seeing is a mix of approaches, and to most untrained golfers, this can be quite confusing.
The golf fitness world tends to focus on “functional” strength training and mobility work.
In the sports world, functional training attempts to mimic the movements that are common to each sport.
In golf, you will see many exercises that mimic the golf swing, and you will see many tour players performing these exercises.
Padraig Harrington is a little bit different because he is 54 years old and understands that at his age, if you don’t train to build muscle, you will lose muscle.
This is due to the process known as sarcopenia (age related loss of muscle mass), which for most people begins around the age of 40.
If you do no strength training whatsoever, you will lose muscle mass, and this process will accelerate over time.
As a result, I’ve watched video where Harrington indicates he lifts heavy weight to build strength and muscle.
Justin Rose and Adam Scott can get away with focusing more on functional strength training, because they are younger, and this type of training will help them maintain their muscle.
At some point, however, they will need to include legitimate strength training into their routine, and I’ll get back to that idea later.
On top of their strength training routines, all of these golfers then add in some overspeed training where they perform repetitions where they swing as hard as possible.
This can be done with a variety of tools, or with a golf club.
I’ve also seen video of Bryson DeChambeau doing this with an 8 or 9-iron.
The issue with that type of training, and why it should be the lowest priority in a golf fitness program, is that it can produce more wear and tear on the body.
Strength Training For Golfers
Low bar squat
Any golfer who has never lifted weights should consider a legitimate strength training program to help them get stronger and to have the potential to generate more power with their golf swing.
This is especially true of golfers who are fifty years old and over.
Legitimate strength training involves basic compound movements that mimic natural human movement patterns.
These compound movements are best performed with barbells.
Training these exercises with barbells will allow you to improve your strength faster than with any other exercises because they can be loaded with more weight.
For instance, you will improve your leg strength much faster by training the barbell squat than with leg extensions.
The squat incorporates far more muscle mass and can ultimately be loaded with far more weight.
The four main compound exercises include:
- Barbell Squat
- Deadlift
- Bench Press
- Overhead Barbell Press
All these movements involve multiple muscle groups and joints, and therefore, involve far more muscle tissue compared to such exercises as dumbbell curls.
That is why performing these exercises with proper programming will allow you to build the most amount of strength over the shortest amount of time.
The principle behind this is the Stress-Recovery-Adaptation cycle.
Lifting heavy weight with compound movements puts stress on the body.
If you recover adequately with proper nutrition and rest, your body adapts through a combination of increased muscle mass, increased bone density, and stronger connective tissues.
A proper weight lifting program for golfers will include these four exercises, and it will start with conservative amounts of weight on the bar.
Then, for a period of time, the trainee will add weight to the bar each workout, and they will get stronger.
How many sets and reps in a weight training program for golfers?
To build strength, we need to expose our body to intensity, or heavy weight. As a result, we tend to train with fewer reps.
Starting out, our focus is on five reps.
Here’s why…
Consider the two ends of the spectrum when it comes to training.
At the low end is 1 rep, and at the high end, we’ll use 20 reps. 20 reps is often employed by the bodybuilding community, which is focused on muscle hypertrophy.
Powerlifters train to have the ability to lift a maximum weight for a single rep. This is effectively just a performance.
A true one rep maximum weight will likely require so much effort, that the rep may take 5 to 7 seconds to complete.
After completing that rep, it will be impossible to immediately complete a second rep at that weight.
At the other end of the spectrum is the 20 reps.
Now, after you’ve completed 20 reps, chances are, if you take a couple deep breaths, you can squeeze out another rep or two.
At this point, it is no longer maximum force production at work, but muscle endurance.
In between this rep range is a number that will result in the following training adaptations:
- Increased strength
- Increased muscle mass
- Improved conditioning
That rep range is right around five reps.
After you’ve been training for a couple months and the weight on the bar has increased quite a bit, you will find that pushing out the fifth rep will be quite difficult.
That typically starts with the overhead press because it is the exercise with which we will ultimately lift the least amount of weight.
Once you find it difficult to complete three sets of five reps, you will need to start making adjustments to your programming.
And guess what?
That means you are much stronger than when you started!
In general, a strength training program like this has you train three days per week.
The need for legitimate strength training for golfers over 50
As mentioned, at some point, golfers such as Adam Scott and Justin Rose will need to train these compound movements for increased strength.
Even if they are exercising regularly, at some point, they will start losing strength due to loss of muscle mass because they have not trained for basic strength.
This in turn will result in loss of swing speed.
I recently did a bit of a deep dive into the swing speed of Bernhard Langer, the greatest Champions Tour player ever.
Langer is well known for staying very fit, and this has allowed him to maintain most of the range of motion with his swing after age 60.
Bernhard Langer
However, from what I have seen, he does not do any legitimate strength training as I’ve laid out here.
His focus is mainly on mobility and core work.
What I noticed when researching his career stats is that after the age of 60 his average driving distance declined quite noticeably, and this was well before his Achilles tendon injury.
Langer’s first season on the Champions Tour was in 2008 and he was 10th in driving distance, even though he was never a particularly long hitter.
That year he averaged about 282 yards off the tee.
He maintained that average until he was 60 years old as he averaged exactly 282.0 yards for the 2017-2018 season and he ranked 23rd.
Fast forward just five years to the 2022-2023 season and his average drive dropped to 269.4 yards and he ranked 62nd.
That is not just a small drop and it wasn’t until 2024 that he injured his Achilles tendon.
While he maintained much of his mobility, is power dropped because he became weaker. He became weaker because he did not engage in legitimate strength training.
As we age, we actually must continue to expose ourselves to high intensity training, or we will lose strength.
Final thoughts on weight training for golfers
Most golfers steer clear of this type of training for fear of bulking up.
The old thinking was that it was a mistake to add too much muscle because it would inhibit range of motion.
Well, that thinking has been turned on its head in recent years by World Long Drive participants.
Most of these competitors incorporate strength training into their fitness programs, they lift heavy weight, and they are quite muscular.
Just have a look at the photo of Martin Borgmeier, a former champion.
At the same time, most have very long back swings that the average golfer can only dream of.
This is why legitimate strength training plays a significant role in the Samurai Golfer Training Program.
Tiger Woods was the first truly great golfer to include it in his own fitness program.
And now you have players such as Rory McIlroy getting stronger and more muscular in order to remain competitive.
For many golfers, it can be a true game changer.
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