Here's Why All Golfers Over 50 Need Yoga
Plus 3 yoga poses to enhance your golf game
Golf, like many rotational sports, is a one-sided sport. If you are right handed, you’ll always swing in the same direction. It’s the same with sports like tennis and softball. With softball you could be a switch hitter, but when fielding, you always throw with the same arm. In tennis, although you will hit backhand, it’s still your dominant arm doing most of the work.
This wouldn’t be a problem if you swung one time. We don’t lead symmetrical lives, so we already don’t have completely symmetrical bodies. On top of that, when you play a one-sided sport a few times per week over the course of your lifetime, this can wreak havoc on how your body feels and functions. You really start to notice these imbalances once you hit 50, or sometimes before, unless you do something to even things out.
Golf requires a strong core and legs, plus good range of motion through the torso and shoulders. I see a lot of golfers with lower back pain, hip pain, and elbow pain (and more) that comes from the asymmetrical nature of the game. If you are not doing something symmetrical to balance your body, those imbalances will eventually turn into pain and dysfunction.
Here’s where Yoga comes in
Yoga is the perfect complement to golf (or any sport, really, in my opinion). Yoga moves the body through a complete range of motion, through all planes of movement and to both sides. The stretching and strengthening poses even out the imbalances that sport and life leave in their wake. When I teach Yoga for Golf, I think about the swing and what a golfer needs to get the most power. Power in any rotational sport comes from the core, and secondly the legs.
Having a strong core is more than having 6-pack abs, which I write about here:
Having 6 Pack Abs Doesn't Mean You Are Strong
When I was a young dancer, I would see other women in my ballet and modern classes with sculpted muscles and a “ballet body.” This was never me. I was (and am) short, and always had a stockier build. I wanted to be sculpted like them, and would spend hours at the gym trying to build my muscles so that I too would look like these ripped women.
A strong core includes all 4 abdominal muscles, the pelvic floor, glutes, inner thighs, hip flexors, and spinal muscles. All of this together creates a strong core from which you can impressively swing your club.
But strength without mobility leaves you more prone to injury. A muscle that contracts but doesn’t elongate very far, when pushed, will tear. Golf requires both strength and mobility, which is why yoga is the perfect companion.
3 yoga poses for Golfers
Bridge pose/Setu Bandhasana
Bridge pose cultivates strength and power in the glutes while creating mobility in the upper back and shoulders. It is the perfect balance of strength and mobility.
Start on your back, with your feet between hip and shoulder distance apart. They should be comfortable, not too wide, not too narrow. Feet and thighs should be parallel to each other. Relax your arms on the floor alongside your body, palms facing the ceiling. Engage your pelvic floor and lower abdominals and press your feet into the floor to lift your hips as high as they will go without struggle or strain.
Stay just as you are, or walk the shoulders closer together underneath your body and interlace the fingers, pressing the palms and wrists together in Yoga Mudra. Imagine the chest rising toward the chin (not chin to chest, but chest to chin), and the tailbone lengthening toward the knees. Stay 5 breaths, then release the arms and roll down one vertebra at a time.
Repeat a second time, interlacing the fingers with the other fingers on top (sliding each finger over by one, so that the other thumb is on top).
Revolved Low Lunge/Parivrtta Anjaneyasana
This pose can be done actively from the core or by pressing the elbow and knee against each other. Each has its benefits, I recommend doing both. This pose strengthens the core, especially the obliques which create rotation, plus stretches the hip flexors and creates mobility in the lower back.
From the core: Start with your right foot forward, left leg backward, knee on the floor. Bring the pelvis and torso as vertical as possible, engaging the left glutes as you melt the hips forward. Bring the hands behind the head as you inhale. Exhale to rotate the ribcage to the right. Don’t let the pelvis move, just the ribs. You’ll feel the obliques kick in to create the movement. Inhale return to facing forward, then exhale to twist. Repeat this 5 times then do on the left.
Elbow to knee: Start again with the right foot forward, left leg backward, knee on the floor. Bring the left elbow to the right knee and press the palms together as you exhale, twisting to the right. Press the elbow against the knee, and resist with the knee so that it stays over the ankle. Feel the work in the outer right hip. Create the twist from the obliques as much as possible so that you are not forcing the twist with your arms. Hold for 5 full breaths, twisting a fraction of an inch more with every exhale to engage your core. Then repeat on the left.
Bound Angle pose/Baddha Konasana
For an in depth look at this pose and all of the ways to modify, see this post:
This is a beautiful stretch for the lower back, inner thighs, and hips, and one of my favorites generally. Of course, after practicing yoga for 30 years, I have a lot of favorites. This is a great go-to, especially if you are short on time, as it covers a lot of ground.
Start seated with your feet together, knees apart. Bring your feet as close to your hips as is comfortable for you. Sit up as tall as you can so that the pelvis is vertical and your spine is straight. You can stay there if you are already feeling a stretch, or, keeping the spine straight, tip the pelvis forward. If your pelvis was a bowl of water, you are trying to pour the water over your feet.
You can stay with the straight spine, most of the stretch is already happening, or from the flat back, you can relax your spine and gently round forward over your legs. Reach your navel toward your feet, not your head. Aim your head toward the floor beyond your feet. It doesn’t matter whether you get there or not.
Stay and breathe 5-10 breaths.
For 6 more poses (plus a bonus pose) check out this free eBook, “Top 6 Yoga Poses to Improve your Golf Game”
I love seeing how practicing yoga can improve my experience in other sports. I noticed a difference with my swimming when I first started practicing, my stroke felt different, more connected and smooth. How has yoga affected your performance in sports or other activities that you do, either physically, mentally, or both? Leave a comment!
If you are local to Massachusetts, I’ll be teaching Yoga for Golf in person at the Marlborough Country Club, starting Sunday, February 23! You don’t need to be a member to join these classes. Click the button below for more information or to sign up for this 4 week series!
Yes, I love the expression a one sided sport. For me, I love swimming.
Sharing this with my husband! Thank you.