A Yogi's Guide to Golf

I had my swing analysis the day before I played 18.  You may be thinking... bad idea.  It was probably a bad idea but in the end it really wasn't.  I scored a 48 on the back 9 which is more in line with how I golfed in about August.  Well before anyone had the chance to put a lot of bad ideas in my head about my swing I was doing pretty well.  Okay okay okay...  so I wasn't doing very well and 48 it's that great...  In fact, even this summer I was sucking but not too bad.  Even blind squirrels find nuts... am I right?

Look how cheeky I am here!  I won closest to the pin on hole 2 at Bixby the first time I played Comedy Golf.  Used my 8 iron over the lake.  Boom.  

I think actually blind squirrels don't last long in the wild and they forget where their nuts are.  Not wanting to be that squirrel or... ahem.... guy at the driving range hacking away thinking he's hot shit I did what I should have done months ago and got my swing looked at.  It is shocking.  It's actually horrifying.  It's shock therapy.  Oh you think your swing is good!?!?!  ZAP!  Hit her with the video!  The good news is John puts up with my slow learning abilities and I do make progress.  And seeing yourself do it wrong on video after he tells you it's wrong and then you do it again anyhow?  Yeah, that shit works.  My address is a million times better.  The funny thing is all the things I've learned from my other sports sort of apply here.  The only thing now is I wish I had played something that involved a stick an a ball....  Here is my Yogi's Guide to the Address.  Lord knows maybe some day I'll write the Yogi's Guide to Golf.  Hot sales in SoCal.  Just sayin. 

Flat Back

No more hunch back like an old man.  The key here is plugging the shoulders as in the set up for full wheel (Urdhva Dhanurasana).  You will also then want to draw the shoulder blades down the back.  This brings the shoulders away from the ears and allows (girls tip) your left arm to rest to the left of your left breast.  The right arm is slightly bent and has more room because of the slight spinal tilt to the right.   This simple move of drawing the shoulders down the back and plugging the shoulders in also gives stability to your core and stops the club from being disconnected.  The added bonus is suddenly our arms are not glued together like the LAPD has us.  Extra bonus if you ditch the death grip on the club.  Look how much progress we've made so far!

Arms

No more reaching for the golf ball - arms hang over the toes now.  With feet shoulder width apart - seriously double check this.  Are they really shoulder width apart?  You should feel the weight come into the center of your feet and they should feel grounded.  As with any standing pose.. let's take Uttanasana or standing forward fold into consideration for a moment, all four corners of the feet are grounded and it's necessary to stay balanced as you fold down or come back up into Mountain Pose or you would tip over.  The same holds true here. The core engages and it feels as though you are just looking over the edge of a building.  When the club is held the butt of the club should point towards your left hip.  

Legs and Low Back

Although to this point it's all coming together and feels right I find myself having to still check two items.  One is I feel I really need to get into a squat.  Wrong!  Maybe it's just too many years of squats and Chair Pose (Ukatasana) but I feel like a really athletic address somehow includes getting my hips down too low.  This takes away our good balance - the knees bend just until the quads start to engage - not very much!  The hinge we are looking for is at the hips.  The low back also needs to be flat.  This comes with core engagement as well.  As in Chair Pose it's natural to want to dump the in the low spine and the "guts hang" as my Thursday lunch instructor says.  It does you no good to dump in the lower back.  You want it to be strong and supportive in your swing so remember, "Guts in! Guts in!"  Engage your lower back and transverse abdominals.  Tuck your pelvis floor in and you're good to go.   

Speaking of yoga - here is a fun new pose I learned today!  Demonstrated by the beautiful Sunina.  I can bet mine was not as lovely.  Check her out here - she has a really nice yoga blog.

So much was wrong now so much is right and that's not even the whole of it.  We're getting there friends.  Just these small changes while thinking about finishing and sweeping the club away made all but one of my drives on the back nine smoking fairway hitting beauties on Saturday.