The importance of the spine angle

The Importance of the Spine Angle

A common golf swing fault is a change in the spine angle during the phases of the golf swing. This single movement causes a chain reaction of compensations that alter the mechanics of your golf swing immensely. The result is usually inconsistency and a myriad of poor golf shots. Leading to frustration on the golf course and high scores.

The question that arises in my mind about this swing fault is; how can the amateur golfer improve their spine angle in the golf swing? The result would be an end to changes that oh so often hamper golfers of every level. Speaking with PGA Teaching professional Christopher Smith on this subject allowed me to get to one of the roots of this common swing fault.

According to Christopher Smith the changing of the spine angle is a common fault of the 1000’s of golfers he works with every year. A common spine angle change Christopher indicated to me was immediately at the beginning of the back swing. Often he views golfers who stand up during their back swing. This obviously changes their spine angle and not to mention posture. Resulting in a chain reaction of compensations in the golf swing.

Once Christopher demonstrated this common spine angle changed I immediately knew one of the “fixes” for it. Observation of Christopher performing this specific spine angle change of standing up during the back swing told me one important thing. This so-called swing fault of standing up may be better categorized as a flexibility fault.

Yes, a flexibility fault as I like to call it is when a golfer’s lack of flexibility impedes them from performing the mechanics of the golf swing correctly. Flexibility faults are often misdiagnosed as swing faults. As a result, the golfer dubiously works on fixing their golf swing with no avail. They continue to struggle with standing up during their back swing and never fix it or understand why it is happening. The reason is they are trying “fix” the problem with the incorrect medicine.

The correct medicine would be the implementation of golf flexibility exercises. This type of fix would allow the golfer in such a situation to perform the mechanics of the swing correctly without limitations in their body getting in the way. Sounds pretty simple when you map out in such a way.

Now getting back to the spine angle problem Christopher Smith was discussing. The standing up during the backswing can partly be described as a flexibility fault. In such a situation this is telling me the golfer has some flexibility issues limiting their ability to maintain the correct posture during the back swing. In such a situation (i.e. standing up during the backswing) we can pinpoint the flexibility fault to hip region of the body.

The hips need to be flexible and mobile to allow the golfer to maintain a fixed spine angle and rotate around it during the golf swing. If the hips are tight and inflexible the ability to do this will be compromised as in the example of standing up during the back swing.

Now looking specifically at the spine angle change of standing up we can even pin point to a greater extent the exact muscles in the hips causing this “flexibility fault”. Usually with a golfer that stands up during the backswing I find they have tight hip flexors. Hip flexors are muscles that run across the front part of the hip on both legs. These muscles when tight (i.e. inflexible) “pull” the hips underneath your spine. Making it almost impossible to maintain the spine angle set in the address position. Once you begin the back swing and suffer from “tight” hip flexors. These muscles will “pull your hips” underneath your spine, causing you to stand up. The end result is a change in your spine angle and a series of compensations in the golf swing to follow.

How do we fix this flexibility fault, get those tight hip flexors mobile, and improve your golf swing? Simply by adding a series of golf fitness flexibility exercises to your golf swing improvement program. These types of exercises take just a few minutes a day to perform. They will alleviate the tightness in your hips and in the long run improve your golf swing.

Simple yet very effective golf fitness flexibility exercises I like to use for tight hip flexors are the kneeling hip flexor stretch, standing quadriceps, and spider. All three of these golf fitness flexibility exercise focus on the hip flexors. Over time these flexibility exercises will lengthen (i.e. stretch) those tight hip flexors. Allowing you greater mobility in the hips and eliminate one of the reasons for standing up in the back swing.

So remember, it is necessary to maintain a fixed spine angle during the golf swing. If you do not a whole series of compensations will occur. The end result will be an inconsistent golf swing. One such reason for a change in your spine angle may be standing up during the back swing. This swing fault is often a flexibility fault resulting from tight hips. The implementation of golf fitness flexibility exercises in a short amount of time can fix this flexibility fault and stop you from standing up during the back swing. Resulting in a more consistent golf swing. Keep in mind the connection between your body and the golf swing, and realize it is the body swinging the golf club.

Sean Cochran

How to pick the best yoga poses for your child

How To Pick The Best Yoga Poses For Your Child

Yoga indeed has become a popular, mainstream alternative for exercise and fitness. Here in Los Angeles, hardly a day goes by that I don’t see people walking by with their Yoga Mats rolled up underneath their arms coming from or going to their Yoga class.

Most stay-home moms have picked Yoga up as well as their method of keeping fit and maintaining physical, mental and emotional balance. Upon seeing the apparent results most naturally wonder how their children might be able to benefit form using Yoga for kids. Well, it is my hope that as a Yoga enthusiast myself, you will find this article much helpful in choosing the yoga poses that could be incorporated into your child’s recreational endeavors.

1. Sun Salutations: These are a group of poses that serve as a warm up to a yoga session or class. For staying fit, keeping obesity at bay and fun (especially when performed at a high speed), the Sun Salutations will be an immense source of enjoyment for kids getting introduced to Yoga. Do you know in India, they actually hold contests of how many rounds of Sun Salutations kids can do in one go? Yeah, they are that much fun.

2. The Shoulder Stand: Trust me, behind your back, kids already try this pose. You probably did as a kid without knowing you were actually doing Yoga. So in your use of yoga for kids, make sure the inclusion of this pose is of priority. Executed with the bridge pose and fish-poses as counter poses, for kids doing yoga, the shoulder-stand will reap many benefits.

3. The Forward Bend Pose: This teaches your kids self-dependence and aids immensely at curbing digestive disturbances as an added bonus. I’ll have you know, some authorities of Yoga have said that these three poses mentioned thus far are enough for humans-although this may be slightly erroneous or incomplete as the execution of their counter-poses for a specified amount of time is also of great importance as well.

4. The Wheel Pose: Okay, I was walking through the park the other day and saw a kid who couldn’t have been more than 8 years of age executing this pose for literally 90 seconds. Yes, I counted this out of amazement and intrigue. It’s been hailed as the “forever young pose”, consequently when using yoga for kids; this has got to be included. Co-incidentally it is the counter-pose to the third pose above.

5. The Relaxation Pose: Of course this is a must-do for everyone. When introducing your kids to yoga, this will be a good time to show them how to relax with its use as a secret for relief from school stress and the little challenges they may face in their young lives. Yes, they do have some demands placed on them parents. Moreover showing this to them now will go a long way with laying the foundation on how to deal with the daily demands of life.

Other great poses to consider are the Bow, Triangle, Spinal-Twist, Inclined and Diamond Poses. Kids should also be shown proper breathing exercises with emphasis on Abdominal Breathing.

Other factors to be included when using yoga for kids are the use of a proper, nourishing diet of Fresh Fruits and vegetables-(emphasis on leafy ones) and positive thinking techniques. On the subject of diets, you can add some celery juice to their fresh fruit juices if you have one of those popular juicers such as the juiceman. This is one way of sneaking in a good source of powerful minerals into their bodies, tastefully. Oh, before I forget, they love BARHI dates! Moms, these are just like their rather harmful counterfeits (candies at the store) but of course are sources of great nutrients.

Yoga for kids is best begun around the age of seven, however, kids-being-kids, they of course will emulate what they see you doing, so as long as you know they are not in harm’s way, it’s okay to let them dabble a bit into Yoga.

Indeed using Yoga is both fun for kids and beneficial for as the book of Prov. 22. 6 states, it is one effective method of “Training your child in the way he should go…” as the discipline and confidence that comes from Yoga (and Martial Arts too-just a hint)

may only be attainable from this ancient form of physical culture.

So Moms and Dads, go on and get your kids started on yoga. You’ll be glad you did.

Burn the fat feed the muscle – a closer look at the new ebook diet craze burn the fat feed the muscl

Burn the Fat Feed the Muscle – A Closer Look at the New Ebook Diet Craze Burn the Fat Feed the Muscl

We’re all familiar with the hyped up new books and diet systems that come out regularly, claiming they can show you a better way to achieve bodybuilding goals, weight loss, or just good overall physical fitness. Most of these are full of rehashed information that doesn’t really show us anything original that we haven’t seen or read about somewhere else before. But one book has stood out from the rest for a while now, Tom Venuto’s Burn the Fat Feed the Muscle.

Venuto is a bodybuilding and nutrition authority, who has studied this subject for over 20 years. His long list of certifications was really the only reason I gave his ebook a second look, and I think it lends some credibility to the methods he recommends in Burn the Fat Feed the Muscle.

This is a 340 page ebook, and these are the major areas that it covers about drastically reducing your own body fat percentage.

1. Permanent weight/fat loss. Yo-yo dieting is commonplace with almost all nontraditional diet and weight loss programs. People can have some sort of success with a program, then gain the weight all back within the next few weeks. Burn the Fat Feed the Muscle talks about some of his carefully studied methods to join that 5% that keeps the weight off permanently.

2. Drugs and supplements: My real disgust with this whole industry really started when I began to come across a lot of mainstream diet books in bookstores, and on bestseller lists, etc. that actually “recommended” their own brand of supplements. Some went so far as to print the website address where you could buy them on every page of the book! Burn the Fat Feed the Muscle is an all natural system, and the author explains why you’re most likely wasting your money on 97% of the supplements out there. There were supplements that I swore by before, but in reading Burn the Fat Feed the Muscle, I’ve been able to continue to get the results I want without them. This approach can potentially save you hundreds of dollars a month.

3. Metabolism. There’s a natural barrier to dieting and fat loss, where you can have some success and lose weight for a while, then it gets substantially more difficult to lose any more. They call this the “plateau.” A lot of diets that consist of really minimal meals get you to the plateau quickly, and they slow down your metabolism to the point where it can be very difficult to continue losing weight or lose it again once you gain it back. Burn the Fat Feed the Muscle explains Tom’s system for speeding up your metabolism to where fat no longer just sits still. Your body continuously expends the fat as energy. This part I have honestly not seen anywhere else. And there’s a lot more to it than smaller meals, more often.

4. The right foods. There are good fats that are more or less essential to losing weight and burning excess fat. A lot of people take this the wrong way and see it as permission to eat a bunch of junk mixed in with their diet. There are very specific foods that this refers to, and Tom tells you exactly which ones. There are also lesser known methods for combining different types of foods to get the best results.

How personal trainers can retire early

How personal trainers can retire early?

As a certified personal trainer through National Academy of Sports Medicine, I have studied Team Beachbody extensively. With over 15 years of experience in the health and fitness field, I was looking for a way to increase my income potential as a personal trainer without working longer hours. I wanted a system that would run in conjunction with my current personal trainer business and work for me 24/7. As a personal trainer, I have as ways believed in the “Work Smarter not Harder” approach.

How many people can, you, as personal trainer conducting one-hour sessions, train in one day? Let’s just say you can effectively train eight to twelve clients a day, 6 days a week. However, how many hours do you really want to work? What happens if your get sick or injured for any length of time? What about a retirement plan? What happens if you take a vacation? You pay both the cost of the vacation plus the cost of lost income from not being able to work your business. What if you could plug-in a proven opportunity that could uniquely help you solves any or all of these problems? Furthermore, what if at the same time, this opportunity provided you with an additional income stream? “Sounds pretty good,” You say, “but how?”

The solution to all of these problems and more is Team Beachbody; become a Team Beachbody coach today! Team Beachbody is a proven system that provides you with the opportunity to generate a second income stream and takes your personal training knowledge nationwide. Team Beachbody products have been around for over 11 years. It began as a nationally televised infomercial company. Team Beachbody spends over 90 million dollars a year producing top selling fitness videos such as P90X, Hip Hop Abs, Slim in 6, The Ten Minute Trainer, Revabs, Insanity and Chalean Extreme just to name a few. As a Team Beachbody coach, you are afforded the opportunity to do something that you are passionate about while inspiring others to achieve their fitness goals and enjoy a healthy, fulfilling life.

Much like you, I went into the personal training business because I loved the subject matter and wanted to learn as much as I could. Additionally, I was thrilled about utilizing my passion to help others improve the way they looked and felt about themselves. As a Team Beachbody coach and a personal trainer, I have a wide variety of health and fitness solutions that are both efficient and effective in helping my clients achieve their goals.

As a personal trainer, you help your clients take control of their health and fitness, as well as achieve amazing body transformations, by providing direction, support and accountability. The same can be said about Team Beachbody coaches. Team beachbody coaches, like a personal trainer, provide motivation, peer support, advice and tools to help members reach their goals faster. As a personal trainer you have a big advantage over other Team Beachbody coaches who are not certified trainers. As a personal trainer you are more knowledgeable about the health and fitness field and have years of experience answering your clients concerns. This is what will set you above the rest, and will translate into your Beachbody clientele.

In brief, Team Beachbody is a great way for a personal trainer to increase work productivity (fewer hours and less clients), accumulate a nest egg, plan for retirement, generate a second income, and much, much more. Join Team Beachbody and stop forgoing your vacation plans, worrying about canceled appointments, and the downward economy.

Burn the fat feed the muscle – an honest review

Burn the Fat Feed the Muscle – An Honest Review

Burn the Fat Feed the Muscle by Tom Venuto is one of the best selling ebooks on the topic of weight loss and fitness. Tom is well recognized in the fitness world and is a personal trainer, nutritionist, success coach, freelance and natural bodybuilder. He has also been featured in Muscular Development, Ironman Magazine, Men’s Exercise, Muscle-Zine, Natural Bodybuilding, Olympian’s News and Exercise for Men.

If you have read this book, you must have felt Tom’s passion to motivate you to reach your fitness goals. What makes it different

from other programs is that it advocates continuous body improvement, such that your overall health and fitness levels are in top range all the time. This program is definitely not a short-term solution.

Now, let us take a look at what exactly you will get if you purchase Burn The Fat Feed The Muscle. First, as said, this book contains only the realistic information about fitness and weight loss. Everything in the book is straight to the point and is written in a style that can be easily understood and followed.

In the first parts of the book you will learn how to prepare yourself: how to set goals, plan a strategy and find motivation to actually get started. As said, this is what Tom’s book is all about – long term health maintenance. By mastering the art of setting goals, almost anyone can stick to the program.

Second, you will learn to classify your body type and identify the key things you need to do to acquire the type of body you desire. Tom goes into details of the different types of food and how they can compliment your effort in weight loss. His technique is centered around boosting metabolism so that you can loss fat and build muscle at the quickest pace possible.

One of the many positive aspects of Burn the Fat Feed the Muscle is that there is no emphasis on “dieting.” This is not another book that lays harsh restrictions on eating that are unnatural for the human body to stick to. Instead, this book arms you with the ability and knowledge to easily determine your own ideal intake of protein, carbohydrate and fats so that you can lose excessive weight and maintain good muscle level the same time.

To end this review of Tom Venuto’s Burn the Fat Feed the Muscle, I have to mention that it is a lengthy book of over 300 pages. Having said that, it is easy to skim reading if you only want the “meat”. But, in case you are looking for a very thorough discussion and education on the subject of getting fit and losing fat, this may be just the book for you.