Early Extension, Part 2

In yesterday's post, I talked about what Early Extension is and what the physical limitations that can cause an Early Extension are.  They are:

• General lower body stiffness, joint immobility or muscle imbalances
• Poor Lead Hip Internal Rotation
• Poor segmental separation of upper and lower body
• Inability to control pelvis
• Weak glute and abs

I went over Lower Body Stiffness, Joint Immobility and Muscle Imbalances yesterday, so today I will talk about Poor Lead Hip Internal Rotation and Poor Segmental Separation of Upper and Lower Body.

1)  Lead Hip Internal Rotation- good lead hip internal rotation is essential to allow the lower body to rotate without any forward movement.  If your pelvis can’t rotate around the lead hip, then you can end up thrusting forward or sliding laterally towards the target.

Try this "Windshield Wiper" self test to check hip internal rotation. The first time I saw this was at the Titleist World Golf Fitness Summit.  We are using it as a self test here but it can be used as a glute medius exercise (which I did in Do You Sway?).

Lie on your back with your feet in the air and hips and knees at 90 degree angles.  Put your fists together between your knees. 
 

Try to separate your feet as far as possible without letting your knees or hands separate. If you can't get to 45 degrees then you need some work.  (Ryan needs some work!)

Here is a great stretch to work on internal and external rotation of the hips.  Make sure you use the foam roller or stick on your hips before this stretch.

It's called the Hip 90-90 Stretch.  Get in a position so that both knees are at 90 degree angles.  (If this hurts your knees, don't do it).  Keeping the 90-90 position, lean over your left knee.

Come back to starting position and lean straight back so there is pretty much a straight line between your right knee, hip and shoulder.

There are certainly other stretches for the hips, but you can start with these.  I can't stress enough the use of the foam roller and/or Stick before stretching.

2) You need good segmental separation of upper and lower body. The ability to separate the upper body from the lower body and the lower body from the upper body will allow you to maintain spinal stability with an efficient kinematic sequence.

Here are a couple of exercises and stretches you can do to help gain good segmental separation of upper and lower body.

Thoracic Spine Mobilization- (if you have any arthritis of the spine, do not do this). Place the foam roll perpendicular to your spine, just below your shoulder blades.  With your hands behind your neck (not your head, your neck), exhale and drop back over the roller toward the floor.  Go slow (3-5 seconds) and work your way up to just below your neck.

Upper Back Foam Roll
Roll over the mid-back and shoulder blades.  Keep arms up to expose some of the muscle for foam roller to get in there.

Foam Roll- Lats
Lie on side, and roll from arm pit to just over the shoulder blade.  Turning body more towards the ceiling will get more rotator cuff.  This is probably the hardest and most painful area to attack.

Side Lying 90-90 Stretch (Upper body disassociation)
Lie on your side with your bottom leg straight and your top leg bent at a 90 degree angle.  Put a ball under the top knee and press down on it, using the muscles of the inner thigh.  If you feel more comfortable with your bottom arm on top of the bent knee, then use it to help keep the knee pressing against the ball.

Open your shoulders and rotate through your thoracic spine, and try to get your shoulder blade and arm down to the ground.  Make sure you always keep your top knee on the ball.  This will help to keep the rotation in the thoracic spine.

Hip Crossovers (Lower Body disassociation)
(A) Lie face up on the floor, arms out to the side, knees bent and heels on the ground

B- Bring knees to the 10:00 position, keeping the shoulders on the ground

C- Bring the knees to the 2:00 position, keeping shoulders on the ground. Don't go passed the 10:00 and 2:00 positions

Hip Crossover progression
Same as above but with feet in the air

TPI Torso Acceleration Drill
This exercise helps develop a better sequence of motion between your upper and lower body.  Break it down at first, doing one step at a time, until you have a good separation and you feel comfortable with your sequence.

A1 & A2- Start standing in good golf posture, as if you have a five iron in your hand.  Keep your arms crossed over your chest.

A1

A2

B- Rotate your torso as if you are taking a full backswing, keeping the lower body as still as possible, making sure your shoulder plane doesn't flatten out on top.  His shoulders are a little too flat in the picture.

B

C- Return to impact position with no lower body motion.  This is not what will happen in the swing as the hips will initiate the movement but we are working on disassociation here.
C

D- Rotate your whole body towards the target line as if you just finished your swing.

Tomorrow, we will attack the control of the pelvis and weak glutes and/or abs.