Well, it’s that time of year again. No, I don’t mean summer. No, I don’t mean tournament season. I mean it’s time for me to be sidelined with an injury. Just call me the Derek Rose of disc golf. I seem to get injured to the point of not being able to play at least once a year. A lot of other people do too, it seems. So this week instead of a playing tip, I thought I’d share a tip that could keep you playing longer instead.

When I get injured, it’s almost always my lower back. The sad thing is that I know it’s coming and what causes it, but I play anyway when I know I shouldn’t.  It took two solid years to rehab from 4 bulged discs in my back. That was two years of intense pain and no disc golf. I’m intimately familiar with my back, how it works, how it breaks, and how to fix it. The problem is that I’m stubborn. I really need to fix that problem right along with my back.

As I talk to other people I play with, it seems like I’m not alone. This is about the time of year when folks have been playing so much that over use injuries start to crop up. Injuries due to poor form rear their ugly heads. The sale of knee and elbow braces to disc golfers skyrockets. Shoulders pop. Ankles creak. It’s time for those dreaded mid season injuries.

What is a disc golfer to do? It’s 75 degrees and perfect outside. All your friends are headed to the course to play. You think that you could probably gimp your way through a round, so a hand full of Aleve or Advil later and you are out there hucking plastic. That can get you through a few rounds. It works great until it doesn’t. That’s when the real injury happens.

There’s two types of injuries. The ones where we can tough it out and play through them are the first. The second are the serious ones we can’t play through and require medical attention. The problem lies in the fact that number one becomes number two more often than not. We insist on playing when our bodies are giving us every sign not to.

This is why I haven’t played much disc golf lately. When my back starts hurting, that’s my body telling me to take it easy for a bit. That’s my back’s way of saying to do extra yoga, twice a day, and to make sure I use my standing desk at work. If I do those things for a couple of weeks, I’m usually good to go. If I don’t, and I decide to go play instead, I’m asking to be out for much more than a couple of weeks.

We have three choices when aches and pains show up. What we choose determines how much playing time and enjoyment we actually miss.

1.  We can see a doctor and then rest and rehab for a week or two until the injury is healed or the pain subsides.

2.  We can take extra pain meds and play anyway until the injury is so bad that we have to stop playing for several weeks or even months.

3.  We can ride the thin line between not quite healed but still playing occasionally. This typically results in ongoing pain that just never goes away. The serious injury may take longer to come, but it eventually does. Then we are out for an indefinite amount of time as our bodies try to heal from the damage we have inflicted.

By far, choice number one is the smartest. Choice number one, in the long run, has the least down time from playing. Choice number one is also the hardest. It requires that we give up something now to gain something later. It requires that we delay the gratification of a round today in exchange for the gratification of many rounds down the road.

For those of you that have been injured or are injury prone like me, you are familiar with these choices. If you haven’t been injured before, or are suffering from your first real injury now, take heed. The choice never gets easier, but it’s always clear.

For the sake of your health and for the sake of being able to play as much as possible this summer, take a week or two off if you are hurt. See your doctor. Don’t try to play through it. Don’t mask the problem with medications of any kind. Your body hurts because it’s asking you nicely not to over do it. If you ignore it, it won’t be so nice. Trust me when I tell you you don’t want to feel what it’s like to have your body opt for the not so nice reminder.

Here’s something you can do even if you are injured… Subscribe to this blog by entering your email below. You’ll get a weekly newsletter sent directly to you along with links to all of the new posts from that week!

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The post Just the Tip – Injuries appeared first on Mind Body Disc - Disc Golf Blog.

It’s here, it’s here, it’s here, it’s here!!!!  It’s finally here!  Happy spring everyone!!!

OK, so we still have some cold and crappy days to deal with (a couple came this week), but we are finally putting winter in our rear view mirrors.  One week ago today was the official first day of spring.  I can’t wait for indoor putting practice to become a fall back for rainy days only.  I sorely miss getting up every morning and heading to the course for my daily practice sessions.

For the folks in warmer climates, spring doesn’t hold near the significance for you that it does for my cold weather brethren out there.  And it means even more for some of our European disc golf brothers and sisters.  The sun is finally coming back out and actually staying out long enough to go play.

In addition to the meteorological signs that it’s spring, there are lots of other signs too.  If you like college basketball, March madness is here and bracketology is in full effect.  The clocks have been changed and the Sun isn’t going down until after 7pm!  For me, one of my favorite markers of spring is the soreness I get the day after my first good, solid day of playing disc golf at my home course for the year.

We’ve all been there.  We have the day off of work or school.  The weather is nice.  The ground has dried out.  It’s that perfect first real day of spring goodness outside.  We grab our bag of discs, dust them off, and head out to the local course with our buddies intent on playing until our arms fall off.  Oh what a glorious and wonderful day that is!

The next day, though.  Oh that next day.  For the disc golfer who hibernated for the winter, it’s a painful day.  Muscles ache.  It’s hard to walk.  It’s tough getting out of bed.  It’s on this day that we pay the price for being sedentary and not throwing a disc all winter.  If you’re really unlucky, you are now starting off your season injured.

I have to admit, I know this pain from experience.  More than once I’ve come back from a disc golf hiatus of some type and just plain done too much the first day back.  I’ve pulled my lat, strained my shoulder, blistered my hand, and strained a ligament in my elbow.  Not all at the same time, of course, but each of those things has happened because I over did it on that first day back on the course after a break.

It’s because of these injuries that many years ago I started using a gradual process of easing back into things.  A sort of spring training for disc golf if you will.  Even if you’ve been playing during the winter (I usually do and this year was no different), this is still a good idea.  Fair weather golf is just a different animal than snow golf.

Even with my continuing preparation for the the GBO, I started this spring ritual 2 weeks ago and it ends today.  Tomorrow I have my first tournament of the year.  I’ve found that starting 2 weeks prior to really playing seriously is enough time to safely get back into the swing of things in a healthy and injury free manner.

First, before we address the daily plan I follow, I want to stress the importance of staying limber and stretched out.  A while back, I wrote a post about the stretching routine I follow daily.  Whether you use that one or another, daily stretching should be a big part of a disc golfer’s life.  As I learned the hard way, jumping out of the car and heading straight to the first tee is not the best idea.

Once you have that general baseline nailed down, it’s best to ease back into things.  The following is what I do every year.  It’s not the only way to approach this, but it’s worked for me for quite a few years and it might work for you too!

Days 1-3:
I take my practice basket to an open field.  The goal is to just get into the swing of throwing again.  I’ll start with 20-30 practice putts.  Then I’ll start throwing approaches.  I start close (50-100 feet).  On these days, I’m not looking to throw very hard at all, just knock the rust off.  Each day I move progressively further back until I’m about 200 feet out.  I’ll never throw more than 60%-70% power during these first 3 days.  I putt out every approach.  The goal is right around 100 approaches thrown each day.

Day 4:
Rest.  Yep, rest.  I’ll typically do a bunch of mobility work this day.  I might practice putting, I might not.  This is strictly a forced “ease back into it” type day.  This is the first of a few days I give my body to recover and build strength.  This is probably the hardest of all the days.  I stay in a field the first three days so I’m not tempted to just go throw a round.  By day 4 I’m itching to play on the course pretty badly.

Days 5-7:
More field work.  Here I take my basket to a football field.  I’ll repeat what I did on day 3 as a warm up (200 foot putter approaches).  Then I’ll break out my mids.  The goal is to stretch back to 300 feet with my mids, but never throw full power.  I don’t have a set number of throws in mind.  I’m just trying to groove in a nice smooth throw and get my mechanics back.  I’m also putting out from every throw on these days too.

Day 8:
Rest again.  On day 7, I’ve worked up to throwing 75-80% power.  I can usually start to feel some soreness again by now.  Another day of mobility work is really useful here.  I definitely practice putting this day.

Day 9:
Time to reward myself with some actual play on an actual course.  Here I take three neutral mids and 3 putters to my local 9 hole practice course.  It’s a great place to practice and never has many people on it.  I play 18 holes of 3 disc  golf.  I play each mid individually and I putt out 3 times from each one.  This is one of my favorite practice drills overall and this is a really fun day for me.

Day 10:
I always feel like this should be another rest day, but at this point the itch to throw plastic is undeniable.  So, it’s back to the field with my putters.  Here is when I start to try and push some distance out of them.  As a note, almost every throw up until this day has been a stand still throw.  Day 10 is when I add my xstep in.  Using putters really shows any issues I might have and allows me to work on correcting them.  Weather and time permitting, I’m throwing a couple hundred up shots with my putters and putting out all of them.

Day 11:
Time to break out the fairway drivers.  Typically I’ll pull out a straight (used to be Leopards, now it’s Visions) and a stable with fade (used to be Teebirds, now it’s Riots – also trying the Stag out this year).  Back to the practice field.  I like to eliminate putting on this day.  It’s my first day out with drivers for the year and I just want to get some reps in.  I start at about 50% standing still and gradually work my way up to about 80%-85% power with a run up.  This is more about regaining muscle memory and working on smoothness than anything else.  It’s also prep for Day 12….

Day 12:
Huzzah!!!!  It’s finally time for a real round on a big boy course.  Still no high speed distance drivers, but fairway and down is fair game.  Depending on how I’m feeling, I’ll play 36 holes on this day and book end it with putting practice inside the circle.  I play real rounds with no practice or second shots.  I try to simulate a tournament as closely as possible.  This is typically a few days before my first tournament of the year so if possible, this practice is done at the same course I’m playing that weekend.  This is the first test of the year as to whether or not I’m ready for competitive golf.  It’s also when I look back at the previous 11 days and thank myself for the self discipline.  I’ll typically be feeling really good about my game at this point.  More importantly, I know I won’t end up injured.

Day 13:
Rest.  I’ll typically beat myself up pretty good on day 12 and will be feeling it.  More mobility work and a lot of yoga on this day.   I will practice putting a lot on this day.  Probably 500+ putts.

Day 14:
This is usually my first tournament of the year.  A good night’s sleep, yoga in the morning, a couple hundred practice putts, and arriving early enough to practice the holes I think will be challenging that day.

So there it is.  My version of disc golf spring training.  I’m smart enough to know that most people won’t do any of that.  Once the weather is nice, most people will just hit the course and start playing.  I totally get that and completely understand wanting to just play until the ole arm falls off.

For what it’s worth, this has worked extremely well for me and I did it again this year (today is day 13).  I truly believe that if you work your way back into your season similarly to this you really set yourself up well for health and success.  There’s nothing worse than starting the year injured.  Hopefully you can take at least a couple of useful nuggets from this plan that will help you prevent that.

Regardless of how you get ready, I want to wish the best of luck to all of you in this year’s disc golf endeavors.  Whether you are a tournament player, a league player, a casual player, or once a week one disc wonder, may all your discs fly true and may your birdies outnumber your bogies.  I truly hope that this is your best disc golf year ever and I’m thankful that you allow me to be a part of it!

Here’s another thing that will help you play better this year, subscribe to the Mind Body Disc blog!  We’ll send you a weekly newsletter rounding up all of our posts for the week so you never miss a thing.

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The post Road to the GBO – Spring Tune Up appeared first on Mind Body Disc - Disc Golf Blog.

I mentioned in one of my Facebook updates this week that I am restricting my reading to sports psychology for the duration of my preparation for the GBO.  I’m really enjoying that decision and I highly recommend that if you play competitively at all you check out at least one book on the subject.  I just so happen to have a whole list of possibilities already put together for you as part of my disc golf reading list.

The one exception to that is a book called Kettlebell – Simple & Sinister by Pavel Tsatsouline.  Pavel is the guy who introduced the kettlebell to North America and is the primary reason you see these cannonballs with handles being swung around so much at your local gym or Crossfit box.

I’ve written a whole series of posts about building a disc golf home gym and disc golf fitness, but I haven’t gotten around to talking about the kettlebells yet.  A big part of that is I don’t have a ton of experience with them yet.  They are a new implement to me and I never really knew what to do with them.  I own a set (you can see them against the wall in the pic below).  I’ve used them here and there.  But that’s pretty much it.

All that has changed.  I’ve been furiously looking for a workout that will get me ready for the GBO.  I went back into the gym for a while as I really enjoy the 4 basic barbell lifts (bench press, military press, squat, deadlift).  At 44, however, I’m just not recovering from that type of workout like I used to.

Also, while I absolutely believe that strength (NOT size) is paramount to peak disc golf performance, I really didn’t feel that my old barbell workouts were paying any disc golf specific dividends.  I’ve been using my sandbag, my rings, some body weight training, and other stuff in my home gym to try to address that, but I just haven’t been totally thrilled with any of it as of late.  Enter Tim Ferriss.

I have an hour drive to and from work each day.  That means I listen to a ton of podcasts.  I wish there were more, but there are only a handful of disc golf podcasts, so I listen to a lot of other types.  (If you like disc golf podcasts, I highly recommend the Smashboxx TV podcast, The Disc Golf Show, Final Round Radio, and of course The Disc Golf Answer Man where you can hear me occasionally)

Outside of disc golf, one of my favorites is the Tim Ferris show.  You’ve probably heard of Tim as he’s the author of 3 NY Times best selling books (The 4-Hour Workweek, The 4-Hour Body, and The 4-Hour Chef), all worth reading.  I find his podcast eminently entertaining and educational.  Recently he had Pavel Tsatsouline on as a guest (check out the episode here), and I was hooked at first listen.

First of all, Pavel has this awesome don’t be a whiny wimp attitude that I love.  Excuses are for losers and he is unapologetic about that.  More people in this world need to be as honest and transparent as he is.  You can really tell that he used to train the Russian special forces just by his attitude.

So, what does training the Russian special forces have to do with training for the GBO and for disc golf?  A lot.  First and foremost, it’s training for functional strength, not mirror muscles.  It’s training your body to move forcefully and effectively and with power.  It translates directly to athletic performance in any sport.

Second, it’s minimalist.  It’s literally 3 stretches, 2 exercises, and 2 kettle bells.  That’s it.  One of my challenges in training for the GBO is finding time for everything I want to do.  I need things that are effective, yet don’t take up any more time than necessary.  This program fits that to a tee.

Third, I can already feel the benefits to my game.  The level of stability I have, the core strength, the increase in explosiveness, and the surprising increase in flexibility are all effects that are manifesting much sooner than I thought they would.

Fourth, it’s fun.  I can truly say that I genuinely enjoy this training and look forward to doing it every morning.  I cannot say that about my trips to the gym.  While I enjoyed lifting, it was never something I looked forward to and it was often something I had to drag myself into the gym to do.

It’s kind of weird to think that I’ve stopped using all the stuff I have in my disc golf home gym (except the jump rope, I still love it and do it regularly!) for now.  I’m sure I’ll still use it all occasionally (I was just doing some pull ups on my rings yesterday, for example), but I don’t see myself deviating from this kettle bell workout any time soon.

If you are looking for something simple and effective to get you in great overall shape, get you extremely strong, and directly benefit your disc golf game, try out Pavel’s book and try out some kettlebells.  If you don’t have kettlebells, you can get them pretty cheap at your local Play it Again Sports.  All you need is two for Pavel’s program.  If you want something more badass than that, you can get the primal bells shown in the picture from Onnit.  I’ve got a pair of those on the way to the house and I can’t wait to start swinging around some monkeys!

This training program is 6 days a week, so that means that over the next 83 days, I’ll get in roughly 66 days of kettlebell training.  I am really looking forward to what that will do for my overall strength as well as my overall game.  After the GBO is over, and I am writing the wrap up posts I have planned, I’ll be sure to touch on just how effective I think it was and if I’ll be going back to other types of training at that time.

Regardless of whether you try this program out or not, I’m still an ardent supporter of strength (again, NOT size) being beneficial in disc golf.  It’s beneficial in ALL other sports, there is no reason disc golf should be treated differently.  Everyone can benefit from a strength training program.  If you don’t already have one, you should definitely consider trying it out!

You know what else you should try out?  Subscribing to the blog!  It couldn’t be easier, just enter your email below and I’ll send disc golf goodness straight to you via email every week!  I promise I’ll never sell or spam your email, I’m just not that type of guy!

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Disclosure of Material Connection: Some of the links in the post above are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will add value to my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The post Road to the 2015 GBO – 83 Days to Go appeared first on Mind Body Disc - Disc Golf Blog.

90 days, folks.  That’s 3 months.  A lot can happen in 3 months.  A lot needs to happen.  I’ve got every week planned.  I’ve got all of the needed steps mapped out.  I thought I’d thought of everything.  I was wrong.

What I didn’t plan for was margin.  I didn’t plan for “what if”.  I didn’t leave room for anything unexpected…  Oops.

If you follow along on FaceBook, you know that this week I got sick.  In fact, this is day 8 of a miserable, horrible, fever ridden, cough my lungs up, missed several days of work cold/flu episode.  I haven’t been sick in probably 5-6 years and I have to say, I wasn’t missing anything!

All that said, I’ve still been putting inside.  I’ve been putting poorly, but I’ve been putting.  I’m stubborn that way.  I had a plan dammit!  I’m not letting some microscopic germs pull me away from that.  While I can still force myself to practice putting, there’s one thing I can’t force myself to do.  One critical, all important thing that impacts the quality of my practice, my play, my thinking, my mood, and my overall satisfaction with life.  I can’t for the life of me get a good night’s sleep when I’m sick like this.

I mentioned in a previous GBO update that sleep was a no compromise issue for me.  It’s something that is of the highest priority.  But I didn’t really go any deeper than that.  I think this week is the perfect opportunity to do just that.

Whether you are preparing for the GBO, your local leagues, a casual round with your buddies, or a challenging day with the in-laws, there is nothing more important to your success than sleep.  It’s #1 on my list of most important health practices.  It falls above both diet and exercise.  It’s simply the single most important thing you can do for yourself.

It seems that lack of sleep is worn like a badge of honor in our society.  Donald Trump extols the virtues of little to no sleep each night.  Some of the most successful people in the world talk about the key to their success is getting up at 4am every day, on just a few hours of sleep, and “getting more done before 9am than you get done all day”.  Well, I’m calling shenanigans.  SHENANIGANS!!!!  I CALL SHENANIGANS!!!!

I’m sorry, that all makes for good sound bites, but the research and the facts don’t bear that out.  People need sleep.  People need 7-9 hours of sleep.  People need 7-9 hours of quality, restful sleep.  If they don’t get it, bad stuff happens.

Here are the medical facts as to what happens when people get less sleep than they need each night:

1. Lack of sleep leads to accidents.  It’s estimated that 5,000-6,000 fatal automobile accidents per year can be attributed to people driving while drowsy.  It wouldn’t do anyone any good to crash on the way to playing disc golf.
2. Lack of sleep makes you dumb and unable to think clearly, retain memories, and process information.  Scoring well at disc golf requires you to be able to think clearly and quickly.
3. Sleep deprivation contributes to your risk of heart disease, heart attack, heart failure, irregular heartbeat, stroke, high blood pressure, and diabetes.  Hard to putt well if you’re having a grabber at the same time.
4. Not getting enough sleep kills your sex drive.  Not disc golf related, but still kind of important, right?
5. Lack of sleep causes and can be confused with deep depression.  I get enough of that from playing poorly, I don’t need to compound the issue or make it worse!
6. Getting inadequate sleep causes weight gain.  Making it that much harder to get around the course and have a good energy level through your entire day of play.
7. Lack of sleep impedes your judgement.  Especially about the effects of your lack of sleep.

That last one really gets me.  The analogy that I’ve heard used is that of drunk driving.  After 1-2 drinks, most responsible people know they shouldn’t be driving.  After 3-4 they suddenly think they might be OK to drive.  5-6 or more later and they are insisting that they drive better this way.

The same thing happens with sleep deprivation.  The first night or two and you really feel it.  After that, you start to tell yourself this terrible little lie.  You start to convince yourself that you have adapted to it.  That you are OK on less sleep.  It’s not until you become well rested again that you realize just how wrong you were.  Meanwhile you are playing worse and worse and just can’t figure out why.

It’s for all these reasons and many more that I made a commitment to myself a while back that I would always get at least 8 hours of sleep.  It’s a core value and something that I rarely deviate from .  It’s also one of the best things I’ve ever done for my own health and well being.  It’s occasions like this terrible cold/flu I have that remind me of just how impactful getting good sleep has been.

So what the hell does all this have to do with getting ready for the GBO you might ask?  Everything.  I only mentioned it in passing in that previous post, but that’s because it’s something I take for granted.  It took this cold/flu to remind me that good sleep hygiene is foundational to everything else I talk about.  That meant it needed it’s own post.

Nothing else I discuss here on this blog, no performance goals, no practice regimens, no disc golf home gym workouts, none of it, can mean anything or be effective without good quality sleep.  It’s so important that they even give professional and Olympic athletes curfews.  That’s right, coaches actually tell grown successful adults when they need to be in bed.  The top athletes in an sport all do that on their own.  It’s foundational to their success.

To sum all this up, what I’m saying is simple.  If you were to only be able to do one thing to prepare for your next game of disc golf (whether that’s a just for fun round or a big tournament or anything in between), the easy choice would be to get a good night’s sleep.  That would have a greater impact than anything else by a long shot.  Not to mention that if you made that a habit, you just might live longer too!  When I roll into Emporia, you can rest assured (see what I did there?!) that I will be ready to play and working on 8 plus hours of sleep.

If you haven’t been able to sleep well in the past, and this blog post hasn’t put your lights out, here are a couple of really great resources for you:

How to Hack Your Sleep.  A really great blog article by Dave Asprey over at the Bullet Proof Executive

Sleep Smarter: 21 Proven Tips to Sleep Your Way To a Better Body, Better Health and Bigger Success.  Probably the best book on how to get better sleep and why I’ve read.

While you need to sleep, your email in box does not.  Give it something fun to do every week by subscribing to the blog!

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Disclosure of Material Connection: Some of the links in the post above are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will add value to my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The post Road to the 2015 GBO – 90 Days to Go appeared first on Mind Body Disc - Disc Golf Blog.

If you’ve been following along on Facebook, you’ve seen that it got cold and snowy here in the Chicago area.  And by cold, I mean stupidly, idiotically, ridiculously cold.  Double digit negative wind chill is nothing to sneeze at.  It’s also not conducive to practicing outside.  With that many clothes on, numb fingers and toes, and muscles tighter than a downhill skier’s body suit, there isn’t a whole lot of improvement that can happen outside.

I still try to go out and throw every day.  I actually like playing in the snow, it’s the sub zero temps that are the problem.  Getting out every day does have the benefit of keeping the throwing motion at least familiar. I feel like I can better stay in the groove I’m carving out for myself by throwing as much as possible.

That brings me to my big aha moment for the week.  Have you ever noticed that some days you are just off?  One day you are threading drives through the narrowest of gaps without a second thought and the next you couldn’t hit a line if your life counted on it.  Every hole sees a shanked drive, an air balled putt, or an approach thrown so far off target that all you can do is laugh.

I’ve had a few of those days lately and it really got me to thinking about what happens if one of those days happens during the GBO?  Months of preparation go down the toilet because my arm suddenly decides to stop working for a day?  That just can’t happen.  So I started retracing my steps.  I keep a much more detailed journal of my daily training than I post here or on Facebook, so it was pretty easy to look back over the last month.

These “off” days just couldn’t be random.  There had to be a cause.  If I could find the cause I could prevent them from happening.  Well, it didn’t take long.  After looking back over the last 30 days, it was as clear as day.

Before I talk about what I found, I want to emphasize that a common cause for these types of days is poor sleep.  Poor sleep is an epidemic in our society and the cause of more “off” days than most want to admit to.  For me, sleep is non negotiable.  I get 8 hours or more every night and I never sacrifice that.  Because of that, I can rule out poor sleep as a cause of these “off” days for myself.  That may not be the case for you.  In addition to what follows, take a hard look at at your sleep habits.  Getting quality sleep every night is one of the best things you can do for your performance in any arena including disc golf.  But since it wasn’t a sleep issue for me, what was it?

Depending on what study you look at, it is said that every molecule in your body with the exception of your bones (which take longer) will be replaced by a new one every 6-12 months.  That means that outside of your skeleton, you have an entirely new body every year or so.  Aside from being a really cool (and kind of creepy if you think about it too much) fact, that begs the easy to answer question of what fuels that process?  Food does.

[tweetthis]Are you a disc golfer made up of Kentucky Fried Chicken?[/tweetthis]

You are entirely made up of what you eat.  That’s right, your body regenerates those molecules every year using the fuel and raw materials you put in your mouth every day.  The foods you eat are the building blocks of your body.  So what are you made of?  Big Macs, Whoppers, White Castle sliders, Oreo cookies, and Tombstone pizzas?  Or are you made of grass fed beef, organic vegetables, fresh fruit, and water?

I ask the question that way because when I looked back at the 4 worst days of practice I’ve had over the last month, all 4 of them were preceded by the crappy meals I listed above.  I normally eat very clean and very healthy.  It’s something I pride myself on.  But every once in a while, the drive through calls my name.  Sometimes I just have to pull a Harold and Kumar and pound down 15 White Castle cheeseburgers.

I never thought that the occasional crap meal would affect me.  I always thought I was putting enough good stuff in me to offset the occasional need to eat an entire bag of Oreos.  Clearly I was wrong.  My performance demonstrated a clear and obvious decrease after eating poorly.  And once a week is still roughly 15% of the time.  If my body is regenerating itself once every 6 months, do I really want 15% of me to be made up of two all beef (debatable) patties special sauce lettuce cheese pickles onions on a sesame seed bun?

So does this all mean that I’m never going to eat shitty food again?  Am I swearing off 2 for $5 chicken sandwiches at Burger King?  Am I done with french fries forever?  HELL NO!  I’m only human and that stuff is delicious!  But I am done with them until after the GBO.  And they will probably be a lot less frequent after that.  Maybe I’ll cut back to only being made up of less than 5% Baconator.

I want every day of practice to make me better.  I want every rep to count as much as possible.  I want to roll into Emporia knowing that I’ve done every single thing in my power to bring the best I have to offer.  If that means that the only tombstone in my life for the next four months involves a spike hyzer, then so be it. I can do that.

As always, thank you so much for following along on the road to the 2015 GBO.  It’s very cool that so many of you are joining in on this journey.  If you haven’t already, do what all the other cool kids are doing and subscribe to the blog.  I’ll never spam or sell your email but I will send you some organic, grass fed articles each week!

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The post Road to the 2015 GBO – 112 Days to Go appeared first on Mind Body Disc - Disc Golf Blog.

If I had to pick the athlete that I’d most like to have the traits of, it would be a gymnast.  Gymnasts are extraordinarily strong, but they balance that with explosive speed and incredible flexibility.  That combination is a huge advantage in disc golf.  Their strength gives them precise control over their movements, their flexibility allows them to position their body to exert power, and their speed and quickness would work perfectly to impart that power onto a disc.

I also admire gymnasts because they train for functional strength.  They train to move their body through space with grace and ease.  They do not train to move inert weight through space in an effort to get “swole up” as the kids these days say.  I train to get better at disc golf and to stay healthy.  The training that gymnasts do is perfect for both.

I’m not saying we should all expand the space in our disc golf home gym and put in a pommel horse.  I’m also not saying that tumbling runs are in your near future.  There are no triple flip dismounts from the high bar in my recommendations.  I am, however, going to recommend a piece of gymnastic equipment as one of the favorite things I’ve ever started working out on.  The rings.

Suspension training has become very popular as of late.  The TRX suspension system is probably the most widely used.  It’s also the most versatile.  As cool as the TRX system is (and I would never try to talk you out of it), I still went with traditional gymnast rings.  There is something analog about them.  They just seem simpler and simple has been an increasing focus in my life for the last couple of years.  Both will work.  You could even use this rope system very effectively too.

In my last post in this series, I spent some time talking about body weight training.  Rings/suspension training is one of the best ways to supplement your body weight workout.  They don’t take up much room at all, they fit in your disc golf home gym, and there are a ton of benefits.  Here’s a short list of the benefits of adding ring workouts to your disc golf training:

1.  They are easy on your joints and help to prevent injury.  Doing exercises on the rings allows your joints to move freely through their preferred range of motion.  You are not restricted a static hand planted on the floor, grasping a pull up bar, or holding on to a dip station.  My shoulders, wrists, and elbows feel infinitely better and less sore when using rings over static implements.  Keeping these joints healthy is huge when it comes to successful disc golf.

2.  They are versatile.  While I’d still recommend a sandbag and a jump rope as part of your gym, if I could only have one implement in my gym, rings would be a serious contender.  Moving your body with complete control is important in disc golf.  Rings directly train that.  You can do a huge variety of training with them and can get a complete full body workout using just your body weight and a suspension system.

3.  They incorporate all of the little stabilizer muscles involved in each movement.  Push ups, pull ups, dips, and all other ring exercises make use of all of the muscles needed to perform a particular movement.  A big part of training for disc golf is introducing stability.  It’s introducing total and precise control over each of your body parts.  These stabilizer muscles play a huge part in that.

4.  Speaking of stability, using the rings as a variant to traditional body weight movements significantly activates your core.  The first few times I did suspension training circuits, I didn’t do any specific core work.  The next day, however, felt like I had done a couple hours of core work.  Part of stabilizing the movement of the rings as you perform exercises on them is a total tightening of the core.  Strengthening your core is critical when training for disc golf.

5.  Suspension training improves balance and coordination.  Not a lot extra needs to be said here.  Balance and coordination contribute directly to your timing.  Correct timing is what makes the disc go BOOM!

For all those reasons and more, several times a week, I’m using my rings.  I don’t do anything fancy, but I rarely do a body weight workout without using them.  Pushups, dips, inverted rows, and pull ups are the most common movements.  There are a ton of variations you can do with just those four.  It’s easy to make each particular movement easier or harder in order to match your current fitness level.

It takes a little bit of work to get them hung safely (and please, make sure you do it safely – falling when you are upside down would not be good for your disc golf game), but it’s totally worth it.  If you aren’t a free weight or implement person, this is the perfect way to make the most out of your body weight work outs.

Building a disc golf home gym is one of several recurring series of posts here on the Mind Body Disc blog.  If you don’t already, do what all the cool kids are doing and subscribe to the blog.  We’ll keep you up to date on all the new content and we’ll make sure you don’t miss a thing.  We will never spam or sell your email.

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Disclosure of Material Connection: Some of the links in the post above are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will add value to my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The post Building a Disc Golf Home Gym, the Rings appeared first on Mind Body Disc - Disc Golf Blog.

If you woke up tomorrow and had no muscles, you’d be in trouble.  Let’s start with your heart.  It’s a pretty important muscle.  It moves blood and all that blood carries through your body.  Your diaphragm is another important hunk of muscle.  It’s what moves your lungs and allows you to breath.  Jaw muscles are a personal favorite as that’s what moves your jaws and allows you to eat bacon.  Your leg muscles help you jump and walk and run, the muscles in your fingers allow you to flip people off in traffic, and there’s a very important muscle that allows you to keep yourself from farting in public.

In the end, the primary function of all of your muscles is movement.  You, as a human being, were designed to move.  You were designed to self propel from point A to point B.  You were designed to stand and run and push and pull and otherwise get around a disc golf course on your own.

Since this is the primary function of muscles, that should also be the primary function of training those muscles.  Whether you are training for disc golf specific movements or something else, the focus of healthy training should always be for movement.  If training for disc golf equals training for movement, then our disc golf home gym should be set up to help us work on movement more than anything else.  Having huge guns will not improve your disc golf game.  Having an arm that will move quickly, powerfully, and with great control will greatly benefit your disc golf ability.

So what are we moving in disc golf?  We don’t really have any heavy equipment or implements (unless you are Dave Feldberg’s caddy) to move, so that leaves only our body.  With that in mind, what better way to train ourselves to move our own body than with body weight training.  If you can’t effectively move your own body through space, you will have one heck of a time trying to get a disc to move through space properly too.

When we hear the term “body weight training”, many of us think of our high school gym teachers.  Countless rounds of burpees, push ups, sit ups, and pull ups (or in my case at that time in my life, hanging from a bar and grunting) made up our gym classes.  I much preferred the good old days of junior high where we played dodge ball instead.

As we grew into adults, we left childish things behind.  Even for those that continued to work out, stay fit, and join gyms, most people left the body weight training behind them.  We instead went to the gym and did “adult” workouts with weights and machines.  At best, we did some sit ups to work on our abs of steel.  Many of us became convinced that we needed Nautilus and Hammer Strength and Life Fitness and many other contraptions in order to train our bodies effectively.  Even if we wanted to work out at home, we felt like we needed equipment to be effective.  Some of us even bought a BowFlex…..  Twice.

The interesting thing is that many of us think we need this equipment when we can’t even move our own body weight effectively.  Lots of people can’t perform simple acts like squatting down and standing back up without emitting sounds that closely resemble the mating call of the giant sperm whale.  They can’t lift little kids up over our heads without exclaiming, “you’re getting too big for this!”.  They have trouble with even the most basic acts of moving themselves around.

The point is that if we can’t even effectively move our own body weight around, we have no reason to adds weights or machines.  If we can’t get down and knock out 50 pushups, we have no business bench pressing something.  If we can’t pull our own body weight up via a pull-up at least 10-15 times, we have no reason to jump on a lat pull down machine.  If we can’t move our own bodies through space, we have no reason to spend any money at all on any training equipment.

That’s why I want to take a break from recommending equipment for your disc golf home gym and instead recommend gaining proficiency with some basic body weight training.  Yep, I’m talking about push ups, pull ups, leg raises, hand stand holds, body weight squats, and other similar movements.  There’s no muscle you can’t work with body weight training.  All you need is a space to do it in and maybe a pull up bar.

[tweetthis]Not everything good in life has to cost money.[/tweetthis]

Aside from being the common sense place to start training, body weight training has a bunch of other significant benefits.

1. It’s cheap!  You just need your body, and like mentioned before, maybe a pull up bar.  I had a few people tell me that the sand bag I recommended in a previous post was too expensive.  Well, this is about as inexpensive as it gets!
2. It’s safe.  It’s  how your body actually moves.  You are not restricted or put into unhealthy or compromising positions by equipment or bars.  It allows your joints to travel through their natural range of motion.  You aren’t overloading yourself with a bunch of weights that your muscles are not yet ready for.
3. It’s efficient.  Body weight training usually involves compound movements that work large groups of muscles.  There is very little need to ever spend hours in a gym doing things that isolate single muscles.
4. Anyone can do it.  Can’t do a push up?  Start on your knees.  Can’t do a pull up?  Put your feet on a chair and give yourself a little help.  There isn’t really a minimum fitness requirement to start moving your own body weight around.
5. It incorporates balance and flexibility, especially when you get to some of the more advanced movements (there is a ton more you can do besides the standard push up, pull up, sit up combination).  Try doing some single leg squats without holding on to anything.  Get good at that and you’ve built some serious balance.
6. It works.  Gymnasts are the biggest proof of this.  Their entire sport revolves around moving their body through space.  Most of their training and conditioning is done while performing gymnastic movements.  I challenge anyone to say that an active gymnast is not fit and extremely strong.
7. Your body can tolerate a tremendous amount of body weight work.  It can be done in very high volume if you want.  If you were to just do some body weight work every day and nothing else, you’d eventually get into really great shape.  Check out what happens to members of our armed forces through boot camp.  I had a few friends go through and they were in noticeably better shape after boot camp than before.  All they did was body weight training and conditioning.

So before you run out and get any more pieces of equipment for your disc golf home gym, see if you are proficient in body weight training first.  All you need to start a solid body weight program can be found here.  Try those out for a while.  You’ll be surprised at how much you can gain doing just those by themselves.  You just might find that your disc golf game will thank you too.

If you’ve enjoyed this continuing series on building a disc golf home gym, consider subscribing to this blog.  We’ll send you weekly updates on new posts so that you don’t miss anything.

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Disclosure of Material Connection: Some of the links in the post above are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will add value to my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The post Building a Disc Golf Home Gym, Body Weight Training appeared first on Mind Body Disc - Disc Golf Blog.

At the top of my 20/80 list for disc golf is the one disc round.  It’s one of my favorite things to do and I use it for a lot of purposes.  It’s taught me how to throw a putter for distance.  It’s taught me how to throw a hyzer with an under stable disc.  It’s taught me a lot about how the wind affects the flight of discs I would never have thought to use in the wind.  It’s also taught me what my most versatile discs are.

If I play a one disc round for fun, I always grab either a stable mid or stable fairway driver.  Those are the discs that make up 20% of my bag, but get 80% of my throws.  The value of having one disc that can do just about everything can’t be overstated.  It often makes me wonder why I carry so many discs to begin with.

Like a lot of other aspects of disc golf, this concept translates over into other areas of life.  Finding one thing that gives a lot of benefits is valuable in a lot of areas.  One good chef’s knife in the kitchen can do the work of a $1000 set of a bunch of different knives.  One good pair of shoes can serve where many people have 4-5 pairs.  One good coat, one pair of jeans, one great video game, and the list goes on.

All that said, then, and it’s no surprise that the first piece of equipment I recommend anyone buy for their disc golf home gym is a sand bag.  This is the 20 that gets you 80 for sure.  The sand bag is one of the most versatile pieces of equipment you can have to train with at home.  With a quality sand bag, you can get a full body work out with just one implement.  You can work every muscle effectively with just one sack of sand.  There are a few key benefits that make sandbag training perfect for the disc golfer.

Sandbag training builds stability.

A sandbag is a mass of constantly shifting weight.  Unlike lifting barbells, kettle bells, or dumbbells, the weight is moving around in a way that requires you to use not only your primary muscle groups to move it, but to also incorporates all of the smaller stabilizer muscles as well.  Disc golf is a game that requires both of these muscle groups to work together.  The fine control needed to accurately throw a golf disc often comes from these small stabilizers.  Very few implements work those smaller muscles along with the larger muscle groups as well as a sandbag.

Sandbag training works your core.

No matter what you are doing with the sandbag, no matter what motion or group of muscles you are working, you will also be maintaining core strength at the same time.  Distance in disc golf starts in the legs, but is then generated most by your core.  The spinning motion used to throw a disc relies heavily on a strong core.  One sandbag training session and you’ll feel what I’m talking about.

Sandbag training works both slow and fast twitch muscle groups.

A solid disc golf throw relies on a steady and strong base.  That comes from your slow twitch muscles.  It also relies on explosive acceleration.  That comes from your fast twitch muscles.  Sandbag training works both of those groups of muscles.  You can change the load, type of movement, and rate of movement all with the same implement.  This works both groups of muscles without changing the tool you are using.

Sandbag training builds your grip.

Grip strength is also a huge component of distance in disc golf.  Every exercise you do with the sandbag will simultaneously work your grip along with whatever other muscle groups you are focusing on at the time.  The shifting weight of the sand will test your grip like very few other tools you could use.

Sandbag training is inexpensive.

It’s a bag of sand, for crying out loud.  While I recommend and use what is called a “battle bag” for versatility and durability, you could literally just fill up a bag with sand, wrap it up in a few layers of duct tape, and do most sandbag training routines.  This is a great example of using the 20 that gets you the 80.  A small investment will pay huge dividends.  Home gym equipment can get pretty pricey and for under $100 you can have one implement that covers a vast range of use.  Here is a really good article on how to buy a sandbag which includes how to do it on the cheap!

Sandbag training mimics movements you’d actually do in real life.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again.  You will most likely never have to bench press your way out of a jam on the disc golf course.  You aren’t going to have to french press a disc into the basket.  Most traditional training movements with barbells and dumbbells not only don’t translate to anything we do in disc golf, they also put undue stress on our joints because they are not natural movements.  With a sandbag, you can do exercises that directly translate to how you move in real life as well as on the disc golf course.  As a bonus, when moving the sandbag, you allow your body to move through its natural and safe range of motion.

Sandbag training is fun.

Honestly, I hate working out.  I love having worked out, but I despise the actual act itself.  For some reason, though, I actually kind of enjoy slinging the sandbag around.  I get pretty rough with mine and it keeps on taking a beating.  You can also get pretty creative with it.  There aren’t really any hard and fast rules so as long as you are safely moving the bag of shifting weight.

All in all, in my opinion, the sand bag is the best piece of training equipment to start your disc golf home gym with.  It’s cheap, it’s versatile, and it’s very, very effective.   Following are some of my favorite drills to do with the battle bag.  You will immediately see and feel how they directly help your disc golf muscles.  You can put all of them together into one circuit, repeat that circuit 3-5 times, and get a great full body training session.

If you are looking for a complete sandbag routine, this 4 week sandbag essentials plan is pretty solid.  I’ve run through it a couple of times and plan on doing it again..  This is great if the sandbag ends up being the only piece of equipment in your new disc golf home gym.

The alternate shoulder swing builds good rotational and upper body strength.

The Zercher squat is a straight forward squat variation.  Squats are a great way to build core and leg stability.  Unlike most people you see squatting in a gym, you do not have to be moving huge amounts of weight for this to be beneficial.

The high pull will work a lot of the back and shoulder muscles that are used in throwing a disc.

The bent over row hits your lats, back, biceps, forearms, and grip.  It’s one of the best disc golf specific exercises out there.

The sandbag spin is my favorite sandbag exercise.  It thoroughly works your core and your entire upper body.  Do 3 sets of 10 in each direction and you will feel it for sure.

If you’ve been following along with the recommendations for your disc golf home gym up ’til now, this is the perfect time to add the sandbag to your training schedule.  If you haven’t been following along up ’til now, head back and read this and this.  Then subscribe below to stay informed as we continue to build your disc golf specific home gym.

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Disclosure of Material Connection: Some of the links in the post above are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will add value to my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The post Building a Disc Golf Home Gym, the Sandbag appeared first on Mind Body Disc - Disc Golf Blog.

When spring came, I was elated.  I had been cooped up, unable to play, for about 4 solid months.  It was more than I could take.  You can only putt in the garage so much before you admit to yourself that it’s a pale substitute for being on the course.  I had 4 months of pent up disc golf aggression to get out.

On top of that, they were starting to finish up the redesign of my local course.  A two year project that the entire NE Illinois disc golf community had anxiously awaited.  The fairways were cut and object golf was possible.  Once the weather got bearable, I started to spend as much time out on the course as humanly possible.

And here enters the problem.  Any of you who have gone from being sedentary for any length of time to huge bursts of activity know what comes next.  Pain.  Sore muscles, sore joints, sore tendons and ligaments.  Pretty much sore everything.  I think my left eyelid didn’t hurt all that much, but that’s about it.

The shock to my body of going from no athletic activity to playing as much disc golf as humanly possible every single day was huge.  My body was pissed.  And it let me know just how pissed when it would barely let me out of bed one morning.  I tried stretching.  I tried walking it off.  I tried Alleve in quantities that could possibly have warranted calling the poison control center.  Nothing worked.

All of a sudden, I was seeing playable weather outside, and I couldn’t play.  I was not a happy disc golfer.  Not at all.

I was complaining about my woeful inability to play one day and one of my coworkers suggested I get a massage.  More specifically, a sports massage.  “What is this sports massage you speak of?”, I asked.  The woman I was talking to is a competitive cross fitter.  Apparently this sports massage she talked about is a thing.  The more she talked about it, the more I thought it sounded like an incredibly good idea.  So I booked an appointment with her massage person that week.

Apparently I should have asked more questions.  My goal was to get out of pain.  I didn’t realize I was going to a distant relative of one of the torturers from the Spanish Inquisition.  She started at my feet.  And that hurt.  Then she moved to my calves, where it hurt more.  Hamstrings, pain city.  Out of the hour I was there, maybe 5 minutes actually felt good.  At the end, she hands me a bottle of water, tells me I might not feel all that good that day, and then asks me for $100.  What the hell kind of racket was this anyway?

I went to bed that night rehearsing the scolding I was going to give my coworker for recommending such a masochistic activity.  I couldn’t believe that people actually paid for this!  I could have paid some thug in an alley to punch me in the kidney a couple times and that probably would have only cost $20 and been more enjoyable.

The next morning, though.  Oh the next morning.  That glorious, wondrous, unimaginably good next morning.  Not only had I slept better than I had in months, I woke up feeling amazing.  Don’t get me wrong.  I was still sore in some of the spots the massage therapist had really dug into the day before.  But overall I felt better than I had in years.  Suddenly my attitude went from wondering if I had completely wasted $100 to wondering why they didn’t charge $500.

I definitely wanted to do that again.  That was a given.  Unfortunately, wanting to do something once a week that costs $100 and actually being able to afford to do that thing ($400 a month is more than my car payment) are sometimes two completely different things.  I could go every once in a while, but with the amount of disc golf I was playing, it just wouldn’t be often enough.  I needed a solution.  Fast.

Enter the foam roller.  That same cross fitting coworker swore by that as much as she swore by the sports massage.  At this point, I wasn’t going to question her.  Especially since a foam roller was $18.00 on Amazon.

Was it the same as the massage?  No.  Was it close?  Sure was.  In fact, the better I got at using it, the closer I got to the relief I got from the sports massage.  In fact, I’m now convinced that sometimes it’s actually better.  The massage therapist can’t actually feel what I’m feeling during the massage.  When I’m foal rolling, I get immediate feedback as to what is working and what isn’t.  I instantly know what feels the best.

Once I got kind of good at doing it, I also got kind of addicted to it.  I was rolling in the morning, after work, after rounds, before bed, while watching TV, and any other spare moment I had.  It was like having my own personal massage therapist.  I was certainly getting my $20 worth.

As good as that was, the foam roller seemed a little inadequate at getting certain areas of my body.  It didn’t do a lot for my feet.  It was hard to get enough pressure to really dig into some of the knots in my back.  A massage therapist has thumbs and knuckles that can get places that no foam roller can get.  So I logged on to the inter webs and started to do some research.  What I found was a world of mobility tools.  The foam roller was just the tip of the proverbial ice berg!

With credit card in hand and Amazon on my screen, I proceeded to order an alarming number of crazy looking implements.  I couldn’t wait to try all of them out.  I was back to playing a ton of disc golf with the help of the foam roller, these could only make things even better, right?

Well, as is my normal pattern, I bought way too many things to try.  Some worked great, others did not.  Some I still use, others are now paperweights or dog toys.  One of my goals here at the Mind Body Disc blog is to save you all the trouble and pain of trial and error.  I want to be the guinea pig for you.  After buying and trying quite a few implements, I’ve narrowed them down to a list of my favorites.

[tweetthis]A foam roller can be a disc golfer’s best friend.[/tweetthis]

As you build your disc golf home gym, mobility tools like this will be a necessity.  While not technically a piece of work out equipment, no work out or home gym would be complete without at least one or two of them.

I’m putting this list on it’s own page (click here) and linking to it on my resources page.  That way you can get back to it quickly and easily any time you want.  I suppose I could have just skipped the last 1,200 words and told you this at the beginning of the post, but that’s just not my style.  I have yet to find the piece of equipment that keeps me from talking too much.

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Disclosure of Material Connection: Some of the links in the post above are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will add value to my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The post Building a Disc Golf Home Gym, the Mobility Tools appeared first on Mind Body Disc - Disc Golf Blog.

There are a bunch of different things that fall under the “mobility” umbrella.  It can get quite confusing and overwhelming.  It’s also something that doesn’t get your pecs a popping or your guns swole up as they say. It adds time to a workout and it’s the one thing most people skip.

Last week we talked about making a space in your home to work out and train for disc golf.  One of the many benefits of having a training space in your home is that you’ve eliminated one of the reasons for not doing mobility work, time.  The following routine will take less time than most people would spend just driving to a gym.  There’s really no excuse not to do it.  Especially since it is critically beneficial in so many ways.

For that reason, I wanted to start this series by giving you a mobility routine that was quick, easy, and effective.  I want you to get into the habit of doing the mobility work before you ever add resistance or weight training.  There are several benefits to starting the use of your new disc golf home gym with daily mobility work.

1. Daily mobility work will get you in the habit of using your new space regularly.
2. It’s a 10-15 minute commitment.  Anyone can stick to a 10-15 minute commitment long enough to make it a habit.
3. If you go no further than this with the use of your new space, this one practice alone will serve your disc golf game and overall health extremely well.
4. It will get you ready to safely start resistance training and working with weight and other implements.
5. It will make you feel better through your entire day.
6. It will help you become resilient and resistant to injury.  Especially the overuse injuries so common in our sport.

While I do a variety of static, dynamic, myofascial, and other mobility routines.  The one that follows is an easy to follow and simple routine that will serve you well pre and post workout as well as pre and post round.

I recommend that you start by doing this once a day.  Many of you will start to feel the benefits in just a few days and will want to do it more.  I can think of many worse things than to start and finish your day with a simple mobility routine.  If you only do it a few times a week, and you don’t currently do anything now, that’s a victory too.  Like I’ve said before, any small step forward is a win.  Take enough of them and you’ve gone a long way!

[tweetthis]A mile of progress is made up of many small steps.[/tweetthis]

As a note, this is a routine that I do and works for me.  I’m not a certified personal trainer, doctor, yoga instructor, or any other person of authority.  I’m just a guy who has found something that works for him.  You should always consult a medical professional before starting any type of physical training or movement you aren’t used to.

Remember to breath with your belly, deeply and slowly, as you do this routine.  Instead of holding each stretch for a set count, I usually hold each stretch for a certain number of deep breaths.  A good deep breath typically consists of an inhale for a count of 5, hold for 2, exhale for 7, hold for 2.  Doing this will make sure you are taking your time, and it will help to make sure you are breathing correctly throughout the routine.

1. Wrist Flexor stretch, hold for two breaths
2. Wrist Extension stretch, hold for two breaths
3. Shake your hands out, keeping them loose
4. Side flexion (latissimus dorsi, trees major), two breaths on a side
5. Windmills, 20 in each direction with each arm
6. Arm swings (dynamically swinging your arms from a “hugging yourself” position to arms stretched wide and back) 10 times
7. Dynamic core rotation (sideways arm swing)
8. Standing calf stretch, three breaths per side
9. Quad stretch, three breathes per side
10. Hip flexor stretch, three breaths per side
11. Hip rotator stretch, three breaths per side
12. PNF or table hamstring stretch, three breaths per side
13. Supine spinal twist, 5 breaths per side
14. Repeated extension in lying, inhale on the way down, exhale on the way up, 5 reps
15. Bird Dog, 5 per side, inhale with limbs down, exhale with them extended
16. Fire Hydrant, 5 per side, inhale when on hands and knees, exhale with leg raised
17. Child’s pose, 10 breaths, really relax into this one

Once you get the flow of this routine, this should take almost exactly 10 minutes.  Here’s the bonus for 5 minutes extra that really gets things loose and feeling great.

Get yourself a LaCrosse ball ($2.49 at Dick’s or pretty much any other sporting goods store) or better yet, a Rad Roller.

1. Hit the bottom of both feet, lingering where there is tension or knots.
2. Move up to your calves, again, stopping and letting the ball sink into areas where there are knots.  You especially want to get the outside of the calves right where they meet your shin.
3. Get your neck and upper back, especially if you don’t use a backpack type bag.
4. And my favorite, do the triceps all the way from your shoulder to your elbow.  You’d be amazed at how tight and knotted the tricep on your throwing arm can get.

You can do any of the above with the roller or just the Lacrosse ball.  Heck, for now, use a tennis ball as a temporary solution.  Don’t let the lack of a piece of equipment stop you.  Start now, get the equipment later.

That’s it.  I do the above every morning and every night.  I do the first 10 minute portion pre workout as well.  After just a few days, you’ll be feeling the benefits.  After a week, you’ll be moving better than you ever did before.  After a few weeks, you will feel weird if you don’t do it on a given day.  At some point, you’ll be walking on the course and realize just how much more freely you are moving.

[tweetthis]Being loose and not stiff is a major benefit to your #discgolf game.[/tweetthis]

Next week, I’ll be reviewing a whole slew of mobility implements.  Once you feel the benefits, especially of the myofascial release portion (the last 5 minutes with the LaCross ball/Rad Roller), you will be tempted to get all kinds of new toys that look like they would help.

I’ll have a guide to those for you in next week’s post.  Until then, keep using your new disc golf home gym space.  Get stretched out and loosened up.  Get those muscles, tendons, and joints ready for action.  We’ll be putting them to work soon!

The post Disc Golf Training, A Quick Mobility Routine appeared first on Mind Body Disc - Disc Golf Blog.