Category Archives: Going Strong

Going Strong, Life, Lifestyle

Improving Your Golfing: 7 Proven Ways to Lower Your Handicap

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Your handicap doesn’t have to mean the end of your game. You can improve your handicap with practice. You may also be surprised to learn that improving your short game is actually more effective than getting longer off the tee. There are lots of strategies that can make your golf game better quicker. Here are seven fail-safe ways to get you a lower handicap.

1. The Right Clubs

When you have the right tool for the job you’re able to do a good job. The same is true for golfing. Get yourself a good set of clubs so you can step up your game. Be sure to have golf wedges for high handicappers.

2. Glove

Wearing a glove on your non-dominant hand can give you and your game a good amount of support. You can improve your grip while creating a safer swing. A good quality glove is one of the golf essentials to most players, helping to keep your club’s grip dry on hot days and prevent the club from turning in your hands while you swing.

3. Improve your grip

The way you grip your club matters. There are multiple proper grips options, so it’s a good idea to check out your options and see what feels good to you. And which is most effective for lowering your handicap. A popular hold has your index finger and thumb in the shape of a V, it is often referred to as the “neutral position.”

4. Mark Your Ball

Balls are a dime a dozen, so make sure you’ve got plenty. As long as the golf ball is yours, break out a Sharpie and draw some straight lines on your ball. In fact, some balls are manufactured with guide arrows to help you better line up your shot and better align yourself.

5. Practice Putting

Putting takes more energy than many may think. You’ll need to practice both patience and thoughtfulness. Change your putting goals. Stop trying to sink putts outside of five feet. Instead go for two putts per green. If you can hit an effective second putt, you’ll be more likely to sink more shots and get better scores.

6. Know the Rules

Knowing the rules of golf will definitely improve your game. You’ll be able to play to the rules and to your advantage. The ability to touch the line of play can be very helpful in aligning your shot and yourself. Knowing that you can use your longest club to measure your relief area can increase the relief area, giving you more leeway.

7. Target and Position

It’s a good idea to line yourself up with a target. It could be a tree very near where you are aiming your putt or even one near you. You want your body to be positioned in the right direction to get the most out of your swing. Center yourself and plant your feet, putting a little more weight on your back foot.

Whatever your handicap, remember that golf is supposed to be fun, so give yourself permission to enjoy the game. Put in some practice, watch a few videos, brush up on the rules and you’ll be celebrating a lower handicap in no time.

Going Healthy, Going Strong, Health, Life, Lifestyle

Strength Training Is The Secret To Healthier Joints

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We have multiple joints all throughout our bodies. The technical definition of a joint is that it is where two bones meet one another. Some of our joints are more well-known than others – like the knee, hip, ankle, and shoulder joints. We need joints to help us move around and perform specific tasks. 

For example, did you know that the way our thumb joint works allows us to have opposable thumbs? This means we can grip things with our thumbs, which basically sets us apart from chimps! 

Anyway, back to the main point! 

Joints are essential, but they are often injured. The more moveable joints in your body (the ones mentioned earlier) are prone to get damaged in multiple ways. You can twist the joint and damage the ligaments, you can get arthritis, you can dislocate them, etc. Joint pain stops you from doing many of your daily tasks and can cause problems in your life. While the chances of suffering from joint pain increases as you age, you can easily prevent it. You deserve to have healthy joints, and it is highly possible when you try strength training. 

What is strength training?

For those that don’t know, strength training is basically training your muscles to get bigger and stronger. Typically, this means you start lifting weights. As you keep lifting, your muscles adapt to the load and get stronger. By progressively increasing the weights, you will get harder muscles that look bigger and can handle more weight. 

Why does strength training help your joints?

Some of you might have heard that weight training is bad for your joints. I’ll forgive this as it seems like it should be the case. Surely it’s not good for your joints to add lots of extra force to them? As long as your form is correct, then your joints will be fine. 

In fact, they will benefit in the short and long-term from exercise and strength training. 

Look at the knee joint – probably the most prone to injuries. If you took a look at all the different knee injury cases, you’d find many happen in slip and fall incidents where the knee twists. Twisting your knee is preventable through strength training. How? Because building strength in the muscles around the knee will also strengthen the ligaments and tendons that hold the joint together. In essence, you reinforce the supporting structures. This adds more stability to the joint, preventing it from twisting easily. 

The same goes for other joints in your body – if you strengthen the attaching muscles, then the joint itself becomes more stable and less prone to injuries. 

Furthermore, one of the short-term benefits of strength training is that it increases the synovial fluid in joints. Think of this as oil for a gate. Joints need this fluid to move smoothly and prevent bones from rubbing against one another. Exercise and strength training increases the production of this, greasing your joints up nicely. In turn, this can prevent diseases like arthritis from forming! 

You see, strength training is the ultimate solution to healthier joints. If you want to live with less pain and more stability, then pick up some weights and protect your joints today.

Going Healthy, Going Strong, Health, Lifestyle

5 Things To Do After A Workout

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If you are into fitness, you’ll know that the preparation that you do before a workout is just as important as the recovery that you go through after a workout. Your training is important, and that’s why you stretch and warm up before you start to work out. But what do you do after a workout? 

The recovery that you do afterwards is just as essential as your warm up, but it’s something that is too often overlooked. You need to know how to jump start the recovery process for your muscles before you start the workout, as this can prevent injury. You may have already looked up the best heat pads for muscle recovery, or tried to figure out what is ibuprofen and how it can help. However, there are some specific things that you should be doing post-workout to make this an easy recovery for you. So, let’s take a look at five things that you should be doing after a workout.

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  1. You should always cool down after a workout. It’s the first thing that people forget to do when time is precious, but it’s really a bad idea to leave it out at all. You need to bring your heart rate down slowly, not just shut off the treadmill and walk away. Without the cool down, you’re going to end up with blood pressure bottoming out too quickly and you could feel faint. Take the five minutes to bring your workout to a close and you’ll thank yourself later.
  2. Stretch properly after your cool down. The last thing that you want is for those muscles of yours to seize up and stop working for you. Without those adequate stretches, you’re going to end up with DOMS – delayed onset muscle soreness.
  3. Use a roller if you want to reduce your muscle tension. Foam rollers are a form of massage and they can help your muscles to feel relaxed and adequately looked after a workout. You want to do this if you are in the gym and your muscles have started to feel sore very soon after the workout has completed.
  4. Hydration is so important when you are working out, but you need to remember to rehydrate after a workout, too. Drink water with added electrolytes to boost your hydration levels after your workout and give your muscles that extra chance at recovery.
  5. Nutrition is essential, and after a workout, it’s always a good idea to go for a snack. Most people love to have protein snacks like boiled eggs and fresh meat after a workout, but it’s also important that you go for something like a banana to up your potassium levels.

A workout is supposed to be something that you enjoy and get something out of when it’s done. The best thing that you can do is to ensure that you follow the steps above and you can recover faster post-workout. Your recovery is as important as anything else, so pay attention to it and allow yourself the time to feel great!