A buzz term in golf in recent years is “ground reaction forces.” Mark Blackburn, Golf Digest’s Best Teacher in America, explains it’s not just about how hard you can push into the ground to generate swing speed, it’s also about the pushing and pulling action of the feet toward and away from the ball along the ground.
For example, getting the lead foot to create friction against the ground toward the ball in the downswing allows the body to rotate around it without losing its address posture. If you just rise up without that friction, you’ll likely alter your swing path and mis-hit the ball.
The intent here is not to geek out on golf-swing biomechanics, but rather to focus on exercises that make your legs and feet stronger as it applies to a making a powerful golf swing. If you think this topic doesn’t apply to you because you don’t have the legs of a running back, take a look at the photo of Justin Thomas above. Thomas weighs 160 pounds but averages well over 300 yards off the tee (309 in 2024). He’s literally leaving the ground as his club meets the ball.
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The leverage the ground can provide should be maximized if you’re interested in making considerable distance gains, says Golf Digest Certified Fitness Trainer Tim Neumann, who trains golfers at Par 5 Performance in Cleveland. Neumann has three basic and one advanced exercise he recommends if you’re interested in developing better ground reaction forces.
Ground-force exercise #1: Snap downs
“One of the first areas to address is the golfer’s ability to de-weight and develop stiffness in their lower body,” he says. “This is eccentric loading. The better you pre-stretch a muscle, the more force you will be able to produce. Longer hitters will de-weight their body faster, stop themselves quicker (eccentric strength/muscle stiffness) and then propel back up faster.”
A great exercise to improve de-weight and eccentric strength is snap downs. Neumann demonstrates it below. “To perform the exercise, stand on your toes, reaching high overhead,” Neumann says. “As quickly as possible, snap down into a downhill-skier position with the knees and hips bent and the torso forward with a neutral spine. The goal is to become a statue as fast as possible.”
Ground-force exercise #2: Banded power squats
Building on the previous thought, once a golfer has de-weighted, they will need to propel themselves up to avoid collapsing, he says. For an exercise to develop this propulsive ability, he suggests banded power squats.
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“Set up in a squat pattern with a long resistance band under your feet and over your shoulders or a shorter band under your feet holding the ends in your hands,” he says. “Perform a squat as fast as possible. This exercise is great for rate-of-force development, because the tension in the band increases the higher you get in the squat.
“If you’re looking for something more advanced, try trap-bar jumps (demonstrated below),” he says.
Ground-force exercise #3: Single-leg hops
Finally, to maximize the timing and application of your vertical force, do lateral bounds to single-leg hops, he says.”Long hitters peak vertical GRF doubles as their horizontal braking system,” Neumann says. “What you’ll see in a face-on view is a centering of a force line from their lead foot up through their body to the head. When rotational athletes are centered in the sagittal and frontal planes, spin occurs with the least amount of resistance and with the most optimal range of motion. “To perform the exercise, load your trail leg and bound as far as possible to your left (for a right-handed golfer). When you land on your lead leg, immediately jump up maximizing height while avoiding lateral movement. Imagine as if you landed next to a wall and you can’t bump into it. The lateral bound develops speed for your horizontal power. The vertical jump develops your vertical force and horizontal braking.”
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This article was originally published on golfdigest.com
