In our last Blog, we talked about some releases for our lats to help with any kind of restriction that might lead to the dreaded chicken wing swing fault, so what I want to talk about now is the squat test that we do in the TPI screening.

So in the squat test, we’re looking for breakdowns in a couple different areas. We do an overhead squat, so certainly that could be a problem with upper back, mid-back, shoulder mobility, could be some core stabilization issues. But one of the most common things is actually your ankles. If you can’t get into the right position with your ankles because of some restrictions in there, that’s going to limit your ability to get into that squat deep position. That squat position for your legs is very important for the golf swing, but also very important in our day-to-day lives.

What I want to do is go over a couple of calf release exercises and a couple exercises you can try at home to work on perfecting that squat performance (please refer to the attached video for reference). One stretch to get into those deeper parts of our calf muscles is to get in that typical calf stretch position, but what we’re going to do is with one foot forward the other foot back, with back foot we’re going to bend that knee and drive that knee towards the wall. We’re going to get into a nice deep stretch through there. What I like to do is hold for about 15 seconds, and then contract that muscle a little bit. Work it another 15 seconds, contract that muscle, and then try to work in even deeper. The whole time we’re trying to keep that back heel locked into the floor so you’re not lifting up.

Another thing we can do is search and destroy. So basically what we’re trying to do with this is find any tender spots in the calf muscles, especially in those deep muscles, and try to work those out. You can use a golf club, like in the video to help massage out those tight spots. The do make specific rollers for that purpose as well. What I’m trying to do is just kind of knead into the muscle. When I find a tender spot, I’ll just spend a few seconds there and work through that. Make sure that you’re hitting all areas of that calf muscle. You can also use a foam roller. A lot of us have a foam roller, it doesn’t have to be any specific type. Also what we’re trying to do is dig in, really find those tender spots. Once you do, we’re going to spend a couple seconds working on those, make making sure that you’re hitting all those spots on both calves. You can also use a peanut to get in there. Again, using a little bit of pressure with your upper leg to really dig into those spots.

A lot of times here in our office, we use the Acumobility Balls because they’re flat on the end, easy to keep in one spot. Again, we dig around for those tender spots, and then what we’ll do is put a little pressure and we’ll bring our ankle up and down to kind of work it through and break up any adhesions.

So the last thing we’re going to work in here is a squat progression to help us get into that nice deep squat. A lot of us have a hard time sitting back and getting down into that deep squat without putting a lot of pressure forward to stabilize ourselves, so we are going to give ourselves a little bit of a counterbalance out front to help us get down into that deep squat. You can use a 10 to 15 pound kettlebell, and what we’re going to do is keep that out in front of us, arms straight, so we can sit down into that nice deep squat. We’re going to try to repeat that three to four times.

Once you feel comfortable with that motion, what we’re going to do is we’re going to get into that deep squat. So what that looks like is we’re going to use our weight to help us get down to that deep squat. We’re going to drop our weight, and then we’re going to come up from here, again trying to keep from leaning forward to create that counterbalance.

I hope you found this helpful. If you’d like any more information about the TPI screening or would like to have a screening in our office in Beverly, you can reach out to us at (978) 927-8466. You can also reach us through our website, which is in8wc.com. Talk to you soon.