Is Your Golf Nutrition Below Par? By Justin Buckthorp

Today we want to help you with a common scenario if you love the game of golf.

You are playing well, the swing feels good, and you are cruising into the back nine. You want to finish strong because you know a good score is on the table.

And then something happens—your concentration drops, your energy dips, and suddenly you start making mistakes. Of course, you do what you can to hold the round together, but the momentum has gone, and you aren't the same player as an hour before.

So, what happened here?

What stopped you from maintaining the level of focus and consistency?

What was the first domino that led to unforced errors and prevented you from playing your best?

Naturally, there are a ton of possible answers here, but an untapped area could be your nutrition.

To ensure you get the most out of your game, this blog will cover some key areas for focus:

- The physical demands of golf

- The importance of nutrition for golf

- Golf nutrition checklist

- What to eat before, during and after golf

- How Kinetica’s supplements can help you on the golf course

 

The Demands of Golf

Golf is a sport that is played at a low intensity for long durations peppered with high intensity bursts of activity. It is considered a power sport seeing as golf shots are anaerobically driven where the player is looking to produce maximum force in minimal time. In this respect, aerobic fitness is not a priority but overall athletic qualities are.

For example, the average PGA Tour golf course is about 7200 yards, which equates to just over four miles of walking. The number of calories burned over this distance will depend upon individual characteristics, such as body weight and lean muscle mass, and whether you push a trolley or not, but it could be as high as 1,500 calories, especially when you account for a proper warm up.

Athleticism is a priority in golf. The swing is a complex motion that requires many physical attributes such as mobility, stability, motor control, strength, and power. The level of compression on the spine in the golf swing is significant, and we need these athletic qualities to attenuate force off joints as efficiently as possible.

 

Over six times a person’s body weight go through L4-L5 in the lumbar spine in the downswing. For a 90kg player, that’s over 500kg of vertical compression in just one segment of the spine. These demands require us to possess the appropriate levels of strength and motor control to withstand these forces and meet the demands of high frequency practice.

Let’s find out how one should fuel this activity.

The Importance of Nutrition in Golf

How we fuel the body and brain for golf is overlooked and underrated. There are probably several reasons why.

First, equipment is often the primary go-to for amateurs and pros alike. We want the latest technology because, fundamentally, golf is hard - and anything that can save us shots is worth trying. Technology tends to dominate our thinking when it comes to improving our game.

Second, we naturally take nutrition for granted. For years the culture of golf has been a bacon sandwich to start and a chocolate bar at the turn, so why change. We expect our brain and body to turn up on the first tee.

Third, we don't see many tour pros discussing how they use nutrition to fuel their performance. We see it with fitness training but not really in nutrition. Without these role models explaining how they go about eating and drinking to get the most from their game, why would you?

Today we'd like to change this. I want to offer some insight into how the pros go about nutrition for golf and offer you strategies to help you in your game.

I've been supporting players in their health and performance on the European Tour, PGA Tour, LPGA, and LET Tours since 2007. It's been an amazing experience, and tour life is filled with brilliant characters and talent.

I sit on the European Tour Medical Advisory Board and have supported Team Europe in Ryder Cup events since 2008. I have a master’s degree in nutrition, so I hope that the experience and education I have gained can help you get from your game.

Nutrition is vital in helping us shoot low scores. For sure, we need technical skill and the right technology. But what enables us to express this skill and utilise that technology is our brain and our body.

How does Nutrition impact your golf performance?

Nutrition impacts many areas that contribute to performance: our energy, our focus, our decision-making, our mood, our resilience, our movement in the swing and our fine motor control in areas of the game, such as putting.

When the adrenaline hits and you need to make a great swing or smooth putt, you need your neurology to be firing in the right way and at the right time.

In my work with players like Justin Rose over the last decade, we have focused on making sure there is appropriate energy in the tank to finish strong. After four days of competition, the last few holes can be critical. So, we look to "tick the boxes" and control the variables under our influence that might impact performance.

Nutrition and hydration significantly influence multiple systems in this respect, such as blood glucose levels, muscle performance, hormonal balance, cognitive function in the brain, and regulating emotions .

Golf is as much cognitive as it is athletic. From a cognitive perspective, golf rewards superior decision-making. The top pros are incredibly aware of the environment, the weather, the flow of the round, the need to shift strategies at a moment's notice.

The brain processes a crazy amount of data in golf, and it is down to specific neural networks to process all this information moment-to-moment and help us access our best.

One network, in particular, is relevant here. It is called the Central Autonomic Network, and it plays a huge role in cognitive flexibility, emotional intelligence and decision-making . Diet and hydration impact this network and can therefore give us a brain-based advantage in our game.

From an athletic standpoint, golf places unique demands on the body . We need sufficient flexibility to access the range of motion required for an efficient and healthy swing. We need stability in the hips, torso and shoulders to ensure control of this motion in the swing. We need strength throughout the body to be able to absorb forces from the swing. We need the power in muscles to generate force quickly and maximise clubhead speed and ball speed.

For example, when you hit the ball with a driver, research shows the club head is moving at 48 metres per second . That is fast! It also is why athleticism is essential. We need muscles and "slings" to efficiently absorb, stabilise and produce this type of load without placing unnecessary stress on joints. Nutrition plays a significant role in optimising tissue health, muscle function and joint health, so we want to make it an advantage in your game.

 

Golf Nutrition Checklist

To make tips easy to digest, I have split recommendations into two main categories: foundational nutrition and then how you can use Kinetica products to help you.

 

FOUNDATIONAL NUTRITION;

The Night Before:

We have a saying at my company, "Good preparation quietens the mind." Ticking the boxes, a night before we play to get the body and brain in a good place for a round or practice is worth its weight in gold.

So, what ingredients matter here? If you are a committed amateur, a game of golf might involve a 30-minute physical warm-up, 60 minutes of hitting balls and working through the bag and then four and a half hours on the golf course.

Even though much of this is not demanding aerobically, it's still six hours of activity and a lot of time on our feet. The brain is also a hungry organ in golf and consumes up to 20% of the calories we consume each day.

With this in mind, the meal the night before we play is an excellent opportunity to fuel up with lean protein, fibre, low-GI carbohydrates and healthy fats. This type of meal will balance blood glucose, facilitate a good quality sleep, ensure adequate muscle glycogen, and provide the raw amino acids ahead of time that the body and brain utilise over the following 24 hours.

A stir-fry is a good example here, and it's quick and easy to make:

Lean protein: Chicken or turkey

Fibrous vegetables: Onions, broccoli, bell peppers, bok choi, asparagus

Low GI carbohydrates: Quinoa or brown rice

Healthy fats: Olive oil or coconut oil

Anti-inflammatory support: Garlic, ginger, turmeric

Garnish: coriander and sea salt

This type of meal is a go-to for players because you can get a lot of nutrient density into your diet, and it only takes 20-minutes to cook.

If you are vegetarian or vegan, you could swap out the chicken or turkey with beans and pulses. This combination of the two helps to ensure a complete ratio of essential amino acids.