Hunter Gathright is a Partner and the Lead Instructor at Gathright Golf at Sweetwater Country Club in Sugar Land, Texas.
Hunter Gathright on the importance of marrying golf and fitness with GOATA concepts:
Though my background in golf includes a lot of instruction (as the student), and an attempt at a playing career, I had not been much into fitness, and my back paid the price for it when I was just 25 years old. The efforts spent and education attained in trying to fix my back, play pain free and share this newfound knowledge has led me down an interesting road to where I am today. With my father, Bryan Gathright, the PGA Director of Instruction at River Crossing Club in Spring Branch, Texas, I represent the Gathright Golf brand at Sweetwater Country Club in Sugar Land, Texas, where we started the Gathright Golf Academy last year. There, I am the lead instructor, and facilitate all the fitness and movement coaching for our students and clients. Ours is a full performance academy where we cover golf instruction, fitness and athletic training. Our team also consists of golf instructor Bradyn Lipps and certified athletic trainer and massage therapist Arthur Robinson. Together we administer a fitness program using GOATA Movement concepts. Founded by Jose Boesch, GOATA means Greatest of All-Time Actions used by the Greatest of All-Time Athletes, specifically those who played multiple decades, retiring in their late 30s or early 40s injury-free, and is based on slow motion analysis and securing the joint structure and tissue, while getting the body moving in a more natural, innate pattern to relieve it of much stress and get the student moving pain-free while building strength.
Hunter Gathright on the business impact of marrying golf and fitness with GOATA concepts:
We feel that traditional strength and conditioning programs train primarily reverse movement patterns, which can often lead to injury and reduce athletic ability and speed. GOATA trains forward movement patterns – locomotion. Our athletes increase strength and muscle mass naturally through forward movement training, improving their standing posture and allowing them to walk, run, squat and hinge. After going through the slow-motion assessment for my own physical purposes several years ago, the GOATA experts in Louisiana warned that I would blow my back out if I didn’t stop competing. Not totally sold on their assessment, I didn’t stop competing and had a major back episode on the golf course less than one month later. I went back to them and have been training with them for almost three years, and have been able to eliminate back, knee, IT Band and Achilles pain. I value their concepts so much that we’ve adopted them at the Gathright Golf Academy. Sweetwater Country Club is a private facility, and we are getting to know the members to improve their physical health and wellness, while honing their golf skills as well. We have held a lot of demos with members to get the word out and get in front of them as much as possible. We conduct clinics and ensure that our athletic trainer, Arthur Robinson is on the driving range, engaging members with his extensive functional movement and recovery expertise. We also disseminate our concepts and programs through emails, signs and flyers around the club. Our students currently range in age from our many junior golfers to 80+ year-olds.
If you would like to email the author of this Best Practice directly, please email goatacoachhg@gmail.com.
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