368: CODY WESCOTT- Lift Heavy, Swing Fast.

Guest: Cody Wescott (Founder Cody Wescott Golf)
Host: Jeff Pelizzaro
Episode Number: 368
Podcast: The 18STRONG Podcast
Partners: Linksoul, 1stPhorm

Summary

Join me as I welcome Cody Wescott from Cody Wescott Golf and the Swing Heavy Lift Fast Program to the show for an insightful discussion that’s sure to up your golf game and fitness routine. We kick things off by exploring the relationship between strength training and golf performance, as Cody shares his candid take on traditional weightlifting versus golf-specific training. We dig into the essence of crafting an effective workout that balances what you enjoy and what truly benefits your game, while Cody challenges the idea of personal trainers and their impact on a golfer’s progress.

Listen in as we tackle the multifaceted nature of golf training, focusing on the harmony of mobility, strength, and power. We break down his holistic approach to athlete development, as seen in his “Lift Every Swing Fast” program, which has successfully been adopted by numerous golfers. Cody and I also touch upon the often-overlooked importance of cardiovascular health for recovery, endurance, and the enjoyment of golf well into one’s later years. The inspiring story of Tony, an 85-year-old fitness enthusiast, serves as a powerful reminder that it’s never too late to embrace an active lifestyle.

The conversation shifts to the nuances between golf exercises and drills, emphasizing the importance of selecting the right methods to enhance your game. We address how gym workouts should complement, not replace, swing drills, and the potential pitfalls of following fitness trends on social media. As we delve into muscle building and mobility, I underscore the evolution of muscle-building philosophies and the significance of nutrition in supporting both body composition and performance. Don’t miss this episode packed with practical advice and personal insights that could transform your approach to golf and fitness.

Cody Wescott

• Cody’s journey in the fitness world spans decades, covering everything from bodybuilding and powerlifting to crossfit and pilates.
• Today, his primary focus is on training golfers, treating them like the athletes they truly are.
• His mission is straightforward: help golfers navigate the fitness landscape, finding the right training approach for their goals – without all the BS.
• Cody’s philosophy is his motto, the namesake of his flagship program, “Lift Heavy, Swing Fast.” His program has impacted hundreds of athletes globally, helping them look, play, and feel their best for the long haul.

Main Topics

(00:04) Optimal Golf and Fitness Training

Nature’s impact on golf performance, incorporating fitness, traditional weight training, and the role of personal trainers.

(09:44) Golf Performance

Effective golf training programs include total body workouts, targeted mobility exercises, and strategic speed and power work.

(14:56) Cardiovascular Health in Golf Longevity and Performance

Cardio and resistance training in golf improve recovery, performance, and longevity, emphasizing the importance of prioritizing health in mid-life.

(18:34) Fitness for Personal Transformation

An 85-year-old man’s dedication to fitness, my sports background, and struggles with drugs and alcohol.

(29:44) Golf Training and Exercise Nuances

Golf exercises and drills have different purposes, with gym exercises complementing but not replacing them. Social media can influence fitness trends.

(38:33) Muscle Building, Mobility, and Personal Training

Nature’s muscle-building philosophy, RPE and Reps in Reserve, nutrition, golf-specific training, and maintaining muscle mass for efficient golf swing.

Follow Cody Wescott

• Instagram: @codywescottgolf
• Website: CodyWescottgolf.com

Links Mentioned

How to Win Friends and Influence People – Dale Carnegie

Diary of a CEO: The 33 Laws of Business – Steven Bartlett

@BioLayne

@Goob_u2

@menno.henselmans

Episode Partners:

LINKSOUL: For your 20% discount on LINKSOUL gear, go to 18strong.com/linksoul or click the logo above.

1st Phorm: Try any of the 1st Phorm products with FREE SHIPPING, go to 1stphorm.com/18strong.com (By using this link, you will be entered into our Monthly 1st Phorm Giveaway!)

More Cool Stuff to Check Out:

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18STRONG Pro Shop (Get your 18STRONG gear!)

18STRONG Resources (All of the cool stuff we recommend: products, books, golf stuff, etc – and discount codes for the 18STRONG Crew)

Want the full episode transcript? (click the “+” )

0:00:04 – Jeff Pelizzaro
The 18STRONG Podcast, episode number 368, with Cody Wescott from Cody Wescott, golf. What’s up guys? Welcome back to the 18STRONG Podcast, where we’re here to help you build a stronger game, because we believe that every golfer deserves to play better, longer. And this week we have Cody Wescott from Cody Wescott Golf and the Swing Heavy Lift Fast Program. This episode is a fun one for me because this is the first time I get to meet Cody and talk about the growth that he’s had, first of all in social media in the golf and fitness world, and I think he’s one of the guys putting out some of the best content when it comes to education in the golf and fitness world and really taking a no BS attitude and laying on what’s going to make your program most optimal. Is traditional weight training? Is traditional strength training good for your golf game? Yeah, it can be, but is it optimal for what you’re wanting to do and what your goals are in the gym? So we have some great conversations about what that looks like, what you want to do, what are the things that you want to put into your program simply because you like them, and what are the things you need to put in there because they’re going to work. And then we talk about a couple topics that Cody’s been pretty hard lined on, and that’s the difference between golf exercises and golf drills. Where is that crossover and where is the separation? And are you doing golf exercises or golf drills and are they really being effective in your training program? And then, lastly, we touch on a bit of a sensitive topic for probably a lot of the listeners of this show, for those of you that are coaches and trainers. But talking to the golfers out there, cody discusses why you may not need a personal trainer and why that actually might be detracting from your goals and detracting from your results, and we go have a great conversation around that. So you’re going to really enjoy this episode of the 18STRONG Podcast.

Right after this, our partners over at Link Soul have been providing us with the best apparel for both on the course and off the course, from polos to t-shirts like the one I have on right now. Everything that they have is meant to be worn from the golf course to wherever you’re going next, whether that be casual, whether that be to the beach there’s all different options over there. So go to 18strong.com, slash link soul. You’ll get 20% off of anything in your cart over on Link Soul’s website. So again, 18strong.com. Slash link soul for our favorite brand of apparel, for anything on the golf course and off. Now let’s get to this week’s interview, tony Wescott. Welcome to the 18STRONG Podcast.

0:02:49 – Cody Wescott
Hey, thanks for having me.

0:02:50 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Yeah, for sure, man. So this is really fun to finally get to connect with you. I’ve been following your stuff on social media for a while and one of the cool things and we just had a couple other people on recently and, I said, one of the cool things about what we do at the podcast here cool things for me is being able to connect with people like you, that I really respect the way that you’re putting your content out, the content that you’re putting out. So, first of all, just keep doing what you’re doing, because I love watching it and I learned stuff from when I’m watching your content and I know that our crew is too.

So I’m excited to have you on.

0:03:21 – Cody Wescott
Yeah, man, thank you so much. I mean the content game, social media has been such a game changer. I think you know I’ve listened to your show a few times, so I know I’m not alone when I say that Like it really has just like opened so many doors Because I’ve been doing, you know, the fitness thing for a long time and just when you consistently start posting content, like things happen for you that I never thought would happen. So it’s really cool. Like I’ve been on you know, someone’s podcast. Like you know, if you were to go, I never would have thought about this. So this is really cool.

0:03:50 – Jeff Pelizzaro
When did your? Is Instagram your biggest platform as far as your social media content? For sure, when did that really kind of take off for you?

0:03:57 – Cody Wescott
You know.

So I was a trainer for, like you know, 12 years before I ever like made a post about my services, right, so? But I think it was summer 2022 is when I started posting about every single day, because I was in an environment down in a gym down in Jupiter, where, like that was pretty much what everybody was doing is like that was like bigger part of our job was actually like creating social media content, and that’s when I started doing it every single day. And then I think you know, the thing is like I didn’t. It took me forever to like get up and going. I mean, I think I made. I think I posted like 90 days in a row before I got like a thousand followers, you know. So, like you know, I get like 12 likes on a post or something like that. So it was a little discouraging, but I was like you know what? Like I think it’s one of those things that you just keep trying and work hard and put out good stuff. It’s eventually going to catch on, and so that’s what I did. I just kept going, kept going, and I want to say it was probably like right around like holiday season, so probably like Thanksgiving of 2022, you know, probably like almost like six months into the thing, I got to 10,000 followers and then that’s.

I don’t know if it starts like kind of snowballing or if the algorithm like kind of catches on and people are watching your stuff and then, but that, that first 10 was super hard and then now I think we’re you know what, like 14 months later, I’m at like 70,000.

And that’s been really cool. Just because you know, when you’re a personal trainer, you are pretty limited on how many people you can work one on one with, right, or how many people you can really make a change for Cause I’ve done group fitness before too, where you’re coaching like 40, 50 people at once. But you know, as a personal trainer, if you’re super busy I mean, if you’re talking about doing 30, 40 sessions a week that is a very, very busy personal trainer, right. And you have, you know, people doing two or three sessions a week like what are you looking at? You may have? You might have like 10 to 12 to 15 clients, really right. So for me to go from that on a weekly basis, like I’m only touching like 12, 15 people, to reaching thousands has been like really gratifying and a lot of fun too.

0:06:05 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Yeah, when? When did you kind of shift out of the the in-person training role, cause I know you said you really just work with, I think, a single client in person. The rest is pretty much online.

0:06:15 – Cody Wescott
Yeah, it’s all on my app. Now why use trainer rogue? But you know I have my programming on their app. It’s been since I moved back to Oklahoma. I moved back here in December of 2022. I moved back here and I was still doing some zoom sessions. So I’m still doing one on one. But now, yeah, for the past like I think about 12 months I’ve had just one guy that I trained a person and the rest is I’ve got some. I’ve got people that I’ve been doing one on one programming for for years now. But now I just put all my time into creating the programming on the app.

0:06:54 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Yeah, it looks great. We’ll be sure to link all this stuff up in the show notes as well, so you guys can go and check out the website, check out the app. You know everything, everything about looks really good. You know like it just kind of draws the eye in your content is great. As far as just really pointing out the, the no BS right, which I think is really one of the big messages that you, that you have, is like hey, don’t do the silly stuff. Here’s the way are here, here are ways for you to really get to where you want to go with your, your golf, with your fitness. And you know, one thing I wanted to ask you about, which is a message that continually goes through your content is not training the old way you used to train. You know it hasn’t gotten you where you want to go yet, so why are you continuing to do it? Expand on that a little bit.

0:07:42 – Cody Wescott
Yeah, that’s been, that’s been a topic that’s done pretty well for me lately. So you kind of catch onto things that people kind of believe in in what you’re saying more right Cause, like that is like a truly like authentic thing for me is like I have literally experienced every possible image or every type of fitness that is out there. Right, so like I feel like I can speak to that Right Like. So I’ve done CrossFit, I’ve done bodybuilding, I’ve done powerlifting, I did Spartan races, I raced high rocks. My wife used to teach yoga. I’ve done yoga. She also taught Pilates. I’ve done Pilates. Like I’ve literally we her and I co taught a boxing class together. So I mean I’ve done like pretty much everything in fitness and I’ve also ran gyms. I was a regional fitness manager in Washington DC. I ran three gyms. Like when I tell you like that I have pretty much done everything that normal people in fitness can do, like I’ve done it.

So now, like my thing is that I don’t think that any method of training is necessarily bad. Right Like. So for golf, that is like, so like I don’t think that anything that’s going to get you in better shape, like you know whether it increases your, maybe you’re doing like a orange theory. Right, it’s going to increase your endurance, you know it’s going to make you a little stronger. You know stuff like that. But any kind of workout program CrossFit, bodybuilding, whatever it is that gets you in better shape.

I think it can help the game of golf, now. What I always tell people is like is that optimal for the game of golf? And my answer for some of that stuff is no, like I don’t think that training like a bodybuilder is going to help you play your best. You know can it. Is it going to be better than you sitting on the couch every single day? And will it help you play better?

If you go train like a bodybuilder? Probably because you’re getting stronger and you get more mobile, you’re going to be pretty sore, so it might suck to go practice that next day or something. If you just wrecked your pecs or something and your chest and your shoulders. You know that might suck, but you know when you recover from that your chest is going to be stronger and more flexible and and so, yeah, that could help you play golf. But you know I’m here for getting athletes to perform at their best and I think what’s interesting about golf is that it’s a very unique game, right. It requires mobility, strength and power, and each one of those pro, whatever program you do out there might give you a little bit of one of those things. Right, but if we do a golf program, we can have it all.

0:10:06 – Jeff Pelizzaro
So what do you feel is kind of the secret sauce of Hitting all of those boxes in a program and not going too far in one direction? Because I feel like we can definitely get into the mindset, or many of the golfers can get in the mindset, of oh, I just got to work on my mobility, or I got, I just got to work on my speed, or I’m going to get stronger, or you know how, how have you found to really tie those things together and, like you said, really become more of an athlete when you’re in the gym?

0:10:33 – Cody Wescott
Right, and you know you think about, like, could you put all that stuff into a workout? You can, right, Like it can be a long workout, but you know, yeah, and how much juice is the average person going to have at the end of a 90 minute session or something like that, right? So I think, yeah, we got to be pretty strategic about how we do it. I like to give people total body workouts, right? So, as opposed to doing a bodybuilding split and yeah, I think you know you can put in, you know, targeted mobility work that also is going to prepare you, like, you know, prime you up for the workout that you’re about to do. You can put in a few reps of like, maybe it’s a plio’s, like, you know, jumps, maybe it’s a couple of mid-ball slams. I like to do the sled, you know, whatever it is that that person has available, maybe it’s just bands, maybe they you know whatever they have available do something that’s pretty fast. And I have to do that, you know, right after your warm up, your mobility, so that where you’re touching on some speed and I don’t think you know you need to do a whole lot of it, right, like, I think speed is, you know a pretty low, low volume, right, like we’re talking like a couple of sets, you know two, three sets, one to three sets, actually, right, and then that lower rep range and then hitting a couple of our compound movements and I really try to get people to do like two to three to four sessions a week and then I’ll put in like my, like my um, in my app.

I have, like I call them our main workouts. They’re Monday, wednesday, friday, we’re going to the workouts going to be structured kind of like I just described, and then, like on Tuesdays, I have them just do like mobility and zone to cardio. Um, saturday is more of like an interval style, like hit training, so that we can kind of get it a little bit, little bit heart rate up a little bit higher, come back down, recover, um, things like that, and it’s still going to have some mobility at the beginning of that workout too. So I like to, that’s how I like to do it and it’s worked really well.

Um, and, like you know, I kind of just took it all from every facet of training I’ve ever done and like just kind of okay, like you know, it doesn’t make sense, it just makes sense, right, like once you become, when you’re a trainer and you know what’s up, it’s like okay, you can’t put this power at the end because you’re going to be dead. I don’t put mobility at the end because it’s like it can be paired with a warmup, like so you just, it just makes sense and I think it’s really worked well for me and for the um, the hundreds of athletes now that that that are on board with a lift every swing fast. So we continue to appreciate it for everyday training and what it’s like to do sport.

0:12:46 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Yeah, that’s awesome. I love the name, by the way. Oh, it’s great. Just straight to the point, right.

0:12:51 – Cody Wescott
I got the trademark, by the way, did you really, hell yeah?

0:12:55 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Nice, you should have for sure. Yeah, for those of you that aren’t watching on YouTube, he’s got the neon sign. He’s in his podcast studio too, which he’s got the shooting straight podcast that he does with his wife, so definitely check that out. We’ll link that in the show notes as well.

0:13:08 – Cody Wescott
Appreciate that.

0:13:09 – Jeff Pelizzaro
But yeah, I mean just the breakdown of that, of that. You’re right, it just seems to make sense. I like how you then have like something on Saturday too, where it almost gives them a little bit of variety too, probably as far as the conditioning stuff, how much conditioning do you think golfers need, and is that something they need? Is that something that they want? Is that something that you like to throw in there?

0:13:30 – Cody Wescott
That’s a great question. I love how you word this Something neat or something they want, right, like that’s what they come to us for, right, jeff? It’s like I’m going to tell you what you need, like, do you really want to do this? I hope so. I hope I’m going to get you to buy in and believe what I’m saying and you’re going to get excited and want to do it right, like, yeah, but yeah, so need.

I mean I love zone two cardio. That has become like my really my big thing lately is going to keep on to that heart rate zone and you know, if you’re listeners out there, you can just simply like kind of Google zone two cardio and you can quickly figure out what heart rate you need to be in to get into zone two. But golf is long, right, I mean if you’re talking, you know people don’t talk. They think that golf is, like you know, taxing, and they’re right, it’s not. It’s not. You’re not playing a football game, you’re not playing a basketball game, so it’s not taxing in that way. But yeah, you’re out there for a while, I mean if you go warm up and if it’s slow, I mean we’re talking. Like my wife says, I’m out there all day right and she’s not. She’s not wrong.

Like you know you know, right, like, if I go warm up for an hour, do my routine and just cause I like it, you know I don’t think you need warm up for an hour, but I like you know I work. I warm up in my gym first, not going to my club I putt, I chip because I just love it, um, and then you know you play and you know what. How long could you be out there? Six hours, right Easy.

You’re up there standing, walking around shipping, putting hitting drivers, like, yeah, I think endurance plays a bigger role than people probably want it to want it to be, because I don’t think people love working on their cardio and working on their uh, vo2 max and their um, aerobic conditioning and all that kind of stuff. But I think it plays a huge role and it also plays a pretty good role in in how you’re going to recover and how you’re going to perform in your own workouts. Right, Like you’re. If you’re a better condition, you know, like a, like a heavy set of squats or presses or whatever it is that you’re going to do, like it’s going to help you recover in between those sets too, um, so then you’re able to get stronger and then, um, recovery and your power. Workouts like it benefits everything.

0:15:20 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Yeah, you know what that’s a great point that I think is overlooked is is the recovery piece of it and how that you don’t necessarily have to be conditioning yourself for the sport itself when you’re out on the golf course, and that is definitely going to help you. We we just talked to Mitch Sadoski recently talking about how golf is an explosive sport, but it’s also an endurance sport, especially if you’re a high level golf and you’re playing four days in a row. But, from the recovery aspect of during your workouts and from day to day, being in in better cardiovascular shape is absolutely going to help you improve from from set to set, from rep to rep and from tournament day to tournament day and practice session to practice session.

0:15:57 – Cody Wescott
So that’s that’s awesome and, and you know, like you know, there’s so many studies out there that prove that. You know, resistance training, cardiovascular training, are like the pillars of longevity, right, and we all want to do this living well thing for a long time and we want to play golf for a long time, Like I want to play golf when I’m a hundred, you know, like, and I think we all do so. You know, if cardiovascular health is going to help me get there, then I better do, I better be doing it.

0:16:25 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Yeah, yeah, it doesn’t all have to be about you know, from shot to shot, what you’re doing on the golf course, and that’s the piece that I think do myself Most of the professionals in our industry yeah, we want you to lower your handicap, we want you to swing faster, we want you to hit the ball further and straighter, but ultimately, I’d love to see you play another 10, 20, 30, 40 years and do it well too, right? Not not just be out there kind of dinking it around, but be the guy that’s out there in his seventies and eighties and people like Holy cow, can you imagine or can you believe that this guy’s out here doing it? So yeah, that’s who.

0:16:57 – Cody Wescott
I want to be right and like.

That’s who I want everyone else to be.

You know it kills me when I’m out of my club and you know I play with one guy who’s like I’m 37 and he’s like I think he’s almost 50.

He’s a pretty good shape, plays really well. And then some of the guys we play with, you know they’re they’re getting a little older, I think that you know they’re in their sixties and you know their their health is, you know they’re overweight, like their their body’s starting to break down a little bit, their back hurts and, you know, sadly, I think they think that they’re going to turn it around somewhere, right, and I’m just like it breaks my heart and I’m like, if you don’t do anything about it, right, like it’s not going to match, you’re not going to get out of a slump right now. Like you know, at 65 years old, I’m sorry, like, unless we like get you moving better and drop some weight and get you stronger and maybe make you faster, like I don’t think it’s going to go up or even plateau, right, like we’re, it’s going to start sliding back and we don’t want that, sadly.

0:17:56 – Jeff Pelizzaro
And yeah, and that’s a message that I wish the 35 year olds could hear and project forward right or the 25 year olds, 30, 35, 40, when we tend to get in this, this area of you know raising kids and being at a desk job or whatever your career path is, your family life is we tend to neglect those things, we tend to neglect ourselves, and then you turn into that 65 year old that is still kind of hoping that things will turn around, but it’s like no, the time is now. You got to start doing this stuff Now. Even if you start very simple, right, you start with just some mobility stuff and just getting into the gym a little bit. So that message rings true.

0:18:34 – Cody Wescott
Oh yeah, I mean I had a guy worked at a country club in Alexandria, virginia, just right across the Potomac River from Washington DC had a guy mid 80s, you know like 85 years old, his name was Tony. He came in, he worked his ass off, slammed the ball around, I got him on the TRX and did some jump squats and stuff at 85 years old and that man got out there and you know he felt better than ever and so I mean it’s not too, you know. So my message is like yeah, it’s definitely not too late, and like you know people that are around my age or even a little bit younger, like you know, it’s going to be there one day. So you know, don’t let it catch you off guard.

0:19:10 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Yeah, yeah, be like Tony no.

0:19:12 – Cody Wescott
Tony crushes it. Tony’s got a bitch named after him out there. He’s like oh no, bridge, not a bitch, excuse me.

0:19:17 – Jeff Pelizzaro
And he’s like oh yeah, when I’m gone.

0:19:19 – Cody Wescott
They’re going to tear that bridge down. I’m like no, not Tony, it’s a great bridge. Like it’s not going anywhere, I use that bridge.

0:19:25 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Love it.

Yeah, people use it. They can’t tear it down. We need that. Let’s take a second to thank our sponsors over at 1st Phorm, and this week I want to highlight their Formula One post-workout protein shake.

I use this thing pretty much every day after my workouts because, let’s face it, being here in a gym working all the time with clients putting on a podcast, it can sometimes be tough to get my protein in on a regular basis, and so I know that with the post-workout shake the Formula One, first of all, it’s fast acting. So right after your workout is a great time to get your protein in to help build your muscles, get yourself stronger and repair what you’ve done in the gym. But also, if you don’t know if you’re going to be able to get your protein in in your regular meals, it’s just a great way to make sure that you’re supplementing and hitting those marks. So be sure to go over to 1stPhorm.com forward slash 18STRONG to get your 1st Phorm Formula One protein shake, and everyone that enters through that link is going to be put into a drawing every single month for free 1st Phorm products. So again, go over to 1stPhorm.com forward slash 18STRONG.

So what kind of sports did you play when you’re growing up. Obviously you’re very fit, obviously you’re in the fitness industry, but I assume you played some sports back in the day. And then I want to know what changed as far as your training mentality and how you’ve transitioned yourself into, because I saw on the website that you’ve really amped up your game quite a bit recently too.

0:20:52 – Cody Wescott
Yeah, so I mean, growing up I played baseball, basketball. I had a lot of, you know, I had some things happen when I was a kid, some some, some things with my family that really got me distracted For a little while. I think I had the talent, to be honest with you, to play, like you know, after high school and all that kind of stuff, but I just got distracted and I, you know, did some other things that people shouldn’t do. That was a big part of my life. I thought about that on my podcast was like I struggled with drugs and alcohol and things like that in my youth and even in my 20s, but I really found solace in the weight room, like when I was in high school. So, like you know, I’m 37, I’ve been working out since, like I was a freshman at high school. So we’re talking, like you know, 20-something years ago, right, and I just found a love for working out, right, like just lifting weights and I remember just working out with some of my buddies and I just felt it different. Like you know, as soon as I like did call it a bicycle curl for ease, right, I said, buy some curl. And they’re always like man, I can tell in your face that you feel that you know what you’re doing Like, and I just naturally figured it out. And then so I started like training them, you know, to try to get them like learn how to do this stuff.

I’d be ripping pages out and muscle fitness magazines I mean, you know, this is 27 years ago I didn’t really, I didn’t have a smartphone to have Google Like. I just went to the store and I took my ripped up muscle fitness magazines of Jay Cutler and Ronnie Coleman and took those into the gym. And then our winter ending coach she was like in his 80s coached a tola and he just yelled at me he’s like don’t do that, you know you’re going to break your arm, like whatever you know. So and I’d be teaching my buddies. I remember this one time I had my buddy come in and the weight room was right right outside the basketball core and I was having us do walking lunges up and down the core and my buddy I don’t know if he ever worked out again his life because he was so sore Like after that maybe he’s never worked out again, but yeah.

So I just really found you know, the weight room to be like my place and so, like I, when I was in high school, like I had some weightlifting records for my weight class, which was very light back then, because I’m only like five, six, I was like five, four back then like 120 pounds Almost. I think I almost did like a 400 pound deadlift back then I was able to do like 70 unbroken dips, like you know. It was cool stuff. So I was very, very into that back then. You know so. But then you know I didn’t like go to school for it or anything. You know I’m from Oklahoma. You know, when I I don’t remember like people like being into fitness, like you know, I went to the gym like it wasn’t a personal trainer back then there was no one. I went to the gym. The guy owned it like he would kind of help you out and like his son was around, but like no, there was no trainer. Like there was.

This wasn’t a career, you know, I didn’t think it was. So I actually ended up in the restaurant business. I was waiting tables. It was like one of my jobs, you know and I went to the guidance counselor and she’s like, well, what do you like to do? I was like I like to work out and I wait table. She’s like, well, you know, we got a great like hospitality program. You know, I wish she would have been like hey, why don’t you get into this like exercise, science or something you know? But hey, hindsight, 20, 20, it all worked out pretty well for me. But so I was in the referral business for a long time and I actually think that really helped me and be where I am today, because they develop a ton of skills Like, if you’ve ever, have you ever worked in the referral business?

0:24:09 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Yeah, yeah. You know, bus tables and all kinds of stuff.

0:24:13 – Cody Wescott
Yeah, you know. So, like I was a manager, like you know so. But anyways, and then I was at a gym working out, just like before my shift at work, and the guy comes up and he’s like the fitness manager said hey man, do you want to be a personal trainer? And I was like, okay. I was like, how do I do that? He was like, oh, just get the certification and you know, we’ll set you up with clients. I was like, oh, yeah, those are the golds of Jim. You know, like five years ago. And so, yeah, then I quit doing the restaurant business. I got all into fitness and you know so, back then, you know, like all I really knew how to do was like bodybuilding and powerlifting, like that’s really all I knew. How to lift heavy, I knew how to like get big, that was it. And but then when you get your first client, you know you’re like I’m not going to pay to come see you once a week. I’m like, what are you going to do with them? Am I going to have you do chest day? And then what are you going to do in the next like four? And then what am I going to do next week? I’m going to have you do leg beer. You know, by the end of the month we’re going to give all one month split, yeah, like, so you had to change, you had to figure it out. And I was like, okay, well, this isn’t sustainable for most people. What do we need to do?

And I remember my very first fitness manager was wrote down on a piece of paper and this like kind of changed my life. He wrote down he’s like lower core upper, and I was like simple enough, right, and that was like my first like exposure into, like just very basic, like we all know this now, right, but like back then like I didn’t really know. And so, yeah, then I started kind of evolving that it’s like, okay, how can I get people the biggest bank for their buck? How can we get the most results on like once a week, okay, and then some people do twice a week. How can we get a big bank for their buck? Like, what is it going to be?

And most people you know we’re talking about general population people, right, like what do they want? They want to lose weight, right, but I don’t control what they put in their mouth, so how do I keep them happy? And it’s like, okay, let’s start focusing on performance Right, and that’s where I’ve so, like a long time ago, I really figured out that to make someone happy and so I get them to continue on this journey, it’s got to be performance based Right, like. But I want to help someone lose weight, then I’ve got to really talk about nutrition. So that’s like where the whole like training for performance thing like really really started for me, like early on in my personal training career, and then I just met people along the way that you know. At the time I didn’t realize they were basically my mentors, but they were guys that like taught me like even more about like strength training and stuff like that.

0:26:31 – Jeff Pelizzaro
So did you start working with a lot of athletes at that time period, or was it just more general population that you know wanted to have some sort of performance based training in some capacity?

0:26:41 – Cody Wescott
Yeah, so it was. They didn’t know they were. They wanted performance based training.

That’s what that’s like when I, you know, like a minute ago it was like what do they want, what do they need? I’m like, well, here’s, you know what you want, what do they need to get there, right? So like, let’s just get you stronger, that’s going to help your quality of life. So like, yeah, at first, like my first, probably three years into the business, right, like I, just general population people, right People, everyday people want to get stronger, injured, you know, wanted to lose weight, just live a better quality of life. And then you know I love golf and I really wanted to, you know, dive into golfers. And so NASM, the National Academy of Sports Medicine, where I got my personal pay or certification and had a golf certification. Did you ever see that? You know? Yeah, yeah.

0:27:27 – Jeff Pelizzaro
I didn’t go through it, but I remember that coming out.

0:27:28 – Cody Wescott
Yeah, so I did that. I think that was like in 2015. I did that and then I found a few golfers in the gym and like just kind of like begged them to let me like do some stuff, because they weren’t really into training. But I knew because but we had talked about golf before they didn’t want to really want to pay for training. I was like I don’t really care, like just kind of let me try some of this stuff on you. And they just, like you know because, because in Washington this is in I was living in Washington DC at the time that this happened and if you’re familiar with Washington DC, it’s like it’s not a really commuter friendly city.

Like you know, it’s tough to go play golf. Like I didn’t have a, I didn’t even have a car. So, like, I took the subway, you know. So like and yeah, we did golf simulator places weren’t really popular back then. Well, like they are now I mean, this is only like seven years ago, but, oh shit, no Longer than that, yeah, it’s 2024, but anyways, they weren’t as accessible. So, like you know, to go play golf I had to literally get on a subway, a bus, and then, you know, or take an Uber and no one really wants to do that Right. So that’s my first like exposure into golfers and I just learned more and more along the way, like doing TPI and all that stuff, to get to where I am now, to where I’m just training or just writing programs for golf.

0:28:39 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Right. And then you, you just recently how long ago did you move back to Oklahoma again After you were down in Jupiter?

0:28:46 – Cody Wescott
Yes, I mean with Washington DC in 2015, I know 2014 and then moved from. I moved all around. Then we went from Washington DC, my wife and I. Then we moved from there to Austin, texas. That’s when I really started working. You’ve been everywhere. Yeah, that’s when I really started working with a lot of golfers was down in Austin. You know I worked. I partnered with some swing coaches. There’s some guys at a simulator place in Austin called Rock ROK, rock Golf. I met a lot of golfers there. Yeah, I partnered with the swing coaches and trade. I traded out them. I would do sessions with them, I would train them in the gym and then they would give me swing lessons.

Oh, nice For a sweet deal, and then then we moved back to Washington DC, Then we moved down to Jupiter, Florida, and now we’re here. So then, back I’m called what they call it boomerang, since I left and came back. So back here. Yeah, been back here a little over a year.

0:29:43 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Awesome.

0:29:44 – Cody Wescott
Love it here.

0:29:45 – Jeff Pelizzaro
So I was kind of I was kind of going through some of your podcasts and you know some of the topics on there really stuck out to me and you know there are questions that people have about you know what is golf training, how do you implement golf training, how does it help your golf swing? And one of the things that you had posed a question of is you know what’s a golf exercise versus what’s a golf drill? Can you break that down a little bit, because it’s kind of a gray area that I think people get confused and, you know, frankly, can be confusing for us coaches as well.

0:30:16 – Cody Wescott
Oh yeah, I mean. So, yeah, you’re talking about the episode where I even asked my wife. I was like, hey, like please help me with like explaining this, because it is like very nuanced and like it can be kind of tricky to even explain this, so, yeah, so what I like to think about is like I work with the swing coach, right, he gives me a drill, that is, with a golf club in my hand, for my exact like swing issue. Right, and I think that you know that drill is much better served with a club in my hand. I don’t think I need to go try to turn that drill into grabbing a band or getting a kettle bell or something like that and try to make it into a fancy golf exercise, because it may not give me like enough like stimulus, right, like provide my body with like enough like reason, because we have the reason we exercise is that we give our body a reason to adapt to the exercise we’re doing, right, and recover and things like that. So if I’m taking this drill and like trying to turn it into an exercise, like make that exercise like might not be that stimulating to me, right, and it might not really just do a whole lot for my body. Like, it may not change my central nervous system, my ability, muscle, it might not gain mobility. It might, it’s, it’s going to.

It could just end up in no man’s land, right, where, as I’d be much better off just taking his drill with the golf club and doing it a thousand times like he told me to do. Right, instead of like, oh, let me get here, let me grab this band, or let me get a million of the other toys that I had to play with. And try to like, oh, here, what if I, you know, help my, you know, get in my pit depth? What if I do this and grab this kettle bell, but with this band, and you know?

But the thing is like, is that again? Is that stuff bad? Like, is it better than getting up off the couch? Absolutely Right. So I think, like, do what I need to do in the gym to make me more mobile, strong, you know, and powerful, right, instead of just messing up his drill that he gave me. If that makes like, yeah, so it’s very nuanced. But like, yeah, I think if you, if you take it out of context and try to turn in something that it shouldn’t be, it could be a problem.

0:32:20 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Yeah, it’s like what’s most efficient, right, like what are you best spent? What’s your time best spent on? Is it actually working on the skill or is it trying to come up with a way to kind of mimic it? But, like you said, if it doesn’t really create the adaptation, it’s almost like am I just kind of making stuff up? That is kind of wasting my time, where I could be either doing that drill or I could be lifting heavy or lifting something that’s going to provide a little bit more of that adaptation.

0:32:46 – Cody Wescott
Exactly so we can. You know, in social media we can kind of get ourselves in that trap, right, Because you know one of my, you know when you’re, I spent a lot of my time in big box gyms. You know what kind of listeners do you have? Like the other thing, I know what a big box gym is like.

0:33:02 – Jeff Pelizzaro
We’re talking like a gold’s gym or like a plan of fitness or yeah, I would say most of the listeners are either kind of the 35 plus golfers or a lot of people in our industry medical pros, fitness pros, all kind of tied into the golf world as well.

0:33:16 – Cody Wescott
So like a big box gym, like a gold’s well, a gold’s is a big company. They want to make money, right. So, like one of the things I’ll you know. So, as a trainer, as a fitness manager that I was you are there to make sales and one of the things the guy would tell me is like you know what? Hey, man, I know you’re here. When I was like a, when I was a new trainer, he was like hey, man, I know you’re here to like train people, help them out, like that’s whatever trainer wants. He was like, but you cannot train what you cannot obtain. So like you have to sell him.

Or now, in the day of social media, we have to like bring them in somehow. And usually the way you catch a golfer’s attention right is not by doing a 405 pound barbell back squat. It’s going to be by doing something that looks like it will help them with their golf. So I think we all have our guilty of that and like not for a bad reason, right, because it does help. But always tell people it’s kind of like the icing on the cake for like when it comes to golf fitness training, and I saw this firsthand when I worked I’ll just leave the gym nameless.

But one of the guys, like you know, posted a lot on social media and it was a lot of this, a lot of the mobility stuff, right. And when the guy came in to work with him, he like put them through his normal workout, which included, like I think it was like Bulgarian split squats. He had him doing co-ops, he had him doing you know, like a trap, bar deadlift or something like you know, just some stuff like that, along with some of the other things. That guy was like no, no, no, man, I can’t hear to do all the stuff on your social media. And I had to listen to him explain to the guy like, hey, no, no, actually, yes, we do that stuff, but here’s like the big chunk of how I train. And so, yeah, I think you know we do it for a reason, so we can obtain eyeballs. And then you get people to trust you and say, hey, yes, this drew you in, but here’s what else we’re going to do and this is why we need to do it.

0:35:03 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Yeah, I remember talking to a golf fitness pro that most people listening to this would know who he is. I don’t want to share his name, but him telling me years ago, like you know, you got to give him a little bit of the golfiness, right, because that’s why they’re there. You got to do this. And he’s like, maybe that’s you working on a one legged deadlift kind of position, but maybe you do throw a golf club in their hand, maybe you do, you know, make it a little, a little golf ish, as Charlie Weingroff would say, but because that’s there to give them the buy-in and then you can.

You know, we’ve always said here at 18STRONG, we kind of like we lull you in, like you’re saying we lull you in with the golf stuff, but we hopefully provide you with enough value where you then leave with, you know, more strength, more mobility, and you didn’t really know that you were coming for some of that stuff. But you then see the benefit of it and you know the balance and whatever those pieces are. But but yeah, we want to do what we want to do. So, as the clients they’re coming in, they want, they want to maybe hit some balls.

They want to maybe you know, put the strap on and pretend like they’re in their golf posture, and there’s nothing wrong with that as long as you understand, or as long as they understand, like, why we’re doing it and it’s not just because it’s a cool, fancy looking golf move, right?

0:36:17 – Cody Wescott
Oh, absolutely, and you know it goes back. I mean, it’s not just with golf, right. I mean, when you know, a big chunk of my career was training people, the general population that wants to lose weight what do most people think they need to do to lose weight? Cardio or something like very high intensity, like get really sweaty. So you know, at the end of the workout, right like we’re like 45, 50, 55 minutes into an hour long workout, what do you need to hit them with? You know you got to get them, got to get them sweaty, because that’s what they want, Right, like there’s nothing wrong with that.

You know, like, hey, I just got you through this strength training workout. Here’s going to be the meat potatoes of what we did. But you still have this belief and, like you know, I’m reading a book right now and, like you know, one of his laws is, like you know, you can’t change someone’s belief. And if people believe that they need to do this golf exercise or they need to do some cardio to lose weight, throw it in there, right, like let them do it because they believe that and that helps them like get to their end goal. And you know so, fitness is so much of a mind game, right. Two like not only I probably didn’t say game, but it’s like you know it’s, it’s a lot of it is up here.

0:37:21 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Yeah, and I truly believe that if that person doesn’t really know what the intention of them, whatever exercise program it is that they’re doing, they won’t get that result because it’s not focused in on that, even if they’re maybe doing the same exercises as somebody else that’s there for that goal. There’s something about you know that whole mind-body connection, or just connecting with the purpose of it. That kind of makes you do the other little ancillary things that you don’t even think about to get you closer to that goal. So, speaking of that, one other podcast topic that you had on your show was the idea of gaining muscle. So you know, I think that, first of all, this demographic often thinks that gaining muscle is kind of in the past. You know the guys that are at 35, 40, 45 plus. But then, especially if you’re on a golf program, is it possible to still gain muscle while still helping your golf game?

0:38:12 – Cody Wescott
Yeah, I mean I’m not going to say her flex on camera, but I think so. You know, a lot of it has to do with nutrition, right, like how you’re going, adequate protein, things like that to help you build lean tissue, right. But you know, when you progressively overload and you, you know, I think a lot of the. You know we used to think that muscle was built like mainly with volume, right, like high volume, like three sets of 10 or four sets of 10 was kind of like the name of the game and the bodybuilder world, right, those types of rep ranges to get adequate muscle hypertrophy. But you know, it’s just, it’s mechanical tension, and so you got to get in some hard reps, like in my, in my programs, I make sure to put in, you know, like RPE or like reps in reserve, like you know the rate of perceived exertion or reps in reserve, so that way you can get that, you know, close to failure, so that way you can build muscle mass right, and it’s going to look.

I think what’s interesting is people don’t understand that that muscle looks different on everybody, right, like whatever your body composition is, like I have short limbs, like I’m only five, six, and like I have short arms. I have short legs. Like it looks like I have a, you know it looks like I’m huge, but like I mean or not huge, but I have a small area here to pack in the muscle, right, I’m not tall, you know, so like, but it just looks different on everyone. I think the people miss the nutrition part and you know I know some people are afraid to bulk up. Like I don’t need to, you know, get all big and stuff like that, and it’s like, trust me, like it’s really not going to happen as much as I would love it to happen, cause like I would be freaking jacked if I could get any you know like get any bigger, like I would be there because that’s what I want, cause I like that, cause I’m I’m a meathead at heart, right, but I’m doing all specific training.

Yeah, I mean, I get that all the time where people like, hey, you know, here I’m doing your like it’s usually cause I offer a free trial. So people like start the trial and like, hey, man, there’s only like two chest exercises in here and I don’t see any arms. Like you know what? Like I want that stuff. Like can I add that in? I’m like why don’t you just give it a shot here? We got heavy pulls, we got tons of rowing, there’s pressing, there’s pushups, there’s all this kind of stuff. Like we’ve got swaths, this total body. You are going to build muscle. If you, if you, if you, if you do the workouts and you check the box and you mail it in, you’re not, you know you’re not going to get anything Right, like, even if you do that with mobility, like mobility is like I think you had a doctor, kyle, on here, right, yeah, yeah, you even talked about getting sore during mobility.

I loved hearing that. Like, yeah, you got to push your mobility right. Like you know, you shouldn’t check in anything or check the box on anything. Like go hard on your mobility, like go for it. Same thing with like your power, like all your, all your exercises should be like you should be like get putting some effort into it and your body will respond to that if you give it like proper nutrients to build that up. And so I think, yeah, that’s one thing you know in my programs. Like my wife, my wife’s a nutrition coach. She wrote like an ebook that goes along with our, our lip heavy, swing fast. It’s called eat to perform. It’s not only like, it’s your nutrition, help your body composition, but it also helps your performance too. So very important. But yes, to answer your question, go all the way back around. I straw, I mean I’m, I feel like I’m living proof of like yeah, you can get pretty good sized muscles from doing a golf specific program.

0:41:31 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Yeah, and the fact that when you do, or if you do, have a good amount of muscle mass, you can still move very well. You watch your golf swing. On some of your videos you crush a ball. I saw what it was 171 ball speed on the one. Just the one swing that I saw on the website.

0:41:47 – Cody Wescott
Oh yeah.

0:41:49 – Jeff Pelizzaro
I’m like people think that big, strong, athletic-looking builds may not be able to move very well through a golf swing. But when you’re doing the right things, you’re training the right way and you’re not even though you know meet heads at heart even, but you know doing it the right way for the golf swing, you can still create a lot of movement and mobility and that athletic motion without suffering, even though you’re building muscle mass.

0:42:12 – Cody Wescott
Yeah, and I think you know one of the topics I hammer on a lot is like is bodybuilding, because bodybuilding is popular and I think that’s what a lot of people just realize. I think that’s like the only way to train right. It’s like leg day, back day, chest day, stuff like that. Yeah, I think the common misconception out there is that like a bodybuilder, someone with a lot of muscle, is like not flexible or they’re not mobile. But I can show you tons of pictures online of like Roddy Coleman you know he is just massive man. Oh yeah, he can like do the splits Right.

Like these guys are super mo they run into a problem right when their soft tissue gets so big that like say, like you know, their biceps and their pecs like hit each other and they can’t like physically grip like a golf club right. Like they are so massive that they like they’re handsy like this close together. I know a guy like that. He was my physical therapist in down in Jupiter and that’s only when it becomes a problem and most people like, unless they take a little bit of something something you know I’m talking about like they’re never, ever going to get that close right.

And like I’m a decent sized guy and, like I told my swing coach, justin Kraft, I was like hey, man, look at my swing, my body can do whatever you tell me it needs to do. Like I’m mobile, I can get in whatever position. So don’t hold back. Like if I need to rotate my hip and you know, rotate my thoracic spine and get good hip depth and do this and do that. Like tell me and I will figure it. My body can get there, I just don’t learn how to do it.

0:43:42 – Jeff Pelizzaro
There’s another point that you’ve made that I really like, and some of the coaches on that are listening to this may not love that we bring this up, but you say that you don’t need a personal trainer.

0:43:54 – Cody Wescott
Right Like yeah.

0:43:56 – Jeff Pelizzaro
So let’s talk about that a little bit, because I’ve had conversations about this and this is coming from a guy that still works with a lot of people in the gym on a daily basis. I still do a lot of in-person training, but I think there’s a lot to be said for this statement of that people don’t need a personal trainer.

0:44:15 – Cody Wescott
Yeah, so where do I begin with that?

0:44:17 – Jeff Pelizzaro
Wherever you want man, Just let it run.

0:44:18 – Cody Wescott
You’re not going to link my phone over on here. Are you Like people harassing?

0:44:23 – Jeff Pelizzaro
me. No, you’re just your social media.

0:44:25 – Cody Wescott
Yeah, that’s fine, those are full of stuff anyways. Yeah, so I mean, I was a personal trainer for a long time. I still am, right, and I get it Like it’s a business, absolutely. But I always felt my job was to be an educator and not to like overly educate and talk, like you’ll probably notice, Like I don’t think I’ve said a very big word yet and I probably won’t, just because that’s not how I speak to people and I don’t speak that way to my clients, like I want to educate them, like here’s why we’re doing this, here’s how you need to do it, because everyone needs to do it differently, right, like everyone needs a squat, but you don’t have to back squat, but everyone should squat or split squat or whatever, and each person is going to do it differently just because of the way they move and the way their anatomy is, and so on and so forth. So my job is an educator and I always feel that you know that old saying like you can teach a man to fish all that you know, whatever. Yep, everyone knows how that goes. So I always feel like that was my job.

Now here’s where, like now, personal training is expensive and if someone can afford it and they enjoy you right, they should keep training with you. Like I always told my clients, like I am going and this was like one of my sales pitches. Part of it I was like, hey, I’m going to teach you enough to where you can do this on your own. Now my job is also to have you enjoy working with me so much. See the results and see that I can keep bringing value to the table, that you still keep paying me, right, and the people that people will believe that, like, they appreciate the honesty, like, okay, yeah, you know I can afford to keep paying you. And there’s also the accountability piece and, like you know, you do get better results. Like when someone is watching you and pushing you and motivating you and you’re held accountable to a schedule. Like you’re not going to, you know, because I think most trainers probably ha