Chiva-Som Hua Hin, perhaps the most famous spa resort in Thailand, has a new Total Golf Enhancement wellness clinic, where experts poke, prod, spa and sate you all in the name of improving your game. We sent our resident avid but self-described inflexible golfer to the heath retreat to see if he could up his swing and break 100. Watch the video here.
IT CAN BE A STRUGGLE to perform when someone is observing with a critical eye.
And such is the case in the gym at health retreat Chiva-Som, where my golf movement guru Chaiyong ‘Oh’ Wongtungjaroensuk is watching me struggle to stretch towards my knees, let alone the promised land of my shins and toes.
I’m performing a program of exercises and movements designed to help Khun Oh determine my upper-body mobility and lower-body stability, the correct balance of which is integral to any successful golf game.
I’m a sturdy, strapping lad with a rugby player physique and limited finesse. Therefore, I had never expected to impress an expert with my feats of flexibility. Nevertheless, the concerned expression on Oh’s face as we end the assessment is giving me pause for thought.
“Well, there’s plenty to work on,” he says, showing me a sheet of paper peppered with negative red crosses next to each exercise. “I can tell you have a lot of strength, but power alone will never help you improve your game.”
I only met Oh this morning, but he’s already nailed the fatal chink in my golfing armory. My failure to marry my ability to give a golf ball a good, meaty whack with consistency is why I’m under the microscope here at Chiva-Som, beachfront on the Gulf of Thailand, as part of its Total Golf Enhancement personal clinic.
Arguably Thailand’s most renowned health facility (which last year opened its first international outpost, in Qatar), Chiva-Som is famous for an array of retreats ranging from detox and weight management to cranial relief for migraine sufferers and cell vitality to support recovering cancer patients.
Introduced prior to the pandemic, the Total Golf Enhancement program provides expertise in golf fitness and swing biomechanics—the analysis of human motion using the principles of physics and physiology.
This is an area in which Oh—head trainer at Chiva-Som and a former pro golfer himself—excels. The program also offers related treatments in essential areas such as post-game muscle recovery, relaxation, and skincare.
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Soaking in the spa relaxation area
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I’m intrigued by the prospect of addressing some of my game’s fatal flaws in such a gilded environment. My uncle was a pro golfer, and I was born within a few lusty tee shots of the Old Course at St. Andrews. Therefore, it was inevitable that I would fall for the Royal and Ancient pastime invented on the windswept dunes of my homeland.
I first picked up a club when I was around five and harbored what I felt were realistic hopes of being a decent player, if not the next Seve Ballesteros. The step up in level never quite happened, and these days I’m delighted to break 100.
With that modest target in mind, Oh and I set out to Banyan Golf Club, one of the several first-class layouts near Hua Hin. Other championship options in the area (Thailand is pretty great for golf) for total enhancement clinic participants include Black Mountain and Seapine.
Even so, some of Oh’s initial simple advice about shifting weight distribution in my legs, positioning the ball further back in my stance, and counting a 1-2 tempo to regulate my breakneck swing speed seems to be making a difference. My game doesn’t exactly burn bright in the hot summer sun, but some green shoots are sprouting from the usual muck.
Post-round, my aching muscles are eased by a deep-tissue massage followed by an aloe wrap to rehydrate my sun-blasted skin. Afterward, I luxuriate in the healthy lifestyle that is Chivasom’s calling card.
Laid out in lush beach-front grounds just south of the center of Hua Hin — Thailand’s most venerable beach town — the property is an absolute stunner.
Guests tend not to leave the resort much during their stay, preferring to partake of the over a dozen health and wellness classes a day, luxuriate in the separate male and female spas, and graze on outstanding wellness cuisine dishes such as zucchini spaghetti with pesto and a gaeng massaman with ossobuco.
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Pa ram rong soung
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Salmon pepper fondue
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Cleansing diet set
I do all of these and place an extra focus on yoga and breath exercises with ace instructor Kamlesh Kumar. Poor flexibility and a busy, scattered mind are among the main ailments driving my golf handicap skywards.
The next day, I’m back in the gym with Oh to conclude our program. He runs me through a tailored sequence of exercises and movements that, if performed regularly, will improve my coordination and fuse my natural power with better control.
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Ocean Premium Room living area
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Leelawadee Suite terrace with Jacuzzi
As I prepare to depart, he produces my scorecard from the round at Banyan. It shows as 100, an agonizing stroke shy of my goal of coming in under a ton. “I saw that the caddy marked you down wrongly at a hole,” says Oh. “That takes you to 99.”
From nearly man to century-smasher in the time it takes to call “fore”: Now that’s what I call golf enhancement.
The Details
Hua Hin a 3.5-hour drive from Bangkok, though also accessible by private airstrip or local train. Five-night Total Golf Enhancement at Chiva-Som, from THB150,000++ (approx. USD4,200), rate valid through Sept. 30, 2023, and includes three wellness cuisine meals per day, health and wellness activities, golf enhancement activities including golf fitness assessment and training, a daily spa treatment, and a round of golf at Seapine Golf Course, with options to play at Banyan and Black Mountain courses for additional charges.
BOOK YOUR STAY AT CHIVA-SOM INTERNATIONAL HEALTH RESORT HUA HIN VIA AGODA.COM
Images courtesy of Chiva-Som, unless otherwise noted.
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