Golf is one of the most popular recreational sports around. In our office many patients in a wide age range play golf not only recreationally but also professionally. Golf can be great for staying active and even for stress relief. One of the biggest questions we receive when some one comes in is either, “how long until I can get back out on the course” or if there is no current injury, “how can this improve my game.” In this blog we want to talk about some of the most common injuries we see regarding golf and some simple things that can be done to help improve your game and hopefully prevent future injuries.
Let’s first talk about 3 of the most common complaints we have seen with golfers:
Low back pain
Elbow pain
Shoulder pain
Now each of these 3 may seem like they are not related, but when it comes to golf, they have much more in common than you think. These injuries most likely occur from one of two problems:
1. Repetitive motion
2. Poor movement patterns
Let’s focus on how these problems can lead to injury. First repetitive motion, this is something that can be easy to figure, but hard to fix because golf is a game of repetitive motions. Swinging, walking, and putting all are putting repetitive stress on all the areas talked about above. The body is meant to be put under a certain amount of stress and movements in its joints. When we exceed this allotted amount, it can lead to injury. Everyone’s allotted amount is different due to body composition and genetics. One way to think of it is as the amount of revolutions on a tire before it needs to be changed. Once you hit that number the tire can have damage from something that before never would’ve caused a problem. The same can be said for your body.
Next let’s talk about poor movement patterns. Poor movement patterns can have an unbelievably bad effect on our body. When we move poorly, we are asking our muscles and joints to preform excess duties that they are not made to perform. It’s like asking a sprinter in the 100m dash to run a marathon. They have not been training for that type of race so they will eventually end up braking down. It’s the same thing that happens with the body with poor movement patterns. When you aren’t moving properly you end up injuring body parts due to asking them to do something that they don’t usually do. If you’re swinging, walking, or putting with a poor movement pattern through hundreds if not thousands of times at the course or driving range you are bound to create an injury somewhere along the body.
These two problems are intertwined. If you have poor movement patterns from bad posture, decreased range of motion, a prior injury, or muscular instability. Then tie in the repetitive movements on the golf course, then this can accelerate the likelihood of an injury. Our goal at APM is to get rid your pain, help increase your range of motion, and correct faulty movement patterns/muscle imbalances. We feel that when we can correct the above then we can help prevent the likelihood of future injury, get you out of pain and back on the golf course!
With that said, golf is a physically demanding and highly repetitive sport. Even golfers who optimize all of the above may fall victim to the dreaded golf injury. However, if you address the above, you will have less injury frequency, severity, and recovery time. We can help you get there! Hit us up at APM and make an appointment to help you get back on your game!
