How To Avoid Back Pain While Playing Golf

We do see a lot of keen golf players here at The Mayfair Clinic, and it’s quite common to experience back pain after a game of golf or after a session at the driving range. In this week’s article, we’ll be covering why you might be getting it, how you can avoid it and a few little tweaks you can make to help improve your play.

How can golf cause back pain

So what factors. In a game of golf might lead you to suffer from golf? One of the most important reasons, is the amount of bending over or bending forwards that occurs over the course of a game. Bending forward motions in general, no matter what sport you’re playing, can cause more pressure to affect the discs in the lower back in particular. When you bend forwards, you shift your weight onto the discs. Alone, this can compress them – but when combined with regular poor posture – it can be enough to cause a lot of irritation in the back. Too much compression on your discs can result in eventually bulging or herniating a disc, which will cause much more constant pain and potentially affect your everyday life on a much bigger scale than the odd ache or pain here and there. If you’re putting your discs in your lower back under stress, it’s quite common to feel like you need to stretch out your back or experiencing a ‘squashed’ feeling.

Rotation in golf causing back pain

The next most common potential cause of irritation in your back can come from rotation of varying degrees. Rotation on its own would not be particularly problematic, but the issue stems from it being combined with bending forwards. The degree of variation in the rotation comes from the different movements involved in more subtle movements like putting, to the more of a fast swing of a drive. Rotation in combination with the bending forwards can put even further stress on your discs. The variety in the movement can be a triggering factor on its own, since you might be putting extra force behind those two movements, it increases the compressive load as the muscles really tighten up to support the golf swing. With a drive, that compression is going to be much higher than any of the other movements. Combining those movements, the rotation into flexion (bending forwards) and the contraction of the muscles, challenge those lower back muscles more than your normal everyday activities. In addition, it’s obviously a repetitive sport involving similar movements through a number of hours on the course. These movements all repeated will start to wear certain joints if you’re not careful and taking steps to make your life easier.

After you’ve finished your round of golf, acknowledge it’s been 9-18 holes of very repetitive activity that’s going to have stressed out your body. Do you have a routine to help warm down at the end? Applying an ice pack to the bottom of your lower back, right on the area your belt would usually sit, for no more than 5 minutes at a time, two or three times in the evening after your game or after you’ve been to the driving range to take down the inflammation. It will also help to improve the circulation into the area which will be helpful for helping to heal your body. These steps can help not let any problems build up. The biggest mistake we see in patients that visit us, is that they often let their back pain get to the point where it’s significantly affecting their everyday life before seeking treatment. When back pain eventually stops them from being able to do the thing they enjoy the most, it can cause them a lot of stress at not being able to take part in their hobby. Don’t let the problem get too far, and take action to prevent a problem becoming one that affects all of your activities in your life.

If you can make these amendments in your routine when playing golf, you should find that your back pain doesn’t ever get out of sorts, or too far along, that you can’t actually play. We see quite regularly when back pain becomes too much that they no longer find enjoyment in practicing and playing golf, and it can really upset the patient. Make the changes, avoid carrying your bag if at all possible and do you best to make sure that you’re setting yourself up correctly to perform the swing, even in the later stages of a game in the back en dog the course. Let the lower back curve come through so you’ve got better alignment, and use a little bit of ice on your lower back after you’ve played to make sure you get a handle on the inflammation. If you do find your back pain to start affecting you, book in to see a professional who can assess your back. That way you can get answers as to what the problem is, some stretches or exercises that can make you stronger and remedy the situation, or provide some treatment to help the pressure off your back. With a more tailored personal approach to dealing with your back with reference to you playing golf and get you playing better and back playing as quickly as possible.

We hope this article has been helpful, and if you’ve got any questions about your golf game, or how your back’s being affected by playing golf, please feel free to get in touch by emailing us at info@themayfairclinic.com or calling us on 0203 947 3222, and we’ll do our best to answer all of your questions and be as helpful as possible.