Tiger Woods Knee and now Elbow (or is it wrist) Injuries
See the post before this one first, please.
It is NOT about Tiger. He IS the most supreme athlete in the world, one whom a worthy coach could make into a super-human performer.
Worthy meaning one who has at least a basic understanding of every single topic related to golf – be in anatomy, biomechanics, injury causation, the psychology of sport or exercise physiology. Not to mention fitness and nutrition.
So, you’re asking, get to the point, WHAT ABOUT his knee and elbow/wrist?
Well, he has such a violent movement starting down (wasted, actually, as the golf swing is surely meant to be a back and through movement, propelling the ball target-ward, is it not?), that as his body is trying to rotate to produce maximum power from the ground up, his knees and wrists have to straighten out from awkward positions, at great speed, and when they cannot ALL unbend and untwist in time, WHAM, something gets left behind, or comes in the way, and he has injury.
SEE the two detailed analyses in the Walking the Talk section of this blog.
And yet the ‘experts’ (tom Watson included) among us say that his up and down movement is great (it’s called a countermove-jump and produces a lot of upward propulsion for basketballers) and other things about his movements are great too, and similarly look at other superior golfers to show us what we should be doing. Ironically the same movements that the pros might get away with for longer can create injury in slower-moving, less adept people in less time.
The moral of the story: this is the 21st century folks, get with it, get a swing which takes into account NOT ONLY how the club needs to be delivered for maximum power and straight direction BUT ALSO how the human body can do it best.
