April 11, 2025 • 10 mins
In this episode of the Golf Fitness Bomb Squad, host Chris Finn discusses the top misconceptions about injuries in golfers, emphasizing that injuries are not solely caused by playing too much but rather by ignoring recovery and proper mechanics. He highlights the importance of mobility alongside strength training to prevent injuries and explains how many injuries can be predicted based on physical limitations and swing mechanics. The episode encourages golfers to assess their mobility and understand that injuries can be prevented with the right information and practices.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Chris fit is really the game teaching these guys to
get bigger and stronger and faster, and we're going to
blade him.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Just a fantastic cystostic. It doesn't get old.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Welcome to the golf in Is Bomb Squad. I'm your host,
Chris Finn, and today we're going to be breaking down
the top three misconceptions about what really causes injuries and
golfers and how you can predict your own risk. So
it's going to be a game changer for your golf routine.
So I think one of the coolest things the number one,
just as an example, like we'll stat the number one
(00:38):
predictor of low back pain and golfers think about it.
Can you guess what it is? It's actually one of
the four road recenters. So you have hips, shoulders, t spine, neck,
any guesses, any guesses, any guesses. If you are thinking
lead hip internal rotation being limited, you are correct. So
that's actually and this is what we're going to kind
(00:59):
of dive in to a good amount. But that's that's
one of the stats out there that we know is
if that lead hips left hip for a right handed
player left hip or a right handed player, if those
that lead hip is limited in the internal and how
much internal rotation it has. You have the number one, uh,
you know, basically risk factor for having back pain when
(01:21):
you play. And we well know that well over fifty
percent of golfers have back pain. So it's a big,
big issue that is actually pretty easily addressed. But anyway,
well so let's let's let's dive into the first misconception,
which is that injuries are caused by playing too much.
So injuries honestly don't come from playing too much. They
(01:42):
come from ignoring proper recovery, warm ups, poor mechanics, basically
things that will lower your threshold of what you're able to,
your resiliency, threshold of what you're able to tolerate, and
when you exceed that amount, and that's then you know,
things will start to break down. So golf obviously nobody's
hitting you. Nobody's like, you know, tackling you unexpectedly. Like
(02:05):
it's not a contact sport unless you're getting hit by
your buddy's shank or you know, a thin bunker shot
that comes out and kind of hitch you know, hitch
you in the knee and bruises you. It's generally your
injuries and golf are coming from repetitive injury, so elbows, backs, risks,
those sorts of things. Obviously, you can have an impact injury,
like if you hit a root or something. But for
the most part, the aches and pains and tweaks that
(02:27):
we get as golfers are not due from playing too much.
They're caused by doing things that are beyond what your
body can hold, you know. So you know, I think
one of the number one things that you can do
is to figure out how big that threshold is by
you know, the home assessment is a great tool to start,
and you know that you obviously we'll have the link
(02:50):
in the show notes as usual, but that home assessment
starts obviously with the mobility centers. We can then look
at your your power numbers, which gives us some insight
into your strength and obviously then compare you to other
golfers your age and your clubhead speeds and that's you know,
happy to jump on a call with you guys, we
do it for free, but that's where we can dive
into all that information say hey, you know, this is
where you're at, this is where your capacity is, and
(03:11):
we have our safe swing speed calculator, so we can
identify and say, hey, fifty five or safe swing speed
based on your physical metrics and your age is you know,
one hundred miles an hour and you're currently swinging one
hundred and five like you are a ticking time bomb,
like you're going. You're doing more than what your body
can handle. So if that's in this case, that guy
(03:31):
who plays a lot and doesn't do anything to correct
that has a much higher risk of getting hurt. So
you know, versus the one who maybe you know, same
age you know, but they're safe swing speed, maybe they
swing five miles an hour below what their safe swing
speed is. Right, those two guys can play the exact
same number of rounds, play the same number of hours practicing.
(03:54):
The guy who's safe swing speed is below what he's
actually swinging is much more likely to get hurt. So
it's not that you're playing too much. It's too much.
I think is used as just like this absolute like
you played three times a week instead of twice a week,
and that's too much. I know plenty of people who
play three times a week and don't have any issues,
and people who played four times a week. It done
(04:15):
five times a week, right, it's not about how much
you're playing, it's about how much you're playing relative to
what your body can handle. So that's an important one
about this first misconception that I want to make sure
that you guys all understand is if you want to
play more, that's totally fine. And maybe right now you're
playing too much what your body can handle right now.
But with science and data, word is, guys in the
golf fitness space, you know it, it's very fixable, preventable.
(04:40):
And actually I had lunch the other day. We had
our we have our in person accelerators that we've started
recently where people fly in for three day experiences. They're
freaking awesome. Part of the last day, you know, some
of them, I'll actually go out and play. So I
this last one, I went out and played with with
the guys the group that was there, and it was
really impactful. One of the guys we're having lunch before
(05:00):
we went played, he goes, You know, I never realized
that golf fitness isn't like what we do or what
you do it p f us golf and he goes,
I didn't realize it wasn't just workout so that we
would actually was going to connect which I'm trying to
address in my swing, and you guys would take a
look at the swing and identify the physical limitations that
are impacting it and work with my golf pro And
you know, we use Mustard Mustard Golf, so we have
(05:23):
AI that we'll use to get some objective measures like
all of that. Like these guys, you know, this is
a bunch of our remote clients flying in from all
over the country. And I think that's you know, because
you're looking at the whole picture. That's why you're able.
That's how you're able to identify what's too much and
what are the elements that we need to address to
to impact it positively. So the second misconception that we
(05:46):
had is that strength training is all you need to
do to prevent injuries. So it's actually, you know, not true.
While strength is important, and I always commonly will say
that strength is like putting non layers of armor when
you're going to battle. The more armor you have, the better. Unfortunately,
if you can't move because that armor is so heavy,
(06:08):
you'll be a slow moving target and.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
You'll still get hit.
Speaker 1 (06:12):
And that's so that's in the golf side, of things
for your body. Yes, strength is important, but if you're
neglecting flexibility and mobility, that's going to lead to imbalances,
which then can lead to injuries. Right, So we'll use
that lead hip example from you know, from earlier in
the episode. If you're really really strong and you can
create a lot of force, but you have no mobility
into your lead side, you're just gonna run really really
(06:33):
hard into a brick wall repeatedly.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
And that's gonna hurt.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
So, you know, I think one of the this is
super common, particularly in men. You guys, we get strong,
you know, when we're younger, and you kind of maintain
a lot of that, particularly upper body strength as you
get older. But then you don't you sit at a job,
you're at a desk, you just you don't work on
the correct mobility stuff. And stretching your hamstrings is not
(06:57):
doesn't count. Actually, it doesn't really matter for the golf.
In other areas it may have it does have some impacts,
but for your golf swing, being able to touch your toes doesn't.
It literally hasn't. No, it doesn't matter. So but I
think that you know, kind of a quick quick tip
for if you feel like this may be you or
you kind of resonates that you feel like you have
a lot of strength, but you just can't let it
out in the golf swing, like you feel like, man,
(07:18):
I should be hitting it so much farther than I am.
There's guys that are way weaker than I am that
just hit it past me or more or more consistent.
It's usually because there's a mobility limitation and you've got
the strength without the mobility. And I would use the
analogies as like you have a caged gorilla and we
got to let the grill out and like literally just
adding ten minutes a day and knowing what to do
like in four four weeks or last like you're going
(07:39):
to see some massive games.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
We see this all the time. And I was talking
about the accelerator earlier.
Speaker 1 (07:44):
We had a guy come on this there just recently,
and like literally in the two days he was here,
he picked up like fifteen degrees of hit mobility, right
and he was at fifteen, So he doubled it in
two days and it's sticking. And so I think that's
like I'll say it's one of the cool things about
the excels As we get guys in and you make
a little tweak and it just you know, unlocks a bunch.
But it speaks to how quickly you know you can
(08:06):
actually correct this limitation if this is you. Obviously, the
final and third misconception is that it's just bad luck
if you get injured, like you're inevitably going to get
hurt and there's nothing you can do about it. And
in fact, most of the injuries are pretty predictable, not
necessarily when they will happen, but if they are going
to happen. It's a lot of times when you just
(08:27):
layer poor swing mechanics on top of bad mobility, on
top of weakness, on top of fatigue or not recovering
well and like all these things that just kind of
continue to stack and snowball to your risk profiles, making
them high and high and higher.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
It's it's kind of easy to spot from a mile
away when the stuff's going to happen.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
So they really, they aren't, you know, inevitable, they aren't
bad luck. And there certainly are there some that you
check the ground for a root and you think you're good,
and you swing and you hit, and you smash a
rock that you didn't see and you crack your Like, yeah,
bad luck happens like everywhere, but injuries in general for
golf are pretty predictable. Of like you can pick kind
of people out, like who's going to have issues, who's
swinging faster than what their body can handle, you know,
(09:08):
who doesn't have the mobility, you know, whatever it may be.
And that's the beauty of the home assessment and everything
we do. And like I can't tell you enough of
like a sess, but don't guess, Like this is all
measurable stuff guys, and you can do.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
It yourself for free at home. Please.
Speaker 1 (09:23):
If you're noticing a common theme here, I want you
guys to help yourselves. I want you to have the
information and just to spell these myths because they really
just rbs. So you know, I think just to rab
this is a quick one today. I just wanted to
kind of knock these three out and just kind of
they were hearing a couple of people talking about them
at the accelerator when they were all here in town,
and it was.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
Like it's like, dude, these are just so not correct.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
But you know, I think the big takeaways would be
like warm up, warming up, mobility, work, pay attention to
your body. You know, it sounds small, but this is
really the secret to staying pain free on the course
and playing the game for a really really long time time.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
So yeah, I just i'd.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
Really encourage you guys test your mobility, you know, and
really kind of like just know and understand that injuries
are not random, like you can prevent them.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
And so you know, we have the link out asleep
for the home assessments.
Speaker 1 (10:14):
Check that out it it'd be really cool for you guys,
you know, and you know, message let me know, like
on social whatever it is, like, just let us let
me know, let us know like what you find and
you obviously we'd love to help you figure out how
to fix that, but at the very least, like we
just want you to have the right information. So today,
thanks again for hanging out with me here on the
the golf in this boun squad. If you found us helpful,
(10:35):
please share it with a golf buddy. Uh And and
definitely don't forget to follow the podcast for all the
tips that we put Now We've got some great guest
episodes coming up for you guys. Uh and as always,
appreciate appreciate your time. We'll catch you the next episode
Chris fit is really the game teaching these guys to
get bigger and stronger and faster, and we're going to
blade him.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Just a fantastic cystostic. It doesn't get old.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Welcome to the golf in Is Bomb Squad. I'm your host,
Chris Finn, and today we're going to be breaking down
the top three misconceptions about what really causes injuries and
golfers and how you can predict your own risk. So
it's going to be a game changer for your golf routine.
So I think one of the coolest things the number one,
just as an example, like we'll stat the number one
(00:38):
predictor of low back pain and golfers think about it.
Can you guess what it is? It's actually one of
the four road recenters. So you have hips, shoulders, t spine, neck,
any guesses, any guesses, any guesses. If you are thinking
lead hip internal rotation being limited, you are correct. So
that's actually and this is what we're going to kind
(00:59):
of dive in to a good amount. But that's that's
one of the stats out there that we know is
if that lead hips left hip for a right handed
player left hip or a right handed player, if those
that lead hip is limited in the internal and how
much internal rotation it has. You have the number one, uh,
you know, basically risk factor for having back pain when
(01:21):
you play. And we well know that well over fifty
percent of golfers have back pain. So it's a big,
big issue that is actually pretty easily addressed. But anyway,
well so let's let's let's dive into the first misconception,
which is that injuries are caused by playing too much.
So injuries honestly don't come from playing too much. They
(01:42):
come from ignoring proper recovery, warm ups, poor mechanics, basically
things that will lower your threshold of what you're able to,
your resiliency, threshold of what you're able to tolerate, and
when you exceed that amount, and that's then you know,
things will start to break down. So golf obviously nobody's
hitting you. Nobody's like, you know, tackling you unexpectedly. Like
(02:05):
it's not a contact sport unless you're getting hit by
your buddy's shank or you know, a thin bunker shot
that comes out and kind of hitch you know, hitch
you in the knee and bruises you. It's generally your
injuries and golf are coming from repetitive injury, so elbows, backs, risks,
those sorts of things. Obviously, you can have an impact injury,
like if you hit a root or something. But for
the most part, the aches and pains and tweaks that
(02:27):
we get as golfers are not due from playing too much.
They're caused by doing things that are beyond what your
body can hold, you know. So you know, I think
one of the number one things that you can do
is to figure out how big that threshold is by
you know, the home assessment is a great tool to start,
and you know that you obviously we'll have the link
(02:50):
in the show notes as usual, but that home assessment
starts obviously with the mobility centers. We can then look
at your your power numbers, which gives us some insight
into your strength and obviously then compare you to other
golfers your age and your clubhead speeds and that's you know,
happy to jump on a call with you guys, we
do it for free, but that's where we can dive
into all that information say hey, you know, this is
where you're at, this is where your capacity is, and
(03:11):
we have our safe swing speed calculator, so we can
identify and say, hey, fifty five or safe swing speed
based on your physical metrics and your age is you know,
one hundred miles an hour and you're currently swinging one
hundred and five like you are a ticking time bomb,
like you're going. You're doing more than what your body
can handle. So if that's in this case, that guy
(03:31):
who plays a lot and doesn't do anything to correct
that has a much higher risk of getting hurt. So
you know, versus the one who maybe you know, same
age you know, but they're safe swing speed, maybe they
swing five miles an hour below what their safe swing
speed is. Right, those two guys can play the exact
same number of rounds, play the same number of hours practicing.
(03:54):
The guy who's safe swing speed is below what he's
actually swinging is much more likely to get hurt. So
it's not that you're playing too much. It's too much.
I think is used as just like this absolute like
you played three times a week instead of twice a week,
and that's too much. I know plenty of people who
play three times a week and don't have any issues,
and people who played four times a week. It done
(04:15):
five times a week, right, it's not about how much
you're playing, it's about how much you're playing relative to
what your body can handle. So that's an important one
about this first misconception that I want to make sure
that you guys all understand is if you want to
play more, that's totally fine. And maybe right now you're
playing too much what your body can handle right now.
But with science and data, word is, guys in the
golf fitness space, you know it, it's very fixable, preventable.
(04:40):
And actually I had lunch the other day. We had
our we have our in person accelerators that we've started
recently where people fly in for three day experiences. They're
freaking awesome. Part of the last day, you know, some
of them, I'll actually go out and play. So I
this last one, I went out and played with with
the guys the group that was there, and it was
really impactful. One of the guys we're having lunch before
(05:00):
we went played, he goes, You know, I never realized
that golf fitness isn't like what we do or what
you do it p f us golf and he goes,
I didn't realize it wasn't just workout so that we
would actually was going to connect which I'm trying to
address in my swing, and you guys would take a
look at the swing and identify the physical limitations that
are impacting it and work with my golf pro And
you know, we use Mustard Mustard Golf, so we have
(05:23):
AI that we'll use to get some objective measures like
all of that. Like these guys, you know, this is
a bunch of our remote clients flying in from all
over the country. And I think that's you know, because
you're looking at the whole picture. That's why you're able.
That's how you're able to identify what's too much and
what are the elements that we need to address to
to impact it positively. So the second misconception that we
(05:46):
had is that strength training is all you need to
do to prevent injuries. So it's actually, you know, not true.
While strength is important, and I always commonly will say
that strength is like putting non layers of armor when
you're going to battle. The more armor you have, the better. Unfortunately,
if you can't move because that armor is so heavy,
(06:08):
you'll be a slow moving target and.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
You'll still get hit.
Speaker 1 (06:12):
And that's so that's in the golf side, of things
for your body. Yes, strength is important, but if you're
neglecting flexibility and mobility, that's going to lead to imbalances,
which then can lead to injuries. Right, So we'll use
that lead hip example from you know, from earlier in
the episode. If you're really really strong and you can
create a lot of force, but you have no mobility
into your lead side, you're just gonna run really really
(06:33):
hard into a brick wall repeatedly.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
And that's gonna hurt.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
So, you know, I think one of the this is
super common, particularly in men. You guys, we get strong,
you know, when we're younger, and you kind of maintain
a lot of that, particularly upper body strength as you
get older. But then you don't you sit at a job,
you're at a desk, you just you don't work on
the correct mobility stuff. And stretching your hamstrings is not
(06:57):
doesn't count. Actually, it doesn't really matter for the golf.
In other areas it may have it does have some impacts,
but for your golf swing, being able to touch your toes doesn't.
It literally hasn't. No, it doesn't matter. So but I
think that you know, kind of a quick quick tip
for if you feel like this may be you or
you kind of resonates that you feel like you have
a lot of strength, but you just can't let it
out in the golf swing, like you feel like, man,
(07:18):
I should be hitting it so much farther than I am.
There's guys that are way weaker than I am that
just hit it past me or more or more consistent.
It's usually because there's a mobility limitation and you've got
the strength without the mobility. And I would use the
analogies as like you have a caged gorilla and we
got to let the grill out and like literally just
adding ten minutes a day and knowing what to do
like in four four weeks or last like you're going
(07:39):
to see some massive games.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
We see this all the time. And I was talking
about the accelerator earlier.
Speaker 1 (07:44):
We had a guy come on this there just recently,
and like literally in the two days he was here,
he picked up like fifteen degrees of hit mobility, right
and he was at fifteen, So he doubled it in
two days and it's sticking. And so I think that's
like I'll say it's one of the cool things about
the excels As we get guys in and you make
a little tweak and it just you know, unlocks a bunch.
But it speaks to how quickly you know you can
(08:06):
actually correct this limitation if this is you. Obviously, the
final and third misconception is that it's just bad luck
if you get injured, like you're inevitably going to get
hurt and there's nothing you can do about it. And
in fact, most of the injuries are pretty predictable, not
necessarily when they will happen, but if they are going
to happen. It's a lot of times when you just
(08:27):
layer poor swing mechanics on top of bad mobility, on
top of weakness, on top of fatigue or not recovering
well and like all these things that just kind of
continue to stack and snowball to your risk profiles, making
them high and high and higher.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
It's it's kind of easy to spot from a mile
away when the stuff's going to happen.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
So they really, they aren't, you know, inevitable, they aren't
bad luck. And there certainly are there some that you
check the ground for a root and you think you're good,
and you swing and you hit, and you smash a
rock that you didn't see and you crack your Like, yeah,
bad luck happens like everywhere, but injuries in general for
golf are pretty predictable. Of like you can pick kind
of people out, like who's going to have issues, who's
swinging faster than what their body can handle, you know,
(09:08):
who doesn't have the mobility, you know, whatever it may be.
And that's the beauty of the home assessment and everything
we do. And like I can't tell you enough of
like a sess, but don't guess, Like this is all
measurable stuff guys, and you can do.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
It yourself for free at home. Please.
Speaker 1 (09:23):
If you're noticing a common theme here, I want you
guys to help yourselves. I want you to have the
information and just to spell these myths because they really
just rbs. So you know, I think just to rab
this is a quick one today. I just wanted to
kind of knock these three out and just kind of
they were hearing a couple of people talking about them
at the accelerator when they were all here in town,
and it was.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
Like it's like, dude, these are just so not correct.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
But you know, I think the big takeaways would be
like warm up, warming up, mobility, work, pay attention to
your body. You know, it sounds small, but this is
really the secret to staying pain free on the course
and playing the game for a really really long time time.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
So yeah, I just i'd.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
Really encourage you guys test your mobility, you know, and
really kind of like just know and understand that injuries
are not random, like you can prevent them.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
And so you know, we have the link out asleep
for the home assessments.
Speaker 1 (10:14):
Check that out it it'd be really cool for you guys,
you know, and you know, message let me know, like
on social whatever it is, like, just let us let
me know, let us know like what you find and
you obviously we'd love to help you figure out how
to fix that, but at the very least, like we
just want you to have the right information. So today,
thanks again for hanging out with me here on the
the golf in this boun squad. If you found us helpful,
(10:35):
please share it with a golf buddy. Uh And and
definitely don't forget to follow the podcast for all the
tips that we put Now We've got some great guest
episodes coming up for you guys. Uh and as always,
appreciate appreciate your time. We'll catch you the next episode
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