If it hurts when you swing the golf club, you are definitely doing something wrong.

I found this out the hard way. Last season I discovered pain in my elbow that just wouldn’t quit. Anyone had tennis elbow? It’s the same thing. A shooting pain that goes right up your forearm and seems to settle in your elbow joint. Yikes! No matter how carefully I tried to swing the club, every time, I felt this “ping!” of pain.

Duh? So did I stop swinging? No. Of course not. I just kept on keeping on, trying to figure out what I was doing wrong. But if the swing hurts, you know there is something “off.”

Eventually, I went to my doctor and she sent me to an orthopedic specialist who took xrays, found nothing wrong with the elbow itself (I was sure I had chips or dips or some such horrible thing) and finally he told me I had tennis elbow.

“Not possible,” I said. “I play golf! not tennis.”

“It’s the same basic injury,” the wise doctor replied. “You’ve strained the tendons in your forearm that go from your wrist to your elbow. Most golfers get it on the outside of their arm, tennis players feel the pain on the inside.” He shot me up with cortizone and the pain abated for a while.

But that was last season. Over the last few months the pain came back… and I wasn’t even playing golf. So back I went to the medical wizards, asking for advice. No cortizone this time. Instead he prescribed Physical Therapy. working with ultrasound, massage and wearing a strap just below my elbow. “This will take the pressure off the tendon,” he predicted. “Use this every time you play.”

I have to tell you, it’s working!!! And not only that, I’ve discovered what I was doing wrong to cause the pain in the first place. I’m one of those golfers who has a death grip on my clubs. In an effort to control the club, I hold ’em really tight. Of course the opposite occurs. By increasing my grip pressure, I don’t give the club a chance to move easily through the golf swing and hit the ball straight down the line. Instead, everything tightens up, my club hits left, right, or anywhere but center, and I end up with tennis/golfers elbow.

Now that I am much more aware of what I’ve been doing wrong, I am a lot lighter in my grip and playing pain free for the first time in months. And my scores are going down.

Bottom line: If you hurt when you play, you’re doing something wrong. Whether it’s your back, your neck, your elbow… it’s not the club that’s causing the problem. Go to a pro and have them check you out. And if necessary schedule a visit with your medical professional.

For more information about golfer’s elbow and ways to prevent it go to: http://www.criticalbench.com/treatment_prevention_golfers_elbow.htm

Have you ever had a chronic pain problem when you played golf? What did you do about it? Add your comment below.