Golfer’s Elbow—How did it start for you?

[J13]

6 hours ago, KMeloney said:

Sorry to hear that. The OVERWHELMING majority of advice on this subject is to shut down the activities that have led to the condition and to give it time to heal. It sounds like you took the advice that you wanted to take, not the advice you knew you should.

 

If it's any consolation, a buddy of mine took all of the actions (including doing PRP injections) he should have taken to try to remedy his issue, but ended up needing surgery. Maybe you were headed for surgery all along.

 

 

I agree with you. It was a combination of not fully understanding the situation and not wanting to take time off. Keep in mind that I workout 3-4 days a week doing resistance training, so that didn't help either.

 

I learned a lot from the experience, and my elbow is 100%, so I'm grateful in the end.

My advice to golfers:

DO NOT HIT tons of balls off older, firmer mats.  

If you feel pain while hitting golf balls regardless of where it is, take a few days or a week off.  A week off is better than 3 months because you made the same mistake I did.

Edited December 2, 2024 by J13

[Double Mocha Man]

16 minutes ago, J13 said:

Keep in mind that I workout 3-4 days a week doing resistance training, so that didn't help either.

 

It may have been coincidental but my elbow "popped" after I had been doing resistance training with bands for about 2 weeks.  I fear going back.

[J13]

1 hour ago, Double Mocha Man said:

 

It may have been coincidental but my elbow "popped" after I had been doing resistance training with bands for about 2 weeks.  I fear going back.

 

I wouldn't let that detour you from working out.  You might have just put the joint in an awkward position or it's a signal to strengthen the surround muscles.

[Mike_C]

15 hours ago, J13 said:

I wouldn't let that detour you from working out.  You might have just put the joint in an awkward position or it's a signal to strengthen the surround muscles.

Agreed.  For me, it was a slow degradation of strength in my arms/hands, this slowly put stress on the joint/ligaments around the elbow which it just couldn't handle.   

 

A slow build up of the muscles is needed.  Quite often you need to rest and let the inflammation cool down, then start to build back up, but not necessarily with golf swings.  I was working with 8-10 pound weights for bicep/tricep/forearms, resistance bands with moderate at best effort, and the twist bar.  It just takes some time. 

[J13]

11 minutes ago, Mike_C said:

Agreed.  For me, it was a slow degradation of strength in my arms/hands, this slowly put stress on the joint/ligaments around the elbow which it just couldn't handle.   

 

A slow build up of the muscles is needed.  Quite often you need to rest and let the inflammation cool down, then start to build back up, but not necessarily with golf swings.  I was working with 8-10 pound weights for bicep/tricep/forearms, resistance bands with moderate at best effort, and the twist bar.  It just takes some time. 

Throughout my sports and surgical journeys I've learned healing consists of two types of recovery.

 

1. Passive - this is when inflammation or injury is fresh and needs things like ice, heat, anti-inflammatories etc...

2. Active - Once the inflammatory response is calming down (maybe a few weeks) you can begin the journey of strengthening the tissue and surrounding area's.  Active recovery will not only help the problem heal but help prevent a reoccurrence.  Physical therapy is also a great idea to build a plan if you aren't sure what to do.

[ChaosTheory]

In my case, in addition to the usual contributing factors, statins (cholesterol meds) add to the problem.  That is not uncommon.

[purdyd]

In my case gripping too tight, tennis elbow. Along with some other sports that involved gripping things.

 

so bigger grips, tackier grips, lighter shafts, relaxing hands.

 

theraband works but in combination massaging the forearm muscles.

 

i also find bench press helps 

 

you should not ignore pain

 

repetitive stress injuries are no joke. 

Edited December 5, 2024 by purdyd

[DB Golf]

UPDATE: The doctor confirmed golfers elbow and recommended rest and PT. I thought it worth sharing that he said the problem usually arises not from impact alone but from forearm pronation and impact. Perhaps not coincidentally, I had recently been working on more of a twist swing instead of a throw swing. Perhaps I was doing it wrong.

 

Edited December 5, 2024 by DB Golf
Correction

[KMeloney]

22 hours ago, DB Golf said:

UPDATE: The doctor confirmed golfers elbow and recommended rest and PT. I thought it worth sharing that he said the problem usually arises not from impact alone but from forearm supination and impact. Perhaps not coincidentally, I had recently been working on more of a twist swing instead of a throw swing. Perhaps I was doing it wrong.

 

Pfft. I hope you got a second opinion. Anyone who's clinically trained knows there's no such thing as Golfer's Elbow. 

 

(Edit: That was complete sarcasm, btw. If you've read the whole thread, you know.)

 

I'm glad you got it checked out and were given a plan of action. Hopefully it's cold where you live and you aren't tempted to hit balls/play while you should be resting it (my rehab coincided with winter time in PA, so it all worked out well for me in that regard). Good luck!

Edited December 6, 2024 by KMeloney
(Sarcasm notification)

[DB Golf]

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/golfers-elbow/symptoms-causes/syc-20372868

[torbill]

DB, I don’t know about the qualifications of your doctor with tendons, but you might want to take another look at the podcast in the link that I previously posted.  This guy Baar has a lot of research and experience with tendons, right down to the molecular level.

I applied his recommendation to my situation, never rested but simply backed off all practice sessions, performed the gentle exercise with a golf club 2X/day, and am entirely pain free, having never missed a round.  Magic.  The thing that got my attention was his comment about how people have rested a tendon for (as I recall) a couple of *years*, only to re-injure as soon as they took up the activity again. 

Your OP suggested that you had an early problem, not acute, which seems to me to have been a perfect situation for easing up, doing the exercise… and not resting…? 



 

[DB Golf]

19 hours ago, torbill said:

Your OP suggested that you had an early problem, not acute, which seems to me to have been a perfect situation for easing up, doing the exercise… and not resting…?

Yeah, “rest” is relative in my case, and you said it much better than I did. Rest just means not hitting balls at full speed. I’m still doing slow swing drills and starting PT today. Thanks for the podcast recommendation—I’ll give it a listen!

Edited December 6, 2024 by DB Golf
Correction

[torbill]

6 hours ago, DB Golf said:

Yeah, “rest” is relative in my case, and you said it much better than I did. Rest just means not hitting balls at full speed. I’m still doing slow swing drills and starting PR today. Thanks for the podcast recommendation—I’ll give it a listen!

 

I’ve had a *lot* of tendon problems over the years.  Just tendinitis, never a tear.  Never serious enough that I couldn’t pick up a tea kettle.  I’ve also been a Mayo Clinic patient for 55 years and seen sports medicine types there.  I see that you referenced a Mayo web page for golfer elbow (Mayo and Cleveland Clinic have really good web info, in my experience, and it’s free).  Here is a more general page on tendinitis, if you haven’t seen it:

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/tendinitis/symptoms-causes/syc-20378243

 

Unlike some of the comments that we see in this topic, we can see under “When to See a Doctor” that Mayo encourages self-diagnosis and self-care for the more typical cases.  From my experience they are not big on a lot of rest, or injections, or drugs unless the case is difficult and so painful that it seriously gets in the way of life.  So I think that your approach of just backing off the intensity of your golf activity and starting re-hab is perfect.

Here is what has happened to me in old age:  Whenever I make *any* kind of swing change, I start using muscles differently.  When we are young and use muscles differently, no biggie. But as I’ve gotten old, without fail I get sore muscles - really sore! - sometimes in places where I didn’t know I had muscles, lol.  When this happens I treat these muscles to stretching and massage by my wife (she is good at deep tissue massage).  What I want to do is to avoid having the muscle tighten-up, shorten-up, and start causing irritation to the tendon.  What I’m saying is this:  If you made a swing change that you like, and your doc thinks that the added rotational element is a possible cause of your problem, I would encourage you to not give up on the change - go back gradually to the swing that you like,  work the muscles that connect to the golfer elbow problem, and gradually go back to the changed swing - and improve your game!!  

Edited December 6, 2024 by torbill

[tatertot]

Played my last round of the year 3 weeks ago ... tendonitis in the elbow is gone. Go figure/

[Barische]

try stretching and massaging.. also extensor muscle training / opposite of golf swing.. 

[Double Mocha Man]

19 minutes ago, tatertot said:

Played my last round of the year 3 weeks ago ... tendonitis in the elbow is gone. Go figure/

 

Time to find a good simulator...

[brutus27]

My GE was caused by doing too many pushups 😳😖. 
Used this theraband to get rid of pain.
https://a.co/d/0HqC00i

[Moonlightgrm]

On 11/29/2024 at 2:41 PM, Mike_C said:

Long similar history.   Hurt what felt like more my forearm hitting a PW out of thick rough off a slight upslope 10 years ago.  It was 2 days before the club championship, I foolishly played that weekend, but it seemed to mostly get better over the rest of the year.

 

Next year, win the club championship, elbow/forearm was feeling pretty good, but literally the day after my wife asked me to move our king size mattress, as I lift it, the shooting pain in my right forearm hits me again, this time even worse, I thought I might have torn something. Struggled the rest of the summer and then the elbow started to hurt on that side too off and on, but they got mostly better by the next spring.   That next spring, decided on getting new irons and tried moving to Modus 120 shafts, had been in PX 6.5 before then C-taper stiff, thought the stiff modus felt soft so I went with X, probably a horrible mistake.  Within 2 weeks my left elbow started to hurt, then my right, and still had soreness in my forearm.   It just got worse and worse and by the end of the year was lucky to play once a week, and not really able to practice much.   In September that year I had entered the state senior amateur for the first time, but withdrew the week before, I couldn't even hold a club in my hand at the time.....

 

Went down a long path of graphite shafts, which do help, therapy (get the TheraBand, it works), and slow work with light weights.   I can't say it is gone 100%, but most of the time I have no problems.   Getting stronger in your grip, forearms, biceps and triceps is a must.   You don't need to be Arnold Schwarzenegger, but it was the work with weights that seems to really kind of get me back over the hill.

 

A year ago I made a dedicated effort to get stronger overall and lose weight, have been going to the gym regularly about 2 to 3 times a week, and it has really helped too, but I have to be careful with weights too so I don't over do it. And I still use the TheraBand even when I don't have any soreness.  I felt confident enough to go back to steel shafts by August this year, and so far, cross my fingers it hasn't caused any problems with my elbows, but I still have an ache in my forearm from the original injury quite often, but its not when I golf, its more when I lift weights a certain way....

I took your suggestion and purchased the Theraband Flexbars (Red, Green, and Blue). Wish me luck?

[DShepley]

I have been fighting this issue since mid June.  It happened on an 'under plane' driver swing that I saved at impact with my hands.  I felt a very sharp pain at impact.  I finished the round, (stupid me), but the only impacts where I felt pain after were with the driver.  The golf season has been over here from a month or so but now I am having pain in my forearm, (left side when palm is facing up), and in the pit of my elbow more on the bicep side when I lift things.  Some mornings it hurts to pick up a coffee mug.  I have dull pain almost every day now and I notice it more than when I was playing golf.  It is particularly bad in the mornings when I wake up as I tend to sleep with my elbow bent and my hand under my pillow.  I need to start some exercises as I am inclined to think the problem comes from age and muscles in my arms that aren't as strong as they should be.

[Double Mocha Man]

1 hour ago, DShepley said:

I have been fighting this issue since mid June.  It happened on an 'under plane' driver swing that I saved at impact with my hands.  I felt a very sharp pain at impact.  I finished the round, (stupid me), but the only impacts where I felt pain after were with the driver.  The golf season has been over here from a month or so but now I am having pain in my forearm, (left side when palm is facing up), and in the pit of my elbow more on the bicep side when I lift things.  Some mornings it hurts to pick up a coffee mug.  I have dull pain almost every day now and I notice it more than when I was playing golf.  It is particularly bad in the mornings when I wake up as I tend to sleep with my elbow bent and my hand under my pillow.  I need to start some exercises as I am inclined to think the problem comes from age and muscles in my arms that aren't as strong as they should be.

 

Well, you can still type.  There's that. 

 

I think you might want to at least talk with a doctor.  If there's more wrong, stuff that won't heal with rest, you could still get it taken care of over the Winter... and then be able to return to golf in the Spring.

[J13]

Def get it checked out. Tendons are notoriously slow healers due to limited blood flow.  Very different from a muscular injury.  The most beneficial exercises for tendons are eccentric movements.  Slow and steady.