🏌️♂️ Golfers: Could Your Flexibility Be Putting Your Spine at Risk?
- Julian Simpson
- 1 day ago
- 7 min read
🏌️♂️ Golfers: Could Your Flexibility Be Putting Your Spine at Risk?
Golf is a fantastic sport — great exercise, fresh air, and a good challenge. But for many Australians, it can also be a source of pain, particularly in the lower back.
Even though golf is a non-contact sport, studies show spinal injuries are the most common injury for golfers, often caused by overuse and poor swing mechanics. These injuries can not only impact your game but also affect your day-to-day life.
At Health Wise Chiropractic, we know that protecting your spine is key — both for performance and longevity on the course. A recent nationwide study of professional golfers has uncovered some fascinating insights into flexibility, stretching habits, and spinal health.
🔍 Flexibility and Spinal Health in Golf
The study found that flexibility is a big factor in the risk of spinal injuries — particularly in the thoracic and lumbar spine. Specifically:
Golfers with fair shoulder flexibility had a significantly lower risk of lower back injuries.
Too much flexibility — known as hypermobility — doesn’t necessarily help, and can actually increase the risk of injury.
Limited flexibility can also increase injury risk by forcing the body to compensate with poor movement patterns.
This means finding the sweet spot for flexibility — not too little, and not too much — is important for keeping your spine healthy and your game strong.
💪 Why Stretching Alone Isn’t Enough
While stretching is important, the research showed it’s not the whole answer. For golfers, a comprehensive warm-up — including stretching, mobility work, and swing preparation — is far more effective in preventing injury and maintaining performance.
In fact, golfers who improved their warm-up routines were able to:✅ Maintain their driving distance✅ Keep their scores steady✅ Reduce risk of spinal injury
⛳ Swing Mechanics Matter
The study also highlighted that modifying your swing can protect your spine. Modern swings often rely on large shoulder rotations while limiting hip turn. This can place extra strain on the spine — especially with repeated swings over time.
Switching to a swing style that allows for more hip rotation (such as a “classic swing”) can help:
Reduce spinal stress
Improve swing efficiency
Lower injury risk
At Health Wise Chiropractic, we help golfers analyse their swing mechanics and build tailored programs to support both performance and injury prevention.
🏌️♀️ What This Means for Golfers
If you love golf but have experienced:
Lower back pain
Limited mobility
Ongoing stiffness or discomfort after playing
A drop in performance
…it could be a sign that your flexibility, warm-up, or swing technique needs attention.
The good news? These issues can often be improved with a personalised approach — combining chiropractic adjustments, targeted flexibility and mobility training, and posture and swing analysis.
📅 Protect Your Spine & Improve Your Game
At Health Wise Chiropractic, we work with golfers to:
Identify flexibility limitations and imbalances
Improve posture and spinal function
Reduce pain and injury risk
Optimise performance
Whether you’re a weekend player or a competitive golfer, your spine is your foundation. Don’t let pain or injury put your game on hold.
📞 Call us today or book online for a Golfer’s Spine & Flexibility Assessment. Let’s help you protect your back and improve your swing for years to come.
For more information about how we can help YOU with your sports performance and/or injury. Please call Health Wise Chiropractic 03 9467 7889 or book online to see one of our Chiropractors in Sunbury or Melton/Strathtulloh Today!
We are also really proud to offer our patients an APP for their Mobile- iPad. With access to your rehab exercises and our health tip blogs with over 600 articles.
Chiropractic has moved online. We offer our online program -STAND CORRECTED- To help you through the day.
We have over 30 programs on different health conditions
Each program contains
- Information about the conditions
- things to do and things to avoid
- nutrition advice
- all the stretches that are needed to help
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