Disc Golf Injuries and Prevention
Common Disc Golf Injuries
The most common disc golf injuries include soft tissue injuries such as pulled muscles (strains), ligament tears (sprains), meniscal tears, tendinitis/tendinosis, and nerve injuries. (Nelson et al, 2015)
Although it is a non-contact sport, many injuries occur due to the rotational forces put on the body. Due to these rotational forces, the most common areas injured include the elbow (46%), shoulder (43.1%), back (30.8%), knee (28.1%) and ankle (21.2%) (Nelson et al, 2015).
The repetitive and rotational nature of the sport can also cause overuse injuries to occur such as elbow soreness, rotator cuff breakdown, meniscus tears and low back soreness.
These injuries according to Nelson et al, 2015, led to 57.6% percent of participants having a reduction in activities of daily living (ADLs) such as moving around the house, dressing, bathing, eating, chores, and other self-care. They also reported that disc golf injuries affected 51% of the people and decreased their ability to enjoy their recreational and sporting activities. 34.5% of the surveyed people reported that their work duties were affected as well.
So, the question becomes, what can I do about these injuries? Well, there are two ways you can help address them.
1. See a movement specialist whether it is a chiropractor or a physical therapist or any other movement-based provider. This should be the first step you take with your injuries.
2. Pursuing injury prevention, once your current injuries are resolved, is best done with movement and preparation for the skill level you are at. See below on what that entails.
Seeing a Movement Specialist
First, if you are in pain, I would start by seeing an athletic or movement professional. I recommend a movement specialist like a sports chiropractor or sports physical therapist, occupational therapist or athletic trainer. You could jump to an orthopedist or a physical medicine doctor, but these options are usually reserved for more serious injuries. The reasons you should start with a chiropractor or physical therapist, is because they focus on self-healing first, through movement. Movement and time, in combination, can be a great healing tool and will serve as an experimental measure to see if you need surgery or medication.
A good sports chiropractic or movement specialist mentioned above will start by asking for you to fill out a history intake form. Once that is done, they will perform an initial examination that looks at function, severity of injury and takes into consideration your goals. Next, they will talk to you about treatment and provide a realistic treatment plan to address the injuries that brought you in.
Most injuries in the sports realm will resolve themselves in 1-6 weeks depending on the severity, type, history of previous injuries and many other factors. This should be the typical length to a treatment plan as well with treatment visits 1-2 times per week depending on the above factors.
At Vector Sport and Spine: Chiro and Rehab we work extensively with athletes and would love to help you get back on the course to increase your rating, compete in a weekend tournament or just enjoy a leisurely round with your disc golf community. If you are interested in scheduling an appointment, visit vectorsportsportandspine.com and click “schedule an appointment”anywhere on this page.
Once your current injuries are resolved, how do we help prevent them form happening again? See below for a list of ways to do this.
Disc Golf Injury Prevention
Listen to your body. If you are tired or sore, it is best for you to listen to your body and limit the amount of playing you do. Our bodies know when we are at our limits and should not be pushed too far.
Don’t throw a disc if it causes consistent pain. Pain is our body's signal that it doesn’t like something or is learning something new. Normally these signals don’t indicate major harm, and in fact can be a good thing in small amounts. It acts as a guide to change something that we are doing to make it feel better. It is best, if you are consistently feeling pain, to go see a licensed healthcare professional. Professionals include sports chiropractors, physical therapists, athletic trainers, occupational therapist or an orthopedic specialist to be evaluated for any serious injuries. For information on pain management, click here.
Be aware of your terrain. A lot of injuries occur due to falls, slips, trips, and stumbles. It’s best if you’re looking for a disc off the fairway to always watch where you are stepping.
Learn better backhand and forehand throwing techniques. Mechanics of throwing are different for everybody. They should be pursued to help increase your natural ability to throw the disc in a forehand, backhand, and overhead setting. Things like efficiency in the kinematic sequence, proper drive from the back leg, deceleration, etc. help protect your body and increase longevity in playing. While they are overrated, oversimplified and over-utilized, we need to remember, everybody is different and needs to be coached according to their own body. For more information on throwing mechanics click here.
Perform strength and conditioning on a regular basis. Too often we do not prepare our bodies for the activities that we want to pursue. Performing sport-specific or general training regularly, can help improve your play in disc golf and improve other aspects of yourself such as mental health, joint health, longevity, skill set, weight loss, etc. Rarely is an injury something that we did wrong, but rather, it is movement we are not prepared for. To checkout our TRAINING TEMPLATES click here.
Practice your skills. This seems obvious, but many people don’t practice the movement patterns that are required to be successful in disc golf, such as circle 1 vs. circle 2 putting, scrambling, etc. This needs to be done consistently and often to become a more efficient player and reduce the risk for injury. Without consistency your body will fail to learn and will cause your play to worsen.
Thank you for reading this article and hopefully you learned something new from it. If you found this article interesting or would like to discuss any of these topics with Dr. Dan, visit our website at vectorsportandspine.com or send him an email at drdan@vectorsportandspine.com
References:
Nelson, J. T., Jones, R. E., Runstrom, M., & Hardy, J. (2015). Disc Golf, a Growing Sport: Description and Epidemiology of Injuries. Orthopaedic Journal of Sports Medicine. https://doi.org/10.1177/2325967115589076
