The biggest cause of outside hip pain in golfer is injury to the hip joint itself or the outside gluteal tendons. Usually, it effects the lead hip due to the amount of accelerating and then decelerating forces acting through this hip after hitting the ball. If these structures aren’t strong enough to cope with these forces they become injured.
The most common technical cause for this injury is the ‘slide’ where the golfer moves their lead hip towards the target at impact rather than rotating.
It can be easily solved by improving the strength and movement tolerance of the hip muscles as well as the muscle of the trunk and pelvis through regular strength exercises. Combine this with a change of technique to rotate through the lead hip and not slide will be the answer.
Easy wins to prevent hip pain:
- Open your lead hip to 10 or 11 o’clock
- Practice should match the course
- Warm-up before you hit
- Start a tailored strength and mobility exercise program
