Golf Swing Fault: Hips sliding
Sliding hips throughout the swing
In this article, we show how your physio can work in conjunction with your golf coach. Exercises and drills, can be designed to allow your body the best chance of breaking unhelpful patterning in your golf swing.
Many golfers will try to generate power by sliding their hips and swaying their body to achieve weight transfer. This will often lead to:
• Shearing forces across their low back, pelvis and hips
• Increasing their risk of breakdown and pain significantly
• Your hips are a very mobile and strong joint with plenty of rotation
• The pelvis should rotate on top of the hips, this will help develop that rotational power you need in the golf swing
• Hip sway leads to your spine and head moving off centre, it becomes significantly harder for you to return to centre, resulting in poor ball contact
Rotation and less sliding of the hips is key!
Three good exercises to help prevent your hip sliding are:
1) Flexibility: Stretch Hip Adductors
• Standing place feet apart into a wide stance
• Drop into a squat on one leg and drop other leg in to stretch inside of groin (adductors)
• The adductors often become tight in the golf swing as they help pull the pelvis through in the swing
• If they become too tight and overactive they will pull the pelvis across into a slide
2) Strength: Step up with Hip Rotation
• Holding medicine ball across chest
• Side-step up onto a step
• Drive the opposite knee up and across towards the opposite shoulder
• This encourages internal rotation of the hip on the weight-bearing leg
• This will strengthen the rotation drive through your hip joint and pelvis
3) Functional: Band around knees swing with medicine ball
• Stand in golf posture with bands around knees
• Keep knees over feet activating your hip abductors
• Swing the medicine ball through the swing path keeping knees apart
• Try to feel you turn and rotate into your hips
• Try to rotate the medicine ball around you feeling the spin throughout your body
Coaching Drill
• Normal set up with band around knees
• Feel resistance help switch on your gluteals
• Make small rotatory swings
• Feel your pelvis rotate, not sliding
Ready to improve your swing?
See former PGA tour golf physio Kam Bhabra