Beware of the injured golfer: The reason why some players are better when hurt | Why Rory McIlroy is a prime example

It comes down to psychology. Golf is played between the ears and the less you think or worry and the more you focus on the shot at hand, you have a better chance of playing well. Joe Skovron explained it well in season 2 of ‘Full Swing’ on Netflix when talking about his Tom Kim’s injury: “They always say ‘beware the sick or injured golfer’, because you are thinking so much about that, so you’re not thinking as much about what happens if I make bogey. It can take the expectations and the worries about the golf off.”

The injury Kim’s caddie refers to is a serious ankle injury the Korean golfer suffered at the 2023 Open Championship at Royal Liverpool GC. Kim finished T3 after finishing round 1 at T89. The pain was evident as Kim limped around the course, but “the distraction” of the injury helped him play better.

Rory McIlroy’s injury

The Irish golfer has complained about pain in his elbow after an impressive showing at the Houston Open. “My right elbow has been bothering me a little bit so I’ll maybe just get some treatment on that and make sure that is OK going into Augusta,” McIlroy said. “I’ve got my coach Michael Bannon coming in tomorrow [Monday], we’ll do some work and make sure everything is in good shape for a week’s time.”

Speaking to Betway, Rob Hobkinson, the strength and conditioning expert who works with Nicolai and Rasmus Højgaard, said: “Rory is super consistent with how he trains, and he and the people around him will have it all under control. It is more about understanding the tolerance of the problem. With any injury, there’s a huge variance in symptoms. You may have noticed from time to time, Rory has some tape over the area in question,” he said. “These kinds of issues can in some cases be debilitating to the point where lifting anything up, your grip strength vanishes. But at the other end of the spectrum, you can play a full round of golf with no pain.”

Meanwhile, some golf journalists are sceptical of how serious McIlroy’s injury actually is. McIlroy finished T5 at the Houston Open and seemed to be in perfect shape while playing at Memorial Park Golf Course. Of course only the golfer and his team know what’s really going on, but Dan Rappaport was not so sure about the injury: “He went out of his way to kinda say that he wasn’t feeling his best. I’m not buying it, I’m not buying any part of it. I’m not buying the elbow. I’m not buying the coach coming in and working on some stuff. I think he’s just trying to throw the scent off a little bit.”

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The skeptics might be right because Rory is playing great and looks unstoppable. Or, then again, maybe it’s the old adage about a an injured golfer...

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