We're in a nasty weather pattern here in the Wasatch range, extremely warm and mostly dry. We do have some moisture that's supposed to come through today, but with highs in the 50's we know what form that precipitation will take. has me wondering whether it's worth going to the effort to activate my glutes....
So, I'm sure you've spent the last forty-eight hours googling everything there is to know about glutes... Ron Kapriske spent some time with Golf Digest fitness guru Ralph Simpson (no relation as far as I know), who had this to say on Tiger's alleged glutus interruptus:
Gluteal deactivation can happen, says Golf Digest fitness advisor Ralph Simpson(@ralphsimpsonpt). Subtle inhibition of the muscles' function is common, but true neurological deactivation is almost always associated with "some sort of nerve problem," he says. If it's both sides of the body, then the cause would be centrally located such as central spinal stenosis. When that occurs, the condition is so severe, the person suffering from it has trouble walking, much less swinging a golf club. Stenosis is a narrowing of the spinal column to the point where pressure is put on nerves often causing extreme pain and muscle weakness."Even if a person could play golf with their gluteal muscles partially or completely deactivated, you'd usually notice huge compensations in their golf swing," says Simpson, a certified physical therapist who worked on the PGA Tour for several years. "Their hands and arms might do more of the work to compensate for a lack of core strength, or there might be a sway or slide with the body. It would look very awkward for a pro."
He seems to be saying that Tiger might have experienced some "Subtle inhibition of function", but don't we all these days. Kapriske and Simpson leave it there, regrettably, because it seems to beg for some obvious follow up as to whether that's a logical explanation for the back pain, tells us anything about the state of Tiger's back post-surgery and also whether it implies a deficiency in Tiger's warm-up routine.
Now I'm finding Tiger's language to be as strange as his golf game, and it seems that I'm not alone. Luke Kerr-Dineen won't be getting any exclusive interviews with Tiger after posting Five Things We Didn't Know Were Problems..., including this possibly fake Twitter account:
Luke's got all the usual suspects, Release patterns, Traj and Explosiveness....not to mention soft hotel beds.
Luke is on fire, and in another post has seven suggestions for Tiger that couldn't hurt, including these:
Take A Year OffPart of Tiger's problem is that he can't get into a rhythm because he keeps rushing back and re-injuring himself. Tiger: Take a year off. Recover, practice, prepare. Take your time. Think of it as an investment in your health that'll pay dividends in the long run.
He's done that at least a couple of times...
Play Four Events A SeasonThe four majors. Why not? Tiger only really cares about catching Jack's major record anyway, and it would leave him plenty of time to recover even if he does injure himself. Adopting a schedule like this would obviously require him to battle some rustiness, but surely that's better than living with a back injury. Qualifying for the majors could potentially become an issue, but at this point he has enough exemptions for it not to be a primary concern.
Ahhhh, the Hogan model. But as he keeps telling us, he needs reps to get back his feels...
Then there's the loss of self-esteem he caused in others:
Woods was playing with Billy Horschel and Rickie Fowler when he withdrew with backspasms after hitting his tee shot at his 12th hole, the third on the North Course at Torrey Pines.
Now, Fowler is among the more popular players on the PGA Tour, and Horschel is the reigning FedEx Cup champion.
“Me and Rickie, we got on number three tee and we sort of joked, I said, we saw [Golf Channel’s] Tom Byrum leave and all the cameras,” Horschel said regarding Woods withdrawing. “And then we saw all the media people scamper away towards [Woods]. And we said, ‘how many people will stay with us?’ And we said about 50 and that was true.
“So we went from 600, 700 people watching us to 50. We became chopped liver. We realized where we stand in this game of golf, and we had a good joke about it.”
Chopped liver? Funny, he doesn't look Jewish... The Daily Mail's Derek Lawrenson finds our Tiger to be cutting a sad figure, and makes quite the unflattering comparison:
And so what we’re left with is the American equivalent of the sad figure Seve Ballesteros cut at the end of his career.
Where the playing partners are so shocked by what they’re witnessing that they are tempted to look away; where the spectators are filled with a yearning for what they once witnessed rather than any expectation of an encore; where the applause is of the sympathetic kind rather than for glimpses of the greatness that, at Torrey of all places, they once took for granted.
Ouch! That's gonna leave a mark....but the late-career Seve was very sad, and that comparison is unfortunately quite apt.
Want more on this depressing subject? Golf Channel has you covered and you'll want to set the DVR:
ORLANDO, Fla., Feb. 6, 2015 – A roundtable of experts will discuss the current state of Tiger Woods’ injuries, examine his golf swing and short game struggles, analyze the current mental aspect of his game and debate his future in a special Sunday segment on Morning Drive (10:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. ET) on Golf Channel.
The panel discussion, moderated by Morning Drive host Gary Williams, will include The Golf Fix host and 2012 PGA of America Teacher of the Year Michael Breed, Golf Channel analysts Phil Blackmar and Brandel Chamblee and Golf World Editor-In-Chief Jaime Diaz, who has followed Woods’ entire career.
Woods withdrew from the Farmers Insurance Open on Thursday – his third withdrawal in his past nine tournaments – citing back pain.Two hours? I do hope Tiger will be taking notes,,,, though the inclusion of Jaime Diaz is a good call.
And is Hank unavailable? As for Hank, he's unable to pass up the schadenfreude:
"I think it would be fair to question Tiger's desire at this point," said Hank Haney, Woods' former swing coach. "And his energy level to climb the mountain. And let's face it, it's not a hill, it's a mountain now. Can he do it? Sure, he's Tiger Woods.
"But look at the shots he is hitting. If you have a bad attitude going and your competitive vibe is down a little, who wouldn't? But it's Tiger Woods. I don't think he's packed it in. I just see a lot of problems with his game."And this:
"All I've heard about is speed," said Haney, referring to Woods' comments that his speed -- and hence a good bit of power -- is back. "And yet all his stats are bad. He was 186th [on the PGA Tour] in greens, 160th in scrambling, 184th from 50 to 125 yards, 169th in three-putt avoidance. What does that have to do with speed?
"That's not your problem, you can't find your ball. You can't chip it on a green from 5 yards. And I thought this guy was going to fix his back."But schadenfreude can go both ways, so how about we finish with the one story likely to cheer Tiger up:
On a beautiful sunny day on the California coast here, Mickelson followed Woods’ earlyexit from the Farmers Insurance Open with his own. Mickelson missed the cut for the second straight week.
Unlike Woods, Mickelson’s issue here was not an inability to activate his glutes, but was instead his inability to activate his putter.
“My putting is beyond pathetic,” he said after missing the cut by three strokes in his hometown on Torrey Pines courses on which his experience dates to childhood. “And if I can’t get back to the levels of 2013, I’m not sure what I’m going to do.”
The putter alone has diminished the optimism he brought into the season.
No argument here.... According to the PGATour.com stats page, Phil lost three strokes putting to the field on Thursday (for some reason the Friday numbers are not available), and that would be hard to do intentionally.
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