Dr's Casebook column with Dr Keith Souter: Golf really is good for your health
The Golfing aficionados out there will doubtless have been glued to their televisions last weekend watching the PGA, the second of the four majors of the year.
It was great to see Aaron Rai lift the Wanamaker Cup, the first Englishman to win the tournament since Big Jim Barnes won it back in 1919. In winning, Aaron said he wanted to inspire the next generation of golfers. Encouraging people to play sport is good for their health.
As always after any major sporting spectacular people are stimulated to get out there and try to emulate their sporting heroes. And a good thing that is, too. The fact is that the exercise in sport is good for you, and you should try to keep it up for as long as you can. The beauty of golf is that it is a sport that people can keep up until a ripe old age. To get the maximum benefit from it though, you need to be a golf-walker and avoid using a golf cart unless you really have to.
People often think that the walking that a golfer does is of no great value, because it is just walking short distances, stopping to hit a ball and then walking a bit more. In fact research from around the world indicates that golf walking is very good for you. Among the benefits are its help in reducing the risk of heart disease.
Research from Sweden looked at the physical demands on middle-aged golfers during a round. They found that the exercise intensity ranged from 40 to 70 per cent of maximum aerobic power, despite the short walk, stop and hit a shot pattern of the sport. To put that into perspective, a four hour round of golf has the same benefit as a 45 minute fitness class. For many middle aged and elderly people a round of golf is probably a better way of getting the exercise, and it adds interest to the walking.
Another study from Hawaii studied data on men aged between 71 and 93 years of age. They found that the risk of heart disease decreased by 15 per cent for each half mile walked daily. More than that, they found that men who walked one and a half miles or more per day had less than half the rate of heart disease of the men who walked less than a quarter of a mile.
Very interestingly, although you would think that carrying your bag or pulling a trolley would be even better for you; this does not seem to be the case. The benefit seems to be in the process of walking, not in expending energy hauling the bag or trolley.