Tiger Woods withdrew from the Cadillac Championship on Sunday after only 11 holes. The reason – problems with his left Achilles tendon, which he injured at Augusta National last year.
After his drive on the 12th tee, Woods winced in pain and leaned over his driver, before making the call to withdraw from the match.
“I felt tightness in my left Achilles warming up this morning, and it continued to get progressively worse,” Woods said. “After hitting my tee shot at 12, I decided it was necessary to withdraw. In the past, I may have tried to continue to play, but this time, I decided to do what I thought was necessary.”
Commentary by Dr. Silverman, Orthopedic Specialist
Tiger Woods has a mechanical dysfunction. Walking is just like a golf swing, there are hundreds of coordinated actions that have to blend together with precision to be effective and not cause injury. While Woods has spent years perfecting his golf swing and knows exactly what he is doing right and wrong each time, he knows nothing about his own gait.
Whether it’s the Achilles tendon itself or the insertion of the Achilles tendon on the heel, it looks like it has become chronic Achilles tendonosis (tendonosis means degeneration of the tendon, while tendonitis means inflammation).
As an orthopedic surgeon, my guess is that the likely cause of his gait problems and subsequent Achilles issues is the surgery to his left knee. After surgery, he limped, placed less weight through the leg, never stretched the calf muscles, and developed a calf muscle contracture (tightness). His gait would have changed to let his foot rotate outwards adding extra stress to other areas of his body and distracting from the true problem. The contracture eventually places greater stress on the Achilles tendon causing micro-tears. Over time the micro-tears worsen.
He needs to rest the tendon while he undergoes a thorough lower extremity assessment. This includes a mechanical foot evaluation to determine what other muscles are weak and what joints are dysfunctional as well as a spine, hip, and knee evaluation to determine if any of these joints have an incomplete range of motion. Only after this assessment does it make sense to perform the classic eccentric (lengthening) strengthening exercises that are purported to be the cure-all for Achilles tendon problems. Unless he fixes the dysfunctional patterns, he will only strengthen this dysfunction and the Achilles will get worse to the point where surgery may be necessary.
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