How I my knee and my golf swing rebuilt

Cover Story
I got my game
back with four
basics: balance,
posture, takeaway
and backswing.
You can, too
How I
rebuilt
my knee
and
my golf swing
For 12 years, my summers have been
pretty much the same—week after week of competing in countries around the world. As you might
have heard, 2005 was different. Two weeks after the
British Open, I tore the anterior cruciate ligament
(ACL) in my left knee (above) on a boating trip in
Italy with my family. When the doctor told me what
had happened, I knew I was going to miss a lot of
tournaments and have a lot of work to do to come
back. Since the time I started playing golf, I’ve never
gone more than a few days without touching a club.
Last year, I went almost two months without making a swing. In October, when I could hit balls at full
speed again, I not only had to strengthen the golf
muscles I hadn’t been using, but also shake off the
rust that comes from sitting out that long. I started
from scratch—with four fundamentals: balance,
posture, takeaway and backswing. Whether you’re
coming back from an injury, or from a winter layoff,
the drills I’ve been using will help you, too.
By Ernie Els
Golf Digest Playing Editor
with Matthew Rudy
Photographs by Stephen Szurlej. Illustrations by Bonnie Hofkin
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My surgery
The reconstruction of the ACL
(the major stabilizing ligament)
in my left knee was performed
by Dr. Andrew Unwin at the
Princess Margaret Hospital in
Windsor, England. Dr. Unwin
grafted a piece of one of my
hamstring tendons onto the
ruptured ACL—which is circled
on my MRI above—and it’s now
stronger than it was originally.
The new tendon is actually
locked into bone around my
knee with small screws (below).
I
‘
couldn’t have recovered half as quickly as I did without
the help of my physical therapist, Sophie Dhenin (above).
Luckily for me, she’s just down the street from me,
near Wentworth, so as soon as I could get on my feet,
we started working. In the picture above, she has me
buckled into what I call “the torture chamber.” The ATM2
was designed for rehabbing back problems, but Sophie
adapted it for my knee. By looping thick rubber straps
around different parts of my leg, she can make me work
a variety of muscles, from my calf to my hamstring. And
does she ever. I’m shaking and exhausted after 20 minutes. But I was hitting pitches six weeks after surgery.
’
My body has gotten over it faster than my mind.
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Ernie Els
B
y the time the World
Match Play Championship
came to Wentworth in
September, I was able to
walk around the course,
watch some of the golf
and practice chipping and
putting. Soon after that,
I graduated to the drill
you see here. Sophie gave
me two rubber balance
disks to stand on while I
hit pitch shots. The disks
make you pay close attention to where your weight
is at address and how it
moves through the swing.
Because the disks are
unstable, you have to use
the small muscles in your
legs, back and stomach
to stay balanced. It’s a
great workout, and it also
makes you feel very solid
over your feet when you
get back on the grass. The
disks worked so well that
I’m taking them with me
when I travel this year.
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XXX
My fault
My fix
I’ve pulled the
club inside with
my hands, off the
plane. See how
my left arm has
moved away from
my body?
The club is in
line with my
left arm and on
plane. It’s much
easier to make
a good coil and
get to the top in
good position
from here.
O
nce I was hitting balls again, I spent a lot of time on the
phone with David Leadbetter, talking about what I
needed to do to get my swing back in shape. My biggest issues were with my posture—which had gotten
slumped—and my takeaway. I was getting too active
with my hands and whipping the club inside at the
start of my backswing, which put me in a too-upright
position at the top. From there, I almost couldn’t help
but swing a little bit over the top—and my divots went
straight left. For my posture, I straightened my spine and
pulled my shoulders back at address. On the takeaway,
I want the club to feel light and in line with my left arm.
Once I did that, all my power came back immediately. It was
quite a relief to be able to hit the same shots I always have.
Sophie breaks up
the scar tissue every
day. Ouch! You can
see the holes in my
knee from surgery.
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Ernie Els
My fault
My fix
Pulling the
club inside
gets me
steep and
prevents a full
turn, and my
right arm gets
trapped
behind me.
Here, the club
is on plane, I’ve
made a better
turn, and my
right arm hasn’t
moved behind
me. Now, tempo
is all I have to
worry about.
all photo & art Credits • will go here • as shown
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XXX
‘T
Ernie Els
’
Your posture is the same with a putter as with a 7-iron.
he posture work I did for my full swing
carried over into my putting as well. I was
slumping my shoulders on putts, which
made it harder for my arms to work in front
of me as they should. As soon as I straightened up into the same posture as I would
use for a middle iron, the flow came back
to my stroke.
Most players
have a natural
tendency to
slump their
shoulders and get
too close to the
ball when putting.
I use the same
posture as I do
for a middle-iron
shot. The only
differences are
the lie angle of
the club and my
grip. My head is
down a little more
on a putt because
the ball is closer.
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dunhill championship (opposite page): Getty images
Free time? What free time?
O
ne of the unintended benefits of getting hurt was the
time it gave me to spend with my family. I took the
kids to school, worked on some course-design
projects and was a real sports fan for a summer.
I watched a lot of cricket and rugby, and golf
at night. The PGA Championship was hard to
watch—I love Baltusrol, and it was a perfect setup
for me. I spent time getting in better overall shape.
My trainer, Josh Salzmann (the guy who’s working on
me here), has me on a great routine—40 minutes of cardio a day, plus stretching, push-ups and strength training
with weights and a medicine ball. I’m in the best shape of
my professional career, and my swing feels nice and tight.
‘ ’
You don’t really know
until you go out and
play for the first time.
The real test was getting back to
tournament golf. I played my first tournament the first week of December,
at the Nedbank Golf Challenge. I hit it
just OK, finishing ninth. But the knee
held up fine (with a little ice at night).
The next week I shot 68 on Sunday to
win the Dunhill Championship in South
Africa (below). ‹›
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