Back Pain in Surfing

As part of my research investigation subject in college, I have had to work on a project of my choice which relates to sport. So I thought that I would pick something I would enjoy researching. With the help of my Dad who suffers from back pain, I came up with this research question.

Is back pain common in surfers and what is the reason behind it? 

The project started with finding any current research on the subject and surprisingly there was quite a bit out there. It is widely believed that back pain is caused by the prone paddling position, and some believe that it is due to the lack of efficient stretching before and after surfing.

Through creating a questionnaire and getting 30 male surfers to fill it out, I was able to statistically analyse the data to see if there was any relationship between surfing and back pain. I also looked at how many of these surfers stretched before and after surfing and the percentage of these who suffered from back pain. Surfing experience was another factor which jumped out at me and so I decided to make up a graph for this as well.

So what did I discover 8,000 words later...

My final discovery was that the prone paddling position (lying down with shoulders, chest, neck and head arched up) does have an impact on back pain. This conclusion was made rather clear because of the percentage of surfers who paddle in this position who suffer from back pain. Another discovery was that all the surfers who suffer from back pain have been surfing for three years or more, which is probably because of their body being put in this position for a very long time.

I would love to continue research on this question because there are some unanswered queries such as whether stretching helps reduce back pain in surfers. It would also be interesting to carry out the same research project but on 30 female surfers instead and see whether there are any changes in the data collected.

Thanks to everyone who took part in this research and I'd love to hear of anyone else's issues with back pain in surfing or any other sports.

My dad suffers from back pain and at 54 he is still awesome!