MORE ON, "TENNIS ELBOW"
I'd like to develop one more point on the direct causes of tennis elbow in casters:
One of the PRIME causes that I see, is with the pickup.
This is one of Tom White's pet peeves..........the caster who finishes the retrieve, then picks up for the next back cast with the rod tip high above the water. As this is done, the caster has to use a lot of pickup force in a short interval....The distance between that rod tip and the water creates slack. This has to be taken up before the rod can begin to load and the effective stroke begin. The caster has shortened his available stroke length. He then uses a lot more force. When this happens, there is tremendous strain on the the extensor muscles of the forearm and hand most of which is transferred to the lateral epicondyle of the elbow (that bony point of tenderness on the outer side of the affected elbow). Doing this repeatedly is a perfect formula for getting "casters arm" (tennis elbow) in some folks, because it provides repetative trauma concentrated at one small point of vulnerability.
Once that happens, and it becomes chronic, then anything which puts a strain on these muscle attachments will bring on the pain and perpetuate the problem.
The casting solution is obvious to good instructors.....but rarely to the afflicted caster. As Tom emphasizes to all his students and candidates, the pickup is best done with the rod tip close to the water for a longer back stroke to spread the energy over a wider arc, thus avoiding a spike of power with the arm in its most vulnerable position. This is beautifully demonstrated in Lefty Kreh's video, "Lessons with Lefty" as Sarah Gardner plays the part of his unknowing student while he corrects her errors.
This is still not always enough to cure the casting problem, which can be compounded by making that pickup with too much line resistance. There are 3 causes for this: 1.) Too much line length out there in the water at pickup time. 2.) Too much line weight out there (this is where the heavy sinking line comes in to play). 3.) Pickup with a heavy weighted fly.....like a Clouser.....especially if that weighted fly is at the end of a long leader.
There is another casting fault which has yielded this problem, in my experience. This is repetative casting with the casting arm extended too far. So often we see poor casters casting with the arm way out and up. This makes very inefficient use of arm power. The cast suffers, and sometimes so does the elbow.
Gordy