Your Electric Golf Brain

Tiger is electrifying even when he plays badly but do the great players literally find a way to give themselves a jolt when they need it most? In February 2009 John Krakauer and Pablo Celnik of Johns Hopkins found that noninvasive electrical stimulation enhanced motor skill acquisition. Basically they performed an experiment where electricity was applied to the subject’s brain.  

A small but very important strip of brain neurons called M1 plays a major role in learning golf or any sport. Access to M1 in the experiment was obtained by placing a current producing device on the top of the subjects head directly over M1.

The group trained 45 minutes a day for five days performing a new motor activity that they had never done before. They tested three differently configured groups and found that the best performance belonged to the group that along with training in the new motor activity was also given a jolt of electricity.

The results of the study have a basis in how the brain normally functions. Since the brain is composed of neural networks which communicate with one another through electrical-chemical events, it might be possible to enhance the signals or even discover the code that allows information to be shuttled back and forth between the brain areas responsible for learning movement. Neurons are brain units whose many branches form highways where electrical flow lights up the brain like a Christmas tree. This Electrochemical event called depolarization is regulated by the speed and strength of the impulse

First your brain turns all information that strikes the senses [sound, heat, light etc.] into electricity then that electricity is routed to the proper brain areas for decoding This process helps your brain answer some key questions --what is this sensation I am experiencing and what do I do with it? Once a decision is made a second electrical code is sent out of the brain and down the spine to the muscles telling them how to respond – thus I run, fight, or make a golf swing.

A surmise: If properly coded currents of electricity enable you to learn a golf swing, it might also be that well timed jolts of electricity enhance the speed and quality of your swing. Electricity as an intervention is hardly new as anyone who wears a pace-maker can attest. Deep brain stimulation (DBS) surgery is common where an electrode is implanted deep in the brain to treat Parkinson’s disease and other movement disorders. And of course the technology known as TENS is routinely prescribed for pain relief. 

If it proves to be efficacious it might be possible to strategically place a small device located directly over M1 that was programmed to deliver jolts of energy to foster both motor learning and golf performance. Currently the big issue in competitive sports is doping but as our intervention capacity expands we’ll face some knotty questions about how much athletes should be allowed to take advantage of neuroscience.