Current research does not directly show that using momentum while lifting weights leads to a higher chance of injury.
Mechanism
Synthesis from 1 study
Swinging weights during lifts makes your muscles work less hard at their strongest points, so your joints and tendons don’t get pushed as hard. Since no one got hurt in the studies, it looks like this motion doesn’t make injuries more likely — it just changes how the force is spread through the...
Most probable mechanism
When you swing a weight instead of lifting it slowly, the motion helps carry the load, so your muscles don’t have to work as hard at their strongest points, and your joints don’t get pushed as hard.
External momentum transfers kinetic energy to the moving load, reducing the need for maximal voluntary muscle contraction to overcome inertia.
Reduced muscle force output leads to lower tensile and compressive forces on tendons, ligaments, and joint surfaces.
Lower joint loading decreases mechanical stress on connective tissues, reducing the likelihood of microtrauma that could lead to injury.
Evidence from Studies
Supporting (1)
Community contributions welcome
Do Cheaters Prosper? Effect of Externally Supplied Momentum During Resistance Training on Measures of Upper Body Muscle Hypertrophy
Contradicting (0)
Community contributions welcome
Gold Standard Evidence Needed
According to GRADE and EBM methodology, here is what ideal scientific evidence would look like to definitively prove or disprove this specific claim, ordered from strongest to weakest evidence.