Golfers love a stat.

Apart from keeping score, there are more than a handful of devices available to measure ball speed, plane, stance, putting stroke and on and on.

Even non-players are involved in numbers, with golf bettors using the likes of tour-tips.com and datagolf to crunch the figures and sort out which player’s best attribute suits that week’s course.

So, even though it may seem fairly obvious that walking and pushing a golf cart is more beneficial to your health than riding a cart, the latest study by the Colorado Center for Health and Sports Science adds the oft-sought science to the belief.

The study was carried out by lead researcher Neil Wolkodoff, PhD and backed by Europe’s number 1 golf bag and push cart brand BIG MAX. It also set out to find out how energy expenditure varies in golf based on the mode of transport, as well as recording data on participants’ reported mental focus and their scores across a round of nine holes.

Researches used a VO2 Master metabolic analyzer and a standard Hans-Rudolph mask to test energy expenditure on the course, finding that golfers burned most Kcal per hour using a pushcart, a significant 36% increase on motorized cart use.

Both using a push cart and electric trolley reached the threshold for being recognized as moderate intensity exercise and would have a positive impact on the health of users, while golf using a motorized cart constitutes a health improvement activity.

Wolkodoff commented, “It is clear that if you walk the course, you will experience the same health benefits as other moderate exercises, possibly better. Particularly noting that improvement when using a pushcart, and certainly more than when taking part in recreational or leisure walking.”

“Previous studies I’ve worked on demonstrated that using a pushcart had performance benefits over other types of course transport. The walking modes in this study had a clear improvement in reported mental focus of participants when walking compared to a motor cart.”

The health benefits were pretty much a given, but how does this affect your actual performance? Will walking gain you that vital shot for your weekend $50 scramble?

In reporting mental focus and overall score to par, the studies concluded that pushcart and electric trolley usage came out with very similar results.

For reported mental focus, manual cart use averaged a score of 5.67 while the electric versions scored 6.63, both outscoring an average of 5.01 for the motorised aid. Scores to par fared similarly, with the two manual carts scoring 10.4 and 10.2 above par respectively with the motor over a shot behind over 9 holes at 11.5.

Rick Oldach, CEO of Big Max USA, the company that supplied all the carts and bags for the experiment, was pleased with the end results.

“Neil and the team have done a fantastic job,” he said enthusiastically. “The methodology for testing energy expenditure delivers undisputed evidence for the health benefits of walking the course. The results that particularly please me though are around mental focus and scores. I’ve long suspected that having time to think between shots, to decompress after each shot and to have time to prepare for the next shot is of real benefit, and this study proves that walking improves performance.”

So, not only for your health, but to also beat your buddies for that free round of beers, go manual!