Angel Yin once came close to walking away from golf altogether. A string of injuries, including damage to her vagus nerve, combined with failed swing changes and the disruption of the pandemic, left her wondering if the game she had chased since childhood was worth the pain. But instead of giving in, she tore her game apart and began again from the ground up.

On The Mixed Bag podcast with Meg and Matthew, Yin laid out that journey in detail, explaining how the years of frustration nearly pushed her out of the sport and how she found the resolve to keep going. The episode, too, was aptly titled The Angel Yin Experience.

That honesty also set the stage for a bigger discussion of how 2023 became the year everything shifted. Her runner-up finish at the Chevron Championship proved she was back, sparking a breakout season that would eventually vault her into the world’s top ten. When Matthew highlighted that Angel looked back with honesty. She traced her struggles through the pandemic and beyond.

“Um, to be honest, I don’t really know. I mean, I just. Uh, I, I wasn’t playing good before that, like 2019. And then COVID hit. COVID, like really dragged my golf game down and I dragged myself down. I was experimenting and um, it just let me into a hole where I just started getting injured ’cause it wasn’t the right way. And I remember the injuries.”

The pandemic stripped away rhythm, her experiments backfired, and injuries piled up until quitting seemed like the valid option. She admitted, “Yeah. It, it was, it was just really bad to a point where like, I don’t even know if I could continue the career because of how bad the injuries were.”

When Matthew pressed on how she managed to climb out, she answered with striking candor: “Well, I just, I had to really set myself down and, um, call people up, ask for their opinion, and then fix it myself. And I was just lucky enough where I met the right people to be able to do it.”

The “right people” she referenced weren’t random. They included trainers, doctors, and mentors who helped her understand the root of her physical struggles. Reports show she battled nerve-related problems in her left shoulder and damage around her vagus nerve. Both of which affected her swing, posture, and even stress levels.

However, after months of struggle, she revisited old swing videos in an attempt to understand where she is and where she was and where she can go now. She isolated variables: equipment, fatigue, and stress.

“But, uh, I, I really sat myself down and I started looking at old videos of mine and saying like, okay, what changed? Nothing’s changed. Why is, why is this changing? Why am I changing? So I was like, okay, there’s one thing that changed my golf clubs. And then, uh, so I just started sitting there and just thinking, I literally just sat like on a couch, which was just like thinking, and then I figured it out.”

She made critical equipment adjustments following the 2023 Chevron Championship. While she’s typically played a Callaway Paradym Triple Diamond driver, she’s since experimented with a PING G430 LST for a lower-spinning setup, aiming to refine power delivery and accuracy off the tee

“And then it, but it’s still taking me like time to like, so I was playing so much and I was so tired and like my vagus nerve was kind of messed up. Well actually really messed up. And so I was like really on edge because of stress, travel and all that. Um, my stuff that was coming in 2020 was showing in my swing again.”

Apart form the vagus nerve injury in her left shoulder, stemming from excessive swing changes and a focus on upper body strength. She also dealt with a separate ankle injury and a foot injury in 2024. But even then the Chevron Champion understood that these injuries are also something she needs to work on. This also gave her the motivation to improve on herself more and more.

“And so the injury is still there. The weakness is still there. And so this time around it showed me that I still have more work to do on that and, which was pretty fun because, you know, you’re always trying to improve and do something better. And so I liked, I, my, my biggest goal, what I enjoy the most is maintaining.”

Reaching the top 10 in the world rankings proved this approach worked. Her consistency and patience, rather than reckless reinvention, turned persistent injury into a foundation for growth. Not being a fan of change, Yin tends to stick to her equipment without experimenting much. Her signature Burke AI-77 putter, a customized model she helped design, is a configuration she kept beyond Shanghai and into 2025.

“Uh, what I have and doing better. I don’t, I’m not a huge person on change, so I, I find it fun that I get to figure out what I need to do to maintain and then be slightly better than what I was before. And so, you know, uh, obviously it’s showing and it’s working ’cause it did reach top 10 in the world this year.”

After retracing her battles with injuries and the patience it took to climb back, she shifted gears to the future. She also admitted her excitement to wear national colors again at the 2025 Hanwha LifePlus International Crown. The event, additionally, has returned to Korea after 7 years. For Angel, the event symbolized more than competition—it was proof she had rebuilt herself enough to carry team hopes on a global stage. She is part of the US team along with Nelly Korda, Lauren Coughlin, and Lilia V

Her journey, from nearly quitting golf to reaching the world’s top ten, shows how resilience fuels redemption. Angel Yin turned injury into insight, maintenance into mastery, and doubt into determination. Her runner-up finish at the 2023 Chevron Championship marked the start of her revival, while her record-breaking triumph at the 2025 LPGA Thailand cemented her comeback. Now, every swing carries the echo of a career once nearly lost but now thriving at its highest level.

Interestingly, she is not the only golfer who has shown resilience when the going got tough. A recent case, for instance, in 2025, has involved every kind of struggle. She endured a health scare at the Evian Championship, fainting mid-round and withdrawing. Just days later, she posted that she was already back on the range, almost fully recovered. Her return culminated in one of her finest performances at the AIG Women’s Open, tying for second despite battling weight loss, exhaustion, and back-to-back withdrawals.

Additionally, there’s also Joel Dahmen, who has set one of the finest examples when it comes to striving on, even in the face of odds.

When doubt crept in, resilience became Joel Dahmen’s strongest golf club

At just 22, Joel Dahmen faced a challenge no golfer expects: a testicular cancer diagnosis. The threat wasn’t just to his career—it was to his life. Doubt and fear could have ended his dreams, but resilience became his most powerful tool.

Through surgery, treatment, and months of recovery, Dahmen rebuilt not only his body but his confidence. Every golf swing after cancer was a reminder that persistence outweighs setbacks. His journey from hospital rooms back to competitive fairways shows how mental toughness, focus, and determination can redefine success.

Even beyond his return to the PGA Tour, Dahmen channels his experience into advocacy, inspiring others, and proving that the strongest club in a golfer’s bag is often the one forged in adversity. In 2024, Dahmen expressed support for Rory McIlroy during a challenging period, emphasizing McIlroy’s leadership in golf and his ability to navigate the evolving landscape of professional golf.

Additionally, Dahmen has acknowledged the legacy of Arnold Palmer, noting that while he doesn’t possess the same playing record, he appreciates the impact Palmer had on the game and the example he set for future generations.