Latest / The Layback Podcast / Josh Davis, DPT, Founder of Tri Star Strength X Rehab (Ep. 83)
Transcript
- 0:00What's up everyone, Welcome back to the Layback Podcast.
- 0:02Joining us today is Doctor of Physical Therapy Josh Davis.
- 0:07He is the owner, operator, founder of Tristar Strength and
- 0:11Rehab. Also worth mentioning, strength
- 0:14Coach 2. With the DPT behind his name,
- 0:16the strength coach probably gets buried pretty often, although I
- 0:20do know that is something very important to him in the
- 0:24structure of what they do with Tristar.
- 0:26I know we'll tackle that as we get going in this conversation.
- 0:30So maybe I just put that little teaser out in front of everyone,
- 0:34just moving beyond solely rehab in not just bridging the gap
- 0:40into performance, but actually getting athletes performing
- 0:44better than they ever were before.
- 0:46That isn't my words. That is straight off their
- 0:48website. So you can go check that out
- 0:50yourself. I, I definitely did some reading
- 0:52ahead of time to try to prep for this.
- 0:55Josh is proud of me for the research with this though.
- 0:57I'm going to kick it over to him before I butcher anything else
- 1:00in this intro. Josh, thanks for coming on and
- 1:03really looking forward to this conversation.
- 1:05Yeah, man, thanks for having me. Just I guess it's a quick intro.
- 1:09So again, physical therapist, graduated from East Tennessee
- 1:11State University. So if you can't tell by the
- 1:14country accent that's coming out of my mouth, I'm from Tennessee.
- 1:18So but yeah, I did my undergrad there, exercise science and then
- 1:22PT school there as well and always want to be a physical
- 1:25therapist kind of thing, like former athlete, baseball player,
- 1:29like about 90% of physical therapists got injured, found PT
- 1:32and was like, I can make a living doing this.
- 1:35But yeah, I mean, a big thing as far as like history goes is like
- 1:39I was in PT school and just kind of realizing that there's a lot
- 1:43of gaps in PT school with. That's another rant for another
- 1:46podcast. They just prepare you for the
- 1:48boards and to be a generalist. And I knew I wanted to work with
- 1:52athletes but was just unsure of how to get from idea to reality.
- 1:57So during my clinical rotation, my goal was to get out of East
- 2:02Tennessee and just see how every black PT is practiced across the
- 2:06country. And that was unlike a lot of my
- 2:09other classmates. They all wanted to stay close
- 2:11and go to Benchmark or whatever, you know, kind of outpatient
- 2:15ortho meal clinics, no shade, but kind of shade.
- 2:19That was just not what I, I didn't want to see three or four
- 2:21people at a time. Like I wanted our one-on-one and
- 2:24provide the best possible care that I can.
- 2:26So anyway, I did a rotation in Provo, UT for like 3 weeks.
- 2:31That was my first clinical rotation where I was doing a
- 2:35presentation and one of the big Polly former BYU guys pause
- 2:40during my intro, use his hand. It's like, can we get a
- 2:43teleprompter for this kid? Went to my seat.
- 2:45I was like, where do I go from here?
- 2:47That would have thrown me for a loop.
- 2:50Oh my gosh, I would have been so scared from that moment.
- 2:53Oh it was bad but you could hear like my voice shaking and
- 2:56everything. But anyway, got through it,
- 3:00great experience. And then one of my last
- 3:02rotations was at Spooner Physical Therapy in Scottsdale
- 3:05and they do the the one-on-one patient care model and they did
- 3:09some cash based stuff, which is completely new to my area, like
- 3:13my neck of the woods to sound even more redneck.
- 3:16But yeah, it was just something where I like, I just seen the
- 3:19care they could provide that was just different than the meal
- 3:23clinic. And they weren't very strength
- 3:25conditioning based, which was interesting because that was
- 3:28kind of what I brought to the table for them.
- 3:30So like after I left, they got some rogue squat racks and trap
- 3:34bars, which is pretty cool. And I still keep tabs with them,
- 3:37kind of just checking in with them, see how they're doing.
- 3:39But yeah, that was kind of my clinical rotations.
- 3:41And again, I just seen a gap in our PT curriculum to where we
- 3:44were like one class of therapeutic exercise, three sets
- 3:48of 10 yellow theraband freaking external rotation for all
- 3:52baseball players. And that was like the all we
- 3:54did. So I was like, I need to expand.
- 3:58And I was a personal trainer all through undergrad anyway, so I
- 4:00had the experience anyway. So I went ahead and got my CSCS
- 4:04in my third year during one of our our breaks.
- 4:07And that best thing I've ever done, honestly, because that
- 4:11kind of got me into what I do now with with Tristar and what
- 4:14we've got a couple other clinicians on board.
- 4:17But the goal is to like kind of what you said, you've always
- 4:20heard that term bridge of the gap.
- 4:22The way that I view it is like a straight line continuum and
- 4:25you've got rehab and then you've got like pro level athlete,
- 4:28right? And we, if we start here, we're
- 4:31injured. I mean like we can still get on
- 4:33that continuum. It just comes down to the load
- 4:35intensity, volume, exercise selection.
- 4:38And then with youth athletes, it's all about like load
- 4:41management. They've got freaking showcase
- 4:44here. They've got showcase here.
- 4:46They're doing pull downs this day.
- 4:47That's been something that I have, I have found interesting
- 4:51managing and then they've got their strength coach at school
- 4:54who may or may not have experience with strength and
- 4:57conditioning, you know? Just four years of high school
- 4:59football in one year at the local D3.
- 5:02Yeah, and they're probably jacked.
- 5:04I mean, let's be honest. Right, right.
- 5:07But yeah, I mean, to counteract that we went really heavy with
- 5:11like sports science tech. So we started with the Bald
- 5:14Force decks and the, and the Dynamo, gosh, we've had those
- 5:17for like 4 years now. So we do like force profiling
- 5:21and then obviously just movement based analysis.
- 5:23But every person that comes to the door, whether they're a 11
- 5:26year old baseball player, pro guy, or our 70 year old
- 5:30longevity clients, like they all get force plate like profiling
- 5:33along with range of motion, all the typical PT stuff.
- 5:36But yeah, whenever you walk in our facility doesn't look like
- 5:39APT clinic at all. And that was my goal.
- 5:41As you can see with step brothers up behind me.
- 5:44We don't take ourselves too seriously here, but you know,
- 5:47it's, it's about training. Like we treat and treat like we
- 5:50train that. That's kind of the key there.
- 5:52But then I got hooked up with you and dude, we got the got the
- 5:56device in and now we're just testing like Mad Men, dude.
- 6:00So it's, it's been awesome. It's definitely a learning
- 6:03curve. PT Squad didn't expect to be
- 6:05doing this much forearm work as far as it goes, but it's it's
- 6:09been solid. Especially bouncing ideas off of
- 6:11you. That's been great.
- 6:13So yeah, man, that's kind of where we're at.
- 6:15Excellent. I appreciate you running through
- 6:17all that. Definitely had to shout out Dale
- 6:19and the crew over your right shoulder, right.
- 6:22I guess I should say Dragon and Nighthawk.
- 6:24They're formal names and I did see one of the times you turned,
- 6:28I saw Flex Pro Grip basically right through your right
- 6:31shoulder. There it is, Love the product.
- 6:33Placement. There, thank you.
- 6:35Yeah. And I'm, I'm excited to talk
- 6:36about the learning curve for sure that that you've gone
- 6:40through. Although there's one particular
- 6:42piece from that whole intro that I want to go back to.
- 6:45And you said it's probably a conversation for another
- 6:48podcast. Although I want to say you are
- 6:51wrong. And I actually think that's
- 6:52perfect for what we're talking about here.
- 6:55You talked about the kind of the nature of your curriculum in PT
- 7:01school. And I even think that goes well
- 7:03beyond PT school and we can apply that to the sports science
- 7:08sector as a whole, sports medicine even.
- 7:11So much of what I see being done from a research perspective,
- 7:17from an application perspective is about stating what is
- 7:21happening. But now to use the phrase that
- 7:24we've already kind of talked about a few times, that doesn't
- 7:28bridge the gap into actual application.
- 7:31We we constantly assess on a force plate.
- 7:34Great. What's that mean?
- 7:36We do a biomechanical analysis. Awesome.
- 7:39What's that mean? And I don't know if that's where
- 7:42you felt the gap was in PT school, but certainly from my
- 7:47side, that's what I've seen now. There's so much information, but
- 7:52the biggest gap that I see is the ability to tell that story
- 7:57from the information. So I don't know if that's what
- 8:00you were experiencing when you were going through PT school,
- 8:03just being told like, hey, this is what's going on, but not
- 8:07really being instructed or guided on how to actually do
- 8:11something about it. I don't want to speak on your
- 8:13experiences here, but I just kind of wanted to call out what
- 8:16I see and give you the floor to take this away.
- 8:20Yeah, I mean, no, you're you're exactly right.
- 8:22I mean, I think I would even go a step back.
- 8:24Like we didn't even talk force plates or anything like that in
- 8:27PT school. But I mean, even from like a
- 8:30differential diagnosis, like, I mean, you know, we were quizzed
- 8:33like crazy on differential diagnosis.
- 8:36And to be honest, like anymore like if it's a shoulder, I could
- 8:39give a crap less about what the MRI says.
- 8:43I'm going to treat what's in front of me and what movement
- 8:45deficiencies they have where their subjective pain is, and
- 8:49then just build the program around that.
- 8:51Like I think that was more of the the discrepancy in PT school
- 8:55is like there was no there. Like we never heard the word
- 8:57programming, which is absurd to me because that's literally what
- 9:02we do. Traditional PT, you're going to
- 9:03get like two or three sessions a week and like P TS already got
- 9:07two people there. You're going to hop on the bike
- 9:09for 15, soft tissue for 15, and then they're going to be like,
- 9:12here's your sheet of paper with stick figures.
- 9:14Go knock this out, holler at me when you're done.
- 9:17But that point, like the obvious thing is like what they're doing
- 9:19terrible form or what if what they have questions.
- 9:22I mean, it's like, it's just basic stuff.
- 9:25But I mean, it comes down to again, like, I use the word meal
- 9:28because that's kind of what it is.
- 9:29You know, when whenever somebody's in here with us, it's
- 9:32like, you know, we want to make sure that they're moving
- 9:34efficiently or the exercise is not the exercise for them,
- 9:37right, Because I may have like most dialed program, I'm stoked
- 9:41about it. I'm texting you about it.
- 9:42Like, dude, this guy's going to crush and then they get in here
- 9:46and they can't dissociate their shoulders from their hips.
- 9:49Well, then it's like, OK, well then that's not the best
- 9:52exercise for them. No matter how much research I
- 9:54see that says that this needs to be done or I see schemes doing
- 9:58something, that doesn't mean that it's good for buddy over
- 10:01here who's got whatever going on.
- 10:03So yeah, I mean, I think it was it was almost the critical
- 10:06thinking side. They were all about Rep ranges
- 10:09that are pretty outdated, be like sets of 30 on stuff, which
- 10:12is doable in some cases. But it's like now we need to
- 10:16load this like pronouns wise TS, it was like pink dumbbells.
- 10:20And it's like, no, it's no different than any other joint
- 10:23in their muscle in the body. Like we need to load it up.
- 10:25So, yeah, I mean, I think it's there's several layers to that
- 10:30question. In short, it wasn't enough is
- 10:32basically what I would say. And like you talking about the
- 10:36the 4th place stuff now. I mean, that's all you see on
- 10:38Instagram now, whether it's Exos or whatever insert well known
- 10:43sports Med clinic. They've got all the stuff.
- 10:46They've got the Kaisers, they've got all this stuff and but if
- 10:49you see the data and you can't communicate what it means to
- 10:52them, like we've started doing VBT stuff and we've got the
- 10:55Voltra beyond power Voltra just come in last week and it is
- 10:58killer. No, no, not sponsored, but I'd
- 11:01like to be. But like, you know, just seeing
- 11:03these, these outputs, I'm trying to reach out to like Coach Cam
- 11:08at CNC. I've been reaching out to him a
- 11:09lot and talking about some, some swing metrics that we can look
- 11:13at. But like, again, I can tell them
- 11:15a number if they're like all right, is that good?
- 11:18It's like, what if you don't know?
- 11:20Then why are you even doing the Dang test?
- 11:23Sorry, I was going to cuss, but enough.
- 11:24No, it's OK. That's, that's clean.
- 11:26You say whatever you want. I, I forgot to cover that on
- 11:28the, the front end here. Usually what I tell people is I
- 11:32don't care what you say, just remember at the end of the day,
- 11:34you're representing yourself. So whatever however you feel you
- 11:37want to talk, you can talk. Dang, for my wife's sakes, you
- 11:40OK? OK, like your son's going to
- 11:42hear this anyway. Yeah, he's not going to remember
- 11:44it. Exactly, exactly.
- 11:46That's, see, now that's a battle.
- 11:47I don't know if I'm going to win.
- 11:48No, but it's worth trying no. This is a brief pause for one of
- 11:54the probably one of the two best things I've heard for dad advice
- 11:57so far, which is try to integrate your kid into your
- 12:02life as opposed to make your life center around their life.
- 12:05So that to me is the perfect example.
- 12:08Why would I change the way I talk just because my kid is
- 12:10around? They're going to hear these
- 12:11things eventually. It's probably better they hear
- 12:13it from me then hear it from somebody else.
- 12:17So you do. Cheers.
- 12:19Well, that's not checkers. That's right.
- 12:21And then I'm going to keep the other piece of advice in my
- 12:23pocket when I need to bust that out if if we hit a dead air
- 12:27period, but I want to go back now.
- 12:31Now we'll bring this back to the actual point of the podcast.
- 12:33I've just been dad brain with everything and I'm concerned
- 12:37this podcast might shift that direction.
- 12:40I promise everyone it's not going to.
- 12:42You just might hear a little bit more about it here and there,
- 12:44especially when I'm talking to other dads on the podcast.
- 12:47But how did you get to the point of actually being able to tell
- 12:52the stories with the data? Was that just from trial and
- 12:56error communication over time, figuring out what works?
- 13:01Really, what was it? Because you have so much at your
- 13:04disposal information wise. You mentioned bald and
- 13:08everything that goes with bald, you're doing force profiling for
- 13:12every athlete that comes in. And as you said, not just
- 13:15athletes, but the 70 year old Wellness patient that's coming
- 13:19in and doing Flexpro grip, doing VBT, it's a ton of data, but
- 13:25where does the story actually come from for you?
- 13:29Yeah. I mean, I think it starts with
- 13:30the the assessment, honestly, like just laying out like what
- 13:33we do and kind of prefacing to the person in front of me that
- 13:37like this is going to be like getting hit with a fire hose of
- 13:40information. If you need me to stop, hit the
- 13:43brakes because I can talk about this stuff all day and and I'm
- 13:46good at like, again, I'm trying to think of a better phrase than
- 13:49dumb it down, but like, that's kind of what it is like meet.
- 13:53People where they are. Yeah, yeah.
- 13:55So, you know, like, again, they care less about the actual
- 13:57number. They just want to know if it's
- 13:58good or bad and what they need to work on.
- 14:01So that to answer your question, I think that was more of my
- 14:04learning curve of like, OK, how can I, you know, explain this to
- 14:08an 11 year old and they can tell their parents.
- 14:12I, this is, this is what I tested.
- 14:15I don't have a lot of twitch. I'm not quick off the ground.
- 14:18Here's how that makes me better on the field.
- 14:20And if I can explain that we're good because then on the
- 14:24programming side, that makes pressure off me.
- 14:26It's like, all right, this is all it is really when you get
- 14:28down to these metrics, it's, it's a bunch of bigger words.
- 14:32And if you just know the general meaning of like what output
- 14:35you're chasing and then what input being training, you're
- 14:38trying to improve that output. I mean that that's what it's
- 14:42about. Like I've had several students
- 14:43here lately. We actually had one last week
- 14:45that she was talking about this very thing.
- 14:47Like, I feel like I, I've got this gap between the diagnosis
- 14:51and what I see in front of me, but I don't know what
- 14:54intervention to use. And she's a third year.
- 14:58So she's in her last year. And I'm again, this is not like
- 15:02saying anything bad about her because she's just not armed
- 15:04with the information. And that's where I told her I
- 15:07was like, you need to get your CSCS or at least just like
- 15:10follow these certain people on Instagram like before you do
- 15:13that, like, and, and I think that's where social media, you
- 15:16know, you're talking about the information.
- 15:17It's a lot. But if you can distill it into
- 15:20trusted sources like Cressy, like Ronald, you know, like the
- 15:24guys at next area, like you know, that kind of thing.
- 15:27You, you, you've got a good start.
- 15:29Obviously try to educate yourself.
- 15:30Like I've got the movement over Max's book above my shoulder
- 15:33there like things like that and podcast, like what you're doing.
- 15:36That's where you can at least get introduced to it.
- 15:39And then from there it's apply. And the best person to apply it
- 15:43to is yourself. I'm not throwing anymore, at
- 15:45least not yet. I'm soft tossing a little man.
- 15:47But like, I mean, that's something like I would love to
- 15:50be able to get Vilo up and stay healthy because I'm 32, almost
- 15:5533. So if any program I, I put in
- 15:57front of an athlete or a client, like I've done it.
- 16:00So I, I think having all the this force plate data, like I've
- 16:04tracked my metrics for four years and I've done X program to
- 16:07try to improve it. So yes, everybody's different,
- 16:10but at least we can distill like do they need contrast therapy?
- 16:14Do they need or not therapy, but training, you know, they need
- 16:17more soft tissue work, they need joint, you know, range.
- 16:20Like you just got to look and see where they're at and then
- 16:23find a way to distill that down to where they are.
- 16:26And I I think that's the key. You mentioned something specific
- 16:30in that answer. I don't know if this was even
- 16:32that important to you in the phrasing of it, but it stuck out
- 16:35to me. You mentioned the 11 year old
- 16:38coming in to see you and being able to explain to their parents
- 16:42how it's going to help them be better on the field.
- 16:45And this goes back to what you were saying about kind of that
- 16:48continuum of rehabbed performance.
- 16:51You are in a position with being a cash pay clinic where you can
- 16:59be a little more mindful of what an athlete needs versus what a
- 17:04sheet of paper or an insurance, whatever company says a patient
- 17:09needs just to check the boxes. So how did you, I guess, form
- 17:15the mindset or come to these conclusions of caring for an
- 17:21athlete in what is going to help them be the best athlete beyond
- 17:26just treating the injury specific to them?
- 17:30Because I'm sure that goes back to what you experienced in PT
- 17:33school. We have an injury.
- 17:35Treat the injury. Your job is done as opposed to
- 17:39understanding that you don't treat injuries in your
- 17:43profession. You treat people who happen to
- 17:46have an injury. That dude, I, I couldn't have
- 17:50said any better. And like that's The thing is
- 17:52like I've, and I didn't go over this as far as like my prior
- 17:56like work, I guess history, but like I worked travel right out
- 18:00of PT school soon as COVID happened, that was a blast.
- 18:03That's when I graduated. It was 2020.
- 18:05So but yeah, I mean, like I've been in the meal clinics, I've
- 18:08been in nursing homes, I've been in, you know, skilled
- 18:11facilities, all the above. And that was something that I
- 18:15would see is like, they send you diagnosis codes.
- 18:18If that treatment doesn't fall within that diagnosis code, then
- 18:22you're, you're not getting paid for it.
- 18:23Like they're not going to deem it medically necessary, which
- 18:28doesn't make a lot of sense to me because like a lot of the
- 18:30insurance companies, they don't have the medical background.
- 18:34They work with insurance. Who's to say that getting their
- 18:37FDP strength, you know what I mean?
- 18:40Like up isn't like that's clearly going to help them.
- 18:42We know that. But they may see this like piece
- 18:44of tech and they're like, we've never seen this before.
- 18:47That's not needed. There's other treatments that
- 18:50have worked for the past 20 years, but then they don't
- 18:52realize that the game is evolving.
- 18:54The players are getting bigger, faster, stronger.
- 18:56The tech is getting just as impressive.
- 18:58I mean, you, you've got to treat the person and and that's where
- 19:00like whenever we do programs, each person gets an
- 19:03individualized program when they're not in here because I'm
- 19:06not going to lie, like a cash based, we are more of a high
- 19:09ticket product in service. But like I'm going to do
- 19:13everything I can to get that person where they need to go,
- 19:16where they want to go. And if they're injured and
- 19:19honestly, like half of my caseload is uninjured athletes,
- 19:22they're just chasing performance.
- 19:24And to be honest, that's kind of what I did.
- 19:25Like, I mean, I don't mind doing physical therapy, but I'm more
- 19:29of a strength coach than I am APT as far as where my passion
- 19:32lies. But having both of those, and I
- 19:35hate kind of using the word hats because I just in my mind it's
- 19:39the same, you know what I mean? It's like same hat.
- 19:41I just kind of go different paths.
- 19:43But it's just a matter of what they need, what they want
- 19:46subjectively, which is a huge part of that setting SMART
- 19:50goals. Like is it achievable?
- 19:52What's our timeline look like? It's one of those things you can
- 19:55over over complicate the crap out of it.
- 19:57But like you just got to listen to what they want.
- 20:00And that's something where in the meal clinics you get maybe
- 20:0215 minutes talk with them. If you have to go to a doc, it's
- 20:05even less. Or a surgeon.
- 20:07So it's like they never feel heard, if that makes sense.
- 20:10So with their assessments, dude, like they're an hour long.
- 20:13We're talking for 30 like at least.
- 20:17And even before that, we've already had a call on the phone
- 20:19to see if we're a good fit. And if they're not a fit, I'm
- 20:21not going to, you know, have them come in.
- 20:22I'll refer them to somebody that that fits them the best.
- 20:25But yeah, I mean that that's something that that you've got
- 20:28to be able to meet people where they are and just talk to
- 20:30people. Like I had so many classmates
- 20:32that dude, they were smashing tests.
- 20:34They'd rather break your plexus in like 2 seconds.
- 20:37But then they can't talk to me. You know what I mean?
- 20:40And here I am making step brothers references in the
- 20:43middle of the exam or something. I think, I think that's a,
- 20:47that's a superpower that that everybody.
- 20:49And I don't care if you're PT, strength coach, pitching,
- 20:52hitting coach, whatever it is, but you got to be able to relate
- 20:54to whoever's in front of you. I'm not saying you got to say
- 20:57bad all the time. Like that's something that's a
- 20:59learning curve for me. It's like an old man, but like
- 21:02you don't have to speak the, you know, the lingo, but at least
- 21:04know the sport. So I, I think that's a big thing
- 21:07is, is just talking to him as a person.
- 21:09I'm going to call on a meeting I actually had over the weekend
- 21:13with an individual young coach up and coming.
- 21:16Wanted to talk about learning more learn about Flexpro grip,
- 21:20but then just how he could learn more about writing programs in
- 21:26coaching athletes. Really his focus is human bio
- 21:30mechanics, true locomotion, not just hip shoulder separation and
- 21:36timing of the arm spiral and things like that.
- 21:38But he wants to learn the true science of human locomotion.
- 21:42And he asked me what books or texts or things I recommend and
- 21:49I could sit there and call back on whatever book is near me.
- 21:53I obviously you have movement over Max's over your shoulder.
- 21:57There's so many good ones, whether you want to go down the
- 21:59path of this final engine theory or hacking the kinetic chain or
- 22:03all these different things or the textbooks for that matter,
- 22:06beyond just these more like coach written novels.
- 22:09I don't want to call them novels or phrasing on my end, but more
- 22:14I guess performance driven rather than true science driven.
- 22:19I don't know, maybe it maybe I'm digging myself a hole here with
- 22:21this explanation. But what I told him is I can't
- 22:27recommend a single specific book to you.
- 22:31Because what you read and what matters most to you at the end
- 22:36of the day doesn't matter all that much.
- 22:38Because what you are going to be faced with is an athlete that
- 22:43has some sort of bias or they're passionate about something, one
- 22:47specific frame of mind. And if you can't coach that or
- 22:52speak that language, you're lost.
- 22:55It doesn't matter if you know every single piece of a
- 22:59kinematic sequence, if this athlete does not understand that
- 23:04language whatsoever, or if you're meeting with a guy who
- 23:08only works in the driveline language and you're trying to
- 23:12preach motor preferences, you're probably screwed.
- 23:16If you have a guy that comes in and only speaks driveline
- 23:19language and you only knows final engine theory, you're
- 23:23screwed. That's going to be a problem.
- 23:25So my, my big recommendation is learn it all.
- 23:28But all of it's good and all of it's shit.
- 23:31It's just how, how do you meet the person and understand their
- 23:37language? So I, I feel like everything
- 23:40that you have gone through is kind of boiling down to that
- 23:45piece and it almost sounds like that's what the strength side of
- 23:50your background has brought you. The PT school brought all the
- 23:53science for you, but pursuing the CSCS beyond just having the
- 24:00certification, but truly becoming passionate about
- 24:03strength and performance is what enabled you to look at
- 24:07everything. More is an entire system as
- 24:10opposed to an acute event. Oh, yeah, yeah, no, I mean,
- 24:14dude, I couldn't have said any better.
- 24:16I mean, that's again, you can have all the information in the
- 24:20world, insert whatever, you know, preference that you have
- 24:23or they have. But like, if you can't, if you
- 24:26can't communicate it because I mean, at the end of the day,
- 24:28it's wraps and says it's truly, I mean, you know, volume,
- 24:31intensity, like it's all those things there.
- 24:35There's a line to where do they need to know this information?
- 24:40Like do they need to know, I don't know, like what external
- 24:43internal ratio that they're at or they just didn't need to know
- 24:46what they need to work on. And, and that that's kind of
- 24:49where I go back to like, you know, the 11 year old athlete is
- 24:51typically after these assessments, I'll plug in like a
- 24:54evaluation or assessment review and I'll go over the numbers and
- 24:58where I want them to be. But then I'll just put it in
- 25:01plain language, like if this number is low, this is an issue.
- 25:06I always use the flag system, which which you are using in the
- 25:09app too, is like people know when they see red, they're like,
- 25:12Oh shit, you know, they're like, that's not right.
- 25:17And I'm like, dude, like it's it's pretty accurate, you know,
- 25:21and I'm not talking about just just with Flexpro, but like with
- 25:23anything like, you know, with the force plates, they start
- 25:25seeing their numbers going down. Then I'm like, how much sleep
- 25:28you been getting to girlfriend dump You like class load heavy
- 25:31right now. Like what's up, man?
- 25:34Like you look like trash. And they're like, well, you
- 25:36know, I just didn't get the number that you wanted me to
- 25:38get. And I'm like, dude, it's fine.
- 25:40Like it, it is OK. We, we just need to look at
- 25:42your, you know, training load. Are you throwing too much Like,
- 25:46and, and that's something I really enjoyed with with flex
- 25:48Pro is like, I've got a kid committed to Virginia Tech and
- 25:53he's, he's playing golf right now.
- 25:54He's not throwing at all. And his number, she's been
- 25:57coming in three times a week doing the, you know, the the
- 26:00protocol you sent me. He just pops in.
- 26:03He already knows how to set it up where it knocks it out.
- 26:05And he tested Friday and he was running it while I was with
- 26:08somebody else and he come in and his expected Velo, he wanted 92
- 26:13and it scored 95. Like dude absolutely crushed it.
- 26:17And and he was like, man, I really want to throw.
- 26:18And I was like, I know you do. But then he's all pleasing, like
- 26:23we're fine. But then the flip side, I've got
- 26:25a kid that's he's trying to get a scholarship right now.
- 26:28So he's going to showcase every weekend.
- 26:30He's doing 4 or 5 pins a week and he's like, man, I am dead.
- 26:35Like he comes in dragging ass. Like, you know, two or three C
- 26:38fours in his hand. I'm like, bro, you need to stop
- 26:41throwing. So that's where I have a
- 26:42conversation with him. Like either stop, you know,
- 26:44Paul's throwing for a bit, at least ramp it down and we're
- 26:48going to adjust your volume in here.
- 26:50Like you might need more just straight up recovery work and
- 26:52just mobility flows. Just try to bring the strain
- 26:55down because like strain and strain and stress and stress,
- 26:58whether it's at the end of a bar or in between your ears, you got
- 27:01to manage it. And it all is going to affect
- 27:03your nervous system no matter what.
- 27:05I mean, the the brain is not going to be like, dude, that was
- 27:07a heavy set of three on dads or girlfriend dumped me.
- 27:11I got 4 exams tomorrow and I've slept 2 hours.
- 27:14You're going to be smoke either way.
- 27:16So that that's where again, like we've been working on this whole
- 27:19time. Freaking talk to him, dude, be
- 27:22like what what's going on? And if we were in a meal clinic,
- 27:25we wouldn't have time to do that.
- 27:26Yeah, if it's not on the sheet of paper in that scenario,
- 27:29you're never going to cover it. It's not medically necessary
- 27:32bro. Talk about their relationships.
- 27:35Right one funny tidbit that I have broke my L4 and L5 back in
- 27:40high school so I I had to do a significant amount of PT for the
- 27:46whole back thing. But I remember I I had the
- 27:52strangest conversation with my physical therapist then and that
- 27:55was when I realized the system didn't make sense.
- 27:58And this is as an 18 year old senior in high school, I was
- 28:03spending like an hour and a half in the clinic every day, which
- 28:07as you said, you're not supposed to do in insurance base PT.
- 28:11You're scheduled out for very set time frames.
- 28:15And one day they came up to me and they're like, what's taking
- 28:19you so long on these exercises? My response was, you gave me
- 28:24three sets of 30 reps That is a lot of reps.
- 28:29And I have to do that on both my left and right side.
- 28:33That takes a long time. And they're like, well, nobody
- 28:36ever does all 30 reps, but then why are you programming the 30
- 28:41reps? And I, I had that.
- 28:43I had that discussion with the PT.
- 28:46And that was the moment that I realized none of this makes
- 28:48sense. Like you, you don't even know
- 28:50what I'm doing. So you're telling me that nobody
- 28:53before me has ever done this amount of reps for you to
- 28:56realize that if you do every Rep that you are going to be in here
- 29:00for an hour and a half and not the 45 minutes that you had me
- 29:04scheduled for? So strange no that it's a
- 29:07perfect story because like I mean and it boils down to like
- 29:10did the PT do they and sounds stupid and like bro Y but do
- 29:14they even lift? Right.
- 29:16No, that's perfect. That person, as you said, they
- 29:21had never done the programming for themselves to really
- 29:24understand what the athlete is going through.
- 29:26And it's so strange to me that disconnect happens so often in
- 29:31the performance world, sports science world.
- 29:35People will make recommendations without ever having done it
- 29:40themselves. Although it is OK to be a do as
- 29:46I say, not as I do industry, maybe at least transform it to
- 29:51do as I say as well as what I've tried I.
- 29:56Don't. Need.
- 29:57I don't need my coach to have thrown 98 mph, but I would love
- 30:02if my coach is at least thrown a baseball in the past year, or I
- 30:07would love if my PT has at least gotten under a bar sometime in
- 30:11the past year. Those things are probably
- 30:14important just so they understand the physical
- 30:17experience as well as the mental experience, not just what is
- 30:21expected based on a sheet of paper. 100% Well, I mean, and on
- 30:25top of that, I, I don't know if you, if you've talked to Padula,
- 30:30I'm blanking on his first name. He's at Oklahoma, but he, he's
- 30:33there, I believe softball. I ran one of his programs
- 30:37recently because I'm trying to dunk.
- 30:38I'm like 5-8 and I, I got some like, it's just my goal.
- 30:42Like I, I bet a couple of my kids that I, I'm going to dunk
- 30:45by my birthday in November, which is coming up.
- 30:47My point with that being is like he's got a Badger protocol is
- 30:51what it's called. So it's like split squats with a
- 30:535 second ISO, 5 reps, 5 second ISO and one in five.
- 30:58And if you've never done that with that heavy of a load on a
- 31:02safety squat bar, you don't know what they're going to feel the
- 31:05next two days. So how on earth are you going to
- 31:09tell them how to load it and then let alone what they're
- 31:12going to do the next day? Like because dude, after I do
- 31:16that, I'm smoked. Now, granted, I'm double their
- 31:18age, but like it's just one of those things where if you've not
- 31:21done it, then why on earth are you having somebody else do it,
- 31:27let alone somebody that may not have the movement patterns or
- 31:30movement efficiency to do it correctly.
- 31:34So we're in the business of making people better.
- 31:36But like if you go too far and I guess that kind of double S back
- 31:40to what we're talking about what you see on Instagram.
- 31:43If you see something on Instagram, you better try it on
- 31:45yourself first or you might get somebody hurt and you're a
- 31:49physical therapist. But yeah, I mean that going back
- 31:52to your point, like that's, that's the the very issue is
- 31:55that person has probably never done what was on the sheet of
- 31:58paper or they would have known you were doing it correctly.
- 32:01It should take that long, but they just don't realize it.
- 32:05Sorry for that little tangent. We again can get back online.
- 32:09I might have over caffeinated myself, which is why I'm just
- 32:12buzzing all over the place at this point.
- 32:14But one of the things that you mentioned off air that I, I do
- 32:19believe would be kind of a fun conversation kind of going
- 32:22through your own learning process live with discussing
- 32:26flex pro grip, the ability to apply it, utilize it for
- 32:30different individuals. You even mentioned that already
- 32:33having different scores kick back on guys, One who is
- 32:37unbelievably prepared, at least the forum musculature is right
- 32:41now versus another guy who needs to be in a good spot and he's
- 32:45getting data kicking back saying that he's in a rough place.
- 32:49So maybe this is the point where I turn it over to you for you to
- 32:54ask a couple questions. Where do you feel like you have
- 32:57a really good understanding? What maybe before that, like
- 33:00what made you want to bring on Flex Pro Grip?
- 33:03But then let's get into where you feel you have a good
- 33:05understanding and where can I help you?
- 33:09Yeah, no, I think this is great. Like I said, I don't think this
- 33:11is valuable for not just me, but but for anybody else thinking
- 33:17about making the jump. But I mean, I guess from the
- 33:19start, like the reason I reached out to you is like Trey Martin,
- 33:22he's in Florida like nothing but high praises about you
- 33:25specifically. So kudos to you.
- 33:27Shout out Trey. Thanks, Trey.
- 33:29Yeah, but like, but, but also just the product and like I've
- 33:32I've got my first TJ patient in here and that I've worked with
- 33:37in this clinic. I've worked with TJ before.
- 33:39Having the ability to go so in depth at this cash based level
- 33:43has been an awesome because like we've got data from I didn't
- 33:47unfortunately I didn't get it before because I just didn't
- 33:49have, you know, the the device yet.
- 33:51But like we've been able to just track this overtime and he comes
- 33:54in here religiously smashing it and he's a very analytical
- 33:58pitcher is the way that I would describe it.
- 34:00Like he's a coach essentially. So he's always asking questions
- 34:03and like, that's great. And you know, you've done a
- 34:07great job of just providing me with information, like our
- 34:09conversations, but also like, you know, all the all the white
- 34:12paper and stuff like that. But yeah, I mean, it's, I think
- 34:15how to correlate it to what I'm seeing at the shoulder has been
- 34:19something that I've been able to pick up a little bit like, you
- 34:22know, extra rotation versus internal rotation ratios.
- 34:25Is it range of motion, put more valgus stress on the elbow which
- 34:28is causing X data kick back, stuff like that.
- 34:31I'll be able to piece together pretty good.
- 34:33I think the big thing that I'm curious is like with the rapid
- 34:36throwers, 10 or not, there was 10.
- 34:38Good Lord. Combining exercises at this
- 34:40point. Kicking in PT schools, but but
- 34:43yeah, I mean like out of the the tip of the finger flexion, mid
- 34:47finger and then ulnar, obviously midfinger is probably the one
- 34:50that that we're seeing the most decrease in.
- 34:53I know that. Yeah, the one wait, I was
- 34:55referring to, he was like 100% on the other two and like 67 on
- 34:59the other one. And he's like, dude, I feel
- 35:01fine. Like what's up with this?
- 35:03So I guess kicking it to you, what would you, how would you
- 35:06explain that to him? This I always like to explain as
- 35:12the movement of the state of blissful ignorance into harsh
- 35:19reality. The reason I phrase that, or use
- 35:22those fancy words almost like it's some sort of album title or
- 35:25movie, is really, I feel like, a perfect representation of what's
- 35:29going on. And you know this all too well.
- 35:33That area is unbelievably difficult to train unless you're
- 35:37a rock climber. Unless, unless you have
- 35:40participated in rock climbing at some point in your life, you've
- 35:43probably not targeted your FDP or FDS or the fingertip and mid
- 35:48finger muscles efficiently doing anything.
- 35:51Yes, you you grip a bar, you do plate squeezes or whatever.
- 35:55But then going back to what you said earlier, the load and
- 35:59intensity is just not there. You're basically doing reps for
- 36:02the sake of doing reps. You might have a bigger, more
- 36:06vascular forearm, but at that point it just looks good.
- 36:09You're not actually training the forearm the way that you need to
- 36:13train it to withstand the forces that throwing places upon it.
- 36:17So an athlete who scores how you explained it or in those
- 36:22percentiles, maybe they're meeting the targets on fingertip
- 36:25and they're meeting their targets in all near deviation,
- 36:28but the mid finger is lacking. That's not anybody's fault.
- 36:31It's just the reality of what we have seen as an industry.
- 36:35Those areas are extremely difficult to train in.
- 36:39Just because the athlete scores poorly, it doesn't mean that
- 36:42they're going to blow out the next time that they pick up a
- 36:44baseball to throw. All this has provided is a red
- 36:48flag. Going back to the flag system
- 36:50you mentioned earlier where we now know what the low hanging
- 36:54fruit is. We know what to address.
- 36:57So it's just providing information so someone in your
- 37:01seat can make a more informed decision for how we target
- 37:06training. So for that athlete in
- 37:09particular, it's not that we're going to neglect ulnar
- 37:11deviation, we're not going to neglect fingertip or FDP
- 37:15strength, but we might put a little more attention to the
- 37:20FDS. So on our normal ABC training
- 37:24cycle, so fingertip extension and then mid finger being the
- 37:29ABC, maybe we double up on those C days.
- 37:32Maybe we hit like an ACBC kind of cycle for that individual.
- 37:37Now then we get into the nuance of the program of there's one
- 37:44thing with Max strength, which is great.
- 37:46We want that to be in a good place.
- 37:47But ultimately we're chasing stiffness of the muscle tendon
- 37:51unit. So a more resilient, more
- 37:54fatigue resistant muscle tendon unit, which takes time.
- 37:57The research would say that's going to take about 8 to 12
- 38:00weeks of training. We can see those Max's jump in
- 38:04less than four weeks with a neuromuscular adaptation, which
- 38:08I'm using fancy words now. But for anyone out there that
- 38:10doesn't understand that that's basically the first time you
- 38:14ever stepped foot in the weight room and you tried to put
- 38:18whatever £95 total on a bench press and you couldn't get it
- 38:22off your chest and four weeks later you're rapping out 135.
- 38:27It's not that all of a sudden you got unbelievably stronger,
- 38:31you just we're now able to recruit the musculature that you
- 38:35previously had. And it's not that that isn't
- 38:38important. That's extremely important.
- 38:40Muscle recruitment matters tremendously, but that is again
- 38:46more of a Max force production thing.
- 38:50Although in the game of baseball when we need to produce Max
- 38:54force over and over and over and over, about 30 more overs,
- 39:00again, at minimum maybe 90 more overs and then we're matching
- 39:05what a pitching workload looks like and then do that five days
- 39:08later. That's where we care way more
- 39:11about the endurance aspect of things.
- 39:13And I mean that from a plyometric endurance or
- 39:16ballistic endurance. How, how often can you repeat
- 39:20Max loading or high intensity loading?
- 39:23And with that athlete that you presented, that's what we're
- 39:27going to focus on. To me like awesome.
- 39:29We don't need to worry about Max's on two things.
- 39:33He already checked two boxes. We need to focus on endurance
- 39:37for the three things we care about and Max force only on one
- 39:40of them. So in the grand scheme of
- 39:42things, he's not in that bad of a place.
- 39:44And then I know I'm getting long winded here, but if we look
- 39:48across the board, that athlete is not that different from
- 39:51everything we see. If we look at every athlete that
- 39:55we have, the 2500 plus data points for the 2500 plus users
- 40:00that we have with Flex Pro Grip now, we're going to see athletes
- 40:05fall into about 1/3, a third, a third, a third are in a good
- 40:09place just from the jump for whatever reason.
- 40:12I couldn't tell you why, but they are in a fine place.
- 40:16Then we have the next third and those guys are probably a month
- 40:20to 8 weeks away from being in a good place.
- 40:24Then we have the next third which are probably in a rough
- 40:27place and need to do something about it ASAP or they are
- 40:30risking injury. I know I just got super long
- 40:33winded on the podcast I'm in interviewing you for, but
- 40:38hopefully that helped you out a little bit.
- 40:40Yeah. No, no, no, it did for sure,
- 40:41because I mean like doubling back to what we talked about,
- 40:44like as soon as he seen that red, he was like, dude, like,
- 40:48why is this red? Like I, I got 100% here, 100%
- 40:51here. And that's where it came down to
- 40:53just be like, man, this is something we can work on.
- 40:56That's all this is saying. And you have good at your great
- 40:59explanations underneath there. We just need to focus on this.
- 41:02And and that's something I see a lot with the force plates too.
- 41:04It's like if we're down, we're down.
- 41:06It's OK, But everybody's freaking competitive.
- 41:09I've got leaderboards up in the gym.
- 41:10They want to beat homie. They played on the same travel
- 41:13team for years and be able to talk ship that.
- 41:16That's what I've liked about the flex pro.
- 41:17I feel like it's a little bit more nuanced and like just newer
- 41:22in general, like my athletes just haven't seen it yet, right.
- 41:26So then they do it and they're like, all right, game time.
- 41:29I'll come in three times a week. Let's knock this out.
- 41:32That's something that I've seen is the buy in with this has just
- 41:35been insane. So long as I can explain, again,
- 41:37like we talked about earlier, like why we're doing the damn
- 41:40thing, the rest of it falls into place.
- 41:42And, and again, like I've, I've had kids come in, they're like,
- 41:45you know, hit hit AB low PR last week or X is not hurt in a long
- 41:50time. And like I can attribute, you
- 41:53know, a lot of that to, to the, you know, flex pro, there's in
- 41:56general and then the program that comes along with it.
- 41:58And like I said, dude, I'm, I'm, I'm stoked to dive deeper into
- 42:01this stuff with you and see where this thing goes.
- 42:05Well, I appreciate that tremendously.
- 42:07Now I guess the question for you on it is what gaps do you think
- 42:12it has filled for you? I think awareness, first of all,
- 42:17like, I mean, because again, like I can look at somebody's
- 42:20grip strength with, with a dynamometer and tell some that,
- 42:25or I can look at their counter movement jump and you know, week
- 42:27to week and see if they're they're going down there and the
- 42:29nervous system fatigues kicking in.
- 42:31Like this makes it so specific to baseball and softball that
- 42:36like it's made my programming for form work and grip so much
- 42:42more dialed. Whereas before it was just like,
- 42:44all right, we're going to do some roll outs.
- 42:46You know, we're going to do a roll ups, We're going to do some
- 42:48barbell curls, supination pronation, see if you get better
- 42:52kind of thing. But like now we can just we can
- 42:55look at every single joint of every single finger.
- 42:57And I mean, that's, that's insane to me.
- 42:59Like we're just looking at now like how tech has has evolved
- 43:03and what you've built. Like dude, I'm, I think it's
- 43:06awesome. Now follow up for you and I have
- 43:10my own bias here, but I understand in clinic it gets a
- 43:13little tough. Of course we have training
- 43:15associated with Flexpro grip. It's, it's not just assessment,
- 43:19but I assume some of what you have to do, especially because
- 43:23athletes may only come in somewhere one to three times a
- 43:27week to work with you. You have to supplement in some
- 43:31capacity. It's not their only forearm work
- 43:34being performed during the week is on Flexpro Grip.
- 43:38You need to prescribe other things.
- 43:40So have you kind of been able to gauge on your side now what
- 43:46forearm work is resulting in greater outputs on Flexpro Grip?
- 43:52Has it kind of given you that feedback where maybe you thought
- 43:57whatever forearm rollers were the best thing you could
- 44:00prescribe and now you see if that's where an athlete's
- 44:03spending their time, it might not result in improved metrics
- 44:07on Flexpro? Yeah, yeah.
- 44:09I mean, we're getting there because I mean, I forget how
- 44:12long we've had it now, like a couple, one or two months.
- 44:15Yeah. I was going to say, I think
- 44:16you're, you're probably 8 weeks in at this point.
- 44:18Yeah. Yeah, I mean, we're getting
- 44:20there. I know, for instance, that the
- 44:23guy that's been crushing it has been doing slightly different
- 44:26form exercises than the other guy.
- 44:29Now granted, the throwing volume is not in day, right?
- 44:33So like it's hard to do if it the is the exercise of being
- 44:37prescribed or is that coupled with just the sheer volume and
- 44:40fatigue that that the other one's feeling?
- 44:43Especially with my UCL guy. Like I mean, that's something
- 44:46like I've got him on the pronator all the time.
- 44:48Now working on ulnar radial, radial deviation, just doing
- 44:51some simple like dead hanging type stuff.
- 44:54And granted, he's, he's far enough out to where I'm not
- 44:57worried about the, you know, surgical site and, and healing
- 44:59and everything like that. Range is great.
- 45:01But we're really starting to dial him up and he has follow up
- 45:03recently And it was like, yeah man, you're about, you know, 4
- 45:06weeks out from throwing everything was great.
- 45:08Keep going. And knock on wood, he's not had
- 45:11pain. He had the ulnar nerve
- 45:12transposition, all that kind of stuff.
- 45:13And he had a traditional UCL, not the internal brace, but I
- 45:17mean, there he's he's cooking. I think the, the hard part is
- 45:21with forearm training in general, and you didn't ask
- 45:23this, but it kind of goes on with the exercises is it's not
- 45:26the sexy stuff, you know what I mean?
- 45:29Like, you know, you don't, you don't, you don't want a girl
- 45:31that you've been looking at in high school, but just sitting
- 45:33over here and you're just doing, you know, freaking older,
- 45:35regular mediation for reps trying to communicate again,
- 45:38back to communication piece of like this is where you're
- 45:41deficient based off what we've seen.
- 45:43And This is why we're going to work on it.
- 45:45This is how we're going to do it.
- 45:46And then four weeks later, six weeks later, whatever we retest
- 45:49and lo and behold, it's better if it's not, we just go back to
- 45:53drawing board and figure out which exercises need to be the
- 45:55best. So that's kind of the kind of
- 45:57the phase I'm in to answer your question of like trying this,
- 46:01see how it goes and everybody's different.
- 46:03We'll we'll end up getting a protocol kind of situation for
- 46:05multiple routes, but maybe holler at me in like November or
- 46:09December. One specific piece that I want
- 46:12to call out what you mentioned kind of the various athletes
- 46:15situations, the athlete who's not throwing is crushing Flexpro
- 46:20right now. The athlete who is throwing a
- 46:23ton numbers aren't in the best place.
- 46:25Granted going in one might have been stronger than the other,
- 46:29could be. I, I guess actually, in fact,
- 46:31that's likely the case based on what you've explained so far and
- 46:34just how long they've been exposed to Flexpro grip.
- 46:37But that is super important to address that the athlete who
- 46:41isn't throwing can spend more of his training economy crushing
- 46:47his forearm because he doesn't need to be concerned about the
- 46:51fatigue level or readiness level of his forearm versus the guy
- 46:56who is throwing currently. We constantly need to make sure
- 47:00that he is as ready as he will ever be to pick up the ball and
- 47:03go showcase, go throw in front of this scout, whatever.
- 47:07Because at the end of the day, we have to expose the specific
- 47:14area to stress in order to get the adaptation that we need.
- 47:18And unfortunately, if we expose it to stress, we're subjecting
- 47:21it to fatigue. If we subject it to fatigue,
- 47:24we're increasing the risk of injury.
- 47:26Yeah, that's sorry for if anyone was like, whoa, we're we're
- 47:30increasing injury risk by doing this in a vacuum, maybe like if
- 47:34somebody does any training, if they train before they go play
- 47:39or go do any thing at peak outputs, you've increased injury
- 47:43risk. Sorry if this is the medium that
- 47:47was used to break that information to you, but that's
- 47:51just reality. If you are tired whatsoever and
- 47:54not just physically tired, but acutely tired, like looking at
- 47:59specific musculature, your injury risk is increased.
- 48:03That's it. It's plain and simple.
- 48:05But that is also why we will mess around with our training
- 48:09economy or the attention that we will give certain musculature or
- 48:14certain protocols given where an athlete is in their own recovery
- 48:22schedule, throwing schedule, what have you and I, I just felt
- 48:25like I needed to address that based on what you explained, is
- 48:28that athlete who's showcasing right now, maybe we're focused
- 48:31more on maintenance. Does he need to spend a ton of
- 48:34time training? Yeah, 100%.
- 48:36You said he's weak. That's not good.
- 48:38But also, if we say Flexpro grip is the single most important
- 48:42thing that this athlete needs to be doing right now, that would
- 48:45be idiotic on my end to preach because Flexpro grip is great.
- 48:51I'm not going to say it's not. But the reason we have it is so
- 48:54athletes can compete on the field.
- 48:56So if we spend more time on flexpro grip and then that
- 48:58athlete can't compete on the field, I'm being a hypocrite.
- 49:01That is, that is exactly what I don't want to be.
- 49:04We want to be supporting athletes and being the best they
- 49:07can be on the field and Flexpro Grip is a tool for that, not
- 49:10something to prevent you from doing what you love.
- 49:14And something that goes without saying, like the same kid is one
- 49:16that doesn't have a spectacular strength coach in my opinion,
- 49:20and they're doing like 5 by 8 on cleans for their Max days.
- 49:24So buddies like this all the time, you know what I mean?
- 49:28With like a hook grip. So I mean, he smoked, you know,
- 49:31grip wise. Anyway, to your point, like
- 49:33we've just got to manage fatigue as much as we can no matter the
- 49:36device or input, right? So I guess a question I have for
- 49:40you really quick and I'll stop asking you questions
- 49:42specifically, but like whenever you've got those, there's 2
- 49:44athletes, 1 Gold Star one, we need to look at his grades.
- 49:49Are we saying test more frequently for one versus the
- 49:52other? How close of an eye do we need
- 49:55to keep on the testing side of things for the athlete that is
- 49:59just gassed? Does that make sense?
- 50:01Yeah, No, I'm with you in some of it is difficult in the sense
- 50:06of in order to get the best picture of where an athlete is,
- 50:12we need to understand where they're at from Max force output
- 50:16standpoint. The problem with that is the
- 50:19more you Max, the more you're going to fatigue yourself.
- 50:22So I'm not going to say that we don't want to test regularly.
- 50:26I think testing regularly is super important for that
- 50:29individual. But also, if we test and we we
- 50:33begin to understand how an outing might impact that
- 50:37individual, maybe we don't need to test quite as often and just
- 50:41ensure that we're doing the things necessary to get them
- 50:45back to baseline to get them to whatever their current best is
- 50:50until we get to December when we know that athlete might not be
- 50:54showcasing and we need to get them ready for their baseball
- 50:57season starting in March. So I I would say some of that is
- 51:03the classic. It depends.
- 51:06Do enough to understand what baseline is.
- 51:09Once we understand what baseline is, we can kind of step back
- 51:14from the assessment unless an athlete, that athlete comes in
- 51:18and says like, yo, I, I feel fatigued, I might have a
- 51:21problem. Let's let's figure out where
- 51:24we're at. But once we know where the
- 51:26baseline is, what's the point of continuing to, I guess, figure
- 51:31out what baseline is, especially when we know we're not really
- 51:34trying to make major improvements.
- 51:36We're trying to hold steady until we can get to a point
- 51:40where we can dedicate ourselves to further improvement versus
- 51:43the athlete that's that's feeling great right now and has
- 51:47really good numbers. That guy.
- 51:48We can kind of look at it either way, like if we're trying to
- 51:52improve peak performance and that's the goal, we don't need
- 51:55to worry about throwing test whenever you want because that
- 51:59that might be what the athlete cares about.
- 52:01Can we get these maxes to go up? And I would be lying if I didn't
- 52:05say that peak outputs are cool to look at.
- 52:08And as you know, it's a great way to get buy in every time you
- 52:11do a jump on the force plate or a mid dipole.
- 52:15That's what an athlete gets excited about.
- 52:17Not 5 by 5 at 70% of A1 Rep Max like that.
- 52:21That gets boring because you don't know what peak force
- 52:23output is. So some of it is juggling the
- 52:27engagement factor versus what really matters.
- 52:30But yeah, it depends. Figure out the baseline.
- 52:33Once we figure out the baseline, understand what's most important
- 52:37and put our energy towards that it.
- 52:39Sounds a lot like training. Don't do bench press.
- 52:43Wonder at Max every freaking week you'd expect it to go up.
- 52:46Yeah. So they that's, that's how I
- 52:49would boil down that answer for you.
- 52:51But now I will, I will take the reins back.
- 52:53Thank you for taking the reins for me on the podcast for a
- 52:57little bit. It was nice to play guest
- 52:59instead of host for a little. But I'll take it back for for
- 53:03one more question or two before we let you go.
- 53:07Now you did mention the whole youth development piece, sports
- 53:11specialization. Where do you stand on the sports
- 53:15specialization? I guess paradigm or continuum
- 53:21because that certainly is a continuum in itself.
- 53:23So at risk of putting you on podium for another debate, I
- 53:28want to hear the, I guess, opening and closing statements
- 53:31quickly, and then maybe I'll offer a little candor from my
- 53:35side. Well, I'm very much on the early
- 53:39sports specialization is not the best idea in my opinion.
- 53:43Like if you can move in different ways at a younger age,
- 53:48you're and again, like, let me preface, this is my opinion,
- 53:51right? But like I forget that there was
- 53:54a study out when I was in Spooner and we had I was on a
- 53:57podcast for that and I was doing some research for it.
- 53:59So forgive me. I've slept a few times despite
- 54:02my son not sleeping but since I've read it but I believe it
- 54:05was like NFL first round draft picks in whatever year it was.
- 54:09It had been like 2020 or before but like I think it was 86%
- 54:13played multiple sports in high school just thinking about that
- 54:17fact. I mean I played multiple sports.
- 54:20Granted I'm 5 foot 8 like 160. I wasn't playing freaking
- 54:24linebacker starting center in my basketball team, but like just
- 54:28being able to move differently and not having those repetitive
- 54:31motions year round. I think that is the big thing
- 54:35being in East Tennessee, dude, like it's baseball 365 like 100%
- 54:41and and that's why most places are the prevalence of P OS right
- 54:44now that I'm talking to in high school is shocking pitcher only.
- 54:48And I'm like, bro, you don't hit like you don't play first at
- 54:52least like come on. Like in, in my opinion, having a
- 54:56well-rounded, I mean, it's kind of, we talked about earlier,
- 54:59like methodologies like don't be married to one thing, learn
- 55:02everything, distill it down. And then like eventually you're
- 55:05going to get to the level where you're D1 or pro where you are a
- 55:08pitcher that is your title now. But like in high school, I mean,
- 55:13my gosh, like, I don't, I don't see how it hurts to play a
- 55:16little, you know, infield and, and hit a bit.
- 55:19So I assume to kind of counteract what you're seeing
- 55:22from a specialization perspective, because of course
- 55:25you have your opinion. Then there's the reality of what
- 55:27athletes are doing to chase down scholarships and all these
- 55:31different things. And I'm not going to be the one
- 55:33to tell them you shouldn't want a scholarship and you shouldn't
- 55:36put your eggs in one basket. But I'm assuming that then goes
- 55:39back to why you program across the board and you're trying to
- 55:43train an athlete to be an athlete as opposed to train a
- 55:47pitcher to be a pitcher. Correct.
- 55:49Yes. I mean like we've got phases
- 55:51where it's like a GPP phase, we've got hypertrophy phase.
- 55:54We might not have them rotating that much for a bit after the
- 55:57season. But like thinking back, my D1
- 56:01guys and gals are all multi sport athletes in high school.
- 56:05Now that doesn't mean that that's the only thing I've also
- 56:09I've also had some that are just straight UPS to us and they
- 56:12pitched ever since they were 11. And that's what it is, right?
- 56:15It has to be, it has to be addressed but not pushed, if
- 56:19that makes sense. Like I've had several athletes
- 56:22like the one I'm talking about that's going to Virginia Tech.
- 56:24He played basketball. He's like the, you know, high
- 56:26school leading scorer in basketball senior year this
- 56:28year. And he's like, I just don't
- 56:29think I want to play. And I'm like, if you're, are you
- 56:32asking me, you know, he's like, that sounds like you already got
- 56:35your mind made-up. And he's like, yeah, what do you
- 56:37think? And I said, buddy, you want if
- 56:38you're not into it, it may not be worth the risk of injury.
- 56:41And you can work on everything else before you go to tech.
- 56:44Then I've got some other kids that are just getting getting
- 56:46beat up and they got tournament every weekend.
- 56:49And you know, it's just, I don't know, I think if there were
- 56:53seasons to every training cycle, I think it may be a bit more
- 56:56beneficial. Too bad seasons don't exist
- 56:59anymore. Exactly, exactly.
- 57:02It's 365 and that's into your point.
- 57:04Like that's where I can try to do the best that I can.
- 57:07If they are going to sports specialized, that's OK.
- 57:10Like there's nothing wrong with that, but we've got to adjust
- 57:13the training to try to mimic those seasons as much as we can.
- 57:17I'm never going to shut a kid down unless it's medically
- 57:19necessary. Like maybe we ramp it down a
- 57:22bit, try out the long toss for a couple weeks.
- 57:24Well, there's many pull downs, whatever it is, maybe throw a
- 57:27little bit less in your pins. But like if they are siloed into
- 57:30that sport specialization realm, which a lot are, that's where
- 57:34you just got to look at all the other factors you can adjust.
- 57:36I love it. One other question which isn't
- 57:39really a question. What did we miss, if anything?
- 57:43Oh, I don't know. I honestly can't think of
- 57:46anything. I feel like we've hit
- 57:47everything. Great.
- 57:49Well then I think we did our job here today.
- 57:51Josh, this is this was awesome to chat with you.
- 57:55I guess actually in a recorded setting.
- 57:57Hopefully I stayed on task a little bit.
- 58:00Like I said, I might have gone too far in the caffeinated side
- 58:03of things. Plus a full night's sleep and
- 58:05now I feel like I'm going too quickly for the first time.
- 58:08One other ask for you, I suppose.
- 58:11How can people get in touch with you or follow what you're doing?
- 58:14Yeah, yeah, we're on Instagram at Tristar Strength X Rehab.
- 58:18That's really our most active platform that we have.
- 58:21I mean, we have Facebook, but my mom's on there and that's about
- 58:24it. But yeah, we're we're actually
- 58:25trying to try to get in the end of the TikTok game, per my
- 58:28athletes. So I've got to download TikTok
- 58:30like an old man. But yeah, Instagram's probably
- 58:32the best place. Perfect.
- 58:34Man, this was awesome. Really appreciate the time today
- 58:37and to all the listeners out there, thanks for laying back
- 58:40with us.