A common expression among various fitness circles is “there’s no such thing as overtraining, just under-recovering”. Regardless of your stance on the topic of overtraining it warrants further discussion. For instance, an individual may experience all the symptoms of overtraining but simply not be getting sufficient sleep to support their recovery. Once sleep is corrected, their performance will return to...

The deadlift can be one of the best exercises for building total body strength and improving the health of your spine. But many athletes get recurring low back pain after deadlifts. If that is you, then we will share the most common causes of this to help you get past deadlifts being an aggravating activity. Low Back Pain After Deadlifts...

Many athletes trying to push their squat weight up end up dealing with shoulder pain with squatting. While we don’t commonly associate the back squat with upper-body injuries, this is far more common than you might think. But breaking down your upper body mobility and addressing tightness can help alleviate this issue while you use other squat variations to continue...

I’m frequently asked by athletes and other clinicians what makes good CrossFit programming. Writing a training plan for a gym following the principles of using “constantly varied, functional movements, performed at high intensity” is incredibly difficult even for veteran programmers. When I’m analyzing CrossFit programming, there are a few “red flags” that I look for in the plan. Things that...

Developing a strong skillset as an orthopedic physical therapist requires a broad range of skills. We must be able to create buy-in with our patients, analyze movement, and formulate a plan to attack areas of weakness. The following are the best physical therapy books I’ve read to address all three of these areas. I hope they help you in the...

I am frequently asked what the best blood flow restriction bands are. As with any trend in the fitness world, many manufacturers have designed blood flow restriction products recently to match the growing demands for BFR equipment. Like most fitness tools, the best set of BFR bands is highly related to your goals. Unfortunately, some devices on the market have...

The hip thrust, popularized by Bret Contreras, is one of the most widely used exercises for targeting glute strength and hypertrophy. This movement takes the standard glute bridge and increases the difficulty by elevating the shoulders for a greater range of motion. A variety of different variations will allow us to increase the intensity of the hip thrust for more...

The psoas march is one of the best exercises for strengthening the hip flexors and abdominal muscles. It’s effectiveness makes it a staple in many programs I write for addressing hip impingement, hip flexor tightness, diastasis recti, and low back pain. If you’re looking to improve any of those areas, then these psoas march (PM) variations will be sure to crush...

If you’re an athlete, chances are you squat on a regular basis. That’s because the squat is one of the most common and important exercises in any routine. We often discuss how strengthening different muscles can help improve your squat performance. But, adjusting your squat stance can be one of the easiest ways to improve your squat performance. When athletes...