Athletic Performance Podcast
The Athletic Performance Podcast: we discuss all things performance-related, with a focus on pushing the boundaries of speed, power, and strength.
Athletic Performance Podcast
Episode 031 - David Grey on Rehab That Actually Works: Fixing Chronic Injuries & Build Resilient Athletes
"Why Most Rehab Fails—And How to Fix It with David Grey"
Most rehab programs fail—not because athletes don’t work hard, but because they miss the key ingredients for real recovery and long-term resilience. Today, I sit down with David Grey, a leading expert in movement, rehab, and athletic performance, to break down exactly what’s missing in traditional rehab and how to bridge the gap between rehab and high performance.
🔹 In this episode, we cover:
✅ Why so many athletes struggle with chronic injuries and setbacks
✅ The biggest mistakes in ACL rehab (and how to avoid them)
✅ Why intensity is the missing link in most return-to-play programs
✅ How to manage in-season injuries without sacrificing performance
✅ The difference between "feeling better" and actually getting better
✅ Footwear, plyometrics, and other overlooked factors in rehab
David’s approach is equal parts science, experience, and no-BS coaching, and this conversation is packed with insights you can apply immediately—whether you’re a coach, therapist, or athlete working to stay in the game.
🔥 Don’t just hope for a better rehab process—build one that actually works.
📌 Follow David Grey:
🔗 IG: https://www.instagram.com/davidgreyrehab/
🎧 Listen & Subscribe:
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Ryan Patrick:welcome man to the athletic performance podcast. Been a minute to try to get you on here. So I'm super excited today and I know a lot about your work. But one of the things that, that I really like to do is just get to know people kind of who the person is behind. And so I'm, I'm a little less. Familiar with your actual career arc. I always joke, you know, many of us in the physical prep space or rehab kind of ended up there because we're failed athletes on some level. So, you know, injury just weren't good enough. Could be anything. So you can go back as far as you want, but I would like to know. What got you interested in this field and specifically, how did you get your areas of expertise and why did you decide to focus on the rehab side of things?
David Grey:Yeah, thanks for having me on Ryan. Looking forward to the chat. It's a pleasure. So, I have a very not unique story, in that regard. Like you said, injury, not good enough. Not smart enough to do other things. Not a lot of things. So yeah, I just ended up here cause I'm not a lot of things probably. So yeah, I played sport all my life and I had a pretty bad, well, I won't say bad, but I had a, I had a very, yeah, I had a very bad knee at one stage, really bad patellar tendinopathy that was not looked after well enough for many reasons. Myself being one of them, I just. Didn't listen to enough people or probably didn't find the right people. That wasn't for a lack of trying or want of trying. And yeah, I just got very frustrated and. Kind of started to explore different avenues of movement and trying to meet different people. And basically the, the route that I went down in the, in the beginning was kind of very traditional old school physio doctor. Let's try an injection. Let's try some kind of glute activation type of work. All the old kind of stuff that still is around actually a lot of the time. And none of that worked for me, to be honest, it just got worse and worse and worse over the years and my body just ended up in a really bad place and. Sport was my life. I was trying to do my best and I was very, very frustrated. So that is, I had several other injuries along the way as well, but that is really what led me down this route of working with athletes, because I feel like it's a natural progression, which is. You are injured, you get interested in it you start to learn more. And most of the athletes that I work with, like I see people online saying that the athletes don't care. They just want you to get them better. And that hasn't been my experience at all. A lot of them do care. They are interested to know kind of to varying degrees, but they are interested to know like why this exercise and why not that, that exercise. And like, there's definitely the. The era of the informed athlete is definitely upon us. The educated athlete is definitely upon us. And I actually have spoken to a few people about this. This should be scary for some coaches and practitioners because some people that I know cannot have no ability to coach or prescribe our program exercise. And you know what, the athletes that are coming to them are far more informed about strength and conditioning principles and stuff like that, because they've actually trained for their entire lives and are following probably loads of smart coaches and therapists online. And it should be a scary time for some people who do not, because you're actually getting athletes that are, you're going to, you're going to tell them some kind of bullshit explanation. And they're going to be like. Well, that's bullshit, like their alarms are ringing. Whereas back in the day, for me, I was trying to be an educated athlete. I was trying to be an informed athlete, but I, I kind of, I just, I just didn't really have a way to weed through. I would, the only way I would be able to test if this person was, was giving me good advice or not was to. Go with it for a few months and then suddenly, well, that's a few months wasted. That didn't work for me. So yeah, I guess that's a roundabout way of saying, yeah, injured, not happy with the results I was given, the advice I was given, ended up working with people and it's just progressing that way, really. So. I
Ryan Patrick:guess on one hand, it's good to hear that it's not just America, because I think sometimes we, we get these very large network systems of hospitals integrated with therapy, and they just kind of usher people through. It's a cookbook. It's an assembly line. It doesn't matter what. You know, knee injury you have, you just get the, they hand you the paper and that's the knee, that's the knee program on the flip side. Now you've got all these educated athletes and it can kind of be a double edged sword, at least to my way of thinking, right? Because now you've got these, these people who are coming in, who have heard of say PRI or DNS or a number of other things, and I think in one regard, like this does force us as coaches to be on our toes, but on the other side. You know, I can see it be somewhat limiting because now they're kind of in your head. So have you, if you had to manage athletes like that, who are almost too educated or they become too neurotic about what they're actually trying to do, that it actually gets away from them improving themselves.
David Grey:Yeah, absolutely. And I think that, that, that was, that was kind of, it was probably always a problem. It was always, that, that, that's going on forever. It's just now like back in the day, it was their, their dad that was telling them, Oh no, you shouldn't squash. Now it's. They have some kind of methodology that they follow or something like that. So you're, you're always probably dealing with similar issues just wrapped up in a different way. So I think that comes back to being a very good communicator. Mm-hmm It comes back to being very confident in yourself and your own abilities as a, as a coach or therapist. Because if you are not super confident, and I don't mean arrogant or anything like that, just, it doesn't mean that you're going to solve everyone's problems, but you should have a, a. Pretty strong degree of confidence that even though I don't know everything, I think I know enough to help this person. And if you're not confident in yourself, then that's going to come across in how you communicate. And so these people are going to leave, like you're going to write them a plan for the next week or the next month that I want you to follow. And if you're not confident in yourself and they're not quite confident in you, then that's where they start to say, right, I'm going to try a little bit of your plan. And I'm still going to try a little bit of this part last person's plan. And now I'm going to dip my toe into this other methodology, PRI or whatever it is, type of plan. So we try to never really shit on any other methodology or anything like that. We try to not really get into those conversations. I try to speak about, okay, here's, yeah, here's why I think that thing might be good, but. Here is what I need you to do right now. And it's follow this plan that I'm laying out. And if there, if you trust me and if there was something else in the world that I think would be good for you, it would already be in your plan. So this is what we're going to use right now. So being a good communicator is important. Being confident in yourself is important, not too confident, but confident enough. And then I think this is also where having some level of authority. In the industry is important as well. And that's a tricky one, maybe for some people to hear because it does take time to build, but having, having a history of results, having some testimonials from people, having referrals from people, having other coaches that say, yeah, I think this person does a good job. That's important because that's part of what builds trust. You can't, your trust is always outsourced. As far as an athlete can see, they, they're not going to, they're not going to have a hundred percent belief in you until you can help them. So up until that point, you have to have things that you can point to that shows I have done a good job with people like this in the past. So you need to, you need to trust me. So that's where. Having good marketing can help. There's a, there's a lot of things that go into it, you know
Ryan Patrick:Yeah in your space there. There's so many people it seems they align themselves with a Specific methodology. I'll use PRI. It's just one that a lot of people know. I'm not saying good, bad, just indifferent. Just they align themselves and it seems that they discard so many other things and kind of to your point. I feel like great coaching is, you know, all these things are out there and it's almost like you have to like sift. Through everything for gold and figure out what's actually most important for the people in front of you and, you know, without striking your ego too much. One of the things that I find that you do exceptionally well is you are so pragmatic in terms of how you actually implement the things that you do in the way that you do them. And I think that's to me, that's always a hallmark of some of the great coaches because. You pay to see their programs. You, you pay for mentorship, you get behind the scenes. And I find that just time and time again, the guys that, that really do the best job, just do the simple things. They do the common things uncommonly. Well, I don't know how else to say that. And so I kind of want to dive deep because there are so many philosophies. Out there and I don't really need you to comment good, good, bad or anything on any of these, but what are some of the fundamentals that underpin your approach and what do you think so many practitioners are really missing when it comes to the rehab side of things?
David Grey:Yeah. I think rehab is a good word to be in because it's, it's kind of, it's kind of, it's kind of simple in terms of measuring things. Even S& C can be a little bit trickier because you can, you can get someone's squat to go up, you can get them to sprint faster through the timing gates, but like. If they are an athlete that's playing a sport, the only thing that really matters is that they play their sport better and that, and those things don't, don't mean that, that will transfer over. It doesn't mean they won't transfer over, but it's just a little bit more vague. It's a bit harder, harder to measure. Doesn't mean you're not doing an amazing job. It's just harder to measure. Rehab is easier to measure because rehab is about, someone comes to me and says, I can't run right now. I want to run again. So the goal that what measures how good a job I've done with them is whether they got back to their goal. And whether they stayed back at their goal, not like I ran once and now I'm injured again, they got back and stayed back. So, what I think a lot of those people with the, that go in like deep into methodologies, they come up, a lot of these methodologies are good, like there's good stuff within them, but they miss the forest from the trees. They end up with a weird goal of this person came into me and they wanted to get back running, but I've spent six weeks doing this exercise that improves their hip internal rotation by two degrees. So like, the goalposts have shifted and it sounds good to the client and it sounds good to yourself, like, oh, this is so important that we get this back, but when you step back, it's like, hang on, that? Is that might be relevant. It might not, but that's not the goal. That's one potentially tiny part of what makes up the broader goal. So I, and the coaches that work with us and for us try to never, we try to always keep the main thing, the main thing, and that's getting back to wherever we need to get back to getting back to the goal. And I think that's why it can be good for people to work in rehab and. Realistically, a lot of these people that are selling a lot of these courses, they are not doing rehab. They're doing something else. They call it rehab. They are not doing rehab. They're doing mobility training, or they're doing breath work, or they're doing something that could be part of rehab, but it is not rehab. So we keep, we, we, we speak with our clients in the beginning. We set a realistic goal. We set a, maybe an outlandish goal sometimes. And we. Help them and us get clear on where we are right now and what's the next step, the next step, the next step. And when you have that kind of framework in mind, you don't, you kind of don't care what tools you use to get there. Like I couldn't give a crap if, if I could just put someone on a leg extension five days a week for six months. And that meant they got back to their goal. I would do that. Doesn't mean the client would like me. Doesn't mean they would do that. So I might need to spice up the program or whatever. But if you told me that that was going to work, and the client agreed that that would work, I would do it. I, I, I really couldn't care less. So, I don't think that answers your question at all. You were asking about like, what are the big things that underpin What we do, but
Ryan Patrick:no, no, I think that's, no, that's fantastic because there is almost this, I see this kind of taboo a lot, right? You a client goes, goes to see a coach and, you know, they've got a wriggle in their knee or something's a little bit off and all of a sudden they're doing rehab and they're not training and they lose. I mean, they might gain this hip internal rotation, right? No different than what's, you know, accused the old school physical therapy. A lot of people get better just purely from rest and not doing things that are offensive to the, you know, the inflicted tissues, but did they really get better? Did they really improve the things? And so. On that note, I mean, I'd almost like to extend this conversation. I'm sure that you get like people here rehab and they're probably thinking, okay, these guys are injured, but like an ACL where you are completely out of training for a certain period of time. But I'm, I'm betting money that you've probably got a lot of people who are like, Hey, like it's preseason or we're in season. And I've got this wriggle in my knee, but I've still got to play. And so I'd like to hear more on that. Of how do you balance this rehab while maintaining the level of robustness that a lot of athletes need to actually perform?
David Grey:Yeah, good question. So we call those athletes, like there's a whole category of athletes, which is like kind of injured, but not really like I can still play, but I just really can't perform the way I want. I kind of feel like crap, but I keep going. And sometimes those are the worst type of. Not athletes to work with, but injuries to have I, that was, I was one of those. My knee, I had a really bad tendinopathy and I basically did not stop playing for 10 years. And my quad was like a toothpick and my tendon was like an old rope. It was in smithereens basically at this stage. And you know what, I probably would have been better off having an ACL where, no, actually I definitely would have been better off if I just ruptured my ACL. A year into that and because it would have been a definite line in the sand, you now cannot play. And now we're going to build back your function and we're going to take a step by step approach. That's why sometimes a leg break can be so much better or an ACL can be so much better. Obviously you, you wouldn't want one, but can be so much better than a really nasty tendinopathy or something like that. So. We get, we have a whole load of athletes that are those athletes in season. They're struggling with something. I do quite a bit of consultancy for other physios and athletes who they're just looking for someone to cast an eye over. What they're doing and see if there's tweaks that can be made. And I kind of enjoy that. And I don't know, it's such a, like, it depends thing. Sometimes it's just like, sometimes it's just having the balls to say to them or helping them have the balls to say to their coach, I need to take off an extra session a week. Like I cannot, if you want me to perform on the weekend, then we're training Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. And we're playing on a Saturday, for example, or whatever, like I need that when Wednesday session off and they always are, are super afraid that the coach is going to feel like this is you being a wimp or a pussy or you're trying to back out and actually. Usually if the athlete can, can communicate very clearly with the coach that like, this is, this is what I need right now, then I'm going to be much better at the weekend. I will be in the gym. I will be doing my whatever. So sometimes it's a matter of just a communication thing. Sometimes it's a matter of, okay, they're trying to fill up too many buckets in season. So they might be doing. They might have a tendinopathy, let's say an Achilles, and because their plyometric ability isn't amazing at the moment, they're trying to do a little bit of extra plyos in the gym, outside of their field sports stuff. And I'm kind of often saying they're like, okay, we need to save your. It, let's say impacts, you have a certain amount of impacts in your body that your body can tolerate per week. And we will be much better off saving those for on the pitch. And it's not that you are bad at plyometrics right now. It's that you're in pain. So let's find ways to reduce pain. And actually you will be able to perform much better when you're on the pitch, rather than trying to do more jumping, more plyometrics, causing more pain. And now you're. Kind of bad all of the time. So that's a conversation that's fresh in my mind. Cause I had that with a AFL and an Australian footballer probably not even two weeks ago, he feels like he's, he's lost his spring when he's on the pitch. He actually has a patellar tendonopathy. I've lost my spring. I can't jump as high as I was, as I could before, cause my tendon is so sore. So I'm practicing more jumping now in the gym. And actually all that's doing is making his tendon more sore. So it was that, that for me was simple enough conversation where let's, let's take those out. Let's take that out. Let's find a couple of exercises that can make you feel better. And he texts me a week later saying, David, I just had the best session of, of the last two years. I jumped higher than I had before, blah, blah, blah. So he was just afraid that he was losing his spring there rather than. Understanding that it's the pain that's getting in the way. So let's reduce that. So I guess, I don't know, in season is very much like problem solving with those types of athletes. And honestly, it can, the tiniest things can make a big difference. Or seemingly tiny things can make a big difference. Whereas a rehab process where they're actually, there is a line in the sand. They're actually injured right now. That's a, that's often a little bit cleaner. We have a, like, this is a six week block that we have. And that's That's a really nice place to start with someone almost like an off season with an athlete as well. That's a nice place to get that full block and you can plan ahead in season. There's very little planning that can be done, more reactionary.
Ryan Patrick:There's always a conflict between reality and like what's optimal. Right. So I think as we learn, it's like, Hey, here's a four year periodization. And I'm like, Oh man, I don't even know if I can make it four weeks. I mean, I'm constantly editing programs, but. With that in mind I think, you know, the initial starting conditions for an athlete, you know, let's say that it's preseason, they've got this wriggle in their knee, right? And I almost think of this kind of magnifying glass. It just like this arc gets wider and wider as the season goes on. So it's like, if you have this thing now and you continue to play on it and you got games and. The reality is athletes are going to athlete, they want to play, they want to compete, they don't want to take time off, especially the ones that are probably at the level that you're working at, or in my case, kids who want to get to college, they just, they're going to go because they're athletes, but it's kind of that analogy of like, Oh, you know, if the plane is a degree off and you continue on this trajectory, you're going to miss the mark by a mile. And so, you know, all of a sudden we get to this point in the season where they are like dealing with some pretty severe stuff, but to your point, it's so funny. It's like. Well, I'm not jumping as well. So I'm going to continue to jump more in my downtime, which just becomes death by a thousand cuts. And so I heard you kind of mentioned two things that you're doing for these athletes and I, and we can just keep it specific to tendinopathies. One is having a difficult conversation about load management and making sure that they are. Reducing this at a level that's going to allow them some bandwidth of recovery. And then second is not adding things in that, that are, that they're already doing that are problematic, but filling some of those empty buckets and giving them some activities and some strategies that are actually going to improve, you know, the, the tissue quality, the resilience, whatever that looks like. And so, again, just kind of looking at it from the perspective of tendinopathies. What are some of those things that you're doing in season that would help athletes recover or get more out of their downtime than just pure rest or doing more of what's causing the problems?
David Grey:Yeah, good question. So I guess if you think about a tendinopathy chronic. What if you take, if you take over the course of a season, let's say, let's say it's the, it's the quad, it's the patellar tendon, usually what you'll see over the course of a, like with a chronic patellar tendon over the course of a season is you will see that that quad atrophies quite a bit and it's kind of a, it kind of, it kind of messes with your head a little bit, right? Because if you were to think about this. Logic, I don't know if logically is the right word, but if you were to step back and look, Ash. A human being and say, right, your, your knee is sore. You are still running, jumping, lifting all of these things. And yet the, the more you do of this, the smaller your quad gets. That almost makes no sense. But that is what we observe in front of us time and time and time again, look at that side that has the tendinopathy and that quad is very small. That calf on that Achilles side is very small. Now you could, a lot of people could say you have that tendinopathy because you have. A small quad, but actually it didn't happen like that. You, you, you had two of the same quads basically, and then you got the tendinopathy and now that quad started to waste away. So it's kind of a funny thing to think about why a nervous system would like. If I was designing a body, I would, if I could put all the parts into place, I would say to myself, right, if this person, if, if this knee is sore, I'm going to try and get the surrounding muscles to work harder, to do more work, to take load off the quad. But the nervous system almost seems to flip that on its head consistently. Now, not this is one or two people consistently, flip it on its head and say, Your knee is sore or my knee is sore. I am going to cause a lot of inhibition at that muscle pain causes inhibition. So, which results in me putting even more load through the tendon and less load through the muscle. So I think what a lot of people do is over the course of a season, then they're trying to maybe limit this atrophy, which is a good idea, but they seem to make a mistake a lot of the time. Trying to make it, make up for it with frequency of exercise. So they will do, they will choose 10 quality type of exercises and they will chase like kind of a pump a lot of the time. Or here's an example. With an Achilles person, they will do, they will do three sets of 15 body weight calf raises every single day. And it's almost like a safety blanket because that feels like you're working the muscle, which you are. And it gives you that analgesic effect. So I feel a little bit better for 45 minutes or an hour. And that's, that's a little bit of a trap because I'm always chasing that analgesic effect of feeling better. And what we tend to do, or what Bucket I tend to think is missed is the intensity side of things. So we tend to, with our tendinopathies, strip back quite a bit on the frequency. And we drive intensity up. So we're looking for one or two times in the week where we can train that muscle really, really hard. And that could be like an Achilles tendinopathy. It could be the day after a game or after your hardest training session, we're going to get in the gym and we're going to do five sets of five. Heavy eccentrics, two legs up, one leg down on a, in a Smith machine calf raise with, with a five second eccentric on every rep. And that's your time to like get a ton of time under tension, the highest intensity that you can, you can do and potentially have some positive adaptations at the tendon as well. So instead of doing. Calf raises seven days a week. Let's try and find one or two days where we can go nice and heavy. And yeah, you can do some lighter isos and some gentler reps on other days, but that's almost always a bucket that's missed is intensity. And just finding that is, is hard to do, but really important. I think so. That's one big thing.
Ryan Patrick:What challenges do you come up against with some of the athletes who are avoidant? Right? My knee hurts and now I don't want to bend it or I don't want to do any of these activities. Do you encourage them to head into pain at, say, a 2 out of 10 level? Do you find completely different solutions for them? How are, how are you? Bridging that gap.
David Grey:Good question. I used to be a lot more. I used to not mind the pain so much. I still don't mind pains pushing into pain so much, when, like for the last decade, there's probably been a lot around tendinopathy is an important research that. Pain during exercise, isn't too bad. It's the next day that you need to worry about. Like if it's quite a bit the next day, and that's, that's very valuable research and kind of a very valuable, even anecdotes that you need to be aware of. And so I think I fell into the trap of. Maybe, maybe thinking that actually, okay, because these people say a three or four, sometimes even a five out of 10 pain is okay. I mean, five might be a lot, but like a three or four out of 10 pain is okay during an exercise that. I would just encourage people to just go ahead and do it anyway. It's, 10. And actually, what I've probably changed my mind on a little bit over the last 12 or 18 months is, yes, it's okay to have that 10 pain, as long as it doesn't spike too much the next day. What's much better? Is having 0 out of 10 pain, or 1 out of 10 pain. So, I've been a little bit more particular with my exercise selection. With my coaching of exercises and my loading of exercise, because it's not that I'm afraid of getting someone into that three or four out of 10 pain. It's that they just feel better if it doesn't feel pain, they get a better muscle, more muscle and less joint pain or more or less tendon pain. And I think that's super valuable. So if we have to, when we can't find anything, I will be okay to go into a little bit of pain with them. Definitely something I've changed my mind on is. Don't be lazy with that and just say, like, just because it's, it's, it's okay to feel pain, then just go for it anyway. I'm, I'm a little bit more particular now. We're trying to find an exercise where we can have potentially less pain. And I think most athletes are okay with it. They don't mind pain that much. They don't tend to be super like afraid of it. As long as you communicate that this is, is not the end of the world. And also we have to try, we have to try and push here and I think if you tell them it comes, it comes back, it comes back to communication. If you tell an athlete, this exercise is going to help your pain and they wake up the next day and their pain is worse, then basically they've lost all trust with you. Whereas if you say to them, I think this could help you. It also has the potential to make you a little bit, a little bit worse. But if we don't try it, we won't know. So are you on board? Do you mind if we push ahead a little bit with this and it's not going to like, we're not going to do something silly. You might wake up a little bit more sore tomorrow, but all that means is. Either we've done a little bit too much or we need to tweak the exercise a little bit, and suddenly they wake up the next day and they say that's a little bit more sore. They don't, they haven't lost trust in you. They've, they understand that this is us gathering information along the way, so two practitioners could do the exact same exercise, the exact same load, with the exact same client, and caused the exact same flare up, and one guy has maybe even gained a little bit more trust because you've been honest. The other guy has lost trust completely. And that's really important not to do not to not to do that.
Ryan Patrick:No, that definitely goes back to your communication and setting expectations with people, right? Because now it's not this you kind of take yourself out of the role of the role of like a guru who I have all the answers versus. Hey, this is kind of experimental and I want you to approach this with a sense of, like, gentle curiosity of, hey, is this working? Is this within the bandwidth of things I can tolerate? Or if we just exceeded that threshold a little bit now, with respect to the pain, this is gonna be kind of an anecdote. Right? So I know there's a lot of research on this, but do you find that the. Inhibition is less when, when you're choosing solutions that don't trigger the pain to that three or four levels. So when you're operating at things that are completely pain free, are they able to activate and hypertrophy the target muscle more effectively in your opinion?
David Grey:Yeah. I think so. I think so. And I also think that, I think that especially when pain has been chronic, the more just because it's not getting worse, like it's here, it's not the end of the world. If they improve their function and their pain doesn't get worse as they get more function. Then that's, that's fine. That's not the end of the world. But if every time you step in the gym and you do some exercises, you feel pain. It just wears you down and you get to the stage where like you expect that pain. You're waiting for it to come. Your it's just becomes part of your life. And I feel like that's a. I've experienced that and I've worked with so many athletes that have had that who have had people say like it's okay to feel pain and it is okay to feel pain but it's also shit when it's every single time that you bend your knee you feel that pain and my knee. My thought process now more recently has been to try and move people away from that. Just stop, stop causing pain all the time. They just start to look for it. They start to get obsessed with it. It starts to dominate everything they do. So, I'm sometimes happy to take a couple of steps back. Even if it just means like, let's get my, my motto for this year has been like with a lot of client with clients to keep it simple, like more muscle, less joint, more muscle, less tendon, more, more, more, more, more, more, more muscle, more muscle, more muscle. And we're going to find more ways to get the strongest muscular contraction we can get. With the least joint feeling or pain feeling that we can get, and that's been a nice kind of mantra for chronic pain people to live by. And what that means is there might be some days where they just, no matter what they do, they can get that feeling of that muscle. They get the feeling of the joint, the joint, the joint, and maybe that day we just need to back off or we need to not do that exercise. And that's been very, very successful for us of late.
Ryan Patrick:No, I appreciate that. I've only had 1 episode of, chronic pain like that, where I think what you're describing in my mind is you get this. It's almost like tunnel vision, right? Where it's like, everything else goes black because it's like, no matter how you move, no matter what you do, it's just. There is like a little cloud over you and you just, you can't think about so many other things. So I appreciate that. Another follow up question on this. Have you had some athletes come to you who have been successful at. Rebuilding some of the, so let's say the quads in the case of a patellar tendinopathy, but they're still not getting rid of the pain. So they find a way to work through maybe some of this inhibition, but they're still experiencing symptoms.
David Grey:Yep, you could, it's very common. You could have, you could spend 10 years building the quads, but like if you're, you could have a lot of pathology in the tendon and well, it's important to note that some people have. A lot of pathology independent attendant and zero pain, but you could have a lot of pathology and attendant that's there already and you've built your quads up so much and they still have pain. And, and that shows that's evident in the research everywhere that it's not just a strength thing. There's obviously a graded exposure thing there as well. There's a very much a neuro side to it, which is that, that, that pain is like The more, just like I said, it's kind of, it's kind of there. It's kind of almost part of that system or it's, it's programmed in almost in some ways at this stage. So yes, that's, it's very, very common. It's very, very common. And you need to be making sure that your metabolic health is good. Your recovery is good. Your sleep is good. Your nutrition is good. Your load management is good. Your strength is good. Maybe you need to be doing things that could potentially. At least it's a change cause you could build a lot of muscle on quad back. Let's say by doing high volume, low intensity exercises, there's lots of weights to build muscle, but I think some of the research is showing that you need to, you need to work at very high intensity to, you know, we're still probably new enough research and we, you hear varying things on it, but you need to work very hard. To elicit very positive changes at the tendon, especially when there is pathology there. And I think that is often missed as well. You very rarely see people doing overcoming isometrics for a patellar tendon or for an Achilles tendon, where they're pushing at a hundred percent, their max voluntary contraction are above 90 percent for. Short bursts of, let's say five seconds and doing that consistently for weeks and months. So there's potential that we have built up the muscle, which I think is, is a good thing in most cases is to just have more strength there. But it doesn't mean that you've maybe had any positive adaptations at the tendon. You maybe just have a muscle that can potentially take some of that force, but that's not certainly not the only thing. The tendon isn't the only thing there's, there's so much else. I play there and probably lots of stuff that we don't know as well.
Ryan Patrick:Yeah, I can imagine somebody with, with pain, you know, doing maximal effort stuff, right? Because if you don't have access to isos, or you're not using like a 2, 1 eccentric, it's like, Hey, we're going to, we're going to squat maximally. They're like, like, hell, I am like, you know, like, there's no way. But the overcoming isos. You mentioned some heavy centrics. What other ways are you driving intensity for these people that have been really productive and not triggered symptoms?
David Grey:Those are the two big ones that we will have almost all the time. So when we get into that, those later stages or even mid stages, to be honest especially within Achilles, I think it's easier to drive that intensity up with. A calf and Achilles than, than the quad a lot of the time. And I don't know if the patellar tendon needs it as much. They, that seems to respond a little bit better to longer, not, not better. It seems to respond well to longer held isometrics. And I think the calf and the Achilles can. Actually, let me put it another way, the patellar tendon seems to potentially flare up easier with something like an overcoming isometric, because I won't say because, but it seems to, whereas the Achilles, you seem to be able to get that in easier and earlier, probably because even if you think about the knee joint in general, it's, it's, it's kind of, Okay. Easy to flare up anyone's knee joint in the gym. Like, there's lots of ways, if I wanted to hurt someone's knee, there's a lot of ways I could hurt someone's knee. But, if I wanted to hurt their ankle and their achilles, there's very few ways I would probably have to get them jumping. Off stuff and jumping high or running fast. So I think in the gym there's, you can probably drive intensity up much higher for something like a calf and Achilles, and it has the capacity to deal with it much easier because it's still nothing like the loads that it's going to experience when you go and sprint and jump whereas the knee, you can start to match the loads a little bit easier in the gym, even though it's still not going to be the same as sprinting or jumping. So. Yeah, we usually try and have a heavy eccentric programmed in once a week for the Achilles and then an overcoming isometric push programmed in even sometimes as far as like three times a week for someone. Because the good thing there is you can, you can, you can get very high intensity, but it won't make them sore usually. And it won't fatigue them a whole lot in, in any way. They will just be, they will just work hard during the set and then. Like 30 seconds later, they're fine. They could go over and do a heavy back squat if they wanted. So for the most part. So yeah, heavy eccentrics and overcoming isometrics, we use a lot of with our Achilles people.
Ryan Patrick:Seems pretty straightforward. I had to almost contrast it to what I see a lot of my athletes go through, which is a lot of lower intensity, higher rep, they get to this place where they're not hurting and then they're cleared and then they have to go back to these high intensity activities. And they're just painfully underprepared for them. So, it's, the intensity, I mean, I know you've mentioned a couple times, I've asked a few follow up questions on it, but just for people listening, like, to Hammer at Home, like, that really is one of the, the difference makers in terms of rehab. Is that fair, is that fairly accurate?
David Grey:Yeah, definitely. I think it's it's probably the thing that's missed. I did, I did a episode on our podcast. Speaking about that, it was like the missing link in almost every failed rehab is a lack of intensity. People didn't push hard enough at a certain stage, actually throughout the whole rehab. Cause intensity is relative. And a lot of times people are just being underloaded throughout. And certainly when they get to end stage, like most people that you see that have had. Continuous hamstring injuries, they get back to sport, but like they maybe did one sprint session or probably not even, you know, and even if they did, did they push a hundred percent where they, where they timed when they sprinted, like, probably not, they just in their sprints, they just never hit. Intensity or the intention, intention and intensity come along together. Like they never had the intention to go a hundred percent balls to the wall. Zero cues. Just someone said, go when you went. And we try and bring that in as early as we can in the rehab and as often as they can tolerate in the rehab. And it's almost always missed, especially my bias is probably like we get a lot of people who failed rehab. So a lot of athletes, elite and sub elite that. Have failed rehab once, twice, three times with the same thing. So obviously my bias is seeing the people. haven't been successful, but this is the biggest thing that is the reason that they haven't been successful. There's usually more than one reason, but probably the one that I could say almost all the time is their intensity was way too low.
Ryan Patrick:Yeah. If you don't have some level of stress inoculation, you really don't know what you're up against. I mean, it's going to break once you get back out there. At least that's the way I think about it.
David Grey:Yeah. A hundred percent.
Ryan Patrick:With some of your athletes. Do, do you have some different perspectives on volume recommendations based on the type of sport they play, meaning surface in, in particular, so your court athletes, obviously, they've got these hard surfaces, the impacts are going to be a lot harder compared to some of your athletes who are out on, you know, fields or grass that are soft. Does that impact your decision making with what you can actually do with them?
David Grey:Not really, I don't think, because what impacts my decision making more so is what they need to be able to do. So if they're on a hard court, like, what, what is the goal here? Do you, it does your practice or your sport to require you to do an hour on this hard court five times a week? Well, if it does, that's what we need to build to versus on the, is it, if it's on grass, is it an hour or five times a week? Well, either way, we have to build up to that. So it's probably more about what yeah. What they, what they have to be able to tolerate. And the good thing, with these different types of sports is if they have to be able to tolerate. A hard court, let's say, then it means that they probably have tolerated in the past. They have come from this sport. So their body is already somewhat prepared for this. All them reps are in the tank. So you can. You can usually get them back to that much easier than someone who has played soccer all their life on, on grass. And now they want to turn into being a basketball athlete, but they have an ankle problem. Like that would be a trickier situation because their body just isn't prepared for that in any way. Nevermind the joint that's in question, like you're lacking individual joint capacity, but you're also lacking the overall tissue tolerance and even the coordinative aspects of. Dealing with that different type of surface. So yeah no, I would just try and do as much of the rehab as I could at a certain stage on the surface that they're going to be using.
Ryan Patrick:Yeah, no, that makes a lot of sense. Follow up question related to these different athletes and the types of shoes they wear. One of the things I know that. is common for you is get people out of their shoes to work on foot strength, but obviously you're not, you know, spending the whole session barefoot and doing things like that. Do you have some recommendations in turn for your athletes or some criteria about what you want them training in? Because You know, you've got a basketball player who's got this heavy shoe. It's going to lock the ankle into a certain degree. You've got soccer players who wear these low cut boots. Sometimes they're a little bit tighter so they can get different positioning with their foot on the ball. So what kind of, what kind of footwear do you prefer athletes train in?
David Grey:Good question. Firstly. Most importantly is something that they're comfortable in, because I've seen a lot of people who have had all kinds of recommendations from different practitioners and podiatrists and blah, blah, blah. And you ask them, like, they've been wearing this shoe because they were told. And you're asking them like, how does that feel? I hate it. It feels horrible, you know? And it's just like, that should be the first question. Like when I was, when I was seven years of age and my mom was bringing me into a shoe shop, like the first question is like. How does that feel? Oh, it feels good. Or it feels like crap. Well, we won't buy them. They run up and
Ryan Patrick:down the aisles,
David Grey:which ones
Ryan Patrick:made me the fastest.
David Grey:Exactly. How does that feel? It feels good. So I'm going to buy those ones. So, see, firstly, something they're comfortable in when they're with us. If it's a foot problem or like, yeah, actually let's say most lower limb problems will usually get their shoes off because we can see a little bit more. But as we progress on. I don't necessarily always need to, if it's a foot problem. Yeah. I think shoes off is better because we can, we can see more, they can probably feel more, but it's not a must. It's really not a must. And. Yeah, something they're comfortable in and then having different types of footwear, I think is important. So we try and encourage people to have a few different types of, of shoes that they can use. So like they like to wear this one in the gym. They like to wear this one when they go for a walk outside or a run. And then they have their basketball shoe that they play basketball in, let's say. So I think having a bit of variety there is actually underrated. And a lot of people just wear their same shoe for every activity they do. And then they have a basketball shoe as well. And then you can get into specifics around, like we had a sprinter here from with us from Switzerland last week. And she has a, she wears a little bit of a kind of a stiffer shoe, a harder shoe when she's doing. Her plyos doing some of her early sprint work that she's doing. She just likes that feeling of like, there's not a lot, not a lot of bend in it. And then when she's doing other lifts, she wears like a different type of shoe altogether. So I think having. Specific recommendations for certain problems. Like if it's a, someone has very limited big toe extension, then maybe having a shoe that is a lot stiffer up through there so that they just kind of roll over the tip of the toe, rather than extending at the, at the MTPJ is probably a good idea. So specific recommendations for specific people, general recommendation is wear something you're comfortable in. And. Still take off your shoes. Some of the time when you're doing certain exercises, it's still a good idea. Barefoot is a good idea. Just, you just don't have to take it to the nth degree.
Ryan Patrick:Yeah, my only request to my athletes that I work with that are listening is you guys get something with lateral support stop wearing running shoes for change of direction because those shoes just Do not hold up I've held my breath a few times. I'm like, oh god, we're gonna we're gonna have an issue here. Yeah Okay, we're getting close to the end here. I just want to shift gears real quick because one of the populations that I work a lot with is the ACL rehab. And so, I want to specifically talk about differences with athletes who start their rehab with you compared to others who are coming to you after slow, not, I don't want to call it failed, not a re injury, but just slow slash failed rehabilitation. So what do you see as some of the most persistent issues with slow rehab and how does your own thought process improve your success? With your athletes.
David Grey:Good question. So we, we try and fill as many buckets as we can from the beginning, from the, as early as possible. And that means like restoring range of motion. Building strength and working on skills and coordinated patterns that they are going to need in the future. So we, we try not to let anything atrophy any of those patterns or positions that hopefully they are going to need. We, we try and use them from the beginning, even if it's an isometric, like an example is someone won't do someone won't plant their foot outside their center of mass and try and push laterally until they do change a direction. For example, and I think that's a bad idea, whereas we will do an isometric with our foot outside our center mass, with our shoulder leaning against the wall. And we push in against the wall, just a lateral wall. I so push, we call it. We will do that as soon as they can bend their knee and, and hold an isometric at their knee. We will be doing that and they're pushing in against the wall. So I know some people will say that. That is not necessary. I would agree. It's not necessary, but I've seen some really good results with taking this approach to kind of multiple positions and multiple directions, and here's where you're getting like, you're going to get. A lot of intermuscular coordination where you're getting the peroneals working with the foot, working with the lateral hip muscles, the IT band. Everything is kind of trying to transfer energy. You're getting co contractions around the ankle and the knee and the hip. And I think that's super important. And I think that this is one really good for the knee joints that are training all other areas as well. And I think it's two really good for helping to. Helping to mitigate against potential injuries and issues and niggles that crop up when we do get back to dynamic movement and running and stuff like this, that we're actually like a lot of people, okay. My knee was okay, but now my grind feels like shit or my Achilles or my whatever feels like crap. And it's because that's the first time you pushed in that direction for a long time. So even though we can't match the. The rate of force production are maybe the the several different things with regards to force, maybe we can match the somewhat matched the direction that you're pushing in from early on. So, yeah, I think a lot of people focus too much. Not, I wouldn't say they focus too much on the knee joint. They just don't focus enough on other areas. And then I think another one is something that I somewhat learned from Jonas Dodoo, who's a sprint coach in the UK several years ago is like really having more drill based running early on than. Like ploddy running. So like when they're ready to run or even before they're ready to run, we're doing their A skips and their B skips and their ankle dribbles, their calf dribbles. We're doing like super small bounds. We're doing all of these pushes in different directions. We're trying to bring in all of that as early as possible. And that makes up the bulk of their quote unquote running work for the first. 4, 6, 8 weeks even of their running this is what they are doing, rather than, okay, the first time you're actually doing some kind of running motion, right, just go for a Like a jog around the pitch, because usually we're working on like true to rehab process. We're working on our plyos. We're trying to be really stiff and reactive through our ankle. We're trying to strike down and retract our swing leg and have pre tension in the air. And we're doing all of these things. We're trying to create all of these qualities that we know is so important for running and change of direction, all this stuff. But then when we tell them to run, we just like go and run. And they. They run, they do a slow, horrible jog, they're heel striking, they're just It's just not nice. And all of those qualities that we tried to ingrain, Oh, now you're running. We forget about them. So we do a lot of drill, drill base running early on. And I think that makes a huge difference. So those are two probably things that I think make a big difference is trying to fill as many cups and, and. Whatever we can do pushing in all directions, isometrics, all that stuff. We do second one is the drill based running early on for a long time. We stick with that with a very little bit of like longer runs sprinkled in as well. And then the, what was the third one I was going to say? I dunno, I kind of like gimmicks with ACL rehab as well. I'm a fan of, I'm a fan of floss bands. Even though I can't explain the mechanism, like it makes a lot of knees feel good. I'm a fan of blood flow restriction. I'm a fan of electrostimulation. I'm a fan of like trying a lot of this stuff early on. And I think it works really well. Again, are they necessary? No, but can they make you feel a little better? So you get a little bit more out of that training session. Yes. A lot of the time. And I think over the course of several months that compounds, and I think that makes a really big difference to be honest. So I won't say those are all the things that. That's not the reason that people fail rehab, but it's often why it slows them down and they have constant like ups and downs because they are just flaring up their knee doing stupid stuff or their groin is sore, their shin is sore. Cause they just didn't look after that stuff well enough from early on. In terms of those who fail rehab, we get a lot of those. And everything is missing is just, it was just bad, like, honestly, just bad from start to finish. We have probably five people at the moment who are on their, they've torn their ACL twice on, like, they're now back to doing really impressive stuff with us. Yeah. I think five online clients right now. And like when you ask them about their previous rehab, it's, it was dreadful. It was just. Bad from start to finish. It was, it was, it was what you would give your granny who just wants to be able to walk again. Lord. Yeah. Yeah. So not one thing is why they're failing. It's it's everything is bad. Start to finish.
Ryan Patrick:Yeah. I've seen both sides of the spectrum, right? People who they get these, Hey, are you an athlete recovering or are you just like a person who's trying to carry laundry at the stairs program and I've seen the other side where we had 1 of my athletes come in and she's jumping off like an 18 inch box onto another 18 inch box on a single leg and I watched her do 1 rep. And I mean, her ground contact time had to be like, 2. 5 seconds. I mean, it was in eternity and I'm like, my eyes were probably like, bugging out of my head. I'm like, what the hell are you doing? She's like, well, they said we need to work on more power. I'm like, well, we should probably do things that look powerful. Like, I mean, this is like a tier 4 exercise, like. You know, you can't even do 20 pogos in a row and be bouncy. And so we had to, like, kind of, you know, I guess it was good intentions, right? We need these qualities. We need to develop some reactive strength. But it was just way outside of the bounds of what she was actually capable of. And I'll echo some of your thoughts, too, about these, I always call it like backdoor stuff when it comes to change of direction, because it's like here, our clinicians typically don't clear them to cut until about 6 months. And up to that point, they're not doing anything side to side. So we'll do a ton of like the isos like you talked about. We'll do a lot of med ball throwing as well. So at least they get that propulsive sense of having a foot outside of your mass and just learn how to rip and turn, you know, through the axial skeleton, like a change of direction. It just, it's made such a difference. And we use BFR. We do a lot of tempo training to slow things down, reinforce range of motion. They can actually feel their weight distribution and not favor the side. I mean, all of these things to me. Are fairly straightforward. We do a lot of rudiments, a lot of the dribbles same way because the plotting the long, slow duration run. I mean, there's, I forget which paper it is, but it's like, there's more knee joint stress doing this than there is. More of these reactive styles of running that we're talking about then, but because it looks like it's higher intensity, it looks like it's a little bit bouncier. People stay away from it. But the reality is it's probably safer for the knee.
David Grey:I agree. Yeah. And they're moving their, their, their, their whole limb is moving with more velocity and you know what else? Athletes love it. If they feel like an athlete again, they, you know what else they love? They love the ISOs where they're like pushing in different directions. They love that stuff. They really do and that is a huge psychological thing where you can get an athlete to feel like an athlete as early as possible while still being very safe. Humongous psychologically for someone humongous. And they will do all this stuff that you think is boring or they think is boring, but is really important. They will do that with more intensity and more intention because it's sprinkled in with all of this other stuff that they really enjoy as well.
Ryan Patrick:Yeah. And really what's the hallmark of, of an athlete. We kind of go back to it. They're just able to produce more intensity than the average person. So like find ways to get it to them. It's not. I don't feel like it's rocket science, but so many people missed the mark. And again, it might be just constrained by. I have 20 people to work with, so it's like shit, but there you go. I'm just handing this stuff out and people are going where, you know, I think you're able to really be specific with it. So, all right, my guy, we'll finish up with just a couple of quick questions. These can be as short or as long as you want. So, I listened to a lot of podcasts in preparation for this. Feel like I. Kind of listened to your, your, your trajectory as a father here. So you're about a year in now. We talked a little bit off, off screen. So how is adjusting to life, especially with, you know, a booming business. How are you handling all this?
David Grey:Depends who you ask. Handling it. Okay. The okay. Could be better. Definitely times where I'm not, what's been the hardest
Ryan Patrick:thing for you.
David Grey:So we, me and my wife, Kira, our business partners together, we run the business together. So that's been difficult because there's been times where obviously at the first few months, like. She wasn't able to do a whole lot. I wasn't able to do a whole lot. And I felt like a lot of the time where I'm like, okay, there's so much I need to do with the business and when I'm at home with them, I am, I'm thinking about work. I'm thinking, shit, I need to get this, this and this done. And then when I'm in work, I'm thinking about shit, I should be at home helping out with this, this, and this. So that's, that's a bit of a, that's been tricky. And I think I've gotten better at that as time has gone on just to be, I've gotten more efficient when I'm in work. And then when I'm at home, I'm getting a little bit better at just being more present and you know what, as time has gone on, Matty, our baby has been helpful with that because he is now he's 10 or 11 months. He's much more animated. You can actually play with him and it feels like, like, I don't know, maybe this sounds selfish or whatever, but like, I get a lot back from the relationship now as well, because he's down, like trying to wrestle you and play with you and laugh and you're laughing and stuff. Whereas for honestly, for the first few months, it's just like. Oh my God, like my job is to keep this baby alive and like, yeah, I don't know, I don't know if a lot of dads feel like this, but like, I, I don't, I don't know, I think that, that, like, that love really develops over time, to be honest, that really like strong love that you start to develop, like, I don't know how much of that I felt from day one, I definitely felt some of it, but I don't know, it's not something that people talk about, but like now, I don't know. I can't wait to get home to see him type of thing, you know, whereas before I'm like, Oh shit, like this is going to be a long night type of feeling. So, so yeah, just balancing that has been, has been tricky, but I think it's in the process of me. I won't say it made me a better person, but is in the process of making me a better person. And Just more efficient with my time and more clear with my priorities. So like before I would have 20 things that I want to get done and I still do, but like now it's cause we have a team to manage and stuff as well. It's like, right, what is our. One thing that we, if we get that done today, it's important. What is our, here's the first quarter of the year. We have three or four projects that we need to do that. If we get these done, not do all this a hundred other things, but if we get these four big projects done, or maybe one big project on that will be a success. And this quarter of 2025. We, we set those out and we're going to tick them off as we go. So one was like releasing our new HIP program. One is we need to release a new ebook. One is we need to sell out our workshop in New York, which we've done. And one was we need to hire someone else for, to help with the whole admin side. So we've done two of those four. We've released our program. And we have sold out our workshop. We have, we are about to take on a new person next week. I think she's going to start. And then I'm going to start working on my new ebook this Friday. So like, those are four really big projects that in previous years, I would maybe. Extend those out over the course of 12 months, or maybe I would get half of each of those done and, and 50 other half things done. So now I'm, I'm trying to be really clear on my priorities and each of our kind of staff members and each of our people that we have. They're, they're clear on their roles and there's no, it's much less muddy. So that's kind of. No,
Ryan Patrick:that's huge. I see this a lot where people, you know, sometimes I yearn for like a minute of time or like free time or a day off or something and I get it and then I just like squander it. Just piss it away doing a bunch of bullshit. It seems like when you really lock into your priorities, especially for, you know, it's like being entrepreneurs and being the idea guys, like you want to go 50 directions all the time. And I, I sometimes get that shiny red ball syndrome, like, Ooh, this is a good idea. And, you know, it just ends up distracted and kind of pinballing between everything. But I find that it's. The kids especially force you to Kind of separate the wheat from the chaff just what is actually important here And what few things do I want to do and at the end of the day, it's like You're doing a lot less, but it's a lot better and you actually get more done because you're not. So, because there's certain restrictions, there's certain boundaries on what you are going to spend time on and what you're just going to end up making cuts. So, I, I empathize with that. It's still like, it's an ongoing battle, man. I don't know if it's just the roles we're in, or just. How we are as humans, but I feel it. Yep. All right. So, hey man, what's your own training look like these days? My training. Yeah.
David Grey:Yeah. So yesterday I had 25 minutes in the gym. Here's an example session. Walk on a treadmill for five minutes. A1 was two up, one down, calf eccentrics in a smith machine. Cause I have a old Achilles tear that I need to constantly look after. And I don't enough. So that was A1. A2 was chin ups. A3 was reverse lunge. That was five rounds of that. And then I did B1, a seated adductor, B2, prone hamstring curl, three, I think it was three rounds of that and gone. So that was my 25 minute gym session yesterday. And then I had a meeting with the bank. So that was that I'm playing soccer maybe once to twice a week. And I'm trying to do jiu jitsu, I was sick for a few weeks, but before that I was probably doing jiu jitsu maybe three times a week. Yeah, so maybe, I
Ryan Patrick:do jiu jitsu.
David Grey:I'm doing it like 18 months with probably like a six month break in between where I fed. I fell out of it and like came back and all the guys that I started with were like blue belts and Beating the crap out of me. I was like, oh, what am I doing?
Ryan Patrick:So
David Grey:they're better
Ryan Patrick:and I forgot everything.
David Grey:Yeah Yeah, and I never knew anything. So
Ryan Patrick:yeah,
David Grey:So yeah, that's that that's kind of it at the moment. It's it's been It's been good. It's been fun. I've been enjoying my training more now than I have in a long time. It's handed me back into shape. I really neglected myself. Just kind of finished up with sport a few years back, like serious sport myself. And kind of felt like I had no reason to train. Like I always, my training was always about like, I'm, I'm doing this gym to get better at this, or to help my knee or to whatever it is. And then when that was gone for me, I was like. Well, I'm not really enjoying anything. I don't really have any goal here and yeah, I just kind of let it slide. And I'm also in the gym all day. You know, like working with people. So I just want to leave. And I felt like my kind of my days of competitive sport were over and I like competing, but then I found, I found tennis and then I found jiu jitsu. And then I found like going back into soccer at a, at a different level. I was like, Oh, hang on. Like maybe it wasn't. Competing at the highest level that I enjoyed, maybe it was just competing that I enjoyed because now I'm like playing tennis with my brother. And it's like a death match to like, it's it's, it's, it's five games a piece are five, four or something like that. And we're on juice advantage, juice advantage for 25 minutes and it's to the death. So. Yeah, just competing and stuff again has been fun, but I really, like, I really, really do not want to get it. I'm not afraid of getting injured, like, as in what it does to my body, but I, for my work and for my life, I really, like, right now, I just cannot afford to get injured. So yeah, especially in Jiu Jitsu, like. If someone really wants to absolutely beat the shit out of me, I kind of let them. I'm not, I'm not like, yeah, I'm not scrapping with every last ounce of my being to, to beat them. I'm just there to have a little bit of fun and hopefully win one in every 15 rolls, let's say. Yeah,
Ryan Patrick:yeah, man, we're, we're wired such the same. Like I know, I mean, I played sports in high school. I didn't go to college for it, but I've always had trouble just. Exercising for health. I'm like, this is fucking lame. Like people actually do this, like for what? So I've always competed in like strength sports Jiu Jitsu now. Like I just, I've had to hit something. I'm like, I don't care what it is. Like, you know, I'll do the midlife crisis division at a Jiu Jitsu tournament. It's fine. Like I'm okay with it.
David Grey:It's
Ryan Patrick:me and like two other guys, like it's a really small division, but. You know, it just, it keeps me locked in. It keeps me focused. And the other thing I wanted to comment on is my A1, A2, A3 used to be squat. I would strap the pumpkin seats for my twins to TRX straps. And then I would push them. So A2 was swinging the Swinging the cradle and a three was mopping the gym floor and I would go through that just constantly.
David Grey:Nice. It works.
Ryan Patrick:Yeah, I mean, when you live the, I call it the trifecta of insanity, which is your married businessman with kids, you know, you gotta, you just gotta figure stuff out. So, all right, real quick, man give me a quick overview of the HIP program. And then you've already talked about what's next. So just. Hip program. And then where people can find you online.
David Grey:Yeah. So I guess where people can find me is on David Gray rehab on Instagram is probably the best place to go. G R E Y. And that's where if people like it. They can see more if they don't, they can leave and banish me forever. And we just released, yeah, we've kind of two kind of flagship programs now, which are DIY programs that people can do themselves. So one is our foot, ankle and Achilles program that has four phases of progressions and it is broad because it's called foot, ankle and Achilles. So like, but that's kind of how I rehab people is like, right. We're going to. We're not just going to do calf raises. We're going to train your feet and your ankles and make sure everything is moving and strong. And that tends to work really, really well for people. And then we just launched a hip one, which is a similar idea. It's like, okay, here's all of the glute stuff that we do and the groin stuff and the lateral hip and opening up flexion and extension and IR and ER and progressing you into kind of more dynamic bounding, lateral bounding, change direction type of stuff. And that's done over the course of four phases. And and yeah, the feedback has been really good. It's released about a week now. So feedback has been really good so far and we get a mix of people who are kind of injured or want to work on these areas. And also coaches and therapists who like 50 percent of the people that get it are probably coaches and therapists who want to. Kind of have a little nosy around and see what's in there and also hopefully do it themselves and feel it because I think that's important and yeah, and then they can, they can get it for their own body and also apply it to their, to their athletes or whoever they work with as well. So, so yeah, that's it.
Ryan Patrick:Awesome. I don't have the HIP program yet. I will be getting it. I have the foot Achilles one. It's awesome. So I definitely recommend people, people get that if you haven't checked it out. I'll say the upper and lower body base upper and lower body basics So those are great programs too for people so definitely encourage them to check it out. But man, I appreciate your time thank you so much. I know you're busy. So I appreciate you carving the time to do this today And look forward to just staying connected man. Take care.
David Grey:Thank you so much