Clifton is a Canadian Power Lifter and Chiropractor.  I worked with a Clifton a few years ago to help him with his concussion symptoms, low back and hip pain.  Working with health care professionals is often interesting.  You will feel the pressure to "fix them" but when you get to listening to them you often realize that they have the answers and the knowledge.  They just need help and sometimes coaching.  I think (IIRC) I was once told that I can't comment on low back pain and lifting until...

Rachel Hannah talks about her own experience as a runner dealing with Relative Energy Deficiency (REDs) and her recovery from bone stress injuries (BSIs).  And Greg (Rachel's former Physiotherapist)  talks about his professional failings as a therapist helping Rachel with her first Bone Stress Injury.   If you want help with all things diet, healthy weight and REDs then you can work with Rachel here: https://rachel-hannah-registered-dietitian.ca1.cliniko.com/bookings   Or See Rachel...

Dr Malfliet was on today discussing her PhD thesis paper which deserves a lot of attention. We discussed her RCT entitlted "Effect of Pain Neuroscience Education Combined With Cognition-Targeted Motor Control Training on Chronic Spinal Pain: A Randomized Clinical Trial" where we focused on the importance of nudging into pain (Time Contingent Exercise), reframing motor control exercises as movements that you get comfortable and confident in moving and how to progress these exercises with a...

We have Erik Meira (The Science PT) talking ACL injury, the importance or not of strength, whether valgus is a true risk factor for injury or a sign of something else and who technique matters for primary or secondary injury prevention. Please go to Erik's website not just for his links to what he offers but excellent blogs and resources that really explain complicated topics in clinically applicable ways. Erik's website is here

Greg and Alex delved into a wide-ranging discussion about the science of endurance and fitness, with a focus on injury prevention and treatment. They explored the effectiveness of strength training in injury prevention, the inconsistencies in the research, and the debatably importance of stretching in the prevention of injury.    Alex shared his personal experiences with a hamstring injury and his approach to running injury prevention and some of the limitations of our current research...

Dr Neil Meigh is a physiotherapist and associate professor at Bond University (Gold Coast Australia).   Neil conducted a pragmatic exercise intervention in insufficiently active older adults.  The intervention was a hard style kettlebell program in those aged 60-80.  These people were not life long athletes but many of them thrived in his program.  They got the type of results and improvements in fitness where an independent observer could be skeptical.     We talk details of the program...

Jo Nijs, PT, MT, PhD,[1] is a Belgian professor of physiotherapy at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel and physiotherapist/manual therapist at the University Hospital Brussels.  He has published more than 200 peer reviewed journals and has been strong proponent of some of our favourite topics on this podcast. We talk about: - classifying pain based on mechanisms (nociceptive, neuropathic, nociplastic) - what nociplastic pain is - the utility of understanding nociplastic pain  - how...

Dr Feigenbaum is a medical doctor, strength and conditioning coach, strong dude, wicked golfer and motocross expert.  He co-runs Barbell Medicine catering to both health care professionals and clients.   We talk: technique and injury risk (duh) the ideas behind the "orthopaedic cost" of lifting the role of excess body weight on health and Osteoarthritis the need for specificity of training when we can forego specificity and be very general in our training and the importance of...

One of the hardest discussions to have with people in pain is shifting our focus from trying to "fix" pain to living well with pain.  Because, if we are very honest there are a huge number of people who might always have pain.  Sometimes the goal for healthy rehab is to shift from eliminating pain to living well with pain.  This is a fundamental of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). Dr Bronnie Lennox Thompson is an expert in this area and she takes us through the importance of this...

Dr Pak has a PhD in minimal effective dose training in powerlifters.  So, guess what we talked about? Dr Pak is a powerlifting coach, scientist and science communicator in the world of strength and conditioning. His PhD specifically focused on the minimum that a power lifter could do to increase their strength.   We talked about: - adults >50 and their powerlifting safety and performance gains - minimal and optimal approaches to improving strength and hypertrophy - when, how and...

Physios have been lambasted awhile for not understanding the basics of strength and conditioning principles. I reject this idea.  There two areas we explore in this podcast. 1. The idea that strength and conditioning basics are relevant for rehabilitation 2. Whether physios actually know these basics. I make an attempt at trying to understand the arguments againsts physios and try to provide a competing view.   Here is how the AI summarized it (not really accurate but I don't want to...

Today we take a bit of a detour and talk a little bit about the business side of Physical Therapy.  We don't do justice to our speakers knowledge but I hope that if this a topic you need to know more about I've introduced you to the right person.  Karen Litzy is an excellent physical therapist out of New York City, owner of a concierge physical therapy business, host of the very popular podcast "Healthy, Wealthy and Smart" and she is the creator the Strictly Business Blueprint. Links ...

Antony Lo (aka The Physio Detective) is an elite physiotherapist with a special interest in the pelvic floor and the female athlete.  Antony is an amazing clinical educator and provides a lot of insight into how our profession can keep moving forward. We discuss: his evolution from the kinesiopathological model to movement optimism the role of movement technique in injury risk reduction (he hates this question) when we need to be clinically specific in our interventions (specific...

Once again we are lucky to have another leader in our physio and rehab space.  Dr Ebonie Rio PhD, researcher (>100 peer reviewed publication), big thinker and practicing sports physiotherapist (with the Victorian Institute of Sport and The National Ballet). Ebonie discusses her dual role as a researcher and as a practicing clinician.  She shares her insights on: manual therapy the role of heavy resistance training in tendinopathy the importance of a diagnosis for both rehab and in...

Dr Stefi Cohen holds multiple (25) world records in powerlifting, is an accomplished Physical Therapist, Strength Coach,author and pro boxer.  She has done it all and shares the wisdom she has gained in all these areas. Stefi talks about her views on: overcoming her own low back pain her book (Back in Motion) to help others with low back pain her powerlifting and athletic career her views on movement technique and injury risk her approach to helping others improve performance, stay healthy...

Dr Bret Contreras (The "Glute Guy") sits down with Greg to discuss some of our favourite topics.  We dive into Bret being one of the original movement optimists with his wildly controversial article "To crunch or not to crunch" in 2011.  Bret took a well thought out position on spinal flexion that was fairly revolutionary at the time. We get Bret's views on whether and when technique is important for injury, performance and life long lifting. Bret also discusses his involvement in the...

Welcome to the Movement Optimism Podcast   The critical thinkers resource for fitness, pain, injuries and health.   In this brief podcast we touch on what Movement Optimism is and what you can expect from the podcast.  In general, we will have three different types of podcasts :   Greg with a Guest Expert in their field. A guest expert tells Greg why he is wrong (a gentle debate to really understand a topic) A deeper dive into the research behind previous podcasts or special topics of...