Actually, you know, you know what, I did want to ask you, I did want to ask you this and I'm just, I'm just going to ask you, you, you straight up is this happens to me every now and then with, with patients and online.

And I used to be proud of it.

Now understanding I'm not, not so proud of it is people would message me and say, oh, you're, you're a podiatrist.

Yeah, I'm a I'm a podiatrist, like, oh, you're not a typical podiatrist.

And I didn't really know what it meant.

And I was like, oh, you may just because I don't unless my Instagram name, but I just do lots of things and talk about different scopes and practices.

And I used to be like, Oh yeah, that that's really cool.

But now I'm like, no, no, no.

It's just the person saying that probably doesn't have the maybe the greatest understanding of the scope of practice, maybe not the greatest experience, whatever it may be.

And I feel like that really holds true for yourself and complete transparency.

When I first started following your page, whether I just didn't look at the name, I didn't realise that your background, you know you're a chiropractor.

I guess that yeah, things are things are changing these days in the across all professions, really, we're seeing breaking down of traditional silos that have existed that, you know, traditionally chiropractors have been thought of, you know, caring for the spine and, and doing adjust, adjusting or manipulation and, and podiatrists have only been orthotics and, and we're seeing that that breaking down now.

There's, there's a lot of intermingling between professions and, and I see this, you've been seeing this increasingly over the years at professional development events where you're seeing, you know, sports medicine Australia is a great example of that, where you see a collection of, of different professions there and they're all learning the same stuff, right.

So you're going to get, you know, when it comes to plant a heel pain, you're, you and I are going to learn the same thing when it comes to plant a heel pain from some of these experts.

So our practice is going to look quite similar for someone that comes in with it with, with planted heel pain.

And I think that's where things are coming out these ways these days with, you know, knowledge translation and, and a lot, lot more available good information that, that people are starting to, to be a lot more similar than, than what we've seen in the, in the past.

So, so I'd say that, you know, I guess what, what would be, you know, considered traditional chiropractic?

Well, it's more like what I would say is historic chiropractic.

It's, it's again, you know, chiropractic is a profession dealing with musculoskeletal conditions and, and you know, traditionally it's been involved in the nervous system, but you can't have one without the other.

So I think that there's, yeah, there's certainly a lot more commonalities between, between all the professions these days.

And I think ultimately that's a good thing for the patient because it means then the patient is getting best evidence care and it's it's all about about them.

Yeah, you know, it's funny and I purposely didn't tell you this because I wanted to tell you online, but I, I had a patient I always been seeing for a couple of a couple of months now and he's a local chiropractor runner.

And we were speaking around this exact topic.

And he goes, yeah, you know, a greatest example of that is sports car Luke.

And I was like, I know that guy.

And I was like full, I'm like, this guy's bloody famous.

So that, that was really, really cool.

And then we, we started to speak about it.

So I wanted to ask you 2 questions, 1 like you would have went to obviously traditional school undergraduate and then come out.

And then when did you start to all I mean, your Instagram page is amazing and we'll have that tag below for the people out for listening if they don't already follow you.

But will you always that way incline philosophy wise?

And then or did you start, you know, traditionally where where most chiropractors finish at school and then go that way?

And then second to that, how do you find your interaction with other chiropractors?

Do you feel you're still using any traditional techniques and then implying it now or just having a different spin?

You know how?

How does that work?

Yeah, it's a good, good question.

So I guess my, my evolution of practice is that I have, you know, I have evolved a lot in my 20 something years in practice, like when I first graduated, you know, our, I guess our, our focus was a lot of manual therapy when we went through university.

And so after my five years, there was a lot of that.

And so I did practice.

It was a fairly heavy manual therapy and not heavy as in forceful heavy, but just, it was.

But most of what I did was, was a lot of manual therapy in my, my sort of early, early, you know, years.

And I, in a way it was, it was good in the way that I could see some of the things I was able to help with that like, and so I guess you know, that some of the criticisms levelled at manual therapy these days.

Well, I've sort of seen and had the experience of seeing some of the things that, that it can be good for.

And then perhaps some of the, the things that it's that it's not.

And, and so I guess I found over time that and, you know, working in the sports side of things, they became a need to, to be dealing with, you know, with exercise and how to get them back to doing this.

And, and, and so I realized that there was quite a difference between what I was doing in the treatment room and then what they were, I was trying to get them to do out on the, the sporting field or on the running track.

And so I then sought ways to upskill myself to fill those knowledge gaps.

And, and a lot of that was around rehab and strength and conditioning and, and those sort of principles there, because we, we did get taught some basic stuff at uni.

And I, I think I almost, because you know, we were, I guess I was, I was taught by a lot of lot of practitioners at uni that, you know, we, we were, we were the ones that were going to fix people, you know, and that, that, yeah, it was, it was our job.

And I was recently on another podcast talking about this.

And so it was almost like a bit of a God complex.

It's like, well, you know, I'm gonna, I'm gonna fix everyone.

And, and if I don't fix them, it's, it's me that's the problem.

And it's not the, it's not the patient.

It's, you know, my application of, of, of what was done.

And that actually was quite burdensome because I remember actually really quite stressed about that in my early few years because you're like, you know, why can't I help this person?

It's, you know, it's my fault.

And, and that was, yeah, it was quite, I mean, I've never really been burnt out, but it was certainly quite burdensome in my early years.

And I'd get, I'd get quite upset about it.

That I was saying my girlfriend at the time and, and, you know, I was always trying to be the best chiropractor that I could be.

So I, I did sort of take it to heart when I, when I, you know, weren't helping these people.

But over time, I, I learnt that, yeah, that that's not actually the case that there's, you know, there's so many things that that go into a patient's problems and, and pain and, and it's not, you know, it's not me that that's, that has to be the other one to fix them.

The patient has to do that.

We're we're really the the guides and, and the things to help them along the way and to help educate them.

But sometimes they don't want to hear.

Sometimes it's, it's, you know, too much of AAA jump from where they are to to where you're trying to get them to be.

And so, yeah, that was quite, quite empowering to me then to, to sort of realize that because it, it made practice more enjoyable.

And I didn't take it so much to heart.

You know, when there were people that I, that I, I couldn't help that it wasn't just just my fault.

So that was sort of the earlier, earlier phase of, of my, my practice.

So yes, I did go from sort of a heavily manual based treatment.

And, and I think that that was, again, it was, it was a lot of what was taught at the time, even across other, other disciplines as well.

So that wasn't, you know, because we're talking 20 something years ago now.

So, and, and things are certainly better now.

I know a number of people involved in teaching at the universities and they're fantastic.

So, so students are now coming out more with more knowledge than what I did when I was at that age about the importance of active care and all the other things that they can contribute to, to their pain and problems.

So it's a, it's certainly, I've seen it, you know, morph over time into into a much better, much better approach.

Yeah, and you do like you do a lot of speaking, you know, but do some do something overseas.

You just have to SMA got a lot of conferences.

Did you, did you ever think, you know, speaking about a whole, whole host of things, especially running, but did you ever think when you, you were going through school and come out of that and then, you know, as your, your career goes on, did you think you would be doing things like that?

Honestly, no, no, I can't really say.

I, I, it just sort of evolved into that like, I guess, you know, all I wanted to be when I, when I graduated from uni was just be helping my patients and I just wanted to, to help the people that were there and just, you know, I guess, yeah, help the local community.

But then I guess that started expanding in terms of, well, OK, I can help these people, but then I could also help others help others as well.

So it's sort of like growing that, that I guess that sphere of influence that.

And it's much like, I guess with social media now and you know, the good stuff as well that you guys are putting out and podcasts is that, yeah, you can, you can touch on so many people and you can be essentially training other health professionals to then contact their patients.

So it's sort of like this expanding web that we can have.

So I sort of of, I guess it's just evolved naturally over time.

Like I, I did, you know, I early on there were speaking opportunities that were presented to me and I was actually quite late.

Like I don't, I don't think I, I'm trying to think when my first speaking opportunity was, but I don't reckon it was much before my, you know, like 8 or even, you know, nine years out of out of practice.

So I guess it's sort of really only the last sort of 10 to 12 years that would be, would that bring us back to 2020?

Yeah, I reckon it was probably at 22,000 and 1314.

It was sort of started doing more speaking.

So I'd been out, I'd been out for a while.

And so I guess at that point, I guess I'd got like a bit of experience as well and, and hearing lots of other presenters.

So it wasn't too much a jump for me.

Like, you know, people talk about, you know, imposter syndrome and, and that sort of thing.

And I'm, I've sort of felt like I'd never had that because I'd done a lot of time before.

I then went into into that sort of space.

I mean, there's always people I look at and think, wow, like they're just amazing.

And and so that doesn't make me feel like an imposter.

It's just like, well, I'm never going to do the best thing in the world at everything.

So that doesn't really worry me.

But but in terms of that, that imposter syndrome, it it's, yeah, I suppose I did a lot of reps beforehand before I started to to venture into that space.

Yeah, I wanted to to ask you, I mean without patting on the back a lot, but your content is amazing.

I got to admit, if you're not following just from the, the translation of the research, do you feel like you're not the online space when you create that because you're putting it out to thousands of people, it makes you think a lot more critically because you're like, what could anyone potentially say that's wrong or I've miscontrued the research?

So you think, I mean that that's the case to me.

I think about it so much and I, I, we had our, hey, Greg Lehmann on the podcast and you know, the joke was like, is it Greg Lehmann proof?

If he's going to comment, can he, he's got nothing to say or he can comment?

Can I basically comment back and say no no this is what I what I meant.

So do do you feel that that's the case?

100% yeah, it's 100%.

And it's actually interesting like a lot of the, a lot of the questions that I, you know, I'll look into topics.

I, I don't actually know the answer with 100% certainty.

So I, I go into it thinking, all right, well, let's just see what this, what this says.

And I go through and I read, you know, read through the research and, and, and summarise that and then what the conclusions are, what the conclusions are.

And I guess I've learnt to somewhat distance myself from a bias, but I think we've all got, we've all got biases that we, that we have.

So I mean, a good example a few years ago was strength training.

And does that prevent running injuries?

And that was, that was sort of a summary.

I did, I think it was back in 22,000 and 20.

And so I looked at all the research and I'm like, well, it's not really that good.

And you know, the outcome from that is, well, there's some studies, but I don't know if we can really, you know, how much of that we can we can really say.

I know Mike Scott just put put a post out on the yeah, the Ted I study as well.

But there were there are a few things, a few takeaways from that that we can do.

But yeah, I mean, before that I was saying, yeah, do strength training for injury prevention and and performance benefit.

But the the injury prevention is, you know, again, is that that can we can we say that at the moment?

And I guess, you know, injury prevention is just a whole nother kettle of fish really in terms of for sure across across any injury or any, any sports.

But I think that whilst, you know, whilst we're on that with the strength training, there's certainly things that that came from that that were important.

So, you know, we obviously need to make sure that well supervised was was the was one of the the keys there.

So whether that's, you know, customised to, to the individual, they have to do it.

So compliance is, is an important thing, which is not really, not really surprising, has to be challenging.

So a lot of, a lot of that's one of the troubles with a lot of the research that's looked at at strength training and running is as it's been, you know, banded stuff.

And I think unless, unless it's, unless it's an early phase injury or an Achilles rupture, bands really have no place in, in calf strengthening at all.

So if I see anything like that with a with a calf strengthening, you know, plantar flexion with a with a band, I'm I'm I'm probably not going to read much further into into that paper.

So I think that a lot of a lot of the stuff just hasn't been heavy enough.

And I love the work that that actually a lot of the work at the moment that's been been coming out of we wish which Blair guys group and including with Michael Zanini at the moment, they've been doing a lot of good work around strength training and performance enhancing and, you know, things around durability.

And, and that I've been reading a really loving some of the stuff that Zanini's been putting out with his PhD.

And, and that's the, that's the kind of strength work that we want to see put into the into the energy prevention world.

But it's a bit harder to do because, you know, we can't just say, oh, Blake, there's a, there's a sheet of exercises and go and do these, like these are, you know, weighted exercises that require some skill and, and execution to be able to do them.

But that's what, but that's what strength training should be and not be sort of banded, sort of standing on one leg, balance, balance exercises, you know, they have their place, but they're not, they're not strength exercises.

Yeah, it's challenging in that it's such a barrier.

It's just access to the gym.

I mean, majority of people, like in our clinic, we have stairs to get up to my room and they're pretty shallow.

Sorry.

They're pretty deep stairs and you think, right, if you walked up those stairs, probably anything I give at your home, you know, it's probably going to be pretty similar.

I can give you some single leg, maybe some weight, but we need to make it challenging and it's a it's a barrier to get into the gym for people.

What what have you seen?

You just mentioned that work you've been reading.

I mean, let me ask you this.

Someone says, Luke, I, I come into you right?

I say I want you to coach me to run 3 hours and you're going to solve all my problems.

That's a big dream for me.

And I'm doing everything right.

I've got the right shoes.

I'm buying a pair of shoes.

I do all the testing.

I mean shoes, pretty much everything.

And I'd say what, what can you, what can you give me strength trading wise?

And let's call me, maybe I won't say a recreational runner running 60 to 70 kilometers a week.

What would you give me performance wise, dosage, exact exercises?

And does that change between novice rec?

Is it worthwhile for a rec runner just do more running or how?

How would that work?

Yeah.

Yeah, so that's a good question.

There's a few layers, a few layers to that.

So firstly, what I'd say to you, Blake, is I say, well, how much time have we got right?

What is in time is in during your week and I guess time close to the event as well.

If you were two weeks out for your event and say make me faster in in two weeks, I'm sorry, mate.

That's that's right.

Lance Armstrong might have some solutions there, but I certainly don't condone that.

And I'm I'm not going to this guy not going to help you out with that.

That's exactly right.

But yeah, it's, it's so firstly, you know, we've got to figure out, well, how much time have you got in your week?

Have you got an ability to, to add more training in?

And how much time is that?

And, and so say in an ideal word, we'd say, all right, Blake, look, if you could give me, you know, 2 sessions a week, and if we'd say we can make those, you know, half an hour, maybe 45 minutes and they'd just be running focus.

So if you want, you know, if you want your beach body and then we could put some upper body stuff in there for you.

But if we're keeping it lower body, lower body focus.

Alright, what?

What sort of equipment have you got?

Have you got access to a gym?

No, you don't.

OK, what have you got at home?

I've just got some, you know, bit of dumbbells and that sort of stuff, right?

So we're getting a bit more limited in terms of what, what we can do.

So we've got, you know, at the focus of, I guess some of the main muscle group or the biggest muscle group.

And anyone that follows me on social media would know that the the calves are the king and a queen when that when it comes to to running.

And they're the things that, that, that propel us forward.

So they're probably the number one thing that we want to look to, to, to get some strength on.

Now they take a lot of weight and, and this is one of the, one of the things that we see with people that do weighted calf exercises is they just under load them so much.

I've got some access to some technology in my clinic.

We use force plates and, you know, I'll have someone do a standing calf raised force plate and they're pushing up there and, and they're able to do, you know, say they're doing 2 times their body weight.

So a 7K person, they're pushing their body weight plus an additional 70 kilos.

And so we'd say to them and say, is that an?

Isometric push, is that just pushing in?

Yes.

How are we testing that?

Yeah, Isometric push, Yeah, isometric push, yeah.

So, and ideally we like to see those numbers getting up to 2 1/2 times for understanding isometric on AI, do a sort of 1/2 kneeling, almost like a seated push, which that's we'd like to see there get get up to 1 1/2 times body weight on that one.

But using that we can say, all right, well, this is how much weight you need to be pushing like this is for, you know, say A1 RM, but which would be, you know, if you're moving through range would be a little bit less than that.

How much weight are you using?

I'm holding a 10K dumbbell and I'm doing, you know, I'm doing 10 reps It's like, OK, well, there's a few things you can do.

There is, you can say, all right, Blake, grab that 10K dumbbell there.

And I want you, I'm going to get you to Max out with that.

All right.

And you're going and you're, you probably do up to 25 reps or something on that and you're doing 10.

It's like, well, Blake, you're wasting your time there.

So you're either going to need to be, if we, we want muscular, you know, we want strength improvements and hypertrophy, we need to go close to failure.

So if you, if that's the lightest weight you've got, I really want you to try and get that as heavy as possible.

So I want you to either your partner, you know, Kelly can jump on your back and we can get, do some calf raises.

And I've had patients do this.

It's like get the kids, get the partner, jump on the back.

That's 50.

You know, there's 50 kilos right there And, and off we go.

You know, we're on steps.

So we're doing some weighted calf raises and that's one of the easiest ways to, to, to, to do them at home so that the cars are cars are one.

Now the other thing that's the other exercise that's great and doesn't require any equipment plyometrics.

And I'm a big fan of, of, of plyometrics.

So they're the jumps and jumps and hops.

And there has been some good research showing in in novice and and recreational runners improved, you know, time trial performance in with, with including plyometrics.

Now I'm also a big fan of including plyometrics for lots of lower limb conditions.

Really, I think really any lower limb condition, if you're trying to get someone back to, to a running sport, they need, they should be doing some sort of plyometrics for, for that.

So from an injury perspective, rehab perspective, and also from a, from a performance perspective, we definitely want to be including plyos.

Now that can be as simple as starting with just some low level, low level Pogo jumps.

So just sort of two legged jumps on the spot.

And you could start with doing that for 20 or 30 seconds.

But then as you start to get more explosive, you know you're going then going for reps and you might only do 8 or 10 reps, but they're really explosive, explosive reps there.

And so plyometrics really important.

There has been some stuff like looking at at some of the, the systematic reviews have looked at strength training and runners.

They have found that that novice and recreational runners probably best to respond to plyometrics and, and more advanced and, and elite runners are better to go with heavy, heavy strength training.

So that can give us some sort of just, I mean, I like to be honest, I, I combine both.

So I get my, all my runners doing, doing some form of, of heavy lifting and also some form of, of plyometrics.

But even if we don't have any equipment, we don't have any weights who don't like doing the car phrase stuff.

Let's just start with doing some plyometrics.

But I can and see if we can, we can get some improvement for that.

If something that that's not that's not that you're not currently doing.

And then we look at the other sort of muscle groups that come into play.

So the quads around through the through the hips and hamstrings there.

And that's, you know, some great exercises for that.

Lunges, Bulgarian split squats.

Beauty of going single leg is is that or, or or split stance is that you need half the weight.

So again, you don't need to don't need a ridiculous amount of weight around the around the house.

There can make it quite easy with, with doing that.

So that's sort of, you know, and then we've, we've got sort of somewhere around accessory movements.

So depending on your, you know, your injury, if you'd said I've got, I've been having a lot of issues with my doctor or, you know, I get this hip pain that's coming up, then we might sort of put some stuff in around through there.

And, and just, you know, keeping it basic.

Like we might start with just giving you 2 exercises or three exercises to do and then just get, get into the, the routine of doing that and, and.

And then piling on, piling on more as you're finding that you're able to, able to do it and your body's feeling good and, and you've got the time to, to be able to do that there.

So, so that's sort of, yeah, that's, I guess you know, in a simplest sense how to get started, start on, start on pliers and, and, and that you'll see some, some good improvements with that.

And do you, you mentioned if someone you know you're returning someone from an injury and you know running is a sport where you're jumping and hopping, you're of course using your your tendon.

Do you find for the tendency you're managing, will you get them doing some plyometrics before they start running?

Or do you think it's fair game for them to just do running at a lower dose and expose them through that?

I like to use.

It can be a useful preparatory test to to ascertain how ready they are to run.

So for instance, like if we look at, you know, some of the work that Bax has done and looking at the demands of different exercises on peak force and also rate of force development, the, you know, looking at things like calf raises and, and even jumps are actually below, even walking is, is actually above the demand of a, of a calf raise, a body weight calf raise.

And so if we're looking at, well, you know, what, what are some of the things that, that are more challenging to the Achilles tendon than running?

And perhaps if we did some of these, then that would also give us a sign of, well, yeah, we might be OK, better off handling the running there.

And that's things like hopping.

So that's hopping, hopping in a line, more explosive jumps and hops there.

So I think it's a good way to test are they, are they going to handle running?

And I, I use that quite regularly.

Is it true all the time?

No, some look, sometimes I find, and I've got, I've got some patients and they've got a really poor hopping ability because they're, you know, their Achilles or, or, or some sort of injury.

And we sort of say, well, look, all right, we're going to have to work on this.

But you can you run and, and can we keep the pain stable?

And are you running properly, not just running along on the opposite, opposite leg there?

And if they're able to do that, then I will still proceed.

But, but on the proviso that we do sort of clean that up, because I think that that is a, it's an important function to, to restore to having that having that spring.

So I'm not always, you know, concrete, there's, there's not always sort of concrete rules.

I guess things can be bent and, and, but I, I do like to use those now.

Is it, is it better for is it going to develop?

Well, I guess we look at what what does plyometrics develop?

Well, they don't.

They don't actually do a great deal to say the tendon stiffness and and nor does does running.

That's where we use and the stuff and the bailing group is being quite useful interest in and and some of the papers I've really enjoyed in the last last few years looking at at heavy longer hold isometrics.

And I know you've had you had bar on your podcast.

Yeah, we had keep, keep bar.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, which is a little bit different.

So he's he's sort of with the longer, longer 45 second isometrics.

So I tend to more use the, the Berlin types of the, the shorter 3 seconds, three or five seconds there at a higher intensity.

But that is has been shown to better improve tenor stiffness than what running in plyometrics.

Plyometrics is working more on a neuromuscular point of view and it does help to improve vertical and, and leg stiffness.

So vertical stiffness and leg stiffness plyometrics is quite good for, but it doesn't actually improve so much the tissue qualities as it does the more the neuromuscular coordination.

So that's, that's a lot of what we're working with when we when we do with plyometrics.

The the leg stiffness, what's the like kind of definition of that?

Just basically overall joint range like or just overall compliance of the lower instance or with landing?

Yeah, it's, it's, it's compliant.

So it's it's look looking at like at the body in a spring, a spring mass mechanism.

So we've got obviously, you know, as the as the as we land on the ground, the body weight compresses that compresses that spring and a stiffer spring offers more resistance that to that deformation.

So, and if we're looking that's vertical stiffness, leg stiffness is obviously the leg lands out in front and it's a similar sort of thing, but it's working in a slightly different direction.

The 2 are similar but slightly different.

Yeah.

And you sit around some of the research like rec runners versus elite in kind of using plyometrics to you, do you think that, you know, for the recreational runners?

And I'm just trying to think of, and this is just, I've just forgotten the actual the comparison group.

If we took a group of recreational runners and gave them a bunch of plyometrics program accordingly with all the, the parameters that you just said versus we just asked them to run more.

Do you think that it's just the exposure that would be beneficial to them?

Or do you, do you think that the plyometrics in such a short dose, it's probably better for them because then you're to running and based off what we know around tissues, it's probably better in the earliest pages to have, you know, higher intensities at a lower dose or lower volume, more more frequent.

And then for the rec runners, because I've already had that long, long week probably for such a long time, the strength rating, the longer heavier stuff might be more beneficial for them.

And that's why it's kind of way good.

Really good for one group, not so good for the other.

Yeah, I, I, I do like, I think there's, there's, there is one study and I can't, I can't actually remember the, the name of the authors, but they did give plyometrics and, and did control for the running.

And they actually, they gave, there was less, less running.

So in terms of total time of, of exercise, it was, it was quite similar.

I try to remember the night the, the author.

But they did show a better improvement with the introduction of those, those plyometrics.

And I guess it's always, it is a balance as well too.

When, when we think about, you know, when I'm, when I'm coaching someone, it's like, are they better off doing this extra run or are they better off doing the, you know, some strength work?

And that, that does come down to, to the individual as well.

Like if I've got like, again, with the, the, the, the, the strength testing that I do on my, my runners.

And if we've had, I've had the ability to do that on these runners because some runners that I coach live remotely and overseas.

But if I've had the ability to do that and I'm seeing that, well, actually their strength profile is very good.

They've got, you know, excellent reactive strengths and they've got good Maxwell strength through here.

So there's actually not a lot that we, you know, necessarily would have to invest a lot of time in.

And so we might sort of say, we might say, Blake, that's you.

You like, you're actually very good.

Let's just, you know, we could put that extra time here.

We could put that extra time into, into running versus someone else that's starting off.

It's like, you know, they're below sort of some of the levels that we like to see.

And we're like, well, I'm sorry, Blake, but you know, we do really need that, that strength work.

It's really important to to help to get these these numbers up.

And and that's when I'd say, yeah, I think we do need to try and keep that at 22 times a week.

And then, you know, with the running men fitting in around that.

So this is where, again, this individualization and some, some people will openly say to me, I hate strength work and I'm not going to do it.

It's not it's not common anymore, but I'm like, OK, that's what you want to do.

Like it.

I will still, you know, educate them and say, well, look, This is why I would add this.

And if you still don't want to do that, that's fine.

I'm not going to force you to force you to do anything.

But if we do hit a block or if something happens, this is when I would suggest we'd add this in.

So you're sort of covering it and saying down the track, like you, you're not being, you know, comes crossed and say, well, how dare you tell me what to do?

You know, you've got to listen to what what they're telling you, what they want.

So you sort of can compromise there a bit and sort of say, all right, I hear what you're saying.

Let's go, let's go with your plan for a bit.

But just know that if this happens, this is, there's, there are alternatives here.

So that way you're also, I guess, you know, covering yourself in that, in that regard too.

And, and, you know, sometimes we wish, or if they only knew what I knew, you know, if I could just implant everything I had into, into, into your head, and they probably wouldn't, you know, then they wouldn't come back with that because they'd just be how to help themselves.

But that's, that's essentially what I'm trying to do.

You know, I think our job is as health professionals is to, is to educate our patients and our runners and, and doing it in a saddling way so you're not sort of jamming stuff down their down their throat.

But yeah, I think that's, that's an important thing for us to, to imprint on our on our runners is to leave them in a, in a, in a better place than when they came in.

Yeah, I don't know about you, but you're right.

Not overloading them with information.

But sometimes when you see someone come in and you know, they've tried so hard and they're really committed to getting better, but they've just had versions of the right thing, but probably just not as properly programmed.

And you get so excited because they're so down.

You're like, I'm like, I can help.

I have this Achilles patient recently who had no heel lifts in like a four mil drop shoe, go out and run a hard 5K and had any return to run programming, no strength training was doing like rowing, CrossFit, all this rate of loading stuff.

And I was like, just for the like this sort of the second time this week that if we just take out all the rate of loading stuff right now, your Achilles will be so much better with these heel raises.

And I was so I'm like, I know I'm excited, but but I promise this is going to, this is going to feel a little bit better.

And I think you might have overloaded this person.

You get there.

Don't give up.

Yeah.

Don't give up.

Yeah.

No, it it does like I've had someone, I've had I've had someone say to you, it was a few years ago.

She's like, she goes, that's a lot of information on this baby.

And I'm like there's more where that.

Come from.

Yeah, I know.

That's exactly right.

So I, I'm, I am mindful again like what you said and I, I always, I mean, I follow up after my, you know, initial consultations and any, any sort of extra information on subsequent consultations.

Well, but I always follow up my initial with an e-mail and saying look like we're going to run through some stuff.

Now all this is going to be in writing, so you don't need to worry about all these sets and reps and what this is and that and that this is all going to be in there.

And so you've got the opportunity to ask me questions afterwards.

So because, yeah, there's often, you know, lots of things that we've identified in that initial consultation, whether that be around Blake, you need to sleep better, you know, to eat better, you know, and then we talk about them, the exercise you need to be doing, the running modification.

So there's a lot of stuff that we, you know, that we we go through.

So I always, yeah, suggest including that and in an e-mail so that you're clear.

And also it also gives you time sort of sometimes at the, you know, at the end of the consult just to say, oh, we didn't talk about that.

I'll put a note on next time to make sure we cover off that because our job's hard.

Like we've got a lot of stuff to, to to cover and, and you're never going to go through it all in, you know, in initial consult.

I mean, I've got an hour with my patients, but I could probably spend hours going through and doing a whole heap of stuff with them.

So we've got to sort of prioritize what we do.

So yeah, it gives you a chance at the end to say, oh, yeah, OK, Yep, I did that, right.

I could have done.

That'd be better.

May I forgot to include this?

We'll do that next time.

Yeah, yeah, I, I, I'm completely the same.

I have the arrow as well.

I, I feel like you, you just need, I guess there are other options of, you know, maybe short and seeing them again that, you know, it's nice just to have that time to go through everything.

And it probably leads to one of the questions I wanted to, to ask you for.

For me as a practitioner working with runners, what the realization came as I started to do more of it was the thing that I felt like I was missing the most, almost like the piece of the puzzle was understanding run programming.

And I wanted to give you this scenario where Iran comes in your clinic with pain.

What do you think is the most important information you can get from them?

Is it training load?

Is it gait assessment?

Is it their footwear?

Of course you're taking, you know, everything for that person, but what do you feel like is the thing that's like, this is the one thing that I need that you spend the amount of time on well.

Honestly, like I, I think that one of the things you need to figure out is, is why, what, what their goals are like in terms of, you know, that that can change a whole lot of things.

I mean, I think you need to, you need to get the diagnosis right to, or at least have a tentative diagnosis of, of what's going on, right?

Because is it cancer?

Is it, is it, you know, is it a, is it a bone stress injury?

Like we're not going to even go down the path of doing a whole heap of testing.

If I'm, if I'm thinking that, you know, this is quite something, quite sinister, a bone stress injury.

So we do need to get, you know, a tentative diagnosis right now, once we've got that right and it's not something sinister.

So we put those things, put those things aside, you know, what are your goals?

Like what, what do you want to do?

I just want to run pain free.

All right, Well, that's, that's going to be a different story versus I've got a race in two weeks.

I want to get to that race or I've got these goals.

You know, pain is not so much a problem to me.

And so you've got again, people that need to be treated very differently.

And I sort of, I guess made a a bit of a mistake recently.

Like I had a patient and we've been seeing it for a proximal hamstring tendinopathy.

And, you know, she's doing a bit of running and, you know, we've been progressing her running along.

She's doing really well, like, you know, running 5K park runs.

And, you know, I spoke to her the other day and she's like, yeah, but we spoke about this.

I said, look, you know, it's amazing all the stuff that she's been doing.

And she's like, yeah.

But I just want to, I just want to sit without pain.

Like I just want to have, you know, out of jump on a long haul flight and not have to worry about that, about that pain.

And this is, this is something I'd probably, you know, neglected to speak to her at the time before we'd probably gone a little bit too far down there.

Well, let's just work on this and, you know, get, you get, you're doing these things and, and, but that for her was actually a really important thing.

So, so, you know, chatting with our patients about, about their goals and, and not, not for getting out.

And that can change as well too over the course of treatment.

They might say or tick that off or no, I don't really care about that anymore.

So that's a really important one because that will then dictate a lot of our management in terms of, you know, how aggressive we might go on on things.

And then, you know, yes, what you were saying, like the, the running is, is a really important one.

And I guess now, you know, as a, as a running coach, like that's a hat that I've always got on.

Like I've got my clinician hat and my running and running coach hat on.

So I'm always sort of picking up things and, you know, they're showing that might be showing me what they have been doing in their, their strata or, or their plan there.

And, you know, I think that as runners, and This is why I guess I've found myself going into, into the more and more into the coaching space over time was because you get this runner into and they're like, well, what next?

What should I do?

And you're like, I don't know, like I know what the problem is.

And, and I can give you some exercises, but I've got no idea about how to progress this.

And, and so that like, do we do a run tomorrow?

Like do I do I do a speed session?

Do I do a long run?

Like, and then what's that going to look like over the next, you know, 8 weeks?

It's like, well, have you got a coach?

No, I don't.

It's like, oh crap, well, I guess I'm gonna have to try and figure this out myself.

And you and you have to.

That's what I became.

Yeah.

Like you have to do a person that does that because you're seeing them anyway and they're like, I wanna run, you have to program.

Exactly.

I don't have a coach.

Yeah.

It's exactly right.

I mean, and you know, you well as a, as a clinician, you should know more in terms of, in terms of sort of tissue capacity and progressions, but you might not necessarily know about, about their, their, you know, how to safely progress their, their running.

So that's where I, I again found that I guess hole in my knowledge base and and then pursued more education down around that's that side of things.

So, so that is, that is an important part because as much as possible, I like to try and keep my runners running because that's what, and much like, you know, playing any sort of sport, like is it safe to, is it safe to continue?

And, and you know, there's some discussions on safe levels of pain and you know, like that Karen Sylvanarkel pain guide, I usually say around that 4 to 5 out of 10 is, is pretty safe to be dealing with through here, you know, during the exercise afterwards and, and the day after.

So most of those, those running related injuries that we can, we can deal with around that.

And then it's a matter of then sometimes it's a it's a matter of testing.

They're, they're running.

And, and, and that's where, you know, again, you're getting that regular feedback.

It's like, all right, Blake.

And if you're not really sure, like you could just say, all right, Blake, go out and just try, you know, 20 minutes tomorrow.

You know, a good, a good rule like, you know, I've learned from from Tom Groom a while ago was, you know, basically run tolerance testing.

So if you said to me, Blake, you said, oh, you know, 30 minutes into my run, money's just killing me.

It's like 6 or 7 out of 10.

It's like, all right, well, 30 minutes is is the limit there.

So let's dial that back.

So whether we reduce that by, you know, 10/15/20 percent, say we brought that back down to 20.

All right, so let's go, let's go 20 minutes, Blake, in a couple of days time, we're going to do the same run again.

How was that?

That was great.

All right, then let's let's increase it for 5 minutes.

Let's go up to 25.

Let's try that.

OK, that's good.

Let's go up to 30.

Oh, that's OK now.

So now we've hit that 30 and it's better.

So we've sort of almost got, you know, we've eclipsed from where we were before and we can sort of gradually increase there.

And there's no, you know, there's no magic rules.

You know, there's always guides and I know you, and I've been talking about this recently and, and, you know, we're looking to, to do something later in the year about at, at the lower limb conference and, and talking about some stuff around this.

But, but there's, you know, there's a lot of, there's a lot of art form to it.

Like there's the, you know, we, we speak about the art and the science.

There's, there's a lot of art that that comes with, you know, with, with running prescription, running, running, loading.

And that's where I guess I've, I've sort of learnt over time and, and, and practice and see what you can get away with and what, and what you can't.

I do have like quite a bit of communication with my patients outside the consult room in terms of, you know, they send me an e-mail update because like, I might not see if I see you for a week or I might see if it, you know, for two weeks, what have you.

Like a lot can happen in that time.

And I can't predict what, you know, how the progressions sometimes are going to go over that, over that time.

So we might just sort of have just a check in of like just update me after this run.

It's a bit more work and it does require more work outside the consult room from from our point of view.

And I do have get quite a few emails, but it's, it's just something I've, I've, I've got to do.

And I guess it ensures that, that our patients are moving along as, as, as quickly as they can be.

Or if we need to, to readjust, then, then then do that.

So that's something I've I've done personally.

Do you so 2 questions for that.

Do you use a specific app to program which patients can give you feedback on?

So, So for me, I use Final search because the emails which it would just get too many or I would forget them or have something else to do and maybe I'd leave it on unread and not get back to someone.

Whereas I feel like I'm final surge, I can see it, I can program it and leave me a comment and then I check it every couple of days and if it's not right, I can change or whatever I may need to do.

And yeah, I wanted to know kind of what you use follow up wise, like for your programming, for running, for your strength training.

Like what do you feel like a clinician who's working with runners as much as you do and working with them successfully kind of can utilize or potentially may do well with?

Yeah, so I guess over the years I've used different like exercise prescription software.

So I'd, I'd used, you know, for, for writing rehab programs and strength programs and then found myself going to using true coach was sort of one of the ones that I used a while back.

And from a running prescription point of view, actually early on, like years ago, I was using spreadsheets.

So, you know, probably, you know, 7-8 years ago I was, I was using Excel, Excel or actually Google Sheets.

So it was, you know, I could have a look and see, but that sort of got a bit involving because you'd have, you know, have to open every single one to see what was going on there.

And that's when I then started using training peaks.

And training peaks, like final surge is, is a, a, a platform where you can have, you know, a whole group of athletes under there and a click of a button.

I can see through the calendar and see what they've, what they've been doing.

So I use training peaks now and I use that to also now do my strength because I was going between the two platforms a while.

It was just a bit of a pain.

So I just moved it all into into training peaks.

Training peaks is hasn't is not as good as from a strength prescription point of view as as as as true coach was.

But I've, I've just had to, I guess, settle for the convenience that that having it all in one has, has has offered for for me and, and also my, my runners as well.

And I use, I use training peaks actually just as a strength.

So even for non runners, if they're, you know, playing footy or they just want to, you know, a strength program, I'll just use training peaks for that as well too, because I can just prescribe it in in through there.

So yes, I do, I do use that and I will check in on there.

But you know, I've got is with quite a few in there.

I'm not going to be checking them every day.

Like I check, you know, my, my, I guess my running athletes that I coach, I'm checking them quite regularly.

But some of the other ones where I'm writing a strength program for like if like, you know, we're going to catch up in 3 or 4 weeks in clinic.

I'm not going to be checking every day or every every week.

You're doing what you're doing.

I expect you to tell me if there's any issues, but probably not going to review that until we until we come into in that follow up appointment.

Yeah, but you're not checking your 100 people every day.

Do you even care?

No kidding.

No, that's, well, actually I'm gonna, I'm gonna be able to go and do it.

No, no, that's.

Right.

Three hours a day.

Don't see just, yeah, just don't see my wife and kids.

They're just just sitting.

Just sitting.

Yeah.

Checking my all day.

Yeah, yeah, that's right.

Exactly.

So, So yeah, that's, that's the system I've found.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

For in your hour contact, let's say for the newer runner that the injured runner, I mean, obviously it's specific their pathology, but what are you testing?

Like, you know, I would like to know what your, what your drive to be with the technology that you have.

But also for people that don't have force plates or valid, what, what would you you think is really important to do?

Obviously specific for the pathology guest, but then outside of that just generally for running.

Yeah, Yeah.

So I guess like Mike, if, if we were to breakdown what I do in a, in an initial consult, so we'll actually to, to take a step backwards.

I, I get get all my patients to fill out a, a, a form beforehand.

So that actually captures a lot of information.

So I can read through that beforehand.

You know, that also includes on their, what their expectation of, of their initial consult is, you know, what do they want to achieve with treatment, How this, this is impacting their, their life, this, this issue.

And that does reveal can also sometimes allow me to to dictate how we might steer that, that that initial consult.

Like if someone says to me, they said I want my, they've come in because they want their running gate assessed or they come in because they want to discuss the training program.

And then I know that that's what we're going to be, you know, probably spending a bit of time on or if I don't think that's clinically relevant, I'll tell them no.

Blake, look, I know you came in for a running gate assessment, but I think it's actually better off that we look at these things and This is why we're doing that.

And so you're telling them so that then they don't walk away and say, well, that was useless because I wanted to, I can't, I just wanted a running gate assessment.

So, so that's, that sort of sets things up beforehand so I know what to go.

It's also a great one for the new clinicians because if someone's coming in, they're writing all these medications or they're writing, you know, these, these different issues or health conditions they've never even heard of, it does give them some chance to, to Google beforehand.

So you don't have to stuck in the awkward position of not knowing what something is.

So that's the, the pre beforehand.

And then I, I spend a good, you know, 10-15 minutes sometimes discussing with my patients.

And by the end of that, I've got a pretty good idea of, of what's going on.

Or I've got a sort of a very narrow list of, of differentials.

And then sort of go into to then testing to get a diagnosis, I guess a, you know, a tissue or, you know, some pain diagnosis if you want to, if you want to use it that way.

And then we go into then sort of looking at at capacity.

So, you know, we're looking at from a tissue point of view, the United strength mobility and that includes like strength.

As I said, we've got all these equipment that I've got in, in our clinic with force plates and, and handheld dynamiters.

I think that these days, and you mentioned before, like not everyone has access to these, these, you know, types of technologies and yes, I know, but they're thankfully becoming more affordable and there's some really affordable handheld dynamiters on the market at the moment as well too.

So there's, there's not really any excuses now that that's out that we don't have for, for assessing this sort of stuff because, yeah, without, you know, one of the favorite sayings is if you're not assessing, you're guessing.

And so it's always funny, I laugh if, if I see someone and they're like, oh, yeah, my previous, you know, health professional told me I've got weak glutes.

I'm like, oh, OK, how did they, how firstly, it's, you know, that's the, the glutes of the bane of, of all injuries, aren't they?

But, but I'm like, oh, how, how did they assess that?

And like, Oh, no, they didn't.

They just said, I've got weak glutes and I'm like, right.

OK, so I think we can do a bit better than that as, as, as health professionals, I think we can, you know, be taking that the, the guesswork and the assumptions out.

And, and so that's where I think they're great.

It's great.

Now that all of this stuff is, is more readily available.

So there's that sort of stuff from a capacity point of view, you know, looking at simply just looking at them hop is, is, is could be a good way without even measuring anything, you can look at, you know, the differences between left and right, How good are they doing it?

How coordinated are they?

And then, you know, then we'll go on to sort of other things like running gate assessment where we'd get them either outside or on the treadmill and looking at how they run and seeing if there's anything that there that might be relevant to what's going on.

And sort of then putting all that information together and, and figuring out then where we need to attack their problem from and where their, you know, the strengths and weaknesses lie.

That's how that we can put out a sort of a guess, an individual plan for that person.

And you said you test like mobility.

Do you, are you doing like hamstring range, ankle range?

Like do you just do that standard?

So you just do their ankle range, you know, big toe, hamstring, internal external rotation in the hip with everyone.

Yeah, yeah.

And just look for what are you looking for like symmetry, pain.

But a bit of both like it's symmetry pain, you know, the, the, the range of movement.

I mean from a from a running, from a running perspective, you know, running is what we call what, you know, Chris Johnson calls a mid range sport.

Like we, we, we barely get to to end range in, in any joint in the body, but probably the hip.

We might get to near near terminal extension of the hip there, but we don't get near anywhere else in in terms of other joint movements.

Maybe any extension you get within, you know, 10 or 15° there of terminal extension.

So, so it's not a, a sport that demands a lot of flexibility and my toe touch would, would, would definitely agree with, agree with that.

So, So what we're looking at there is it's, it's, it is often a bit of, you know, it's a pain provocation and you've got to, you've got to, you know, I guess determine what's relevant, what's not.

So you can collect all this information.

And, you know, is it relevant that they've got a 2 centimetre weight bearing lunge deficit on one side versus the other?

You know, is that something that we need to chase after?

Is it something that we're like, well, I reckon that's OK.

And this is where, again, your, your clinical judgement and, and justification comes in.

Is that something you do?

I don't do, like, I don't do a lot of mobility work with, with, with my, my runners.

You know, in terms of a lot of stretching, my, a lot of my treatments are focused on strength.

And, and you know, there's, there has been some research to show that strength through range can get just as good as improvement as, as stretching can.

So, so it's like, well, why not have both then?

Not that I'm anti anti stretching, unless it's, you know, it's, it's aggravating, provocating their, their issues.

I'm just think, well, your time could be better spent doing something else.

So, so yeah, that's that's sort of my approach on flexibility and and mobility in in runners.

And tell me with this assessment, because there's a good faith discussion around, do you, so do you need to assess the strength parameters?

Because the numbers don't mean much other than maybe symmetry.

And there's no number to say, you know, 300 means you're at greater risk.

Two, sorry, 300 means you're no risk, 250, you mean you don't have that risk.

And we're building someone's capacity.

It's usually the active strengthening.

It's also the active doing resistance training, going through the movement rather than the kind of the end goal.

So same with bone stress injuries, you know, having strong calves isn't what makes your bone stronger.

It's the act of getting strong calves and doing the plantar flexural load and so forth.

So when when we're looking to assess you, do you think that you need to have the exact numbers and parameters to be able to then prescribe your training program or your strength program or your running program?

So you when you were speaking around, you know, assessment and I guess having the the number, it's difficult because the number doesn't mean anything in isolation.

You know, it's not like you have 300, you have no risk, you have 250, you're at greater risk.

We probably look for symmetry and it's the act of doing the training that seems to be, you know, the best stimulus, consistent stimulus for tendon and bone.

You know, for bone fresh injuries.

It's not having strong cars, it's great for tibial bone mass.

It's the act of getting strong cars and and you know, having that consistent plentiflex a load.

So, yeah, in saying all that, do you think that it's necessary to have these measurement tools to measure, you know, whether it be the counter movement jump or we're looking at isometric strains, looking through a strain through range to be able to help someone when it's the act of doing is what's getting better.

So if I measure your glutes right now, and one says 301 says 250, I'm still gonna give you some stuff for your glutes anyway because you've got a glute.

Turn it off with you.

Yeah.

So I think that my my answer to that would be, does it matter?

Yes, yes, it can.

Like how much does it matter?

I mean, I guess if you wanted to, I mean, it allows you to sort of, I guess subclassify, you know, in terms of, and there's been some research that's looked at that, you know, things around like tendinopathy, for instance, like Hamlin's research that's looked at, you know, those that are structural versus, you know, load related and psychosocial, those sort of things there.

So it does allow us to to sort of see, all right, you know, to subclassify you.

So if we're sort of looking black and they're like, well, your calf capacity is quite poor and how do we know that?

Like we, you know, we could visually look at you and think, well, maybe it's poor, but how how would we assess that?

So I think that yes, it is, it is necessary to do that.

I know what you're saying in that it's the act of getting strong that builds the tissues, but also from a performance point of view as well too.

You know, I generally tend to find my better runners, the faster runners are stronger and they've got a better reactive strength ability now, which is which they are they, you know, fast because and and then they've got, you know, that's developed these as they've, as they've gone through.

Are they genetically gifted with that?

You know, generally I find though that and working with runners for a long period of time that if we prove these strength qualities, then also their, you know, their performance does improve as well.

So, so I think that there's, yeah, there is no, you know, research to say just yet that if you're, you know, you are under this cut off of 250% body weight, then you're, you're going to get injured.

I think though that the future of, of, you know, research and looking at all these things will include stuff like that, like, you know, putting all this data in there to I guess give you a, an injury risk profile and, you know, can we ever do that, that are pie in the sky thing?

Well, I think that we can, you know, there's, there's certainly some evidence to support that, you know, whilst well, actually weakness can be a precursor, A contributing factor and also a, a consequence of certain injuries.

So things around patellofemoral pain, patellar tendonopathy, those sort of things there.

So weakness can be a risk factor for, for some of these conditions.

So I think that we should be, we should be assessing that and we'll, and you know, I guess if you're going to say weakness is a risk factor, well, what's what's weak and, and then how you're going to assess that.

So, so I do think that there is, it's not, it's not everything.

Like, again, if you don't have access to this technology, doesn't mean you're a bad, you're bad, you know, professional by any means.

There's lots of ways that you can do it without without technology, but just know that they're that's the limitation of what you've got to work with.

Yeah.

And have you found in your experience going from, you know, I'm assuming not using it to using it?

You can't.

You just don't know what you don't know.

And then you've started using it and then you're like, you know what, This actually has changed my programming, It's changed my advice, it's changed my education.

And you know, although I'm not saying that you have to, I have to have this to help you.

It isn't.

And it is informing me.

And then you know that the big one, which truly believe is the case for the especially for runners and for the right person, they really value it and they're really enjoying seeing the numbers and the change and the progression and the journey back, although they're paying up by improving.

You know there are symmetric kind of flexible strength is is increased.

Exactly and exactly what you said in both those in that one, you don't know what you don't know and and again, having worked with without it and now with it.

And then exactly what you said about the runners that that do like it.

I mean, runners are type a data-driven personality and what better to help to motivate them by showing them, Hey, Blake, your numbers are down here.

This is why we need to get you strength training and that can be an incentive.

And, and obviously you've got to make sure that you're presenting that data in such a way that it's not nice if you can say, Blake, you're just shit and you should just give.

Up These are the worst.

That is that's exactly right.

That's say that on a daily basis.

But yeah, you could be careful how how you frame that that those those findings as well too.

But the again, going back to not what no, you know, you don't know what you don't know in that.

Like I think you take the calves, for instance, like if I'm assessing someone's maximal strength and also looking at their strength endurance and also looking at their explosive strength.

So some hopping ability, well, that sort of can help to, I guess, classify and and help to guide what sort of strength intervention we might be doing.

Because I might look at you like and say your maximum strengths excellent.

These numbers are great, but your reactive strength is not very good.

Are we going to be spending a lot of time lifting heavy weights?

Probably not.

We're going to be going into into plyometrics.

And that's some of the things that I see with, you know, even with Achilles tendonopathy, we see some that are just, they just don't have very good that utilization of the stretch shortening cycle.

So that's, but they've got excellent maximal strength.

So why do we need to do this here?

Whereas if I didn't have that information, I would say we'll look like, I don't know, we'll just throw everything at you and just and see what sticks.

So it's sort of allows you to be more specific.

Now does, does which, which way is better?

Like which way gets better results?

We don't know, like we don't know that because there's no, you know, studies that to show that and would take.

And this is where I'd love to say like with, with, you know, strength interventions is individualizing strength training for for runners, like actually, you know, comprising a program based on your deficiencies versus just giving a generalized program.

And there's, there's nothing that's, that's, that's done that and even a lot of the, the, the, the strength interventions, strength training that's done is not, not being individualized.

So it's just being group based.

It's like everyone gets these exercises and there's variants of progressions in there in some of the studies.

So that's one thing I'd love to, I'd love to see and looking at that, that individualization and is, is that a better way to do it?

We don't.

I don't know.

Sounds like there's a PhD on the horizon for the For the man, it's.

So many, so many questions.

So many questions.

Just not enough time.

Not enough time and resources to to answer them.

Yeah, I mean, not when you go to check bloody everyone's programming 100 times a day.

Yeah, that's, well, that's exactly right.

That's not much time for anything, really.

Yeah, now tell me, tell me the answer to this question.

How do we prevent pain?

No, I'm kidding, but I, I really want to pick your pain on this because I, I don't know if there is an answer to this question, but you're managing, you're managing a bone stress injury.

Yeah, you diagnose it.

They have their period of non weight bearing, whether it be boot or crutches.

And let's just say we kind of talk 2 scenarios, high risk versus low risk.

And let's just say they're both medium grade.

You, they come out of the boot or crutches or whatever it may be.

They're pain free for a week.

How do you choose their loading?

If we don't have any guidance other than what we assume bone takes to remodel, which is a long time, what do you say?

Cortical trabecular 120 to 200 days approximate give or take?

How do?

You do yeah, it's, it's a good, it's a good question.

And, and it was actually, I was, I was having a, a chat with, with Bob about this recently about, you know, time based.

And, and I, I, I generally work off criteria based rehab progressions.

So basically what that means is, you know, you achieve this, you go on to this, you go on to this.

And so for instance, if you know, you've, you get through that, you take those off very quickly, will you, you progress through faster?

Now bones a little bit different because there's, there's an element of time based criteria and time based being at two weeks, at 4 weeks, at six weeks.

So, so it's one of those slightly probably the one of the few conditions that I will manage more on time than than criteria.

And but there's a, there's a mixed into though, right?

Still still with bone stress injuries, you need to be able to do this to be able to get through like for instance, you know, we need to be able to get through your activities of daily life before we then start to look at and we very controlling on your step count.

And then, you know, we're increasing your step count from week without actually adding any exercise just yet.

We're just making sure that you can get back to normal life.

And then we start to pile on, pile on these things.

And it's interesting because you know, there's not actually a lot of even even offloading periods as well too.

There's, there's very little that's, that's being done on comparing offloading duration.

Like I've had, I've had some patients where they've come to see me and you know, like they, they might have seen me two weeks, 2 weeks later or something like that, and, or three weeks afterwards.

And I'm like, oh, what's going on?

I'm like, I've got this hip pain And, and you know that it's like, well, get a scan.

You know, you, you've got a, you know, femoral neck stress fracture.

And it's like, oh, OK, well, it doesn't hurt me.

I didn't offload it.

I just, you know, I didn't, didn't go on crutches.

I've just been walking around doing my normal thing.

And, you know, try running every now and then.

It's just like, OK, well, you've clearly got lucky there.

And, and I've had that happen a few, a few times where people have been walking around with these things.

And then you sort of think, well, so does everyone need to be doing that or, and, and how much does that accelerate and how much does that slow that down?

And I don't think we've got the got the answers to that.

So, so I think that there's yeah, there's a lot of questions.

And it seems to be just all like, well, what has been done?

It has just continued to be done without, without that being tested.

Like I'm not aware of anything.

Are you aware of anything that's that's sort of looked at that and examined, you know, compared offloading times that.

No, no, so, so, so there's still, it just seems like, well, this is the way it's done.

So this is, this is, this is how we do it.

So, so in terms of, you know, going back to your original question about, you know, offloading time, you know, offloading times and, and how to progress them, like, I think my, my criteria is, well, we need to get them back to life before we, before we start adding, adding exercise.

And what is your normal life?

So what are your, you know, are you, are you in a job where you have to be on your feet all day?

Well, that's, that's going to take a bit.

We don't, we're not even consider adding in, you know, any cardio or, or, you know, if it's a low limb stress fracture and we're not going to think about doing any, any lower limb cross training until we've got back to your normal work duties and, and life duties.

Then we can start to add those things in.

And then it's like, OK, well, let's get, you know, let's get cross training in, let's get some resistance training and gradually building that by, by week by week by week.

So that's, that's how I progress it.

And so I wouldn't say that everyone, everyone looks the same.

Like I, I don't have like, I know there are.

And I think for the young clinicians, it's important to have, I guess, you know, a cookbook, if you like, for some of these, because it, it, it teaches you to be pretty safe.

Like, you know, you could say I do it at this four weeks and then at 8 weeks weeks I add this and then at 12 weeks I add this.

And I think that's, that's good.

But in, in the real world and in practice, I see it work.

You know, it can work a bit differently and, but it, but I'm not going to certainly encourage and, and I'd, I'm, you know, very hesitant to do anything that's, that's risky or, or involve setting them back.

Like, I think I've, I've got a, I've got a good record with bone stress injuries and, and, and recurrences that yeah, I, I, I'm not blase with that either.

I think you do need to be, to be careful.

And, and you know, I recently had had a case and, and she was coming back from a femoral neck stress fracture and, and bone stress injury in grade 2.

And, and we'd sort of, yeah, set a plan in place and, you know, with a gradual, she was back to up to return to running.

And then I saw her.

I'm like, oh, how are you going?

It's like, oh, I'm a bit sore and I'm a bit sore of my groin.

I'm like, oh, hang on a SEC, OK, jumping on had a look on a training peaks.

I'm like, what's this like, Oh, I decided, you know, I decided I'd just do a a 5K run.

I'm like, what's this?

She's like, oh, there was a there's a school last day and I did I did the 100 metre Sprint with the parents.

I'm like, oh, why I was.

Not ready, and I was not ready.

No, no.

And, and and that was it.

That was that was done.

And, and that's, you know, again, it's just, it just again hits home how quickly these things can go wrong, like in the 1st place.

And then also a recurrence.

Like things are travelling along very well until, until they're not.

It takes sometimes a couple of bad days and, and, and and that's it.

If you've gone, you've gone back.

So yeah, they, they, they, they are challenging.

I don't what I do.

I love treating them.

That's why I said to Bo, I said that I don't know how you, it's like for the worst news to deliver to runners Like it's, it's, it's not nice.

It's, it's almost like a death sentence to them.

So I, I don't, I never like, you know, giving that diagnosis and, and I'm sure Bo doesn't either, But but yeah, to be dealing with that with all the, all the time, I think I'd find it hard to be dealing with bone stress injuries every single patient.

You know, it's just, it is a real and it's, it can be a real mental challenge for them as well too.

They can go to some real dark places.

And yeah, I've had a lot of runners that have really struggled mentally with them.

So you know that they often need a lot of, a lot of support.

So I.

Yeah, certainly see unfortunately a a fair share of them.

But yeah, it's, it's certainly the the diagnosis that I from a musculoskeletal point of view that I that I don't want to be delivering.

Yeah, it's, it's tough to when you, when you run yourself and how much it means to you and you deliver that information.

It, it, it sucks.

There's sometimes where I'll finish the day of work and I, I don't, I would, wouldn't go for a run, but sometimes I'll just go for a run because I'm like, I can go for a run and I just saw six people who aren't going to be running for six weeks.

I need to get out and just enjoy it.

You know, you just get that perspective.

And sometimes, as you said, you go to that dark place.

My last case today, you know that, that when they first come to see me, which was two weeks ago, this is the second appointment they were having surgery for their Hagglunds like the I'm having, I'm having surgery for my Haglunds.

My and it was a social Achilles centenopathy and 2nd appointment with no running, just calm things down and I'm like, I need to get out and train like I just, I just need to do it.

This person can't rather you're gonna have surgery.

I'm gonna go out and just one to 5K just because I can.

Yeah, it does.

It's certainly, you know, I don't, you know, don't take that for granted.

I think again, as you said, it hits home and and you certainly appreciate, appreciate what you've got when, when things have been taken away from people.

You're right.

It does give you should give you an opportunity to reflect and say I'm pretty lucky.

I'm pretty lucky.

Now, does Luke change foot strike pattern?

Very rarely, very rarely, I'd say to be very, very, very, very small percent of, of, of any sort of gait interventions that I do.

And if if anything, I'm actually, you know, I guess the, the, the typical when people think foot strike interventions there, it's, oh, I'm changing them from rear foot to to 4 foot or mid foot.

But it's actually for me it's the opposite way.

So I'm often often encouraging the reverse and there's a few that come to mind recently where they had all three of them had recurrent calf issues.

So.

Two bloody calf.

Yeah.

And two.

Yeah, well, that's right.

It is that two of them, two of them recurrent calf issues, one of them just had almost like this.

He was he was training up for his first marathon and he said I just can't get past 17 KS without my calves absolutely screaming at me.

And so that wasn't an actually an injury, more just this big overload.

And I don't know how he didn't didn't injure to be honest, but he actually was quite strong from his calf capacity.

But anyway, well, like, alright, let's get a look at you get a look at your running and oh, you know, these 33 instances were were all four foot landing and two of them had had actually retrained themselves.

Like they'd they'd, you know, read somewhere or, or found that, Oh no, I'd I'd read that this is the way to run or I had some knee pain and so this is how I run.

And the third one, he was just sort of a natural 4 foot Lander.

He was sort of a toe Walker.

Where is it when he was younger and sort of just adapted that that running pattern.

And so all three was like, well, okay, we're going to start to transition you away from that.

And you know what?

I would have known that if I didn't check.

So this is the thing with with, you know, gait analysis these days.

And I recommend is that I will assess it as much as I ever have, if not more, but but I will intervene probably less than than what I used to.

And so because you just don't know what you don't.

Yeah, he's like we mentioned before, you don't know what you don't know unless you see that person.

Like I wouldn't know that these people are running on their forefoot and, and you know, here I am trying to improve their calf strength and, you know, have doing the foam rolling and all this sort of stuff there there might be to try and calm things down.

And all we needed to do was just tell them to to not be running on their tip toes.

So, yeah, so foot foot strike intervention is is not one that I'm I'm regularly doing.

I'm, I'm usually looking at other cues to that might change their foot strike.

So we might change them from a, you know, a large inclination angle when and you know, a heavy landing, a heel landing to to a lighter landing or or mid foot landing.

But that's not I'm not queuing them to change their foot on again.

Would that be cadence, whether that be posture, all these sort of things that might that might change change that.

So, yeah, I'm not not big and I know that you can like is obviously researchers looking at at, you know, 4 foot landing to to reduce loads at the knee.

But I think that there's other cues that can be can be used that could could see an equal reduction in in a load without then the increase in implantar flexolide.

Yeah.

How often do you find the people that you're changing keep that in the long term like let's say the course of treatment?

You know, it might be, I don't know, let's just say three months like you find if you make some changes at the end of their three months, if you reassess them, it looks pretty much the same whether that be caters or strike pattern or with what do you find?

Yeah, a lot, a lot, a lot too.

And, and especially if we're, you know, some of the things.

And I recently gave a talk to Athletics Australia about looking at data and, and you know, one of the things we spoke about was was cadence.

And I think, you know, cadence is 1.

As health professionals, we can quite easily see on our runners because they can just show us, you know, how you how's your run tracking along what's your average cadence at?

And not that cadence is the be all and end all of of changing running technique, but it's one way you can, I guess monitor and see has that change sustained.

And so we often do see like if you're getting them doing a cadence intervention or you've changed their posture and or getting them to take some shorter steps there and seeing their cadence up and then you're looking at them down the track.

And it's like, all right, show me your Strava and or following on training peaks and you actually see that sustained.

So I think that a lot of the times it, it, it, it is, there are things that can be more persistent and, and I guess it depends on the focus that that person puts into it as well too.

Like it, it's how much, how much work they put into interchanging.

So there are sometimes changes that you, that you will not see that, that are sustained because the person's only thought about them when they're painful.

And that might have only been a few weeks and then they've just neglected it and they've gone back to their old, their old patterns.

So that can also happen as well.

But I would say, I would say that a lot of the time some of these these changes are being sustained.

So, but I know that like you know, and Greg Lehman talks about do you need to and it's like, well, maybe you don't, but but I certainly see them that they can, they can, yeah.

That that can be their then their new pattern ongoing.

Yeah.

And when you're programming for someone back running, how, how do you figure out what to start with?

Like how do you go, you're gonna run 2 minutes, you're gonna run 3 minutes?

Do you test them in the clinic?

Do you do some of these testing before?

Like you said, car phrases, hop in and go.

Yeah, based off your history, let's just start with a minute and then progress from there.

Yeah.

So are you talking about like, you know, they've, they've had a bit of time off with an injury.

So they've they've it's their first run back and they haven't.

Yeah, yeah.

So depending on how much time they've they've missed and and also like again, how quickly, what sort of a timeline we've got to work with.

Like if, if like you said, I'm running a marathon in two weeks or three weeks.

And and you know, this is this needs to be a big week.

We're like, alright, well, look, we can take some risks here, but just know that if we blow this, we're done.

And and so you know, we might say.

And generally this is this is sort of more the exception.

This doesn't happen too often where we say, all right, Blake, we're going to do an hour tomorrow.

Like that's not my preferred, preferred first run.

And if it has been, if it has been so say, say a calf strain, right?

So say it's the first, first run that we've got coming back from a calf strain.

We know that especially with a soleus that it's more likely to be injured during sustained, long sustained running, you know, longer time on the feet.

And so that maybe initially might just be doing some some run throughs.

It might be saying let's just go 60 meter run throughs and just do ten of those with stationary recovery.

Tick that off yet that went well.

Alright, next one we can go on.

And then that's when I do send a sort of then go on to like generally a pretty safe, you know, run, walk interval is that one minute on, one minute off.

And we might do five of those.

We might do ten of those, depending on, you know, a lot of things like if someone's had a really checkered injury history, like they've had multiple calf strains, they've got poor capacity still that you're still working on them to get them up there.

Then we might progress them a little bit slower if they're like, first time I've done it, need to get back quickly, good capacity, good health, otherwise good recovery, all these sort of things we've, we've taken into consideration.

Then that's that will also dictate how quickly we we progress.

So again, this is where I say like, you know, and I teach like there are, I guess, you know, cookbooks that perhaps if we go from this to this to this, but in the real world, I guess then you see, you know, you your brain is processing all these things and all these contributing factors that are going on that may hasten or slow down that that person's progression.

And Chris, Chris Johnson and I actually working on something on that at the moment, actually.

So stay tuned in the in the coming, coming weeks, we'll hopefully have something on, on that that coming out.

So some things that to sort of consider when you're, you know, returning someone to to running.

So yeah.

Yeah, and what do you find?

Yeah.

So yeah, send it over here first.

Sports medicine project exclusive.

Would be nice exclusive.

That's right, I'll give you the scope.

So, and how do you add someone back to intensity?

Like, let's say you've done the programming, walk around, you give them strives.

You go out and say, listen, go blush the half marathon this weekend.

I'm just kidding.

Yeah.

Just that.

Just that.

Yeah.

Yeah, just exactly.

Just therefore just got full sand blast it.

Just just full sand.

Full sand the whole way.

Good question.

Like I like to, I like to sort of say, you know, I like to get my runners back to if they're distance runners and they're doing, you know, 60 minutes or 45 minutes is their, you know, their shortest run and their long runs.

I really like to get them up to building up that volume and getting that, that 60 minutes done.

Once they're taking that over, then we'll look at putting some speed work in there.

And yeah, as you said, that could be some, you know, surges initially or, you know, strides.

Strides is I determine them as a bit more of a like, OK, let's really go at this from from the get go.

Surges are more like this is sort of gradually accelerate.

You know, we might get up to sort of our threshold speed, which is, you know, if someone's maybe marathon, half marathon pace.

And then just just easing off there and let's just try sort of a little bit of some accelerations there before we go into full, you know, strides, which might be at, you know, your 400 meter pace.

So, so yes, I like to like to, to test those first and then we look to then go back into some shorter intervals and, and some speed work from from there.

And all dependent, of course, on where the person is in their program as well to like, if they're getting close to a marathon and they've gone through this, well, we don't need to blast them with high speed work.

We can just say, right, let's just get some marathon pace work, You know, maybe some threshold.

We might not go above that if it's too risky, because it doesn't really matter anyway for this, for this, this marathon.

We push you too fast here, then runs a risk of ovary injury.

So let's just keep you, keep you slower.

And, and so, yeah, depending on where they are and their, their, their training block will dictate how hard, how hard we might push them.

And.

But yeah, 60 minutes is a good guide.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, I wanted to to give you a scenario if you were you imagine someone with Achilles tendonopathy and you know you're slowly building the back to volume.

Let's say they're running 20 to 30 KS a week, three to four runs and you know that their pain is is stable around a two or three out of 10.

Do you find, would you, do you think it's better for people to slowly continue?

Let's say they had a long history, they had a couple of flare ups.

Do you think it's better to continue to build that volume?

And where do we kind of have that ceiling to then start to add in intensity?

Do you think it's better for the tendon to just have a good month of solid slower volume training or drop that at the intensity?

And let's say the person just I just want to get back to their normal running load, which was a couple of sessions a week, you know, running five days a week with the group.

Like how do you, you find that And then if, if you are running with that volume of four to five times a week and it's going OK, you know, 20 to 30 KS, if they're still getting two to three out of 10, do you think you then need to drop that to be able to get them to be in less pain or do you think it's safe to keep progressing?

Well, I think that there's there's actually there's, there's no real way to know.

Come on, just give me the right answer.

Just the.

Only answer yeah, OK, OK yes, yes.

So the, the yeah.

And I'll actually go and talk a few things, other things as well too, which is interesting to talking about, you know, do we rest or do we run?

But if we talk about what you mentioned first about introducing speed work.

So a couple of things around that.

Like some runners really love that side of their running.

They're like, I just miss running fast.

I just want to get back to, to doing speed sessions.

And and so for them, we might look at, you know, putting it back in, back in sooner or, you know, I'm missing my track night.

I'm catching up with all my buddies on a Tuesday and a Thursday night down at the end down at the club there.

You know, I'd really like to be doing these this stuff again.

So we might be putting that back into the program earlier and looking at that pain response and if the pain is stable, then I'm fine with that.

So we can, we can keep, keep building on, on that there.

You know, like I say, we don't need that to, to get to 0.

What I was referring to, what I was touching on before is, you know, are they better off resting versus trying to run and exercise through it?

And, and we will never know.

I always, you know, try and keep them going and, and, and, you know, exercising through this.

But sometimes like, you know, a period of rest can, can sometimes do wonders, but we'll never know.

Like I've had, I've had a couple of cases recently, both with really chronic hamstring tendinopathy and one had a, she developed a femoral neck stress fracture, bone stress injury.

And so she had, you know, a period of time off and then a gradual rehab and build, no repair, no reappearance of the hamstring tendinopathy like it's been there for years.

And so, but that was a forced, you know, three month, four months.

Are you recommending just get a stress fracture that'll fix you?

Turn it off.

Well, that's well there we go.

So that was the issue it.

Wasn't it?

Wasn't the rest of.

Us.

She just needed a bone stress injury to heal the tendon.

Yeah.

And the other one was also in a, you know, she had a ham really grumbly hamstring tenability and she busted up her knee skiing.

And so again had a forced, forced time off and came back and her hamstring was, was was again, fine.

But you just, you don't know, like it's, it's a brave, it'll be a brave clinician to say, Blake, all you need is four months off of just doing nothing.

And what happens if you get to the end of that four months and it's not.

Yeah, that's right.

Exactly.

It's like save, like I won't be back.

I'll call you.

So yeah, it's, it's funny like that.

I just look at those and, you know, scratch my head and it's like, wow, OK, so if we've done that, we could have done that or, or behind, but yeah, it's, it's, it's a brave call to try and to, to, to, to make that.

And so I'd love to know, you know, it'd be awesome to have a crystal ball to say, Oh yeah, this just needs, you know, a week or two of nothing versus this.

We will just, we'll just run through this.

So usually my option is to to run through because it keeps them happy.

It keeps them mentally going and, and, you know, we're working towards their goals and it's still safe to do so.

And, and then also sort of educating them as well too, I guess that, you know, some people get too focused on their pain.

And, and so I guess then drawing their attention more to their function.

Like, I'll look at the things that you can do and let's not sort of worry about this, you know, this bit of stiffness that you might be getting in the morning at a two or three out of 10.

And how much does that really impact in your, you know, your, your daily life and your quality of life?

And they're like, well, it doesn't really.

So, OK, let's, yeah, it's sort of draw out, draw our focus on, to, on to working on these things.

So, so yeah, that's, that's my, my usual approach to, to, to that in terms of, you know, adding, adding speed work.

Yeah.

If so long as we're seeing that pain stable, I'm, I'm fine to, to, to keep progressing from that because especially if they've got performance goals that they're, that they're after and, and most runners do, whether they've got a race or something that they, they, they want to do.

So, you know, delaying that for, for too long can just sort of put things off.

But in saying that, like, you know, as I educate most of my runners, you know, if we can't be doing speed work, we just try and keep as much of that easy running as we can.

Because you know, from a, from a performance point of view, the, the easy running is your cake.

Like getting that volume of, of training and is what builds the cake.

And the speed work is really just the icing.

The speed work you can introduce at a stage you, you know, you sell your adaptations are a lot quicker to, to, to pick that up versus the long, slow process it takes to, to, to, to build that cake.

So, so, you know, I won't be afraid to say, look, let's just dial back the speed work for the next couple of weeks.

Let's just focus on on just, you know, keeping that volume going, keeping your long runs up and making sure that we can get through these, you know, got one that's it's going for Melbourne marathon in a week.

She's got a grumbly hamstring tendon.

So we're just like, look, speed works.

Really not doing this any good at the moment.

Let's just keep the easy, easy running in and let's just keep that ticking over.

Yes, you know, we'll miss out on it, but it's still going to get you, you know, most of your most of your results.

Yeah.

Now last couple of questions I want to ask.

Do you use any?

I call it modular mechanical, but also mechanical interventions like heel lifts and tape and foot authorities and metatarsal pads.

Do you use all all of those?

Yep, I do yes, yes, yes and yes.

So I do I I find that there's certainly a a use in a place place for those heel lifts.

Yeah for you know, Achilles more insertional.

I often don't use it for for mid portion if they've had it for, you know, really chronic recurrent issues on and off and even sometimes calf strains and sometimes we might put them in their running shoes, heel lifts or if in their daily shoes.

It's not common that I do that though, for for for that sort of population taping.

Yes, I'm, I'm not a huge user of tape.

I've never probably never have been, but I'll still use it.

Like probably the most common one I'd use is you put up, you know, around fat pad planet planet plan to heal, taping McConnell taping around to the knee for patellofemoral pain.

They're probably probably the three most common taping techniques that I use apart from also an ankle sprain, you know, from the stability point of view, but they're probably probably the three type of taping that I use.

And then orthotics I, I tend to more, I tend to more sort of go, yeah, Lane.

Buddy.

Yeah, that.

Well, that's no, but that, that's actually true.

Like I've, I'm, I'm good.

I've got, I've got, you know, I've got a good network of, of people around me that and some good, good pods that that I actually will refer to for that.

So no, I've it's realising you just can't know everything about everything.

So it's it's something that I'm like, yeah, well, that's just, that's not my do you know so.

That's why I've got the castle pants like PMP.

Yeah, yeah, use.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, that's good.

Yeah, I've actually, I've actually, I've got got one at the moment.

Actually, I, I, I picked up AI don't know what, I don't know what shoe it was.

I think it was, I actually got a suspicion that it was actually my super blast one day that I, I gave this sort of individual neuroma.

So it was like, oh, this is a bit sore.

So yeah, yeah, yeah, that's.

Probably it's over now once I start.

Well, no, this is, this is no, no, it was about about two, two months ago.

And no, it's probably actually longer than that three months ago.

And yeah, but it's, it's getting better though.

So it's, it's, it's, it's settling.

It's settling down.

But yeah, I've been, I've, I'm not indestructible.

I've picked up, I've picked up lots of things in in, in my time.

In fact, I've probably ticked off most running injuries apart from bone stress injuries.

I haven't.

Haven't had you just tried that doesn't happened.

No, that's right.

I've picked up, picked up a lot over the years.

And, and I think that, you know, what differs is that I've then got the knowledge, I guess to say, all right, well, this is what I'm going to change.

I'm going to take this out.

I'm going to do this.

I'm going to modify my shoe wear and, and do that.

And so I guess I would say that I make fairly smart decisions around the the injuries that I pick up.

And that's just because I've got the knowledge to, to be able to do that.

So, but but yeah, that sort of has kept me running 'cause I haven't missed any, I haven't missed any running from, from the injuries that I've sustained apart from a nasty vitality injury from, from basketball.

But that was that was returning to basketball in my late 30s was not that was not a great idea.

But other than that, other than that, I've been able to keep myself going.

So.

So yes.

But to go back to your question, yeah, that there are some of the stuff that I will use.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, and footwear.

Tell me your favorite shoe and what you tend to recommend the most.

Brooks Ghost, is that right?

It's Brooks Ghost Max.

To let's run there.

I don't know, you realise you're a Brooks guy.

This guy's definitely getting paid to say that.

No, I'm not.

I'm not.

Yeah, the time on the Hyperion for our listeners that didn't know Blake and I will wind and dine with another group of another bunch of awesome health professionals on the the Blake on the.

Brooks on the Blake on the Blake Hyperion boat on the on the Brooks.

Yeah, you got your own.

You got your own boat.

Now it's no, I'm not not affiliated with any anyone shoe brand, but I I would say my favorite favorite shoe at the moment is is the Super blast is the ASIC super blast.

I I've I've liked that since it's version #1 and now they're up to to version #2 I haven't yet tried the the mega blast but I've I've heard that could be.

Have you got a mega blast as well?

Yeah, yeah.

I don't know how they made the Super Blast too better, but they did.

They made it light up and they made it snap.

Yeah, which is crazy.

Yeah, that's so that that would be that's probably my, my my favorite shoe.

But then in terms of racing, I've I've I've bite my trusty, trusty vapour fly.

Vapour fly 3 is is my in my arsenal, but love testing shoes.

I think it's it's an awesome.

It's really exciting time, the last, oh, especially the last five or five or six years in, in shoe development, like the, the, the brands have gone nuts in terms of pushing the boundary for performance and, and yeah, it's been, it's been been a great time to be alive, hasn't it?

The favorite racing shoe is the trusty tried and true Vapour, Vapour Fly.

I've used the, the ones, the twos and the, and the threes and that's what's got me through my, my most of my, my marathons.

In fact, I think, yeah, the majority of my marathons I've I've running those so but but yeah, there's some more and more exciting shoes and and again, some of the new phones that are that are coming out.

It's it's yeah, it's pretty cool for us sneaker heads.

Hey.

Yeah, it's awesome.

It's really, really fun.

And you do, do you recommend locally or do you get people online or a bit of both to get their shoes?

Yeah, so I, I, I always recommend to try the shoes on.

So I'm, I'm, I've got a number of shoe stores and, and there's one that's quite close to me that, that I, I, I steer my runners towards and, and there's thankfully some, a good chain across Australia and that I will send them to.

And, and it's a great way to do it because I've got no idea how they're going to interact with the shoe.

Like I can have some suspicion and say, well, these are some of the characteristics that we might want in a shoe and we might want this, this and this.

But then it's up to them to go up there, the shoe store and say, Hey, this is what Luke said.

Let's go and try on four or five different pairs of shoes and, and see which one actually agrees with them.

So I would by no means say that.

I, I could say, Blake, you are going to respond best to a so currently Triumph and this is no other shoe.

So my shoe prescription is, is not that, that precise.

So I definitely recommend getting to getting to a shoe store and and a reputable shoe store that deals with runners and, and actually try on lots of pairs to see see what.

Works.

Now final two questions.

If you could interview anyone, dead or alive, who would it be?

And if you can answer any research or find any study, what would it be?

Right, so to interview one person, well, he was just in Australia recently and and a friend of ours, Sophie Lane, actually did get to have a conversation and that would be the goats, the goat, Elliot Kipchoge, who once again evaded me on course.

I ran with him in in Boston in 2023.

And when I say with him loosely, he was an hour down the road from.

Me.

I thought you were gonna say I was like, what?

I didn't know this.

Yeah, no, no, he's at Boston.

And then once again, we we rocked up and lined up together on the streets of streets of Sydney.

And I was I was that keen to to catch a glimpse of him out on course.

I did.

I did ask ChatGPT to to tell me at what point of the course we would intersect and and and it was actually it was.

Sadly it was part of the course where we had to make a a dog leg out and back.

And I.

I I based his time off 6.

I think it was a 206 or two.

Yeah, 206 I put him down for and mine 258 and I held up my end of the bargain.

I was on pace, but he was too, too damn slow.

I say slow in, in inverted commas.

So we missed each other as as we were coming back, I could see here the helicopter.

I'm like I said to the guys that I was running with him like, Oh no, he's just over there.

Anyone want to want to, you know, race up there and see him and they are like just laugh at me.

I'm like, yeah, no, I don't think that's a good idea either.

So I missed him.

I missed him.

So yes, I definitely have to have to have a sit down chat with him and, and what makes him, what makes him tick and yeah, just just about, I guess interested, just sort of here.

It was funny actually, I looked up a while ago about it, an autobiography with him.

And there's actually on on Amazon, there's an autobiography.

It's not not released till like 2035 or something like that.

So I don't know what the guy is there.

They've they've yeah, I don't think that's interesting.

He's well, yeah, I, I don't know what they've done there.

I don't know whether they've just put a stock mark so that no one else, no one else steals it or, or what.

But you know, the book is no human is limited.

Obviously.

That's yeah, yeah.

So I so I bought 10 copies already.

So are you?

Trying to get him to sign it on course and he's running past.

Oh, that's good.

OK.

Yeah, good answer.

Good answer.

Yeah, so that's, that's one.

And then question 2 would be yeah, any, any research.

Well, what, what research question would I like answered?

Well, I think we've sort of spoken about some of the the gaps that are that are in the research.

Like I think cracking the injury code would be nice.

I think that's, you know, preventing injuries.

I, I realistically though, I think that, I mean, that's gonna be so hard to do again, because you know, as you're going to be delving into with your PhD and looking at the risk factors and, and you know, it is, it is such a multi factorial thing.

I think that, you know, if, if it weren't for that, like that's obviously a pie in the sky thing.

But maybe working out like, what is the best, you know, say pick a condition like Achilles tendinopathy and for, for that person in front of you, figuring out ways that, that to I guess to cater your treatments to make sure that that person gets the best results.

So, you know, that that would be gathering all this information about, about them and, you know, stuff that we probably can't even measure at the moment, but you know, that that that may be playing a role.

And then figuring out that because if we can't prevent the injuries, well, hopefully then we can just treat them goddamn well and, and get them back-to-back to doing what they were doing.

So.

So they're probably, you know, some of the things.

And I think that's going to take, yeah, you know, with, with AI and supercomputers and everything else to, just to, to taking all this information in because we are also individual and, and it is so multifactorial.

It's going to take something that's that's going to to to bring all this, all this information and data in to to formulate these answers.

Yeah, yeah, but I love it.

No one said Ellie Kotogi.

So I like that and there the research, it'll be nice for me.

Maybe with AGI, artificial general intelligence and machine learning, you just put in all these factors, they pull it together and here's a closer or maybe a better guest than us now.

Yeah, that's.

Yeah.

For people to find you, obviously if they're already, if they're already follow you, they they are going to be after this.

I'll have all your links and everything down below, but what's what's coming up for Luke?

What, what?

What's on the horizon?

And if obviously people find you social's best contact, what's on the horizons?

Well, I think that the highlight of my year has to be you and I getting on stage together at the Alumin conference doesn't.

It we're, we're going to be, we're going to be, we're going to be doing some good things up there.

That's right.

That's so yeah, that's going to be that's going to be a lot of fun.

So I've got a few few sort of speaking opportunities later on, later on the year that that thing one of them.

So that'll be that'll be really good.

Otherwise people can find me, hit me up on on socials at at sports car Luke on Instagram.

I've got any questions, feel free to reach out.

And yeah, look to sort of certainly be doing more teaching in the in the future as well too.

So keep an eye out for sort of course dates and all that sort of stuff for my, my running course, which we which we teach.

So yeah, more of that to, to come, I'm sure.

But but now looking forward to catching up again Blake in later in the year.

Yeah, so you just said if they don't have any questions, they can just see him and say, hey, my knee saw, what do I do?

And you'll just give him a full treatment plan.

You had no trouble at all.

Yeah.

Oh, isn't that what?

You do That's, that's yeah.

Between between my, my, my checking on my, my training peaks to to to replying to random Instagram messages.

Yeah, that's that's pretty.

Much my whole day.

My shin's really sore at night.

What's the best shoes for me?

Yeah, books guys too.

That's.

Yeah, Goat the.

Goat goes Max goes Max goes Max.

That's right.

Very nice mate.

Thank you so much for coming on.

Thanks for giving me so much your time.

And yeah, can't wait to see you up in Brisbane, but also can't wait to see all the awesome stuff you're going to do.

And we'll keep an eye out for some of those teaching courses, hopefully have you up around in the better state of New South, up around New E Sydney Monday for that.

Yeah, awesome mate.

That'd be, that'd be awesome.

Thanks.

Thanks so much for having me on.

See you later.