The other day I released an article entitled 10 Critical Principles Physical Therapists Need to Know about Crossfit for Successful Rehabilitation.  I admit, I was a bit ticked off from so many therapists judging me for wearing crossfit t-shirts (Please don’t tell me you do that, blah blah etc etc.).  A lot of that was written because I was just plain peeved about it.  

I’m happy with the message that was sent but in honesty, I think it did backfire some.  I had some smart therapist friends who had their patients come in with a copy of my article with the idea that their therapists were incompetent and didn’t understand their unique needs as a patient.  I really didn’t mean to give this notion nor do I believe this in any way.  Most physical therapists hold a doctorate level education and work all day everyday getting people out of pain.  They’re good at what they do and deservedly so.  I think the article pushed some patients to lose any and all faith in their therapists and I didn’t mean to do that.

What I think IS a more fair assumption is that our two professions just don’t know each other well enough.  As a trainer/coach, when was the last time you called your patient’s therapist or doctor to ask about specific advice on what your client should and shouldn’t do?  As a therapist do you regularly speak with your patient’s coaches/trainers to see how they are progressing back to their sport and recommend ways to ease back?  I believe that if we understood each other’s roles better there would be much less animosity and more importantly, better patient/client outcomes.  Here are my top five reasons that therapists and trainers should talk more.

1) Ignorance Breeds Misinformation and Hostility

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This week I get a chance to interview Dr. Dave Tilley.  Dave has a very interesting background as a competitive collegiate gymnast, physical therapist and crossfitter.  This combo allows for some excellent insight in how to bring gymnastics safely into the fitness realm.  Today we discuss:

• [1:50] Introductions, porkchops and Dave’s background
• [6:05] Dave’s website bridging the gap between physical therapy and gymnastics performance
• [8:00] The dilemma between medical professionals and athletes
• [10:24] What are the most common injuries seen in gymnastics and why are they occuring?
• [12:50] How Dave integrates prehab and corrective exercises into his gymnastics programming for injury prevention
• [15:14] Common exercises to fix anterior pelvic tilt and excessive lordosis commonly seen in gymnastics
• [17:55] Dave’s thoughts on adding gymnastics movements into your fitness program and how to safely incorporate them
• [20:05] Dave’s thoughts on crossfit bringing gymnastics into people’s lives
• [21:42] When things go wrong when introducing gymnastics movements into crossfit
• [25:17] Adding gymnastics progressions into your daily training for health
• [27:44] Progressions to string together ring Muscle-ups
• [29:28] Should we be using bands to assist us when learning muscle-ups?
• [35:36] Should we screen clients before we add gymnastics exercises into people’s programs?
• [40:56] The value of spending time working gymnastics skills in the gym
• [43:20] How do we build longevity into crossfit and gymnastics exercises?
• [46:35] How do I plug gymnastics exercises into my program without causing overuse injury given the large amount of variety and unique stress seen in a crossfit program?
• [49:50] More about Dave’s website and where you can lean more about Dave’s work

The Hybrid Perspective – Dave’s Website

Get your handstand on, 

Dan Pope DPT, CSCS

P.S. If you enjoyed this article then sign up for the newsletter to receive the FREE guide – 10 Idiot Proof Principles to Crossfit Performance and Injury Prevention as well as to keep up to date with new information as it comes out …read more