In this episode of Strength Stories, Ryan sits down with one of his most influential mentors — Scott Johnson, a physical therapist with a background in sports science, dry needling, and strength athlete rehab. Scott shares his journey from failing a GRE to building an elite PT practice with a full gym, force plates, VO2 testing, and sports science tech — and how he’s changing the game in physical therapy.

Together, Ryan and Scott break down the trap of passive modalities, how belief shapes outcomes, why loading matters, and why posture might sometimes matter after all. This is a must-listen for anyone navigating injury, programming around pain, or trying to make real progress in the gym.

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What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

✅ Why passive fixes like dry needling or foam rolling only take you so far

✅ How fear and nervous system overactivity often hold back healing

✅ Why loading — done right — is critical to long-term progress

✅ When posture actually does matter

✅ The truth about pain scales, movement confidence, and rehab psychology

✅ How to return to training with patience and progression

✅ Why chasing “quick recovery” can actually prolong injury

✅ Why context is everything in rehab and programming

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💡 Why It Matters

Injuries don’t mean you’re broken — but they do require smart coaching, progressive overload, and patience. Scott shares deep insight into how pain works, how to return to training without setbacks, and why the best rehab doesn’t look that different from smart strength programming.

Whether you’re an athlete, coach, or just someone dealing with nagging pain, this episode gives you the tools to move better — and stay better.

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📲 Connect with the Guest:

Instagram: @physiofitbend

Website: PhysioFitBend.com

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🎙️ Connect with the Host (Ryan Jore):

Instagram: @RyanJorePT

Website: JoreStrengthTraining.com

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👉 Enjoying the show? Don’t forget to subscribe, rate ⭐, and leave a review wherever you listen!

👉 Follow for more content: Instagram | Facebook

Ryan Jore 0:15
Hey guys, welcome back to strength stories with Jory today we have on Oregon physical therapist Scott Johnson, Scott, welcome to the show.

Scott Johnson 0:22
Hey. Thanks, brother. How you doing good? So I wanted to

Ryan Jore 0:25
bring you on, because you’re definitely one of the people that I’ve learned the most from over my 10 years as a trainer. So before we get into some questions, maybe give the audience a quick background.

Scott Johnson 0:33
So I grew up Michigan, went to Grand Valley State University exercise science. Wanted to get a PhD in exercise physiology. Didn’t do well on the GRE because I and I had some published research, and I thought I was going to be going to PhD program, because I was supposed to be kind of like a shoe in it sounds like that movie with Jack Black, oh,

Ryan Jore 1:00
Orange County. I was literally just watching, yeah,

Scott Johnson 1:03
whenever I tell the story, I’m like, I swear that movie was about me chewing. He said, shoe in, yeah. So I ended up not getting in. And then I moved to Colorado. End up going to PT school. Went out there, do some prerequisites, work at a PT clinic for an old mentor. Moved to North Carolina for grad school, moved back to Colorado, and then kind of worked there for a few years. And I poked around the country, doing travel, PT and working different jobs. Try to see where I wanted to kind of settle in. Settled in Montana for a few I think I was there like five years like that, yeah, then you open a practice there, saw a little bit of a opportunity to work with strength athletes. Saw a little bit of hole in the community, as far as, like education and because I did cross that do CrossFit, and saw a hole in the sports medicine, kind of the gap between between strength conditioning and medicine. And I was, I had a patient come in and say that I was doing a clean. And I went to my my orthopedic surgeon. He asked what I was cleaning. That’s somebody’s got to help somebody out here. So very knowledgeable person, yeah, yeah. So that’s what made me want to open practice. First, and then, you know, we got that up and running, and at that time, I just, it’s just like time to move on. And left things with Jeremy, and then he’s done a great job with with the company still. And I moved back down to Colorado, worked with my old mentor, and we grew a practice from I think we had, like, we were in like a double wide trailer, like right next to a gym and like that, like a double wide trailer, like the modular homes that you would see. And we grew the practice. I think when I joined, there was, I think there’s five of us, and by the time I left, I think there was like 10 or 11 of us a couple years later, then I ended up moving to bend and worked for a company here for about six months, and I was just, it was the same little thing, you know. So ended up opening practice with a buddy, and we’re about three years in now, just ended up a pretty, pretty cool place. Got a full we got like a 2000 square foot gym in the back with rogue racks and Rogue everything. Got ourselves a little sports science station there with dynamometers and force decks and BFR. We’ve got a guy that comes in and does metabolic testing, so like, VO two, and it’s

Ryan Jore 3:46
so pretty comprehensive.

Scott Johnson 3:48
Yeah, it’s pretty cool. It’s, I always thought I’d go back and get a PhD, and I got all the stuff I would want to do with a PhD in my in my business, so it’s like that doesn’t make sense to go back and get a picture. So

Ryan Jore 4:03
honestly, one of the first things I wanted to ask you about, actually deals back when you were here in Billings, because to give a quick story here, when you first moved here, a friend of mine introduced me to you because I had been having back issues for years. I had this, like, hip problem, and it would lead to some back stuff. And so I literally visit you for like, two sessions, I feel like, and we did a bunch of dry needling, and like, my back pain went away for years, and that was awesome in the moment. However, one things that I realized that it did for me is it made me think, like, okay, just dry needling is the answer, versus, like, anything else I can, you know, just that classic trap of, like, a passive modality works for someone, whether you know that’s a mental reason or physical and you just get attached to that thing. And again, I, I still think dry needling is obviously very valuable, like, and I still recommend it to people sometimes, if, if it feels like they need it. And I’ll, you know, send them out to a PT or a Cairo a lot of times. Jeremy, but yeah, I just want to talk about kind of how people tend to over rely on these passive modalities. Like, obviously, they can be helpful in the short term. You. But how do you see, as far as people sometimes just getting attached too much to that passive modality, versus realizing that there’s other ways to continue to progress?

Scott Johnson 5:07
Yeah, I think a lot of that goes like, there’s a time and a place for passive modalities. I don’t want to shit out anything, you know. No,

Ryan Jore 5:16
yeah, there’s not to say that they’re not useful, but yeah,

Scott Johnson 5:20
and it’s content. It’s always like, not an, it’s always an and, right? This can decrease some of the tone in your soft tissue, so we can load you, so you can do the things that we need to do. You know, I think I was thinking about this today, actually, I was like, long story short, I was testing somebody’s strength with our dynamometers, and we were testing his quad and, like, Dude squats, like, 400 pounds, but he kept having patellar tendonitis and, and I’m just like, you know, he had seen an acupuncturist, and he’d seen done massage and done all these things. And I’m just like, you know, he had some weird, like, like, not crazy, but just like eccentric control was not awesome or not what you’d expect from somebody that squats 400 pounds. But we tested his. We did some dynamometer testing. We tested, like, a longer quad, but just like isometric quad at 90 degrees of knee extension, and he had a 23% asymmetry between his two legs, which is, like, pretty significant, right? Like, I wouldn’t expect that. So, like, the easy thing, and this is what I would have done in the past, is, we know, like, some acupuncture and some massage has been helpful. So you just do that, and you just send them off on their way. But I couldn’t, you know, I can’t detect if somebody’s squatting that much if I’m doing like a brake test, like a manual muscle test, like I can’t, I can’t break that anyways. So being able to have that comprehensive thing or comprehensive tool is very helpful. So to kind of bring it kind of back around, I think, like the past modalities and being too reliant on them, I think partially due to people’s inability to endure a little bit and be just put in the effort to do some of the things that really are gonna make some meaning. Make some meaningful change. And sometimes it’s because they don’t have access to stuff like I was just talking about, or they’re just impatient, you know, I think that’s a lot of times what it is is impatience,

Ryan Jore 7:35
yeah, and it’s something even now, when I have people where, if, let’s say, We’re doing some sort of tendonizing, and I refer them out for that training. I even honestly try to coach the language at this point where I explain to them, like, this isn’t gonna be the only thing we’re gonna do. Like, it’s not a This isn’t like, just, like, you just keep doing this forever and it fixes it. What I try and tell them is, like, this will hopefully put your nervous system in a place where we can now train and get to, get to, like, a more training adaptation. He says, like, like, sometimes we can have the right exercise, but if your nervous system just freaking out, like it’s not going to matter, like we need to get that nervous system calmed down enough that we can make a difference. And the more I’ve read into, like, you know, the Myo, myofascial pain syndrome and all these other like, tension, my Titus and stuff, so much that does seem to come down to have, like, if you feel comfortable going into the movement, it’s probably a good chance this again feel good versus, if you already have, already apprehensive going into it, the odds of you having pain with it are still pretty high. So it’s like, if we can just find some way to, again, like, calm that down, just a little bit and, like, cool, like, now let’s just train basically,

Scott Johnson 8:34
yeah. I mean, like, that’s part of it with, with, I mean, the massage gun, or a like foam rolling or lacrosse ball, unless there’s some other literature out there that I’m not privy to, which is possible because I don’t read all the research. You know, probably reading a little bit less than I used to. That’s what it’s doing is kind of down regulating the CNS, so you can put some, put a little bit of load on there. Or it’s not necessarily load that, like neuromuscular control. That’s even a thing, you know,

Ryan Jore 9:09
yeah, one, Steven, this would be very much paraphrasing, because it’s probably like, seven years since you said this, but I still remember you telling me back the day on how, like, when you compared, like, dry needling versus acupuncture versus East em, or, you know, any of those other or, what am I trying to say? I can’t think of the old one where you just wave the wand around somebody. But ultrasound, ultrasound, there we go. Like, basically, whether or not it worked came down to whether or not the person believed it was going to work, leading into it, like, if they felt like, this is what’s going to be the fix for me, weird, it tended to work for them. Yeah,

Scott Johnson 9:40
that’s, I think that’s worth most things in life, right? Like, there’s the belief response is a big deal. And I would say, like any of those tools will work. It’s just like, kind of what you do after after them to how long, it’s how long. Going to work, or what, like, the big outcome is going to be. So, yeah, like, loading afterwards, training afterwards, that’s the big deal. No, exactly.

Ryan Jore 10:08
And that’s even so I was dealing with someone recently who’s coming back from a back thing, and as you explained to her on how, like, we’re probably under loading her right now, but I’m going literally just based off of, like, what she feels comfortable doing. Because, again, yeah, if she goes into it like nervous and expecting that something’s gonna hurt, like it’s probably gonna hurt, versus, you know, maybe worth 20 pounds less than that, and it doesn’t even feel like she’s doing anything. But it also doesn’t make her apprehensive, and as a result, like she doesn’t have with her, we’re dealing with more of a hip thing, like her hips just feel better, as long as we stay within a range that doesn’t feel scary to her. At the time, I told her, eventually we have to increase this, but now we’re just basing it on feel,

Scott Johnson 10:44
yeah, well, and, and so P, I think people underestimate, if you add like for her, if you add two and a half pounds every week, she’s that before she knows it, she’s quadrupled her her load, And she didn’t even recognize that there’s any, exactly, like, any increase in, I guess, increase in load, and so that makes her a little bit more comfortable, and it’s just like, again, progressive overload, right?

Ryan Jore 11:14
Yeah, I know I was trying to give people that chart of, like, here’s the line at which you have pain. It’s like, as long as we can stay below this line, that line gets a little bit higher, and now you can tolerate this, and then it becomes here. But it’s like, if you just keep blowing past it, that line not only doesn’t get higher, it actually gets lower. And now it’s like it used to take 100 pounds to bug it. Now it takes 90, and then it takes 80, and then eventually you’re just really weak because you can’t do anything without triggering a pain

Scott Johnson 11:38
response. Yeah. And for sure, I would also kind of add to that. I think over the last probably, like four, three to five years, I’ve kind of been, like, pinning people down a little bit more and saying, like, that hurts. Like, okay, tell me more. I’ve been asking a lot more questions. Because I think often people, at least in the rehab world, when people are have pain, I’m sure you see it as well as like, oh, that I think that hurt. It’s like, Well, did it hurt? Or do you think it hurt, or you were expecting it to hurt, or is it just your muscle working and you know you were,

Ryan Jore 12:18
yeah, well, or even it’s like, just, does it feel like a little pain, or does it feel like a threatening amount of pain? Like there’s, there’s a difference between that too. Like explaining something like, yeah, like a two or three out of 10 that doesn’t feel threatening, that’s probably just going to be part of your rehab process, like, as far as muscle getting back there, but it’s like, yeah, if it’s a five or you just feel nervous about that, then that’s probably going to trigger a different response.

Scott Johnson 12:39
Yeah. Yeah. And I think being apprehensive about some things, I think, is as part of it, and I’ve seen a lot more of that of recent we’ve got more language to kind of have that conversation. And I think sometimes that pendulum swings a little bit too far of like, central nervous system and, and like fear and threat and, and sometimes it’s just like, sometimes you just need to just do some hard work, and you’re gonna have a little discomfort with it. It’s like progressive overload. If you’ve ever done a one rep max, it doesn’t feel awesome, you know, it’s just but you need that stress on your tissue to to make change, and I think that psychologically, that will help as well. So I think of recent I’ve been just trying to put more more load on people, ask more questions and try to get clear with what they’re really saying or what they’re really feeling. I know I’ve said to you over the past, like when I was doing a little bit of programming for years, I kind of want to know like, Man, I wish I could be in your body and feel what you’re feeling. It would just make it Yeah, it’d be really helpful to have be able to do that and really feel what people are feeling. Yeah, well, even just

Ryan Jore 14:06
because that is definitely the hardest things, is when we’re even talking pain scales, because you’ll ask someone, okay, what’s what are you feeling on a one to 10, and they’re like, an eight and it’s like, I don’t think you know what a true eight is. Like, you’re talking to me normally, you’re not sweating, you’re not grimacing with every movement. Like, that’s not a real eight, but to that person, it is, you know, it’s just, maybe they just experience less pain in their life, or whatever it is. But so trying to figure out, like, you know, then same point you have the guy who can barely sit down, he’s like, Oh, it’s like a two. And you’re like, Okay, that’s also probably not a two. So trying to get an accurate number is really hard. Like you said, if you could actually experience what that person’s experiencing, it would give you a lot better gage of, like, Is this safe or is this a lot?

Scott Johnson 14:43
Yeah. And that’s where I’ve, I’ve like, I said earlier, pinning people down a little bit more on like, well, let’s, let’s be a little bit more clear. And I think sometimes people are just going through the motions of life, and it’s like, yeah. It’s like, an A it’s like, I. Give them a little bit of context of what an eight would probably feel like. And it’s the same thing with like training, right? Like an RPE, it’s like I could have did like, 50 more, but it was an eight, yes, like, one rep max looks like

Ryan Jore 15:18
I know on those anymore. I love doing like, instead of, like, four sets of eight, you know, trying to get an RP. It’s like, like, okay, let’s just do three sets of six. We get a little bit of moderate volume. And I’m like, All right, now, just go for it. And it’s amazing how many times they’ll get, like, 23 reps. And it’s like, so you see how these sets of six, we’re not doing shit like, you’re like, at negative 17, RPE, like, it’s not doing anything yet, but it’s like, until someone knows what it feels like to truly exert they, they don’t really, I mean, you can’t know, I guess, yeah,

Scott Johnson 15:43
you don’t know what you don’t know. So is that something that you do frequently and just kind of put people to exhaustion, just like, hey, I want you to feel what it feels like to be at failure. So you know what that this burn feels like?

Ryan Jore 15:58
Yeah, honestly, one of the easiest ones I do is I will have them do, and this is almost always, like, one of our first sessions, I’ll just have them do, like, an easy bar bicep curl or dumbbell if they’re not strong enough for the easy bar. But I’ll just have them go and I’m like, okay, stop when you think you’re done. And then as soon as they hit, they’re like, Okay, that’s amazing I can do. And like, Okay, now keep going. And I’m like, you don’t stop now until I say it. And so we just do one really hard balls out set. And like, I still think of one girl, she was going to stop at like 15. She got like 43 reps once I started pushing her. And it’s like, because again, like when we’re doing, like, say, deadlift, squat, bench, stuff like that, we’re not going to push those nearly to failure nearly as often. But it’s like, when we’re doing just a straight muscle building exercise, I’m like, this is where I want you within a rep or two of that every single time we do it, and it is kind of a good lesson. Like, oh, like, that’s what that actually feels like. Like me talking while I’m doing bicep curls is not doing shit because I’m not getting anywhere close to that point. It’s like, I need you within like, two to three reps of that feeling

Scott Johnson 16:55
right, that stimulus is just not enough to make that so

Ryan Jore 16:59
I use that as a beginning tool a lot of times. But I also, I do love just having them do just one balls out set at the end of a workout, or some or at the end of a, you know, two or three sets for volume or something that are actually for, like, split squats. I give a lot of people just literally one set, because they just find it that I find it a lot easier to push really hard knowing that they don’t have to do another one afterwards. And I have a couple of girls were, like, the one girl has gone from, like, on safety bar split squats, like 110 for eight, she’s doing now, like 170 for 10, and we’ve literally been doing just one set a week, and she’s just steadily making progress just from one set a week, because she’s

Scott Johnson 17:31
actually pushing. Is she like new lifter

Ryan Jore 17:35
or no, she’s been with me for a couple years, but she now, to be fair, we also do, like, safety bar back squats on another day, and we do deadlift. So it’s not like this is her only leg volume, but we found like, for her, for split squat, she doesn’t have to do more than one set a week to add to make progress. Like we just keep pushing one hard set every week, you know, with D loads occasionally, but and it’s just been steadily going up now for months. Yeah, I think it’s like, it works a lot better on something like a split squat, where they have to do both sides, because it’s so easy to sand Vegas split squat.

Scott Johnson 18:03
So how many years of lifting has she been doing?

Ryan Jore 18:08
She’s probably been with me now, including like, nine months of pregnancy and, like, a postpartum thing, I think we’ve been for like, a little over three years. Oh, okay, cool. So about year and a half of that has been, like, really hard training, maybe a little more. Okay, cool. She’s not like beginner, beginner, but also not like advanced,

Scott Johnson 18:25
right? So she’s got plenty of room for that floor to go up, yeah?

Ryan Jore 18:29
And that’s also too, yeah, like, obviously she becomes more advanced. Like, maybe that’s not going to work as well. And I even told her that, like, eventually we might push where we really push the safety bar, split squat, and try and hit 200 just, that’s cool number. I said, like to do that. We’ll probably start putting in, like, at least some easy volume work on a second day. But for now, it’s like, as long as it’s working, I see no reason to change it. Like, we’re gonna keep milking one set a week as long as we can,

Scott Johnson 18:51
yeah, as little as possible, as much as necessary, right?

Ryan Jore 18:56
No, exactly one thing I kind of wanted to go back on too, and we were talking about people’s comfort level with lifts. Tony genticor, is this really it’s like an article I read of his one time where he talked about how so many women like, if he gave them like a 95 pound barbell, they’re like, Oh, I can’t lift that. I’ll get bulky. But he gives them like 100 pound kettlebell, and now, magically, they can lift that all day. And you know, there’s, there’s no concerns about that. I do think too. That’s why we see a lot of things with like reverse hypers or back extensions or stuff like that. You know, those seem to be usually pretty pain free movements. I wonder how much that just comes from a lack of trepidation leading into it. Like, I don’t think there’s necessarily anything magic about the reverse hyper for back pain. I mean, it’s, I’ve used it for a lot of people with back pain. It seems very helpful, but it’s like, I don’t know that it’s the implement itself versus it’s not the barbell. And then that person feel more comfortable. And again, ultimately, what we’re just trying to do is trying to get some work in for that low back and hamstrings and glutes or whatever that doesn’t threaten the nervous system. And reverse hyper seems to do that pretty well.

Scott Johnson 19:54
Yeah, yeah. It sounds like your question is, do I think is the. Yeah, is it kind of scary, or is

Ryan Jore 20:03
it, well, or is it just, yeah, like, how much is it is, is the exercise magic, versus how much it is just that person goes into it without trepidation? As a result, they’re able to, like, get some sort of stimulus for the same muscles without, like, triggering a response.

Scott Johnson 20:17
I mean, I think it’s both, like, I I’ve seen, I’ve seen people that tolerate reverse hypers, or don’t tolerate reverse hypers, but will tolerate, like, a back extension. It’s like, not the same thing, but it’s essential. I mean, essentially, you’re doing hip extension and

Ryan Jore 20:35
something else is just moving.

Scott Johnson 20:38
Yeah, yeah. And why that happens? Like, I don’t know, but I generally try to do the thing that doesn’t hurt. It doesn’t hurt. And then we can move to sometimes the thing that I actually want to do. There’s a lot of times where, for instance, like, if somebody is afraid to deadlift or afraid to squat, I mean, there’s nothing wrong with doing some goblet squats, you know, or, you know there’s or, just like, I think it’s one of those things where it’s also kind of progressive overload on the technique right, or the or the movement. So give them a kettlebell that’s a little less scary than or a dumbbell, or a kettlebell little scary than a barbell, and to me, like a safety bar squat, I’ve been trained for decades. And safety bar is a little bit more threatening to me because it’s got more things, you know, just the barbell, yeah? So it’s, I think there’s a part of that that, yeah, it’s like, what feeling comfortable is important. Feeling the right muscles work for each exercise is important. And doing the one that the person will do be consistent with right

Ryan Jore 21:55
so on a similar thing there, when you’re saying as far as like feeling the right muscles, that’s another thing where I’ve changed my thought process a little bit. So I used to be like, Mr. Like, everything is form. You know, so much of injury risk is just form. Like, if you have bad form, you’re going to get hurt, versus if you have good form, you’re not going to get hurt. And now I tend to ride that line of I still think form matters, but not in the same way. Like, obviously, like, four matters in terms of, like, maybe your your strongest output is going to come with a certain technique. So I think it definitely matters there. And it’s not, it’s not that I necessarily think that bad technique causes injuries as much now as if, let’s say your squat variation has been predominantly loading hips, and now you have bad technique on a set, and it puts an extra strain on the low back, and let’s say it hurts your back. It’s not necessarily that the bad technique caused that as much as that area wasn’t as prepared, and so it’s just more more open to feel having an issue when it does have to be the thing that’s like taking on the brunt of load, if that makes sense, right? Essentially, because I know early on, I think you were already there, got years ago. I feel like when we talked it, it took me years to get to the point to realize, like, yes, form matters, but just maybe not in the way we always thought, or, like the way I always thought, in terms of just being, like, super technique dominant.

Scott Johnson 23:05
Yeah, I I’m so my business partner is, like, very about he’s a great he’s a very good coach. He’s well beyond his his years when it comes to like coaching, he really is. He does a great job, and we used to work together. That’s how we how we met. And he was an aide, and I was PT at that, at that particular business, but he had come from college, and he was a crossfit coach, and he took it very serious. And I kind of always told them, like, you know, this person just needs to move their body. I don’t really care how it’s coming. And it’s like, yeah, we’re not doing a what? Like, most people aren’t hitting like, one rep max, or even 70% of their one rep max, or even 50% of the one rep max. With a lot of the rehab stuff that we’re doing, you know, we are just giving them a little bit of exposure. So it’s like, I don’t, yeah, I mean, when it comes to somebody that’s high level yet, or, I guess we trying to define what high level necessarily means, but, right, it’s like, but when you’re starting to hit a little bit higher loads relative to your body, or relative to your strength or your training age. I think technique matters for how much force you can produce, or for sure, not bleed, not bleeding any energy, or being more efficient, I would say, with the the more like functional fitness kind of craze that’s happened. Name CrossFit s for f 45 gosh, there’s 1000 of them. You know, I think the volume generally matters more than the technique. Oh, for sure. Then it’s like and now you’re moving not. Efficiently and at a high volume, I think that is more likely to lead to an injury versus technique. That’s why

Ryan Jore 25:09
I try to explain to people. And I was like, to me, like the form matters now more when it matters so like, because we’ve all seen that person who does well, you know, my wife’s like this. My wife deadlifts with, like, the worst rounded spine on her sumo deadlifts, but she has no issues with it. You know, she’s deadlifted like 340, almost three times her body weight, so it’s not inherently injurious. But again, she’s also like she’s dead lifted that way for years and built up with gradual volume to where her spine has built resilience in that position. That’s different than the person who’s, you know, always deadlift with the perfect back, and then they go for that stupid one RM attempt with terrible form. Terrible form. It’s, have you built up the exposure to justify that position? Essentially,

Scott Johnson 25:48
yeah. And just like you said, it matters when it matters, right? Like, the whole thing of, you know, well, I guess it’s not the whole thing. It used to be like, posture is everything, right? Yeah. And then all of a sudden there was this like, new wave of like, posture doesn’t matter. It doesn’t like, there’s no correlation of pain. And it’s like, true until it is exactly. It’s like, okay, I’m flexing it lumbar, like my I’ve got some back pain, and it’s flexion intolerance. So I do not tolerate bending over, whether that be deadlift. So from from my kind of profession, I’ll see people like doing CrossFit, so deadlift and toes to bar and and rowing and kettlebell swings, like a clean injury, like all that stuff is like hinged and if you’re doing if you have a disc injury and you’re not you don’t tolerate flexion very well, and then you like, yeah, it doesn’t matter. But I can tell you this, every time you bend over, your back hurts or you get sciatica, it’s like, yeah. Now it matters. So how are we going to deal with that now that it does matter?

Ryan Jore 26:56
No, exactly. It becomes a very like semantic space argument. Like, yes, you can have bad posture and not have pain, but I said, if you said, if you are flexion intolerant and you’re hurting because of back pains, it’s kind of hard to deny that for that person at that moment, posture is correlated with their pain. It doesn’t mean it’s always going to be, like you said, after a few weeks, stuff heals, and they’ll probably be fine, and they’ll be able to go back to that as long as they’ve made that, kind of made that up emotionally and, like, accepted the fact that they can move again, but yeah, like they’re, I don’t know if I’m kind of rambling a little bit on there now, but it’s they say. It’s just not as important as I always thought it was. It’s more, yeah, these pieces, which is how fitness should be for the most part. Anyways, almost everything is case by case basis.

Scott Johnson 27:38
I think that’s life, though, right? Yeah, most of life is case by case and content context dependent. You know, we’ve got some principles that we try to build on, that we know is true, and

Ryan Jore 27:52
then we go down there. Plus, I was even explaining some of the other day because I had a new client who’s got some autoimmune stuff, and she was curious, like, how I’ve dealt with that in training. And honestly, even, like, I look at all these things now, whether it’s like, autoimmune or pregnancy or a lot of these things, like, we’ll make some small adjustments, but for the most part, everything is just symptom based. Like, if I have someone who’s got autoimmune disease, it doesn’t mean I’m going to change all their programming to, like, low volume, tempo, work, pauses and stuff like that is probably where I’m going to bias my programming. But as long as they’re responding well, like, we’re going to basically just train like normal. And, you know, now, if it’s like, oh, I’m starting to feel a little worn down, yes, we make that adjustment. But it doesn’t mean, like, we just throw out every single principle we have just because we’re, you know, they have certain thing,

Scott Johnson 28:32
yeah. And from, you know, I guess I would probably end up dealing a lot of times, but not all the time with clients who have co morbidities or multiple things going on, but I mean to I look at it and it, and if I know it’s going to matter, then we might have a conversation about it. But again, like I’m generally not, I try to make it as basic as possible. I think that’s why we do a good job. Because it’s like, do you have full range of motion of your joint? Yes, okay, are you strong enough to tolerate the full range of motion? No, that’s where we’re gonna start. Let’s do some range of motion and some strength through through that range of motion and make you tolerate it. And yeah, I think too many people try to get fancy with things and take all and just try to be too smart. You know, it’s like, human in front of you, like, just do the basics,

Ryan Jore 29:33
regardless of, like, what they’re coming in with. Ultimately, all training boils down to is, like, finding where the person’s at and finding a way to do more than they currently are doing and keep building on there. Like, that’s training for everyone, regardless of what it is. It’s like, I still think back to when I first was a physical therapy assistant doing my internships. And, like,

Scott Johnson 29:52
I won’t name the place I was working at your physical therapy assistant.

Ryan Jore 29:56
I know everyone does, but. Like, I still remember, like, one of the first places I did an internship job, and it was literally like, oh, total knee. Here’s this printout from 1985 this is what total knee does. And it’s like, is it though? Like, that’s one of the things I always appreciate when I did some shadowing stuff out of your place, is like, you had like, a base idea of, like, where we’re probably going to start, but then it’s like, Okay, how did that actually feel? And then we adjust based on that. It’s not just handing someone a printout and, like, every total knee is there, and that’s, again, that’s all good training is, like, actually taking time to ask the person the question, like, did that make your pain feel better? Did make it feel worse? Like, how did you feel doing that and then adjusting if you have to, like, it’s kind of crazy. Just assume that you’re Yeah, just back pain is this?

Scott Johnson 30:38
Yeah? I I don’t think that’s necessarily the case. I guess not the people I try to

Ryan Jore 30:43
be around. No, I think it’s a lot better now, but

Scott Johnson 30:47
it’s a lot better. I still think that there’s some lacking, at least from my field, probably your field. Oh, I think too many people forget that every profession, there’s a bell curve for the profession, you know. So try to not throw the baby out with the bathwater with any profession, because there are, there are people that Excel, and there are some people that are not, not excelling. There’s, yeah, they’re in the 25th percentile. And it just, it is what it is. Well, it’s

Ryan Jore 31:20
definitely, you see, it’s kind of like the instagramization, if that’s a word of fitness where, and you see this, especially in rehab tour, it’s like, Hey, here’s one exercise to fix your back. And it’s like, yeah, based off of what, like, there’s 7000 reasons someone could have back pain. The odds that you’re going to nail it with one perfect like, McGill sit up, or whatever, is pretty low. It’s like you said, there’s things we’ll probably try based on what the person is describing, but just assumption, like, you only need one shoulder exercise and one low back exercise and one knee exercise, you can fix everything.

Scott Johnson 31:49
Yeah, that there’s, like, some, you know, used to be this thing with in the rehab world, where I was like, Oh, I’ve got the secret exercise. It’s like, no, no, you don’t. There’s just, like, it’s just an exercise. There’s 1000 of them to do the same thing. And how you dose it, and how you give it to other people

Ryan Jore 32:12
is, yeah, well, even, like, you know, I took FMS God now, like, six years ago, something like that, and I still learned some valuable things from it, and it, it was helpful to a degree in training, but the idea that just because someone didn’t pass this one random push up test meant now I can’t do any pressing exercises with them until they’re at least a two on that. It’s like, I mean, initially I followed that religiously, and it was dumb. Like, it’s like, why wouldn’t I instead work to find, like, coming back to what you’re talking about, like, reduce range of motion, or lower intensity or something like that, or find a way to still incorporate some sort of pushing exercise. It’s insane to think I’m just going to take out this one entire pattern just because they didn’t pass one arbitrary test. To me, it’s, it’s kind of lazy coaching, assuming that this one test is gold standard. Nothing else matters, like we can find a way to do a pressing exercise, or, you know, whatever other thing they failed.

Scott Johnson 32:59
Yeah, I do not have a good score on the FMS,

Unknown Speaker 33:05
and you’re still, it’s weird,

Scott Johnson 33:07
yeah, I still squat double my body weight. I hit a lifetime PR for a strict press and a clean and jerk at 41 how’s my 41 Yeah. Even after injuries to my shoulder, you know, still do a lot of stuff, pretty much everything, pain free. So it’s funny when you’re saying that

Ryan Jore 33:29
about the squatting, because it’s actually it’s weird how just certain Instagram posts, like, stick in your brain for a long time. So when I was coming up with questions for I literally remember a time where you had, I want to say it was like, patellar tendonitis or something like that. And I remember you saying, like, something in the caption of, like, squatting got me here, and squatting is going to get me out of here again. It’s weird that I remember that that’s been, like, probably five years since you posted that. But I just want to come back to that on kind of explain to people how you would just basically take the same exercise that hurt and find a way to bring it back to where it doesn’t hurt anymore.

Scott Johnson 34:02
Yeah. Do you want, like, my case in particular? Yeah, exactly, yeah. So mine was, we had just, like, started doing that was when I was in Colorado, right? I believe so, yeah, I’m pretty sure. Is when I was in Colorado, we just had a squat program and the gym I was going to, like, Tammy had us do we got everybody there was strong, everybody there was strong. And we had, we were doing a squat cycle, and I think we were doing like a 20 rep max, which is terrible, yeah. But then we, I think, like, the open was coming up, and there was, there was some event, and we started just like, volume wise was just kind of through the roof. So I just kind of went back to the basics. I decreased the volume. I think that’s a I think that’s something that most PTS, or I. I would say strength coaches probably do a better job of keeping an eye on that. But like, asking somebody, what’s your training program looking like? How much volume have you been doing? And then on top of that, like, I think I was mountain biking as well, and so I was, like, doing a lot of, like, knee extension. So we, I obviously backed off on some of the volume and started doing more isometric holds with heavier load. And that was, you know, if the viewers don’t know 10 and 10 and oppose tendly, tend to respond very well to isometrics up front and then heavy eccentrics. And depending on the person you know, like the literature, I know what the literature says, It’s eccentric is no better than concentric. It’s just like, we get it so, but oftentimes the isometric will have analgesic effect and make it so that you don’t have the same symptoms. And then you load the tendon. So for me, I decreased the volume, added isometric holding with, I think I was, think was with squats. I think I remember the post, and it was like, I think it’s like 70% of one rep max that I was holding. And that’s heavy I was, I think at the time I squat like, 415, four, 410, 70% that’s a fair amount, but that’s generally how I put people back. And it’s one of those things. It’s, it’s, really doesn’t have to be that hard, you know, ask the right questions, put the fire out, load it. And then I think one of the spots where, you know, I kind of struggled with was the reconditioning process, and I think that’s where a lot of people end up struggling. Is sweet. We can squat without pain, but I can’t do a Mac con with 100 air squats without paying because I haven’t been doing it for the last, you know, six weeks, because I’ve been rehabbing, and then they jump back into it and and miss that middle part of of there’s like rehab, reconditioning or rehab, like reconditioning, return to sport. And what ends up happening is it ended up being like rehab, return to sport. So tissue, tissue tolerance doesn’t, doesn’t like come into it doesn’t really get developed. And that is a big area of

Ryan Jore 37:40
issue. Yeah, I feel like a lot of times too, that is so much of an ego thing, because they say, like, Well, I used to do this workout at, you know, whatever number of time or with whatever reps, and so they just, yeah, they rush back in, because I have got to be back to where I was. And they said that ramp up period doesn’t have to necessarily be that long, but you should still have it. One of my online clients is a coach as well, and it’s nice to see someone who wasn’t dealing with it emotionally, where she so she had, like, a foot in a groin issue. And there are days and she’s been working with PT as well, and she went for a walk, and she I did 25 minutes zero pain this time, this first time that’s happened in months. And she literally, actually, like, realized she was probably gonna do too much. She just turned around and went home. And it was just, it was so refreshing to have somebody do that, because so much the time people are like, hey, this felt good. Now I’m sure hey, this felt good. Now I’m just gonna keep going until it hurts again. It’s like, and then we just start this whole cycle again and realizing that, like, you did more than you did last time you had no pain. It’s like, let’s come back and beat it again the following week and the following week, and just keep ramping up and yeah, then eventually you’re back to where you were without having to

Scott Johnson 38:38
set yourself back 17 times. Yeah, call those chronic rehabbers. Then those people are generally the people that never they do. They do the cycle, and that’s due to never getting that reconditioning phase back. That’s the, the the real thing. And, and you said ego, and I think impatience, yeah, yeah. You know, it’s you do have to respect tissue healing time, you know? And people don’t want that anymore, because you just inject some BP, 157, and it cures everything. Or you can do stem cell therapy, and it’s like, still takes time. There’s, we haven’t really figured out how to beat biology, so

Ryan Jore 39:26
No, exactly it’s and one of my clients recently was coming off of a back thing. That’s where we kind of just, I literally, when I had her find her new starting weight, it’s like, just find a set of five that feels like, that doesn’t make you feel apprehensive about your back. It’s like, sometimes it’s just as simple. It’s like, Okay, now we’ll, next week, we’ll do a couple more sets there, and then you and then after like, three weeks, we start to add weight. And just, it’s crazy how often that works, as long as you just take the patience of that, like I said, it’s, you know, maybe a couple extra weeks. But most people aren’t training for their financial future, and they also don’t have to have a certain hit a certain weight by a certain day, you know, or their business goes under. It’s like, you. This is, you’re doing this for fun and for health, like, who cares if it takes six weeks longer if you get there feeling better and don’t have to just start the cycle over and

Scott Johnson 40:07
over and over again, right? I She said, wish we should put that in repeat, rinse and repeat, because that’s a that’s a common theme. I just think about the time and the financial loss for just like, paying for me, or for a chiropractor or somebody, if people would just literally, just like, I don’t have to get back faster. I just gotta get back completely. Yeah, I heard Mike Go ahead, Mike. Is your tell what? I was listening to one of his podcasts, and he was talking about, it’s like, I don’t know why everybody’s so, like, got a hard on for getting back faster. And he’s like, I’d rather you get back not injured, then, yeah, slightly less injured. Yeah. And it’s like, yeah, it’s sure and, and to that, like, I try to tell, I try to educate people on this. It’s like you’re even when you even when you get back too soon, you’re still not training at the capacity at which you should be. So take a, take a couple extra weeks, and then just heal, yeah, and then at some point you do have to, like,

Unknown Speaker 41:25
you know, sometimes and see, see where you’re at, you know, the sunshine, and you gotta make hay, right?

Ryan Jore 41:32
Yeah, no, exactly. It’s like, I think back to, like, with my shoulder issue that I had when I had some labral stuff that it was, again, it was nothing to do with technique. Like, I mean, who knows, my technique was perfect, perfect. But I was doing a shit ton of snatches at the time. Was just doing a lot of overhead work in general, and because I was trying to hit a certain goal of kettlebell snatches in 10 minutes, it was a stupid, arbitrary goal that meant nothing outside of just I decided this is what I was going to do. And I did it. And I ran through my first cycle. Towards the end, I got close, and I started to have some lingering shoulder stuff, and I’m like, Oh, I’m so close to this. So I basically just re ran the program, which was a shit ton of volume to run for, you know, essentially, whatever that would be in like, six straight months, and ended up just with much longer term shoulder issues. And again, it’s it was setting an arbitrary goal and then hitting, adhering to it no matter what. Versus, had I just taken a couple weeks back down, the volume gradually ramped back up. I probably would have, who knows, if I would have actually still hit the goal, but at least I wouldn’t have created, like, months and months and years of lingering shoulder stuff, just because I, like you said, I was just too impatient. I’m like, I’ve decided to hit this now. I’m going to hit this now.

Scott Johnson 42:33
Yeah, was that happened to be a strong first certification.

Ryan Jore 42:38
Well, so I’d already passed that. But I was like, so the back then, you had to get 53 pounds, you had to get 100 reps in five minutes. And I’d beaten that because I did my certification. But I’m like, what if I did 200 in 10 minutes with a 62 pounder? Again, for whatever reason, it just sounded cool. And I just kept pushing it. And again, looking at my program, it was just really imbalanced, because I was pushing I was also pushing chin ups at the time. I was also pushing Turkish get up. So it’s like it was just a lot of overhead volume. It has nothing to do with any of those exercises being bad exercises, but you shouldn’t be pushing three massive overhead exercises at the same time, like my program was. I hate to say the term imbalance, because, you know, we know now it’s not like you have to, like, match your horizontal with your vertical, or anything like that, but you probably just shouldn’t push multiple vertical exercises at the same time. Like, that’s just probably an expert, especially because they were all high volume and they were all fairly high intensity. Like, it was just, it was just bad programming, and it’s, you know, I’d like to think I’m a little smarter coach than that. Now,

Scott Johnson 43:33
right? Did you write that program? Oh, yeah, yeah.

Ryan Jore 43:38
Perfect. As, like, I tell my clients, like, I made the mistake, so you don’t have to, right, exactly. Awesome. So thanks for coming on today, Scott, where can our audience reach out to you if they were interested in what you guys offer

Scott Johnson 43:50
on Instagram. We have an Instagram page. We’re trying to be more active. We got really busy for a little bit. But physio, fit bend.com you can look at us there. Physio fit bend for Instagram. I think we have a Facebook page. Somebody runs that for us. I try to make the main thing the main thing right now. But yeah, physio fit bend, you can kind of check us out, see what we’re doing. We’re doing a little bit more posting with our force plates and kind of showing people what we’ve the whole we’ve been kind of missing as a professional. So awesome. Thanks for coming on. Yeah, thanks for having me, brother. Good to see you guys next week.