Rich Pruett & Hunter Eisenhower: Assessments, Training, Outcomes

In this episode of the Keiser Human Performance Podcast, the conversation centers on performance, training strategy, and how effective coaching bridges the gap between theory and real-world application.

The discussion highlights the importance of individualized programming, consistency, and intent — focusing on how to develop strength, power, and overall performance in a way that is both effective and sustainable. Key insights explore how small adjustments in training approach can lead to meaningful improvements over time.

Listeners will walk away with practical takeaways on how to think more critically about training, apply foundational principles, and create better outcomes across a wide range of populations.

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Welcome back to the Keiser human performance  podcast and in this case two smart guys in Arizona

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talking and Gabe listening. I have Rich Brew here,  director of performance at Exos out of Phoenix,

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Arizona and head performance coach with Arizona  State men's hoops and creator of the four system,

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Hunter Eisenhower. Gentlemen, how are we doing  today? Doing great, Gabe. I appreciate you uh

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having us on, man. Doing awesome. Appreciate it.  Of course, Hunter, we understand that you are

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the road in Boulder, Colorado. So, thank you for  making some time. Rich, thank you as well. Guys,

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let's just dive right into it. I want to start  with assessments. And Rich, I'm going to begin

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with you. What are your go-to evaluations right  now? What are your core assessments that provide

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the most value to you and your team as we look  at athletic performance? It's a loaded question

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and uh I think Hunter and I have had a lot of  extensive conversations regarding this specific

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topic. So within the the exo system when we  bring everybody in it is a counter movement

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jump on the force plate and then we collect an RSI  through two different means whether that is the

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multi-rebound test or a drop jump test depending  upon the specific position and sport that they're

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playing. That's our four splits. Like everyone  goes through that. Then we'll take them through

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a load velocity profile on a Keiser air squat in  order to collect the optimal power resistance and

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velocity optimal power resistance. Uh we will  also take them through a Keiser prone leg curl

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LVP as well low velocity profile collecting the  same metrics their OPR and velocity at OPR and

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then it goes on from there right depending upon  their sport their position the time of the year

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that they're in uh any previous injury history  or injury prevalence that they have within those

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uh sport in the the position that they play. Uh  we can take them through a leg extension LPP.

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Um we can take them through a sprint profiling  assessment as well, a conditioning assessment.

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Just kind of the list goes on depending upon what  your specific tasks are within your environment,

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your operation. Awesome. Hunter, before I go over  to you, Rich, just one quick followup on that. Why

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did you choose to go with the leg curl with LVP?  ly debated topic I think right now. So, we took

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all of our information uh regarding isometric  assessments and profiling. We'll call it just

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for simplicity sake, we'll call it hamstring  profiling. It's not necessarily hamstring

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profiling. It's really like posterior chain  profiling. Um we took our isometric assessments

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like bilateral and unilateral overcoming iso30s.  um standing 90s and so forth. And with the data

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that we had over the past few years, we weren't  really able to find any correlations between um

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injury risk, injury mitigation. And we were really  looking for something that was able to objectively

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identify a posterior chain assessment through like  leveraging velocity, right? really like kind of

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tapping into neuromuscular assessments looking  at a range of motion that also involve velocity.

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So now we are taking them through unilateral  load velocity profiles left and right side and

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collecting their optimal power resistance and  their velocity optimal power resistance and we

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can build in asymmetries there. Awesome. Thanks  for sharing and I'm sure there's a lot we can go

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into on that which we will and Hunter I'm going to  kick it over to you now in terms of your battery

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of assessments things that you find very valuable  throughout the entire year. Where are you at with

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that? Yeah, so it does depend because uh the  offseason the battery of assessment that I have is

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is much bigger. The inseason period it gets very  simple because obviously in the inseason you have

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more time. you're focused on different qualities  and trying to develop those certain qualities.

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Whereas the inseason, I'm not saying that you're  not trying to develop certain qualities. However,

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the time that you have to train and also assess  gets limited and you have to be as efficient as

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effective as possible. So, the inseason and  offseason kind of change. I'll go through the

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entire thing and then I can explain what I what  I touch on in the in season. Sure. But for me,

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for the for the offseason, um there's a couple  different categories. The one place I start,

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and the reason I start here is because it's the  most simple to collect, and it's something that

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I do all year round, multiple times a week, is  just three different assessments on the uh force

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plates. So, I will do a bilateral CMJ, hands  on hips. I'll do a multi-rebound assessment,

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specifically a four jump, and I can I mean, if we  want to talk about mult different multi-rebound

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assessments, Rich said he used the drop jump,  which is not a multi-rebound assessment,

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but similar family. There's also the 105, which  is very popular. I've chosen and I've used the

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four jump for a couple years now. And then also  a assessment that uh that I don't want to say I

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created. Sounds uh kind of you can say you created  but I I haven't seen it. However, it's the CMJ

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single leg land, which is a bilateral hands on hip  CMJ landing on a single leg, which I'm actually

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going through a turn of play case right now, and  I have backlogs of CMJ single leg land data on the

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individual. And it's been very powerful to look  at CMJ data now and seeing potential to return to

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pre-injjury state or closer to and then you put  them in a CMJ single leg gland and you're like,

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"Wow, there is dramatic asymmetry." So, those  are three assessments. I use the CMJ multi and

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the multi-rebound. use consistently year round.  The CMJ single leg land is typically like an

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offseason assessment just cuz it is a little bit  more tedious to do. From a speed perspective,

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the the assessment that I really hang my hat on is  a 5 plus 10, so a 5 yard build into a 10 yard fly

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through lasers. And the last two years that was  year round weekly. This year I've actually taken

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it out of the inseason um period for different  reasons. And then throughout the offseason,

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that will extend to further distances. So  we'll get all the way to a uh 25 plus 10. So,

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a 25 yard build and do a 10- yard fly with a bunch  of basketball players and they get to max velocity

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at that point. I'm not doing that week one by  any means, but we progressively add distance to

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that assessment to get them to uh assessing what  their true max velocity is. From that same realm,

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from a change direction perspective, I'll use  a 1005. So, that's going to be a you're you're

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starting 10 yards off the change direction line.  There's lasers 5 yards away from you. So splitting

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that distance in half, you're sprinting five,  tripping the lasers at five, touching the line,

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coming back five. So between those two assessments  I just said, the 5 plus 10 and the 1005, you can

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get a change direction deficit, which admittedly  I haven't done a ton with, but I do think there

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is value in seeing the athletes that are more  inclined to change direction versus linear

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speed. And then you can get into archetyping  and kind of predicting what you could expect

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to see based on the athlete in front of you. And  then finally, the last change direction and speed

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uh family assessment that I use is a lateral  505, which is going to be it really is a 605

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because I have the athletes line up a yard off of  the laser so they don't trip it with a hand when

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they start moving or something. But it's going  to be six yards off the change direction line,

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lasers at five. It's going to be a lateral  slide, no crossover step, touch, and then

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come back through. For a strength assessment,  I've went back and forth on a couple things.

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And something that I've used pretty consistently  is just a trap bar deadlift using VBT and finding

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what their load is at about 0.5 meters per second,  which is about 80%, which is just something that I

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can then rely on and use periodically throughout  the year to evaluate general strength measures.

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One that I'm high on and very keen on currently  that I'm using um newer to this battery is a body

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weight split squat ISO. And by body weight, I mean  body weight additional load. So if I'm 200 200 lb,

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it'd be an additional 200 lb. So let's say 100 lb  dumbbell in each hand, a split squat iso for 30

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seconds. That's something I took from Tanner Care  and I've messed around with finding various ways

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to evaluate strength outside of just like this  concentric bias that we live in. And I think that

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that to me takes away the skill, takes away the  technical aspects of executing like a movement,

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a traditional exercise. And you're also evaluating  isometric strength which I think is more closely

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related related to sport than concentric strength  which we typically evaluate. And then finally the

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last couple are just going to be general body  comp. We use it in body. So really just looking

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at obviously body weight and then muscle mass and  body body fat percentage. And then the last one

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is going to be max vert. And that's something I  just use in the offseason period. And that is a

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vertex set up in front of the rim. that athlete  can approach that vertex however they want as long

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as they're starting within the college three-point  line two feet one foot and I do think it's

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interesting to look at the strategy they prefer to  use but really just tracking jump height on that

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and then to round that out as I said in season  I've done the 5 plus 10 weekly for most of my time

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here at ASU but we are going to be on force plates  doing the CMJ and multi-rebound weekly if not

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multiple times a week okay lot to chew on there  appreciate you outlining all of that um I think

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I'm going call the bilateral CMJ single leg land  the Eisenhower test. Yeah, I like that. Yeah, I

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mean I'm not I'm not going to stop you from doing  that, but I uh I'm writing that down right now.

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It's going in the notes. That's the Eisenhower CMJ  single leg land. Yeah, it makes me cringe a little

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bit to hear that, but I respect I appreciate the  Yeah. Yeah, that's why. Um, so question for you

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here. I I kind of want to dive more into that. I  really also like the body weight split squat ice.

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So, I imagine with these, you know, basketball  players you're working with, long lever athletes.

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It's nice. You get to test the single leg and do  it in a really comfortable manner and something

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that you can do quite often if you really  choose to kind of at a low orthopedic cost. So,

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any correlations you're seeing between that and I  know you're just starting with that CMJ single leg

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land and just getting a better idea of maybe any  correlation between those two right now. I would

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say that the the split squad ISO is too new for  me to understand, but I just think that there's so

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much value in the CMJ single leg land for like a  multitude of reasons because at its simplest form,

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you can just assess the like psychological  confidence the athlete has to achieve a certain

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jump height when they know they're landing on  either limb. And that's just like it's so simple,

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but it's it's really just assessing that piece  of like, okay, if I know for me like my right

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leg is horrible, my left leg is like still  fairly athletic. It's what I jumped off all

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the time when I played basketball. So when I know  I'm landing on my left leg, I'll jump four, five,

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six centimeters higher than when I know  I'm landing on my right. So right there,

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that's a flag. And then I also think the metric  from Hawin Dynamic landing performance index is

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is a really cool metric which is landing height  and landing phase and a ratio between the two.

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And it's a really cool metric to look at with this  specifically because you get to see the landing

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height and also the time it takes to control the  landing portion of the movement. So with those

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two right there, like the return to play example I  brought up, I did the initial assessment recently

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because it's not something you're going to do like  right away in a return to play case. This was a

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lower leg ankle situation. So, it's not like I'm  going to have him do this assessment right away,

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but once I felt comfortable of implementing  this, it was kind of like CMJ first, then we did

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multi-rebound. Now, we're implementing the CMJ  single leg land. And when I first did the test

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with him, he was uh 35 or 36 centimeters on both  sides, landing on both both limbs. So, I was like,

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okay, it's like even. I was like pretty impressed.  And then when I looked at LPI, his um unaffected

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limb was like 16% off his average in his LPI and  his affected limb was like 46% off his average in

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his LPI. So I think that just jump height is the  most glaring thing that you can really see of of

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just initial assessment. 48 centimeters on one,  41 on the other. Okay, there's some psychological

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or a lack of of confidence there. And then you can  look at LPI and really dig under the hood a little

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bit more of like, okay, jump height might be  the same, but LPI is very different. And I think

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that can tell you a ton as well. It's almost like  you're taking the same principles of the change of

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direction deficit and just implementing it within  the vertical actor, right? You're looking are you

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like flagging any of them that are aren't hitting  a certain percentage of their counter movement

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jump height like their bilateral jump? So, is  it like 85% or is it like have you developed any

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found any thresholds there? Yeah, it's a really  good question. The reason that I came up with this

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test is because I became obsessed with and this is  all the way back to my time with the Kings. Like,

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I became obsessed with finding like a simple  way to quantify deceleration that's that's

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more effective that you're able to use more often  than like setting up a 1005. I'm not gonna have

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my entire team run 105s throughout an inseason  period, but I would have them do a single CMJ

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singularly land. It's a little bit more efficient.  So, that was really the thing that I want to try

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to accomplish was quantifying deceleration and  seeing if there is correlation amongst that with

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more horizontally oriented assessments. to answer  the second part of your or the the your question.

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I thought about two different things and I don't  have like a threshold right now, but it's it's

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what you said of are they able to achieve a  certain jump height of their just traditional

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bilateral CMJ and that could be a flagging system  and then also the asymmetry between the two limbs

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from a jump height perspective but then more  specifically an LPI perspective. So I don't have

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like a a standardized 80% 85% 90% whatever it may  be. But as I collect more data and can potentially

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correlate it with horizontal deceleration tasks,  lateral deceleration tasks, then potentially a

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threshold may present itself. Yeah. Yeah, that's  good. I appreciate you guys outlining all of the

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assessments. It's fantastic. And I I kind of am  so eager to get into the okay, then what aspect of

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all of that, right? Um I really do. So Hunter, I'm  going to go back to you here. Okay, we flag this

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deficit, right? So what, you know, how do how do  we approach this now? You know, how do we approach

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this with our training specifically with the CMJ  single leg? Yeah, let's start let's just start

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there because I think it's a really intriguing  thing a road to go down. So let's let's go with

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that. Well, I think what I've seen a lot in my  population and this is unfortunately very commonly

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what you see is this asymmetry that may present is  an athletes the population of basketball players

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just like every sport but especially basketball  players are typically dealing with some sort of

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varying levels of patellar teninopathy like  it's just it's just part of basketball and I

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try to do as good of a job as I can to keep  that at bay but it's it's just the nature of

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the sport. So what I have seen is that typically  if there is a very big asymmetry, it is going to

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be based off of this chronic discomfort that an  athlete experiences on one of the two limbs. And

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that would lead to probably a decrease in jump  height when they know they're landing on that

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limb that's dealing with the discomfort. And then  also something that you notice as well, which this

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isn't something I t talked about to this point,  is the stiffness at which they land on that limb.

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So you can get into different variables in terms  of metrics that you might be able to look at like

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peak braking force typically is going to  be higher on a limb that you land with a

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more rigid strategy. And the reason is because  they don't want to move their knee through any

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range of excursion when you're dealing with that  patellar tendinopathy. So you'll see an athlete

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jump their LPI will typically be lower or worse  on the side that's dealing with the tendonopathy.

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their braking metrics from a peak perspective  will typically be higher because they're less

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willing to move through a range of motion on  that limb. So that's just like now you don't

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need this assessment to figure out if somebody's  knee is causing some discomfort. However, that is

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a important place to start because that discomfort  and that patellar teninopathy that they could

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potentially be dealing with that they've probably  dealt with a long time is just going to create a

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chain reaction through that whole side of the body  that that entire limb because like knowing myself

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for example, one of the reasons I never used my  right leg when I played basketball is because

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my right knee always hurt. So then now I'm to this  point where my left leg is so much more developed.

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So I think that that's that seems like a specific  case of patellar tendonopathy, but it is something

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that continues to pop up with this assessment is  big asymmetry. Yeah, like my right knee always

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hurts. So I think that beginning to tackle that  specifically from like a local perspective with

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what I say within force system terms like slow  force loading, then you begin to make changes

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in just like the the function of the tissue of  an athlete and how long they've dealt with it

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is probably quite a while. Also, if you're able  to affect that, then they gain more confidence

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of landing in that limb and you begin to see that  clear up. So, that's a specific example, but one

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of the ones that I see fairly often, especially  with my population. Awesome. Thank you. Really

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nicely outlined, Rich for you. Going back to maybe  some of the assessments that you had mentioned,

00:17:35.040 --> 00:17:41.520
the ability to perform unilateral assessments.  Curious to hear from you. Okay, red flag. We have,

00:17:41.520 --> 00:17:46.400
you know, a large discrepancy between right versus  left. Hey, we've also have some self-reported

00:17:46.400 --> 00:17:50.800
pain. Maybe there's an injury we were even aware  of. It all kind of makes sense. Okay. Like how

00:17:50.800 --> 00:17:55.840
do we go about attacking this? So I think it's  like it's important to just throw out one of the

00:17:55.840 --> 00:18:02.720
reasons, right? We we were talking earlier about  how we weren't able to find any type of like

00:18:02.720 --> 00:18:08.480
strong correlation like I for posterior chain risk  mitigation and risk identification or anything

00:18:08.480 --> 00:18:12.640
like that, right? And obviously soft tissue  injuries are going to happen in sport. That's just

00:18:12.640 --> 00:18:20.800
the nature of sport and we're constantly looking  for like that gold nugget like what is that one

00:18:20.800 --> 00:18:26.720
assessment that we could leverage uh to help us  really identify any type of risk. So I say that

00:18:26.720 --> 00:18:35.920
because we've got guys that are having like 27%  30% plus asymmetries in a prone hamstring LPP that

00:18:35.920 --> 00:18:42.320
don't have any injuries that don't have any. So  that right there is interesting and it's uh gives

00:18:42.320 --> 00:18:48.640
us an idea of what we need to start attacking. Uh  I think asymmetries are going to inherently exist

00:18:48.640 --> 00:18:55.040
within the organism. I think that's just a natural  adaptation. But once we say if we have someone

00:18:55.040 --> 00:19:00.560
that is functional without pain, we use that term  and they have an asymmetry, right? Then it starts

00:19:00.560 --> 00:19:05.040
giving us a clear identification of what their  key constraint is, especially if they're good to

00:19:05.040 --> 00:19:09.360
go on everything else. And I say good to go like  they're checking the boxes of the normative data

00:19:09.360 --> 00:19:17.680
that we have within our sports and our positions  from LVP to jumping metrics and so forth. So now

00:19:17.680 --> 00:19:22.640
it gives us a clear indication of what we can  attack to hopefully like decrease any type of

00:19:22.640 --> 00:19:29.440
any type of risk. The second reason that we do  that and the other reason that we're collecting

00:19:29.440 --> 00:19:36.880
this information is because we can leverage this  as a monitoring tool. And we can take a certain

00:19:36.880 --> 00:19:42.720
percentage of their OPR, optimal power resistance,  and have them rip into it a few reps, like two or

00:19:42.720 --> 00:19:48.160
three times. We'll use the example of the leg  curl to give us uh a sense of their current

00:19:48.160 --> 00:19:55.600
functional state. So after we've tested them three  to five times, then we can start building out some

00:19:55.600 --> 00:20:00.480
uh ranges, right? Just leveraging standard  deviations based off of their norms and are

00:20:00.480 --> 00:20:04.080
they falling within that that healthy range or  are they falling outside of that? If they fall

00:20:04.080 --> 00:20:10.160
outside of that range on say like a negative one  standard deviation more, then it gives us an idea

00:20:10.160 --> 00:20:17.360
of like what can we immediately change within  that session for that, right? So it's giving us

00:20:17.360 --> 00:20:25.360
an idea of one is there a potential risk factor  not saying it's absolute nothing is in this field

00:20:25.360 --> 00:20:33.440
um but it gives us an idea of a potential risk  factor as an asymmetry and then also we're able to

00:20:33.440 --> 00:20:40.160
identify the individual's functional state at  that very moment in time before we go outside

00:20:40.160 --> 00:20:48.240
and do like say topend speed work accelerations  and it can inform how we and adjust that game plan

00:20:48.240 --> 00:20:53.680
or that that training session for that day. We've  tested this fairly extensively with guys coming

00:20:53.680 --> 00:20:59.760
off of flights, dehydration, coming in from a long  weekend, and we've been finding a pretty strong

00:20:59.760 --> 00:21:06.320
correlation of not being able to hit within their  specific ranges. Um, and it usually lines up with

00:21:06.320 --> 00:21:10.320
how they're feeling. So, it's we're getting this  objective feedback and that objective feedback

00:21:10.320 --> 00:21:15.520
within one session. And we know that they're not  just trying to, you know, take it easy that day.

00:21:15.520 --> 00:21:20.400
we we know that they're actually telling us the  truth and yes we believe our athletes they are

00:21:20.400 --> 00:21:25.440
paying us in this situation not in hunter situ  but they're paying us to help them so it helps

00:21:25.440 --> 00:21:31.440
us keep them in the best possible environment and  we can leverage those constraints to help them

00:21:31.440 --> 00:21:36.560
continuously improve their performance capacity  yeah awesome um and it's gonna be a question for

00:21:36.560 --> 00:21:42.000
both of you and Hunter you mentioned addressing  things more locally right so with these tests

00:21:42.000 --> 00:21:46.400
and rich something that's a leg curl right that  is very local, right? We're talking about knee

00:21:46.400 --> 00:21:51.360
flexion Hunter for you having tests that are more  jump based and it is this more global movement,

00:21:51.360 --> 00:21:55.440
albeit it is more specific to a basketball  jump, which is fantastic for your athletes. Um,

00:21:55.440 --> 00:22:00.160
and it can really be very telling for many types  of athletes. Hunter, how do you then take this

00:22:00.160 --> 00:22:06.960
test that is more global and start to pinpoint,  hey, here's a local area that we need to start

00:22:06.960 --> 00:22:14.160
addressing? Yeah, it's a really good question and  I thought I think so much about local tissues,

00:22:14.160 --> 00:22:20.240
local tissues during the inseason period, like  what I call local tissue prep is at the forefront

00:22:20.240 --> 00:22:28.160
of my mind and like very high on my list of  qualities and things that I need to try to attack.

00:22:28.800 --> 00:22:36.480
Now, when I say that, I also think, man, I really  need to add some local tissue assessment to my

00:22:36.480 --> 00:22:42.160
maybe my initial screening. It may not have to be  often, but to get this baseline data for my for

00:22:42.160 --> 00:22:48.480
my individuals, for the individuals that I work  with. So, all that to say, I I do think there is

00:22:48.480 --> 00:22:54.720
a ton of value in a local assessment. I do also  think that when we're dealing with local tissues,

00:22:54.720 --> 00:23:00.240
I think just the subjective feedback from the  individual is also very helpful and what I rely

00:23:00.240 --> 00:23:06.080
on right now. Like if I have an Now I had a I had  a conversation the other day with Trent Salo who

00:23:06.080 --> 00:23:11.600
is a genius when it comes to tend tendons,  runs the tendon lab in in Michigan and we me

00:23:11.600 --> 00:23:17.600
and me and a friend of mine were talking about  like this presentation of pain versus no pain.

00:23:17.600 --> 00:23:22.640
And just because there's no pain doesn't mean  that there's not issues with the tissue. So,

00:23:22.640 --> 00:23:30.320
we have to be careful when we're just reporting  pain or discomfort. However, I'm probably not

00:23:30.320 --> 00:23:33.520
going to be doing ultrasounds on my athletes to  determine the quality of their tissues, at least

00:23:33.520 --> 00:23:37.680
at this point in my career. So, the subjective  evaluation and subjective feedback I get from

00:23:37.680 --> 00:23:41.840
those individuals is very impactful. And if I have  a guy that says, "Yeah, my left knee is really

00:23:41.840 --> 00:23:47.760
bothering me." and I I load it over the course of  however many days and perform different things to

00:23:47.760 --> 00:23:52.000
try to alleviate some of that discomfort and he  says, "Yeah, it's feeling great." Especially when

00:23:52.000 --> 00:23:58.960
he's cold walking off the bus, not just warmed  up and playing, then I am happy with that result,

00:23:58.960 --> 00:24:06.160
whether there's a specific objective assessment  I've performed on that local tissue. Yeah, Rich,

00:24:06.160 --> 00:24:10.800
it it makes me think about like your environment  and kind of what you were just talking about here.

00:24:10.800 --> 00:24:15.520
it, you know, assessing at the beginning of  a session, you have the subjective feedback

00:24:15.520 --> 00:24:18.960
you're laying on top of it, then trying to make  adjustments. It seems like all that's happening

00:24:18.960 --> 00:24:24.400
really fast, right? Like kind of on the fly. So,  talk through that like the challenges of maybe

00:24:24.400 --> 00:24:29.040
having to make decisions really quickly. At what  point is this something that okay, we we flagged

00:24:29.040 --> 00:24:35.520
it versus this is an issue and we need to now  address it prior to moving on to like let's say

00:24:35.520 --> 00:24:39.760
the field for sprinting or something like that.  I think it's always contextual, right, based off

00:24:39.760 --> 00:24:46.000
of the individuals that you are getting ready  to take out to do whatever on the field with an

00:24:46.000 --> 00:24:54.800
movement session. But in all of our training, we  have contingency plans. Um, that's just part of I

00:24:54.800 --> 00:25:01.200
think part of being just a a good practitioner is  being able to make informed decisions on the fly.

00:25:01.920 --> 00:25:08.080
And so, you know, if you're using say counter  movement jump as an assessment or for our

00:25:08.080 --> 00:25:16.320
instance, maybe we're using a velocity at OPR on  an air squat or at a leg press or in this example,

00:25:16.320 --> 00:25:22.800
a leg and we're good and ready to go out and do  some like flying 10 with a 30 yard buildup. And

00:25:22.800 --> 00:25:29.920
if we've got guys that are dropping below that  within that one day, then we can immediately just

00:25:29.920 --> 00:25:34.640
make a transition and have the contingency  plan already built in and say, "All right,

00:25:34.640 --> 00:25:40.320
we're going to be working more of a technical  aspect and start hitting some tempos instead of

00:25:40.320 --> 00:25:45.120
hitting a flying because they'll understand  the risk there based off of one how they're

00:25:45.120 --> 00:25:48.080
feeling. That's objective feedback that  Hunter was talking about and then two,

00:25:48.080 --> 00:25:52.080
the objective feedback because it's right there  and and like on the screen in front of them.

00:25:53.120 --> 00:25:57.280
So, not only are they feeling it, but then they  become aware of it because there's some days that

00:25:57.280 --> 00:26:00.720
they're going to come in, they're going to be  feeling a little tough, you know, or a little

00:26:00.720 --> 00:26:05.520
rough from whatever training that we've been doing  or maybe they went out for the weekend and they're

00:26:05.520 --> 00:26:10.560
still ripping it and they're feeling good. Um,  but it's having those contingency plans built in

00:26:10.560 --> 00:26:15.920
to being able to make those adjustments on the fly  and just being able to recognize, all right, well,

00:26:15.920 --> 00:26:21.680
we got three out of the 15 guys within the session  that drop below, you know, their range. Let's have

00:26:21.680 --> 00:26:26.720
them go off to the side. Okay. And working  together. We're going to go through the same

00:26:26.720 --> 00:26:33.360
warm-up, seeing how we're feeling, getting their,  you know, feedback and then um being able to, you

00:26:33.360 --> 00:26:38.960
know, making sure that we're assessing everyone's  flying 10. We're going through the session and

00:26:38.960 --> 00:26:43.680
then once they come up, right, we're going to  have them work more technical aspects or have

00:26:43.680 --> 00:26:50.240
them run at like say 70% of their max speed or 80%  just holding them back. and you know we're running

00:26:50.240 --> 00:26:55.600
through the gates or on a 1080 so we can help kind  of objectify that too like making sure that we're

00:26:55.600 --> 00:27:00.560
having those metrics and tell them hey you need to  pull it back a little bit or yeah stay right there

00:27:00.560 --> 00:27:07.200
right or even speed it up some. Um but it's just  ensuring that you start off with a contingency

00:27:07.200 --> 00:27:13.680
plan from the start and knowing that it's going to  happen and we've got to be able to make the best

00:27:13.680 --> 00:27:18.320
decisions possible in the moment for the athletes.  Yeah. Awesome. And and and one quick followup on

00:27:18.320 --> 00:27:27.200
that too would be, you know, you had mentioned  LVP before with air squat, with leg curl, and

00:27:27.200 --> 00:27:32.160
you know, LVP is not something you need Keiser for  necessarily to perform, but can you just expand on

00:27:32.160 --> 00:27:37.680
maybe what the advantage of uh having pneumatics,  what the advantage has been of being able to

00:27:37.680 --> 00:27:44.320
implement pneumatics with LVP and and kind of  the value you place with that? Yeah. So I always

00:27:44.320 --> 00:27:50.400
tell everyone that we will perform our force plate  assessments whether that's a countermovement jump,

00:27:50.400 --> 00:27:56.720
squat jump or so whatever it is right and  in this situation we'll take metrics from

00:27:56.720 --> 00:28:03.680
the counter movement jump and that tells us how  they're producing forces right how they are what

00:28:03.680 --> 00:28:08.080
is their output what is their strategy and what  are their specific times in different phases and

00:28:08.080 --> 00:28:12.080
we're able to break that down so we have a decent  understanding of how they're producing forces and

00:28:12.080 --> 00:28:22.800
then a say a global LVP so Keiser legs Keiser air  squat right so lower body but velocity profile is

00:28:22.800 --> 00:28:30.080
going to tell us what type of forces that they  leverage in order to accomplish the task. So,

00:28:30.080 --> 00:28:37.360
are they more velocity dependent or are they more  strength dependent? And pneumatics allows us to

00:28:37.360 --> 00:28:45.280
really assess the velocity characteristics of  the individual organism because they don't have

00:28:45.280 --> 00:28:50.160
to decelerate at the top. They can accelerate  throughout the entire range of motion. So,

00:28:50.160 --> 00:28:56.560
we have a true understanding of what their actual  velocity characteristics are within that current

00:28:56.560 --> 00:29:04.640
time. Um, and it helps us kind of pinpoint where  we need to provide the specific stimulus to. So,

00:29:04.640 --> 00:29:08.880
we we always compare everything to our normative  data based off their sport and their position

00:29:08.880 --> 00:29:16.160
and we're able to tell like you are significantly  above a standard deviation of like strength. So,

00:29:16.160 --> 00:29:24.320
you are strength dependent but your velocity  right is just well below what it should be.

00:29:24.320 --> 00:29:30.560
That's what pneumatics allows us to assess is  that full spectrum of velocity all the way through

00:29:30.560 --> 00:29:37.600
power and into strength, right? And then it gives  us a clear ident like identification of what is

00:29:37.600 --> 00:29:43.760
your limiting factor? What's your key constraint  that could potentially help you accomplish your

00:29:43.760 --> 00:29:49.120
task more efficient? Yeah, I'm going to use that  now as a segue, a really nice segue to transition

00:29:49.120 --> 00:29:53.600
from assessments and this conversation surrounding  assessments into training. I noticed that you

00:29:53.600 --> 00:29:58.160
guys had a little bit of fun together on social  media, Hunter, talking about adaptive complexes,

00:29:58.160 --> 00:30:02.000
right, on the air squat. And let's start  hitting on some of these different training

00:30:02.000 --> 00:30:06.160
methods and we can begin, you know, we'll hit  on eentrics, we'll hit on maybe some isometrics,

00:30:06.160 --> 00:30:10.400
but let's start with this adaptive complexes.  Hunter, for you, what was that experience like

00:30:10.400 --> 00:30:18.000
in talking with Richard um or Rich about utilizing  pneumatics through adaptive complexes? Yeah. So,

00:30:18.000 --> 00:30:22.640
adaptive complexes are something that I've used  and they always kind of made sense to me. The

00:30:22.640 --> 00:30:27.120
most common pairing I would do would be like a  a split squat overcoming iso and like a kettle

00:30:27.120 --> 00:30:30.880
bell rhythm split squat. That's something that I  always just like felt like I wanted to program on

00:30:30.880 --> 00:30:36.320
my high force days. And then I read the breaking  performance framework from Damian Harper and Matt

00:30:36.320 --> 00:30:41.280
Van Dyke and Chris Aventus and those guys and  they put a name to it. It's overcoming isometric

00:30:41.280 --> 00:30:46.640
paired with a what they said fast eccentric is an  adaptive complex and it's a way to to in layman's

00:30:46.640 --> 00:30:51.120
terms like potentiate the nervous system with the  overcoming isometric before you perform the fast

00:30:51.120 --> 00:30:57.440
eccentric. Now with that being said I currently  don't have access to pneumatic resistance. I don't

00:30:57.440 --> 00:31:02.560
have any at ASU and I have a home gym that I work  out at primarily and I don't have anything there.

00:31:02.560 --> 00:31:09.840
Wink wink Keiser. And uh I uh and uh we went on a  trip to Vegas and we stayed at a fairly nice hotel

00:31:09.840 --> 00:31:16.240
and I walk into the the hotel and there's a Keiser  Air Squad and I was like, "No way." And Rich, I

00:31:16.240 --> 00:31:20.880
think I sent you a picture of it right after I saw  that and I just began messing around on it. And

00:31:20.880 --> 00:31:26.000
me and me and Rich had to have the conversation  of what I call drop catches or fast eccentrics

00:31:26.000 --> 00:31:33.360
with pneumatic resistance versus just traditional  loading. And Rich was talking to me about just the

00:31:33.360 --> 00:31:38.400
fact of like you're working with gravity versus  like pneumatic resistance that is actually like

00:31:38.400 --> 00:31:41.920
pushing you faster toward the ground. And he said  that it made sense, but I never experienced it.

00:31:41.920 --> 00:31:47.280
So when I walked in and I saw the air squat, I  thought, well, I'm going to try some drop catches

00:31:47.280 --> 00:31:52.880
out. And it was it felt completely different and  completely different to exactly what Rich said.

00:31:52.880 --> 00:31:58.080
Like when you're performing a trap bar drop  catch, especially if the load isn't high,

00:31:58.080 --> 00:32:05.360
you are just dropping at the rate that gravity  is pushing you ultimately. You know, now we put

00:32:05.360 --> 00:32:10.480
those the Keiser on and now it is pushing me so  much faster toward the ground. So that to me just

00:32:10.480 --> 00:32:15.040
like souped up drop catches much more than just  traditional loading. I haven't had the chance of

00:32:15.040 --> 00:32:19.840
getting plates on any type of Keiser equipment  to actually look at ground reaction forces cuz

00:32:19.840 --> 00:32:26.560
that's why I think that drop catches can be so  potent. pairing with the eccentric stimulus that

00:32:26.560 --> 00:32:32.560
they provide. And then I'm weak enough that I was  able to just load that Keiser air squad up all the

00:32:32.560 --> 00:32:37.280
way and perform an overcoming isometric at the  bottom. So then I was thinking, man, I can just

00:32:37.280 --> 00:32:41.840
do an adaptive complex right here on this piece  of equipment and don't even need to move cuz I

00:32:41.840 --> 00:32:47.600
just loaded that air squat to like heavy enough.  I think it was I think it was like a souped-up

00:32:47.600 --> 00:32:52.000
one that went heavier than usual ones cuz uh  Yeah, I'm sure. Yeah, that's exactly. Yeah. So,

00:32:52.000 --> 00:32:59.680
I just loaded that heavy, performed isometric, and  then I just dropped the weight, stood up with it,

00:32:59.680 --> 00:33:04.080
performed the drop catches. Um, and that was my  adaptive complex, which I thought was awesome

00:33:04.080 --> 00:33:08.240
because it was efficient because I'm in the  same spot. All I'm doing is pressing a button

00:33:08.240 --> 00:33:13.760
to change. And then also, you get the increased  um I'm assuming the increased ground reaction

00:33:13.760 --> 00:33:18.320
force from the drop catch with the pneumatic  resistance as opposed to traditional loading. So,

00:33:18.320 --> 00:33:26.560
shout out to uh I guess you haven't posted it yet,  Gabe, but Phil Nash and I have actually tested the

00:33:26.560 --> 00:33:31.280
drop catches on force. Did Did you guys go into  talking about that at all on the podcast? No,

00:33:31.280 --> 00:33:35.600
we we had a conversation yesterday more  so related to just some of the education

00:33:35.600 --> 00:33:40.400
processes through through Exo. So, he said, "You  know what?" I asked him about it and he's like,

00:33:40.400 --> 00:33:43.600
"I'm going to save that for Rich cuz you're  talking to him tomorrow." So, so yeah,

00:33:43.600 --> 00:33:50.240
it was like 6:30 in the morning and we were like,  "Let's do this." And we did trap bar drop catches

00:33:50.240 --> 00:33:58.080
as well as Keiser pneumatic resisted drop catches  on the Keiser deadlift machine. Um, and we started

00:33:58.080 --> 00:34:04.720
off with body weight. So the external load was  our body weight and then we would go up by 50 lbs.

00:34:05.440 --> 00:34:12.800
And what we found soon as you start to kind of go  up in load and intensity that the rate of force

00:34:12.800 --> 00:34:20.880
development drastically like skyrockets leveraging  pneumatic resistance, which makes sense,

00:34:20.880 --> 00:34:25.680
right? Because you're not operating anymore with  gravity. You're taking momentum out of it. You're

00:34:25.680 --> 00:34:34.480
taking inertia out like you're it's accelerating  you to the ground faster. Yeah. And it it was very

00:34:34.480 --> 00:34:41.200
interesting experiment to kind of one just see  the objective metrics coming through and like

00:34:41.200 --> 00:34:46.160
okay yeah this definitely clarifies everything  that we thought we believed and it definitely

00:34:46.160 --> 00:34:51.120
checked the box of yeah like we're heading in  the right direction with our thought process. So,

00:34:51.120 --> 00:34:56.560
we'll definitely use pneumatics for drop catches  just to help improve rate of force development,

00:34:56.560 --> 00:35:00.640
especially if we have individuals that are  significantly lacking in like the breaking

00:35:00.640 --> 00:35:05.200
phases of their counter movement jumps. And if  they're having a hard time with the unweighing

00:35:05.200 --> 00:35:12.400
phase, too, and really just uh like help teach or  provide a stimulus to help get the adaptation of

00:35:12.400 --> 00:35:17.280
uh rate of force development in that breaking  phase. With some of our athletes, we can use

00:35:17.280 --> 00:35:23.680
pneumatics for some overcoming stuff. Not too  many. Sorry, Hunter. But what we do use the hell

00:35:23.680 --> 00:35:30.880
out of them for yielding or holding isometrics.  Yeah, no question. Because the the ground force

00:35:30.880 --> 00:35:36.880
reactions there are pretty much the same with  mass and pneumatics. That is to say though,

00:35:36.880 --> 00:35:44.800
you cannot cannot adjust the load intrarep with  external mass, right? With with mass. You can with

00:35:44.800 --> 00:35:52.080
pneumatics. So, we just got done with a foundation  phase one with our NFL offseason group and we were

00:35:52.080 --> 00:35:58.160
doing uh up to like 20 30 second uh split squat  isometrics just like what Hunter was talking

00:35:58.160 --> 00:36:04.400
about. And we'll have the spotters sit there and  have their feet in the racks on the pedals and

00:36:04.400 --> 00:36:10.000
ready to adjust. So if we're getting like really  significant force trimmers to where it is starting

00:36:10.000 --> 00:36:15.200
to like disrupt their actual position in that in  that pattern that they're trying to hold, we can

00:36:15.200 --> 00:36:20.640
start to kind of adjust the load accordingly,  right? To kind of calm the system down and just

00:36:20.640 --> 00:36:26.720
providing that sweet spot stimulus, right? And  we can't do that with mass. It's like, all right,

00:36:26.720 --> 00:36:30.720
hold on. Like, let me take some plates off or drop  the dumbbells and go grab some other dumbbells,

00:36:30.720 --> 00:36:38.480
right? So it's uh a very unique tool that you have  access to when leveraging pneumatics that you can

00:36:38.480 --> 00:36:46.080
adjust interrupt and then we can also use them  with EQIS quasi isometrics and adjust the the load

00:36:46.080 --> 00:36:51.200
accordingly there. And we can do joint isolated  EQIs and we can also do global EQIs the compound

00:36:51.200 --> 00:37:00.560
EQIs if we're doing uh air squats uh bench press  and so forth. So, we've kind of uh experimented a

00:37:00.560 --> 00:37:09.280
little bit with the smaller population sizes with  uh heavy EQIs with the air squats and bench press.

00:37:09.280 --> 00:37:15.440
Um, and had some pretty I'd call it significant  results if we're looking at counter movement jump

00:37:15.440 --> 00:37:22.560
output. So, yeah. Fun. Hunter. Hunter, you  got to get over there and you got to check

00:37:22.560 --> 00:37:30.560
out the the deadlift. I've seen it. Uh, I went  and visited Rich after you guys outfitted Exos

00:37:30.560 --> 00:37:36.960
stuff and I was like, "What the hell is that?"  Rich was talking about changing loads, right,

00:37:36.960 --> 00:37:40.960
with mass-based resistance in the middle of a rep.  I've seen some of the videos that you've had to,

00:37:40.960 --> 00:37:43.840
right? Obviously scanning your social, being  able to take that deadlift. I know you like those

00:37:43.840 --> 00:37:47.040
eccentrics where you're adding mass plates, taking  them on and off. And in my head, I'm thinking,

00:37:47.040 --> 00:37:51.760
well, how easy that be if you just can press a  button, you know, and actually just change the

00:37:51.760 --> 00:37:56.320
load. Yeah. Don't even don't even don't even say  that right now until I get some Keiser equipment

00:37:56.320 --> 00:38:01.440
because that is like because don't get me wrong  like I love like I think the the trap bar version

00:38:01.440 --> 00:38:05.840
of that is actually a lot easier and went a  lot smoother when I did it for like the super

00:38:05.840 --> 00:38:10.240
maximally eccentric loading particularly through  this summer. Like when I first thought of that

00:38:10.240 --> 00:38:14.960
idea because I really just rely on like trap bar  deadlifts, riffid elevated split squats like we're

00:38:14.960 --> 00:38:20.080
not I'm not really loading like a back squat  ever with my guys. And I think that's what you

00:38:20.080 --> 00:38:24.320
see typically with like weight releasers is like  you're in a front squat, you're in a back squat.

00:38:24.320 --> 00:38:27.760
So I was like, "Well, what can I do?" And came up  with a trap bar and I was like, "Well, that's kind

00:38:27.760 --> 00:38:31.440
of sketchy to be putting plates on when guys are  holding near maximum load at the top of rep." But

00:38:31.440 --> 00:38:35.760
I was like, "I'm just going to try it with some  maximal load when they're not dealing with as much

00:38:35.760 --> 00:38:39.680
intensity." And it actually went really smooth and  I used it all summer and I think it worked great.

00:38:39.680 --> 00:38:45.120
But yeah, thinking about the ability or the the  the process of an athlete standing with that in

00:38:45.120 --> 00:38:50.960
particular, adding load at the top and then having  them perform the movement, I think is is next

00:38:50.960 --> 00:38:56.320
level in terms of super maximally loading. And  then you even get into being able to do that on

00:38:56.320 --> 00:39:00.880
any piece of equipment, including the load. You  you perform the concentric portion of the lift,

00:39:00.880 --> 00:39:07.040
add load, and then it's a super maximally. Yeah,  absolutely. And and again, not trying to sell you,

00:39:07.040 --> 00:39:12.720
but I'm just connect connecting the dots here  with, you know, Rich talking about, you know,

00:39:12.720 --> 00:39:19.440
the EQIs specifically with the air squat. You can  do that in a split squat position. And I was just

00:39:19.440 --> 00:39:27.760
thinking about the test that you do with the body  weight split squat isos, right? And just trying to

00:39:27.760 --> 00:39:31.680
make a connection between those two in terms  of maybe trying to increase performance in a

00:39:31.680 --> 00:39:34.880
test like that. I would just be curious to know.  I don't have the answers like over a long period

00:39:34.880 --> 00:39:39.680
of time training that for a while with the Keiser  coming back retraining with maybe some dumbbells

00:39:39.680 --> 00:39:43.040
at body weight. I'd just be curious to know  what that looks like you know over time. Yeah,

00:39:43.040 --> 00:39:47.840
there there's definitely something there. I think  it's the ease of the application of actually doing

00:39:47.840 --> 00:39:52.960
the assessment and I think that that obviously  whenever you add efficiency to an equation like

00:39:52.960 --> 00:39:56.880
effectiveness isn't always going to change but  in some situations it can and I think this is a

00:39:56.880 --> 00:40:02.720
situation that it probably could. So, I'm going to  go to Hunter for this and Rich right afterwards.

00:40:02.720 --> 00:40:07.280
Like, what is what interests you right now?  What rabbit holes are you going down in terms of

00:40:07.280 --> 00:40:13.760
training right now? Yeah, that's a good question.  I feel like my mind is all over the place. I would

00:40:13.760 --> 00:40:22.880
say um the thing that I'm really like trying to  refine currently is using the force system and

00:40:22.880 --> 00:40:27.200
how I think about like my methodology and how I  think about training in a return to play setting.

00:40:27.200 --> 00:40:32.480
I have uh like I mentioned a couple times now  return to play um case that I've been working

00:40:32.480 --> 00:40:37.440
with this season and it's it's a really cool  situation because like he travels with us on

00:40:37.440 --> 00:40:41.440
the road like he's a part of everything we do so  it's not like I leave and he's at home training

00:40:41.440 --> 00:40:45.520
with the GA like he's with us all the time. So  like right after we get done with this podcast I'm

00:40:45.520 --> 00:40:50.320
going to train him and now that I've like thought  about my methodology so much it's just how I think

00:40:50.320 --> 00:40:54.960
about training regardless if it's performance or  return to play or whatever it may be. So when I

00:40:54.960 --> 00:40:58.800
was going through this return to play case, I  just found myself like applying the principles

00:40:58.800 --> 00:41:04.400
that I've known within the force system to a  return to play setting and similar progressions,

00:41:04.400 --> 00:41:09.280
but there's like shifting and blendings of certain  things that I think can be very impactful. Pulling

00:41:09.280 --> 00:41:13.840
from a lot of smart individuals that I've learned  from to flow throughout a return to play process

00:41:13.840 --> 00:41:19.920
using the force system and it just it works in my  head and it flows well. And I think that what I'm

00:41:19.920 --> 00:41:25.200
constructing correlates with certain aspects of  different individuals philosophies from return

00:41:25.200 --> 00:41:29.440
to play sense that I respect and and hold very  highly like Kyle Sammons with the Cardinals and

00:41:29.440 --> 00:41:33.280
Danny Foley in San Diego. Like some of those  guys that I really rely on from return to play

00:41:33.280 --> 00:41:40.400
sense like the things that I'm trying to do with  my system from return to play perspective aligns

00:41:40.400 --> 00:41:46.800
with certain aspects of what they do. and I know  if I can align my ideas, put my own twist on it

00:41:46.800 --> 00:41:52.080
with the way that they go about doing things,  then I'm probably on the right right route. So,

00:41:52.080 --> 00:41:57.760
that's that's really been my biggest thought  process right now is blending the force system,

00:41:57.760 --> 00:42:03.520
which I really created out of like a performance  perspective to a return to play setting. Shout out

00:42:03.520 --> 00:42:08.400
Danny Foley, former Keiser podcast guest. Rich,  for you, what's really interesting to you right

00:42:08.400 --> 00:42:16.000
now? Yeah, I think I'm kind of similar. um similar  boat uh with Hunter and shout out to to to Kyle

00:42:16.000 --> 00:42:21.760
Sammons. He's kind of uh helped us along the this  this journey that we've been going through with

00:42:21.760 --> 00:42:29.760
these low velocity profilings and experimenting  with EQIs and stuff. Um but definitely um like

00:42:29.760 --> 00:42:36.880
really starting to kind of dive into how we can  leverage pneumatics in a in an RTP situation,

00:42:36.880 --> 00:42:41.360
you know, and and pretty much everything that that  Hunter said is kind of like that's why probably

00:42:41.360 --> 00:42:47.520
we talk all the time is, you know, we're we're  constantly exploring new avenues or alternative

00:42:47.520 --> 00:42:52.240
routes that we could take or more advanced or just  completely like nuanced routes that we could take

00:42:52.240 --> 00:42:58.160
to help individuals get back as soon as possible  in a safe manner of course but on the other side

00:42:58.160 --> 00:43:07.600
of that it's how can we really leverage um I've  been working with with you guys and Keiser for I

00:43:07.600 --> 00:43:13.520
guess about two years now is like how how can  we really leverage pneumatics to kind of one

00:43:13.520 --> 00:43:20.560
identify monitor and continue to assess uh  specific key constraints for individuals

00:43:20.560 --> 00:43:25.520
and that's kind of like where the the leg curl  came out of right we we noticed that we weren't

00:43:25.520 --> 00:43:31.360
getting much out of isometric assessment um  on the hamstrings. And so we decided to like

00:43:31.360 --> 00:43:36.960
leverage pneumatic resistance to try to assess,  monitor and train individuals from a leg curl,

00:43:36.960 --> 00:43:43.360
right? So like how can we help provide the most  efficient stimulus possible in order to get the

00:43:43.360 --> 00:43:50.720
outcome needed as quickly as possible. So taking  an individual and significantly improving specific

00:43:50.720 --> 00:43:56.320
strategies within their counter movements or  improving their strategies in say a sprint,

00:43:56.320 --> 00:44:02.000
right? How can we leverage pneumatic resistance  to do that? And I think it's a very open area of

00:44:02.000 --> 00:44:07.520
exploration. It's it can go as deep and broad  and you know wherever you wanted to take it.

00:44:07.520 --> 00:44:14.240
But that's kind of where I've been recently and  kind of where I continue to go. like, all right,

00:44:14.240 --> 00:44:18.880
well, you know, this person needs to improve  their stretch shortening cycle utilization,

00:44:18.880 --> 00:44:24.720
right? Well, what protocols can we leverage and  pneumatic resistance and training in order to

00:44:24.720 --> 00:44:29.120
help them get that? Because sometimes we'll have  guys in here for two weeks that, you know, are at

00:44:29.120 --> 00:44:34.560
the end stage of an RTP, right? And we've got to  help them get back out on on a team as quickly as

00:44:34.560 --> 00:44:39.040
possible because that's their livelihood, right?  So that's kind of what's always in the back of my

00:44:39.040 --> 00:44:44.880
mind is taking care of our athletes and providing  them the best stimulus possible in the shortest

00:44:44.880 --> 00:44:49.440
amount of time in order to get them back out.  Yeah. And while you're in this exploration phase

00:44:49.440 --> 00:44:54.480
as you're trying to figure things out, Hunter,  like you alluded to this too off off air was,

00:44:54.480 --> 00:44:58.240
you know, we're we're always making our best  guess at the end of the day. Rich, what's been

00:44:58.240 --> 00:45:04.080
the impact of changing to something like, you  know, posterior chain LVP, you know, hamstring

00:45:04.080 --> 00:45:10.240
test? like has it been how's the efficacy of it  been? Has it been valuable for you? Can't say

00:45:10.240 --> 00:45:18.000
anything regarding the hamstring assessment yet. I  can say we had a pretty significant return to play

00:45:18.000 --> 00:45:24.960
uh where we had an individual that came in, NFL  athlete that came in for partial hip replacement

00:45:24.960 --> 00:45:32.960
rehab. Uh and a year prior to that, he had a  uh quad patella rupture, quad tendon rupture,

00:45:32.960 --> 00:45:40.240
excuse me. was still having or still experiencing  some pain in that knee and hip was fine. And so

00:45:40.240 --> 00:45:44.960
we took him through force plate assessment.  We took him through air squat assessment,

00:45:44.960 --> 00:45:50.720
not finding any major asymmetries in the force  plate assessment for uh the Keiser squat LBP

00:45:50.720 --> 00:45:55.280
was kind of on par, still lacking some velocity.  And then we took him through overcoming isometric

00:45:55.280 --> 00:46:03.280
assessment at 90° of knee flexion and 60° of  knee flexion and he was surprisingly symmetrical.

00:46:03.280 --> 00:46:11.440
And then we decided to take him through a leg  extension LVP. And when we took him through a

00:46:11.440 --> 00:46:23.200
leg extension LVP, his OPR on his left and right  side, like the outcome was uh 57% asymmetry for

00:46:23.200 --> 00:46:28.960
his non-injured side versus we'll call it healthy  side. And that was like a light bulb moment for

00:46:28.960 --> 00:46:36.240
us. And so we started leveraging metrics from that  LBP um and started taking him through different

00:46:36.240 --> 00:46:42.560
protocols like different EQIs and so forth and  and the leg extension and other exercises as well.

00:46:42.560 --> 00:46:48.240
We just kind of added in the the leg extension  and different protocols there within his rehab.

00:46:48.240 --> 00:46:54.800
And within four weeks we saw that that asymmetry  drop down to I think it was like within the 20%.

00:46:54.800 --> 00:47:05.360
And then within 6 weeks it was within like 13%.  And we started to see his performance metrics,

00:47:05.360 --> 00:47:11.040
his counter movement jumps, his sprints,  everything started to significantly improve. And

00:47:11.040 --> 00:47:17.280
uh if you look at it from like a, you know, just a  scatter plot, you just see this nice little linear

00:47:17.280 --> 00:47:24.240
progression with everything. But we wouldn't have  been able to do that if we didn't have the the

00:47:24.240 --> 00:47:27.840
lighting extension. we wouldn't have been able  one to identify it and then two be able to train

00:47:27.840 --> 00:47:32.320
like we trained it you know and that individual  ended up getting cleared from us and from our

00:47:32.320 --> 00:47:38.400
PT staff that did an amazing job and go out and  do a workout for multiple NFL teams right after

00:47:38.400 --> 00:47:44.960
that. Uh so that all happened within just like  probably three two to three months. Um, and that

00:47:44.960 --> 00:47:52.480
was probably the most impactful meaningful moment  and also just an ignition moment for me where I'm

00:47:52.480 --> 00:47:57.360
like, "All right, there's something to this. Let's  start diving. Let's start diving." Yeah. Awesome.

00:47:57.360 --> 00:48:03.200
A really great example of like identifying a local  issue, right? And then seeing an adaptation there

00:48:03.200 --> 00:48:07.680
which then contributes to like a more enhanced a  better global performance. So, I think you were

00:48:07.680 --> 00:48:13.840
like the first person that even said that in LA  at the Red Bull facility where you were like,

00:48:13.840 --> 00:48:17.040
"Yeah, I'm going to give you partial credit for  this, Gabe." Where you were like, "Yeah, this

00:48:17.040 --> 00:48:21.360
allows you to start pulling the onion back and  diving deeper and deeper into the layers." I said

00:48:21.360 --> 00:48:29.280
that. Yeah. Must have read a book that morning. I  appreciate that. It's really cool to see that into

00:48:29.280 --> 00:48:32.880
practice and thanks for walking us through that.  It's always nice to hear some specific examples.

00:48:32.880 --> 00:48:36.480
Hunter, I know you are on the road right now.  You got like a couple minutes left here. So,

00:48:36.480 --> 00:48:41.200
got a couple of fun questions to finish up with  for you guys. Just kind of some quick hitters,

00:48:41.200 --> 00:48:45.680
but Hunter, before we do that, any resources you'd  like to share. I know you have the Force system,

00:48:45.680 --> 00:48:49.760
maybe your social media, too. Please share.  Yeah, I appreciate that. I would say my social

00:48:49.760 --> 00:48:55.600
media is probably like the place where you can  access any of it. I have a website that's not

00:48:55.600 --> 00:49:01.680
particularly unveiled yet, but good enough. It's  forsystem.com, and it has a lot of information on

00:49:01.680 --> 00:49:06.560
there that can direct you in certain ways.  Cool. And then Rich, for you guys at Exos,

00:49:06.560 --> 00:49:10.000
there anything that you maybe want to share  potentially a social media handle to, where's a

00:49:10.000 --> 00:49:17.360
good place for people to connect with you? Social  media wise, it's coach Rich Puit. P R U T. You're

00:49:17.360 --> 00:49:22.000
not going to see much there. I just pretty much  repost everything that uh Exos puts out unless

00:49:22.000 --> 00:49:27.520
it's a few like hiking or racing videos that  I'm getting into on the weekends, but um you can

00:49:27.520 --> 00:49:33.120
definitely connect with me there. And then EXOS  has a plethora of educational resources as well

00:49:33.120 --> 00:49:38.960
that you can reach by going to our website and  being able to go into the EXOS education portion

00:49:38.960 --> 00:49:46.800
of the website. We are going to be dropping uh a  new Exos XPS certification later this year. So,

00:49:46.800 --> 00:49:51.280
I don't know if that's being promoted yet, but  I do know that we're going to be putting it out

00:49:51.280 --> 00:49:57.280
later on later this year. So, keep your eyes out  for that. Awesome, guys. Appreciate it. Hunter,

00:49:57.280 --> 00:50:03.360
uh, you'll start you'll kick off with this one.  Favorite restaurant in the Phoenix Tempe area.

00:50:03.360 --> 00:50:07.040
Man, I was thinking that you were going to hit  us with training questions and now I'm having to

00:50:07.040 --> 00:50:11.120
shift gears and we don't eat out that much. So,  this is a toughest question. Tough of the day.

00:50:11.120 --> 00:50:16.000
Rich, you go first so I have a second to think  about this. God, I'm the same boat, man. Okay,

00:50:16.000 --> 00:50:21.200
I'll say this. This isn't a restaurant,  but I'm like a big coffee shop fiend. like

00:50:21.200 --> 00:50:30.240
other than my family and whatever, like I love  coffee shops. So, Satellite Coffee in Phoenix,

00:50:30.240 --> 00:50:36.160
probably near uh near Rich, probably a little bit  south of Rich. They have a shake and espresso with

00:50:36.160 --> 00:50:42.080
a salted cold foam. Man, it is the best coffee  you'll ever have. Satellite coffee. Got it. Thank

00:50:42.080 --> 00:50:48.800
you. Got to check it out. Uh probably Buck and  Ryder. Solid restaurant. Good atmosphere. It's

00:50:48.800 --> 00:50:54.400
in the Scottsdale area. Haven't had a bad meal  there yet. I didn't think I'd be able to stump

00:50:54.400 --> 00:50:58.560
you guys today. All I have to do is ask about  food, you know. But all right, satellite coffee,

00:50:58.560 --> 00:51:02.000
shaking espresso, buck, and rider. Thanks, guys.  And then, all right, Rich, going to you on this

00:51:02.000 --> 00:51:08.000
one. Super Bowl prediction. I can't give you one.  I got guys that are playing on both sides. I knew

00:51:08.000 --> 00:51:13.680
that was going to be the answer. I had to try. I  had to try. honor. I did grow up a Patriots fan,

00:51:13.680 --> 00:51:19.760
but um you know, I've got some we've we exos,  you know, we we've got some athletes on on the

00:51:19.760 --> 00:51:25.120
Seahawks, but I I would say this, the Seahawks  defense is firing on all cylinders right now. So,

00:51:25.120 --> 00:51:29.680
the Patriots are going to have a really tough  job. Diplomatic. I like it. I would I would say

00:51:29.680 --> 00:51:34.880
uh honestly, the Seahawks and the Patriots are  probably my two least favorite teams in the NFL.

00:51:34.880 --> 00:51:39.680
Um, I'm a Chiefs fan, so this year was rough,  but I'm not used to seeing us play late in the

00:51:39.680 --> 00:51:45.360
playoffs. So, I'm going to go Seahawks. I think  it's the lesser of two evils in my opinion. And

00:51:45.360 --> 00:51:50.560
as Rich said, like their defense is phenomenal,  and I don't know. Sam Darnold is probably a

00:51:50.560 --> 00:51:56.640
little bit better of a quarterback than Drake May,  maybe. Oh, that's what I'll go with. All right,

00:51:56.640 --> 00:51:59.520
guys. Well, I appreciate it. Thanks so much  for making time and joining us on the Keiser

00:51:59.520 --> 00:52:03.200
Human Performance podcast. Can't wait to catch up  with you guys soon. Thank you. Yeah, man. Thanks.