Movement is Medicine: Dr. Matthew Brackney on Muscle Mechanics, Injury Prevention, and Keeping You Running Strong

If you haven't had a moment to do so yet , please consider heading over to your favorite podcast app hit , follow , rate the show and , if you're getting something of value , leave us a review and let others know . And finished numerous ultra distances , all the way up through 220 miles , and I am unashamedly a member of the back of the pack .

Just like many of you Now , have you ever wondered why certain injuries keep coming back despite all your efforts to heal ? What if the key to preventing common running injuries lies in how you move Well ? Today , we're super excited to have Dr Matthew Brackney as our guest to help answer those questions and maybe more .

Dr Brackney is a highly accomplished doctor of chiropractic and a certified chiropractic sports practitioner with extensive expertise in sports therapy and human movement .

He holds a master's degree in physical education and motor learning from the University of Houston and has served as assistant athletic trainer for Rice University Athletics and provided sports chiropractic services for all Rice University Athletics between 2016 and 2019 .

As the valedictorian of his chiropractic college class , dr Brackney has dedicated his career to helping both elite and everyday athletes like us improve their movement , heal from injuries and lead healthier lives . Dr Brackney's approach combines chiropractic adjustments , muscle therapy and therapeutic exercises to address the root causes of pain and injury .

He believes that movement is medicine and is passionate about educating his patients on how to take care of their bodies to prevent future issues . Fantastic . Join us as we dive into his innovative concepts , especially victim and culprit in sports injuries , and grab yourself some valuable techniques to enhance your running experience , whatever your level .

You know , just here's patellar tendonitis , here's a plantar fasciitis , and you'd look at that condition and you're just looking at that anatomy and that tissue . What are the exercises that you do for this area ? What are the therapies that you provide for this area ? And there's a lot of value to those things . Those are necessary .

But what I learned actually at my time at Rice this is when I learned this lesson and I'll tell you how I learned it here in a minute but what I learned was that just because someone has pain in a certain area doesn't mean that's where the problem is coming from . You can have incredible results when you address the actual root cause issue .

So just to give a little bit of the context there , I was an athletic trainer before I was a chiropractor , so that was my background . Like you mentioned , I was working at Rice . I worked primarily with the swimming team as well as the tennis teams , a swimmer who was dealing with shoulder pain . She had shoulder pain .

She started seeing me every day in the athletic training room and we started doing ultrasound . We started doing some exercises , we started to e-stim every day in the area . She was just not getting any better and this went on for at least a month , so a whole month . She's still kind of practicing , but she's practicing limited .

You know , she's not going full go and she was . She was a , she was a pretty good swimmer , she was a contributing member of the team , you know , and in university athletics , you know division one athletics and stuff a lot of times their education is linked to their scholarships . So it's not , you know , it's a big deal for them .

They , if they lose that scholarship , they may not be able to continue their higher education , you know . So there's a pressure there to help these athletes get better and get better as soon as possible . Staff said , hey , have your athlete go see one of the chiropractors . And my initial thought was the chiropractor ? It's her shoulder , not her back .

Why would I have her go see the chiropractor ? And the head athletic trainer at the time she she said just trust me have him go see the chiropractor . We'll , we'll see what they say . So I signed her up to see the chiropractor . I didn't actually go with her to see the chiropractor . He would come a couple times a week to the athletic training room .

He came , she saw him for a session . I saw her the next day and she came into the athletic training room . I was like what's your pain scale today ? What's your pain like today ? I was like what's your pain scale today ? You know what's your pain like today ? And she was like it's a zero . And I was like a zero .

I was befuddled , I was baffled yeah , because you know she hadn't had no pain in six weeks . So she was like , yeah , I saw the chiropractor and the pain's gone . And I was just flabbergasted that she could have that fast results after one session . So I go in next time this guy comes to Rice , to the university .

I went in there and I was like , hey , man , thank you for helping my athlete . But what did you do ? I was just . I was like I was almost indignant as well Like I've been working on this athlete trying to get her better for a month and with no results . And you see her one time and she's fixed , just walk right in .

Yeah , I was so confused so he opened my eyes to this concept . He said she didn't have a shoulder problem . I think I had mentioned something like how did you fix her shoulder ? He's like well , the problem wasn't her shoulder , the problem was her neck . After I shoulder , he's like well , the problem wasn't her shoulder , the problem was her neck .

And you know I , after I picked my job off the floor , he explained to me you know , just because someone has pain in the area , it doesn't mean that's where the problem is . So many times the area that hurts is the victim , it's the tissue that's getting excessively stressed or pulled or twisted or compressed .

It's getting biomechanically affected because of neighboring anatomy that's not working appropriately . That was a really big light bulb moment for me as a clinician and from that moment on I began to look at the body . That way , I began to be more thorough in my evaluation .

So instead of just looking , someone came to me with knee pain instead of just looking at their knee , I started looking at their ankles and their hips and their low back as well , to see if I could find something that was overtly wrong in those other areas . That may make sense why it was affecting their knee in this case .

So that particular chiropractor , he became my mentor , he became a mentor of mine . He taught me a lot organically there and that really revolutionized how I looked at the body and how I approached injuries and pain .

Are those the kind of things where you might look at that and go , okay , well , I might look at that and think , why is my shin hurting ? I've got to roll my shin . But you might come in with that victim-corporate context and say , actually it might be something else going on there .

Yep , as you were mentioning about back I mean back issues , hip issues causing things lower down that chain too .

So if you understand , if you know the anatomy , if you know how the hamstring ties into the knee and how that ties into the calf , this becomes pretty easy . So anatomy , and then the second part is biomechanics , and that takes an expert eye and training in understanding how biomechanics works .

But that can also you can have faulty biomechanics in an area that leads to an issue in another area . But a lot of times and this is where I like teaching folks is just kind of showing them those kinetic chains and how , yeah , you have a really painful Achilles but it might be because of the calf or your hamstring being really tight .

So kind of learning to explore upstream and downstream , if you will , and just learning that concept . Man , someone could really fix a lot of their own issues if they understood that concept . So that's something I like teaching people .

They're such good tools at doing the myofascial release digging into muscles , helping break apart restrictive tight fascial adhesions , helping break apart knots .

You know , the vibration gun , a foam roller , a lacrosse ball it's all basically doing the same thing . You're kneading the muscle and you're kneading the connective tissue that's called fascia . You're helping it not be too adhesive or sticky to the muscle .

It all kind of does the same thing at the muscle level , but they're just sort of different tools for different areas , you know yeah like different . You think about different screwdrivers . You know flathead versus phillips head , but if you were to just get one , I'd get the vibration gun , because it it's you know you can .

You can bring it anywhere it's tends to be . You get results a little bit faster .

It's the one that I have now . It's an excellent tool , it's well-made , it lasts a long time . But over the years the market's been inundated with other ones , which I think is actually a good thing , because there are some pretty good quality products out there that you can get for just cheaper .

I think I've even seen some as inexpensive as like $30 on Amazon . Oh wow , yeah . Inexpensive as like 30 bucks on Amazon ? Oh wow , yeah . But if , if , if you're going to be using it with regularity , I'd I'd recommend you .

You know , maybe you don't have to get the most expensive one , but get something that in the middle of the price range so that it'll last you .

You know other sports chiropractors and even sports physical therapists can provide . Yeah , you know there's just stuff that you can't do to your own body . So there's the . You know chiropractors call it the adjustment , physical therapists call it a manipulation . It's the same exact thing but different sports medicine realms call it different things .

But essentially what it is is decompressing compressed joints . That's essentially what it is . There's sometimes nuances to that , but that's essentially what's going on . So two joint surfaces get excessively compressed and when they get compressed it acts like a suction cup and that suction , you know where there's a vacuum effect and there's not a lot of movement .

That's great for suction cups , but it's bad for joints . Joints need to be able to freely move . They're not meant to be stuck and adhesed . When they're like that , that leads to the joints not being the the , the joint fluid it's called synovial fluid .

That tends to get dried out because there's not movement happening and that's like if your engine got low on oil , your car engine had got low on oil , there'd be excessive friction and that would really be bad for the engine . Well , in the same way , when there's a diminished amount of synovial fluid , that's really bad for joints .

You know , joints get more wear and tear . They just kind of hurt and ache more . There's more inflammation . So this joint decompression therapy , the adjustment manipulation , whatever you want to call it , is decompressing those joints . So now that joint can move appropriately again , now that joint can move appropriately again .

So whenever you go and you get popped , that's what's happening is the that suction , that suction is getting is getting released and now the joint can move appropriately . That's just not something that is . Yeah , that's what the pop is and that's a . It's just not something you can do on your own In most cases .

Some people can crack their low back , you know , and that's fine , but there's a lot of you can't pop your own ankles , you can't pop your own hips in most cases . So that's something that you know . It's really valuable to have a sports chiropractor like me to be able to help out with .

But obviously the you know the expertise of understanding the biomechanics , you know the mind is also important .

It's not just not just the physical popping of joints , but also , you know , understanding how the body works and helping people implement strategic concepts to get over their issue faster , you know so yeah , now my , my body pops and cracks all over the place For the synovial fluid .

If you get damage to that synovium , then it can affect the ability of the joint to produce synovial fluid . But yeah , it's self-replenishing , which is pretty cool .

So the back and the pelvis , the sacroiliac joint , is a really it's starting to become , you know , more common knowledge about that particular joint , but it is such an important joint for the low back , the pelvis , the hips , and it seems to be involved in just nearly anyone that ever has back pain . This joint's involved at least somewhat .

So that's a really important joint to have functioning appropriately . And then I'd say the ankles and the feet . That would be the the next one I would say for runners , that's a really important one .

The feet if they're not absorbing shock well , if the muscles are imbalanced calf is too tight , shin muscles too weak that tends to lead to a lot of lower extremity issues , pain and injuries . So having those joints aligned appropriately and decompressed appropriately is super valuable .

And that's not something that every chiropractor does , but usually more a sports chiropractor or a sports physical therapist tend to be more skilled in the feet and the ankle .

Now , as far as movement mechanics go , are there some key elements of , of the way we move as runners , or in particularly , ultra runners , where we're out there for such a long time trying to do a repetitive motion that we should be aware of or focusing on making sure we get right ?

So a lot of us sit when we work , sit when we drive , sitting at school or what have you . So the common pattern is tightness in our quads and hip flexors and then relative weakness or just less use in our glutes and hamstrings .

So if I were to be overly simplistic , you know , I would say just about everybody could benefit from being diligent about stretching their hip flexors and quads and then making sure they're using and activating their glutes and hamstrings .

Again , that's a massive oversimplification , but it's a really common pattern that can lead to a lot of different types of injuries and pain . So I'm confident , like I said , that just about most people could benefit from that idea , that concept .

Where do you stand on the whole warmup , stretching kind of thing ?

So stretching should be looked at the same way , and I think that's sometimes when people , experts even they're not addressed looking at appropriate , they're just looking at it as one one thing and yep , stretching either it works or it doesn't . I think that's . I think that's short-sighted . I think it's a tool and when it's used appropriately it's awesome .

Just in general . So if we're talking about warming up , then I would say a dynamic warmup is more appropriate . If you're just talking about you're just needing to get warmed up , needing to get your muscles more elastic and blood flowing , then I would say a dynamic type warmup is more appropriate . But stretching is a fantastic tool in several different circumstances .

When you have an adaptively shortened muscle , so when a muscle is really tight you ever been on a phone call for a long time and you're holding the phone to your ear and your bicep muscle starts to get really tight and you stretch it out .

And you're holding the phone to your ear and your bicep muscle starts to get really tight and you stretch it out oh my gosh , it's so tight . What was happening is that muscle was getting shortened because it was in that position for a long time . So this concept that's a sort of extreme example , but that sort of concept happens all the time .

So when we sit for a long period of time , our quads and our hip flexors get adaptively shortened and tightened . When a muscle is in a position for an extended amount of time , it tends to adapt to that position . That's the principle I'm referring to .

So back to the example of the quads and the hip flexors if someone sits a lot , their hip flexors and quads are going to get shortened , and when they're shortened they need to be stretched . So that's one example of when stretching is really valuable . Another is when you're dealing with a really stubborn knot .

Knots respond really well to stretching , but a particular type of stretching the contract relax stretching technique so this has a few different names . Stretching technique so this has a few different names . Different medical disciplines call it different things . The physical therapists call it PNF stretching or proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation .

Osteopaths , osteopathic physicians call it post-isometric relaxation . But the concept is this when you stretch a muscle , there's a neurological reflex that wants to reflexively contract and kind of fight that stretch . So when you squeeze the muscle and activate it and then stretch it , you actually are able to inhibit or shut off that reflexive little mechanism .

That's what happens .

So this idea , how you implement this in a stretch is you stretch a muscle let's say you're stretching your quad you hold it for a good , you know , normal 15 or so seconds and you just engage the muscles you press against your hand or whatever you're holding your leg up with for a few seconds three seconds , one , two , three and then you relax .

After you relax , you'll pull further into the stretch and you'll notice you can go deeper into the stretch . Like I said , what happened is you were able to shut off that reflexive contraction mechanism that our body does and you're able to get a deeper stretch . But that also helps with knots .

When you have a knot in a muscle that's really stubborn , you're having a hard time with it . That contract , relax , stretch is really valuable . So that's another example of a really valuable circumstance where stretching is great , it's fantastic .

So yeah , like I said , if we're just talking about warming up , then I think it's better to do a dynamic type warmup , but there are certain circumstances where you need to stretch , because it's a valuable tool .

But can you share with us just some basic exercises or routines that you feel might be useful for runners like us that we might be able to do at home just to kind of keep ourselves in a good health state ?

so . Going back to that pattern , I like to talk about patterns because it helps create a framework for the victim-culprit concept .

So , like I was saying , a really common pattern is tightness in the hip flexors , tightness in the quads and then relative Pattern is tightness in the hip flexors , tightness in the quads and then relative I don't want to say weakness , but inactivity , disuse of the glutes and hamstrings .

So with that , doing the lunge stretch is a really valuable stretch for the hip flexors . There's some nuance to it . Sometimes people do that stretch incorrectly and it leads to and they're just not feeling a good stretch . So the hip flexor stretches in a lunge type position .

If you'd like , I could send you a video a YouTube video that I have that goes over how to do that stretch correctly for your listeners .

I like to do that same thing , but instead of using my hand to hold my foot where it's supposed to be , I like to use a couch , a bed , a bench , something to prop my foot on . So that way I have both my hands free and I'm not trying to balance on one leg and hop around .

I , I I work with patients a lot on these types of issues and hip bridge is something I use all the time with my patients so making sure they're feeling it in the right place and they're not overarching their back . Those are important concepts .

They're all lifestyle-based Heart disease , stroke , cancers , diabetes , lung disease . Those are all related to lifestyle factors what you eat . If you're physically active , do you smoke ? If you eat better food , better choices , and you stay physically active , don't smoke , you can really avoid the top killers of people in our world .

So from that standpoint , that's why I'm so passionate about helping people stay in these activities they love doing Stay running or weightlifting or whatever it is Golf or hiking . I want to help keep people involved in these little athletic endeavors . They're a part of because it's so important to our overall health .

Part of because it's so important to our overall health . Physical activity is super important for our cardiovascular health , our musculoskeletal health muscles , joints but also our mental health . We've learned a lot about that more recently in these past few years . That physical activity is so important for mental health .

It is unbelievable the amount of benefit it has for different mental health issues , whether it be anxiety or depression , and then also our metabolism , how our internal body functions . So much research that that's come out in the past decade , two decades , about how important physical activity is for so many different aspects of our of our health .

So and then the other kind of piece to that is you know , if you have a physical injury , a physical problem , then in my opinion a physical solution is most appropriate . If you have a chemical problem , um , then a chemical solution tends to make more sense as being appropriate . But the sort of traditional Western medical model doesn't view it that way .

They just use chemical approaches for everything , a chemical approach for every problem . So that's sort of an aspect of that little phrase as well . If you have a biomechanical problem , then a biomechanical solution is the most appropriate solution .

We sit around and we don't move during our work life and we work longer and longer hours and there's so much evidence , I think , that not just from the physical but , as you brought up , the mental side of things , that getting outside , in particular trail running as well as many other sports out there , but when you're out in nature and you're moving around ,

moving along the landscape on your own two feet and just kind of , there is definitely a mental aspect . But you can only get there by moving right . So if you look after your engine , your car , you can get out there and drive it and go to some really cool places and get the benefits of the mental side of things .

But I think you know when your car starts to break down you can't take it places and then you lose that option from the mental side of things . I agree , I think , just moving , and I don't care if you're the slowest person out there or the fastest person out there .

I think it's amazing when people get up and give it a go and just commit to moving , really , just commit to moving , really .

You mentioned just earlier of a recent experience you had with , uh , someone in their eighties , I believe you said running their first marathon , with someone in their 80s , I believe you said running their first marathon . I've seen other examples of men and women doing incredible athletic feats well into their years and they didn't start that way .

They started where they could and then they built up and worked at

it . But I think that's so inspiring because we just tell ourselves the narrative , the lie , that well , I'm getting older , I guess I can't run anymore . Well , I'm getting older , I guess I can't do this anymore . And I think in a lot of cases that's just wrong , that's a lie that we kind of buy into .

But I think if you just keep moving , you know , even if you can't do as much as you used to be able to do , but at least if you just keep moving , you're going to preserve your joints , you're going to preserve your muscles , you're going to make your body more resilient .

So bone density right , bone density is is improved when you bear weight in your body , when you run , lift weights . Those things help improve bone density .

So there's just there's so many health medical benefits for staying physically active , and I hope that more and more people decide to go against the grain and say you know what , even though I'm getting older , I'm still going to get out and I'm going to try this new activity . I'm going to try to do a trail run , like you said .

There's relatively few young people actually getting into the sport age and thinking , wow , I'm really feeling like I haven't run , I haven't been athletic , I haven't moved for I don't know 10 , 15 years since I was in my twenties .

It seems like there's a lot of people in this particular sport of ultra running who are in that age bracket , certainly the 40 to 65 bracket . So I think it's really interesting that . I think it's .

It's one of these moments where people kind of have this aha , and they go all right , I need to move again , yeah , and it's a sport that allows you to move to some degree at your own pace .

You don't have to be fantastic at it , you just have to get to the finish and be to cut off here and there , yeah , so yeah , I just think the demographics of it kind of fit the I'm getting older narrative and actually I really want to do an episode on that . I want to do a whole episode on on sort of training and running races .

Uh , as an older athlete , as as people who are aging , as I approach my 50th year , I think that's only appropriate . But but yeah , I mean , things change , right , and maybe your approach to training changes and your approach to racing changes because of the age .

It doesn't mean I mean you might be slower relative to yourself at age 30 , but you can still set goals and you can still go out and train and you get all the side benefits that we talked about from a health perspective for doing that as you age and maybe then you are healthier later into life .

So I think that's kind of why I like the sport and there's lots of opportunity to take on a challenge within that and sort of keep yourself mentally active as well as physically active and outside in some beautiful places across the world .

So yeah , I think maybe an episode on aging as an ultra runner , the differences in training and the age-appropriate challenges that come with getting older , how we might approach those . So yeah , good thoughts indeed . Now I know you're not just a chiropractor Outside of your own practice . I think you're a fairly accomplished ultimate Frisbee player . Is that accurate ?

Then I actually hung up hung up my cleats for a few years because I couldn't , couldn't manage it with family life and owning a practice and everything that went into it . But just to give some context , club club when I say club , that used to be the , the highest level of ultimate frisbee there's actually professional leagues now .

Believe it or not that it's been around since 2016 or 17 , I think the professional ultimate Frisbee league , but it runs sort of parallel to club . All the club players that are the highest level athletes play on those professional teams .

But the professional league is run by completely separate individuals who are trying to make a business , you know , sports , professional sports , out of it and the club , the people that run the , the what's called club ultimate frisbee , are just , you know , it's a non-profit , it's just for the sport and the things like that .

But essentially the same type of people play . But more of the past few years I've picked it back up because I aged into the masters category , so masters is oh yes , 33 and up .

So it it it lends itself a little bit better to my . You know , I'm married , I have three kids yeah a business owner , so it it kind of works nicely .

So we actually just had our regional tournament a couple weekends ago , and so I was in oklahoma city competing and our team uh , we didn't do as well as we wanted to , but we competed pretty well and we had a good time .

So it's just called a point where you just call it scoring a point . But it's not like football in that American football has downs and you stop play in between each down . It's not stop , start and stop . Like that . It's more free flowing , like hockey or soccer or basketball .

You know , someone can steal the Frisbee and then go back the other direction , you can throw it backwards and across the field to go forwards . So it's sort of a combination of like I said American football and soccer , but you're throwing the Frisbee .

I help out their athletes I've played with several of them that are on the team but I help them out on the side as well as far as from a sports chiropractic perspective . But , uh , yeah , you can very cool , you can . If you wanted to watch a game , you'd go to , you know , ultimate frisbee association , ufa . Go to their website or or their youtube channels .

Like I said , you can . You can see some pretty cool plays .

Now I know you had a song choice , which is kind of fun . Do you want to tell us what song you picked and why ? Maybe you picked it ?

I think in the spirit of the song it's more about taking internal action in your life and not being on the sideline , but also the double meaning for me and us and this conversation is really just getting out and moving and moving your body and choosing some form of activity to do on a regular basis is , like we said , so important for our overall health .

So sort of a little cheeky song choice .

We'll make sure that song gets added to the playlist so that folks out there can enjoy it as much as we do here , enjoy it as much as we do here .

And so , as we wrap up this enlightening episode with Dr B , I want to extend my heartfelt thanks to him for sharing his wealth of knowledge and practical insights on injury prevention and the importance of proper movement mechanics

. Dr B's expertise in identifying the true culprit behind sports injuries and his holistic approach to chiropractic care has given us some fantastic information .

You may well find him at the finish line of your next race , and I know firsthand that his passion for educating runners like myself on how to move better , heal better and ultimately live better truly resonates within our ultra running community .

So thank you , dr B , for your time and for empowering us with the techniques and strategies to stay healthy and stay active .

Listeners out there , you can find Dr B in a variety of places , on Facebook , over on YouTube for some of those tutorials and if you're anywhere in the area in person , at Spine and Sport Therapy , which I will link to as much of as I can in the show notes below , if you have interest and I can tell you from personal experience he really is very good .

While you're on the internet searching for Dr B's practice and videos , don't forget to subscribe to this show as well , get notified each time a new episode comes out and , of course , follow , share and like . That would be very much appreciated .

Doing any of those things really helps promote the show , gets the word out and increases the chances of other runners finding the information that awesome guests like Dr B have given up their time to come and share with us . You can find this show on Instagram , facebook and over at ChooseToEndurecom .

So be sure to head over to any of those spots and check us out . Say hello to endurecom . So be sure to head over to any of those spots and check us out . Say hello and you can now drop us a text message right from the show notes if you like , or even suggest a topic . I do love getting those interactions .

So until then , go practice your movement mechanics and go look up one of dr b's enlightening youtube videos so that you can continue to run long , run strong and keep choosing to endure .