Navigating Pain and Performance | 28min snip from Huberman Lab

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Dr. Stuart McGill: Build a Strong, Pain-Proof Back

Huberman Lab

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CHAPTER

Navigating Pain and Performance

This chapter explores the complexities of managing pain through targeted movements and personalized training strategies, especially in high-performance sports. It highlights the need for balance between workout intensity and injury prevention while emphasizing the biopsychosocial factors influencing an individual's pain experience. Additionally, it discusses how different training styles can impact mental endurance and emotional responses, offering insights into tailoring approaches for athletes to optimize performance.

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In this episode, my guest is Dr. Stuart McGill, Ph.D., a distinguished professor emeritus of spine biomechanics at the University of Waterloo and a world expert on spine anatomy and physiology, back pain, and rehabilitation. We discuss the most common sources of back pain, how back pain can be assessed (including self-assessment techniques), and how to design a personalized recovery plan to reduce back pain.

We discuss how to train for lifelong fitness, reduce injury risk, and protect your back and joints based on your age and personal goals. We also discuss how to prevent back pain, build core stability, and explain how “McGill’s Big 3” exercises protect and strengthen the back. Dr. McGill, who is exceptionally fit in his late 60s, describes his low-time investment, personal training routine, and the specific exercises he uses for mobility, strength, and cardiovascular fitness.

We also discuss controversial issues in the back pain and rehabilitation field, including how pain originates, the biopsychosocial model of pain, and treatments such as platelet-rich plasma (PRP). This episode provides clear, actionable tools to strengthen, prevent, and remedy back pain and injury so you can be pain-free while enjoying sports, exercise, and daily activities at any age.

Access the full show notes for this episode at hubermanlab.com.

Watch the clip on back pain relief and spine anatomy that accompanies this episode.

Demonstration of The McGill Method