Dr. Kelly Starrett: Mobility King

Kelly is one of the great thought leaders on the planet earth. In person, he is the funniest and most dynamic presenter you will ever see. When he wowed guests at our PrimalCon retreats, he had people alternatively in stitches and absolutely captivated by his breakthrough approach to mobility, flexibility, and correct human functional movement for all activities. Kelly, aka K-Starr, is a physical therapist, former elite level whitewater kayak athlete, proprietor of San Francisco CrossFit, creator of the popular MobilityWOD.com website, and author of Becoming a Supple Leopard—perhaps the most comprehensive volume on mobility, flexibility, functionality, healing and prevention for athletic folks ever in the history of the world. Visit MobilityWOD.com to get a free 10-day dose of Kelly and his highly engaging, informal, and humorous style with which he conveys his unique and effective approach.  

Via his books and MobilityWOD videos, you can get everything you need to heal lifelong injuries and dysfunction quickly, and improve your performance dramatically by optimizing technique and minimizing injury risk. Kelly has basically created an entire new language and colorful vocabulary relating to warm up, injury prevention, rehabilitation, and improving fitness technique and general function. Terminology like “flossing,” “bashing,” “tacking,” and “mobilizing” relate to creative use of implements like foam rollers, golf balls, long rubber “voodoo floss” straps, and (his favorite) lacrosse balls in an aggressive and focused manner to increase blood flow, improve range of motion, and facilitate healing in muscles and connective tissue. Once your mobility improves, you then have a fighting chance at exhibiting correct functional movement during exercise and daily life (e.g., running with a balanced center of gravity over your feet and an efficient dorsiflexion of the foot on each stride), such that you won’t be doomed to a lifetime of repeating injuries, both acute and overuse. 

While Kelly was classically trained as a doctor of physical therapy, but this stuff is leaps and bounds beyond anything you’ve seen before. If you standing at the cutting edge of fitness and performance, you will bump into Kelly for sure. I relate on the podcast intro the single sentence he uttered to me on a phone call that helped me cure my long-starting and treatment resistance case of tennis elbow (tennis elbow caused by excessive golf!).  

If you search your podcast app for Kelly Starrett, you will get an abundance of content options for Kelly going off on his area of expertise. Tune into one of the shows and get a megadose of awesome. What’s great about our conversation is I wound this man up in the back room of SF Crossfit and he went off on a beautiful theme of simplicity and simple strategy to live a healthy, balanced life. We get so wrapped up in the details and sophistication of modern health practices that we forget how tech addiction and unconscious lazy habits can trash the best laid plans and the most motivated Type A peak performers.  

Kelly’s show will trip you out and will inspire you to relax, slow down, take a baby step in the right direction each day, and make some simple changes to daily habits that will make success and compliance easier and easier.