Ep. 297 - Your Body : Your Pickleball

[00:00:00.820] - Tony Roig Hello and welcome to Pickleball Therapy, the podcast dedicated to your pickleball improvement. Hope you're having a great week. My name is Tony Roig. I am your host of this weekly podcast. This week we're going to be talking about our bodies. [00:00:16.610] - Tony Roig Um, you know, a lot of time we spend a lot of time on the podcast talking about the mind. That's super important, obviously. But I've been reading— rereading, actually— this book called Move Your DNA by Katy Bowman. She's a biomechanist. And, uh, just some takeaways into that I think are really interesting, and I wanted to share with you because, you know, as important as the mind is, you also got to have a body to play pickleball. [00:00:38.420] - Tony Roig It's not, you know, we're not just sitting there punching the screen or moving things around a board. We actually have to move around a pickleball court, and the better our body is going to be, the better we're going to play. That's why I actually wrote an article as well called "Your Body, Your Pickleball." So I'm going to be sharing with you guys some ideas about your body and how to think about it maybe a little bit differently. And also encourage you to continue working on it, right? And how to think about it, again, a little bit differently than maybe you have in the past. [00:01:09.250] - Tony Roig As we dive into the podcast, we still have a few spots left in our New York camp coming up at the end of June. So if you care to join us in New York, please take advantage of that. It's going to be a lot of fun up there. Good food, hopefully some good weather. Definitely some good pickleball. [00:01:25.940] - Tony Roig So, all right, let me dive into the, uh, the subject we're talking about again is our body. And, uh, again, the book's name is called Move Your DNA. It's by Katy Bowman is her name. I, I, the author's name. I read the book a couple years ago, really changed how I think about, uh, my body and moving and how, you know, how you can avoid, potentially avoid injuries and things like that based on using the ideas in the book. [00:01:51.650] - Tony Roig So I wanted to share with you, share those with you. And generally speaking, her, her approach, uh, uh, Katy Bowman's approach in the book and in her, the way she explains things has a logical flow to it, right? Kind of like, uh, and that resonated too because that's the way that, you know, we try and coach pickleball, right? Is explaining to you the logic of it, the framework, objective strategies and shots, right? So we start with framework. [00:02:14.590] - Tony Roig So she sets up a framework of, of basically, you know, that our body, the basic function of our bodies have evolved, has evolved to move us from point A to point B in search of food. That really is the most basic function, right? That's our most basic need is to eat and obviously drink water. So we need to have a vehicle, which is our body, to move us from point A to point B. The way we live now, right? [00:02:42.230] - Tony Roig Modern, the, our modern way of living, is a much more sedentary way of living than we did, than our ancestors did, right? Than the hunter-gatherers in our history did. You know, if you think about the amount of time that we spend static versus the amount of time that we spend in motion, it's night and day compared to what it used to be. And in fact, you know, I'm recording this podcast seated, right? I'm seated on a stool in front of a microphone in a room. [00:03:11.830] - Tony Roig And when I get done with this, I have to go sit in front of a computer to type some things and do some things like that, right? So my movement today is going to be very small. I did a little bit of housework this morning, some things I was working on in the laundry room. I went to the gym for a little bit. And that might be the extent of my movement today other than just getting around the house and things like that. [00:03:33.860] - Tony Roig So when you think about the way that we move relative to how our bodies evolved, There's a mismatch there. And what she suggests is that this mismatch is in fact potentially the cause of many of our ailments that limit our ability to fully enjoy ourselves or enjoy our bodies, right, throughout our life. And, you know, why this is so important to us, and it's important in pickleball, as I mentioned, right? We need our bodies to be able to do things. On the pickleball court to be able to hit the ball and move around. [00:04:07.120] - Tony Roig It's also important for life, right? You know, we basically have this one vehicle, our bodies, that we are going to, you know, spend our time on earth in. So the better that our bodies are, the better that they feel, the more enjoyment we'll get out of our life and our pickleball. Now, what's really interesting about her approach is that it's not that it's easy to do what she suggests, but it's not as complicated as you might think it is, as long as you have some attention to it and some, some increased intentionality in how you approach it. And then, so what, what can you do, right? [00:04:45.310] - Tony Roig What, what can you do to, uh, to improve your body using these concepts or trying to, trying to avoid the mismatch between how we live now, the sedentary lifestyle, and how our bodies evolved, it's actually just to move. It's to have more movement in your daily life. Now, let's talk about what we mean by movement or what she means by movement and what we're trying to get out of movement here. It's movement is not the same as exercise. Okay. [00:05:14.590] - Tony Roig You know, in other words, like, like whenever you're moving, you are in fact exercising. But exercising may not by itself be movement, not the type of movement that you need. And one way to think about it is like riding a bike, right? Now, riding a bike is a physical activity, right? You could ride a bike for 100 miles and you're going to get a lot of physical activity in riding the bike those 100 miles. [00:05:36.400] - Tony Roig But if you think about the type of movement that you're using in that biking, it's a very limited range of motion, right? It's basically, it's a repetitive motion. It's, you know, your legs are going up and down, up and down, you know, and around as you push the bike along. You're seated in a certain position. Maybe you stand up once in a while, but most of the time you're going to be in a certain position as you travel on the bike. [00:06:01.020] - Tony Roig And you're also, one thing that she explains in the book really well is the idea of load, right? So, you know, we think of Earth gravity as 1G, right? That's the standard gravity on Earth. That's how we think about it in terms of gravity, right? It's 1G. [00:06:15.500] - Tony Roig If you're on the moon, it's like 0.3G or something like that. And if you're in a car going around a corner really fast or in a roller coaster, you might get to 3, 4 Gs. So we are always subjected to 1 G. So like walking, you're subjecting your bones to 1 G of force or of load as you, as you walk, right? On the pickleball court, you're, you're exposing your bones and your muscles and your joints and everything to 1 G of force as you move around the court. When you bike, you actually are not applying G's to your movement, right? [00:06:46.070] - Tony Roig To the force that you're exerting when you're biking because you're sitting on a bike and you're pedaling the bike as opposed to exerting that movement onto the earth. So the way that you move, the way that you load your body is really important to the type of movement that you do as well as the range of motion that you engage in to get this idea of movement, to get this idea of what Katy Bowman refers to as nutritious movement. And I really like the way she explains in the book the idea of, you know, let's say that you need 2,000 calories a day, right? 2,000 calories is your recommended daily allowance of caloric intake. You could, in theory, eat 2,000 calories of pasta or 2,000 calories of potatoes or 2,000 calories of Snickers bars, right? [00:07:33.030] - Tony Roig Is that a healthy 2,000 calories? I think you would agree the answer is no. You need some variety in there, right? You need some, maybe some vegetables, maybe, uh, some protein. You need some carbs. [00:07:43.320] - Tony Roig You need, you know, different things in your diet. You need some macronutrients, things like that to have a complete nutritious diet. It's the same thing with your movement. In order to have a complete well-rounded movement, to have nutritious movement, you need to have different, move in different ways. You need to articulate your joints in different ways. [00:08:01.850] - Tony Roig You need to load them differently and things like that. Now we don't have the, um, it'd be unrealistic to say, okay, go live like a hunter-gatherer. So walk, you know, 6 miles a day over different terrain, climb trees, you know, go climb over rocks and things like that, which would be the full range of motion that your body's designed to do. But there are certain things that you can do to, um, to increase your range of motion and your movement. Now to make your movement more nutritious. [00:08:29.250] - Tony Roig So like even if you don't have access to like fresh vegetables in your movement, right? Maybe you can add, you know, a can of green beans once in a while, or you can add, um, you know, a, a different form of, of, uh, starch or a different form of carb, right, to vary it up a little bit. Maybe you can throw in a half a banana once in a while to your movement, right, to your movement routine. Um, now I'm going to tell you the, the first thing that I would do if I was you is I would buy a copy of this book, Move Your DNA. By Katy Bowman, K-A-T-Y B-O-W-M-A-N. We'll put a link down in the show notes. [00:09:03.160] - Tony Roig I'd get a copy of her book. I think it's $10 to $20. Great investment to learn more about your body, right? And, and potentially your health. Now the next thing is, is being more attentive and intentional about your, your movement, about your, You know, about your, how you incorporate movement into your life, right? [00:09:28.790] - Tony Roig Not let it be like a side choice and not let it be like, well, I'll move only, uh, you know, the times that I'm required to move. For instance, you, you have to move on a pickleball court. I get that, right? You can't not move on the pickleball court, but you can also move other times, right? So be more and more intentional about moving and plan your movement, right? [00:09:51.060] - Tony Roig So, and I'm not talking here just about taking like a 10-minute walk, right? 10-Minute walks are fine. So if that's all you can do, do that. But if you want to add more intentionality to it, are there times when you're driving somewhere that you could instead maybe walk? And if you know me, uh, you know, those who know me, my friends, my family, they know that I love walking. [00:10:10.720] - Tony Roig So like you, if I can walk somewhere, I will likely walk there rather than, um, than catch a ride or then, then, then, uh, take an Uber or drive. Recently I was at the PPA in Atlanta and I stayed about— I was about 35 minutes from the venue walking, and I walked there pretty much every day. I did— I would shuttle back sometimes to the shuttle stop and then walk from there, which is about 20 minutes. So if I was tired, I would save the 15 minutes of walking sometimes, but I walked pretty much every day while I was there and I felt great walking. So look at your situation and see, maybe like you're headed to a friend's house who's 5 blocks away. [00:10:49.480] - Tony Roig Right? Maybe don't drive there. Maybe walk there. Right? Maybe there's a store near you that you can go to to pick up a, you know, half gallon of milk. [00:10:56.060] - Tony Roig Take a backpack, walk to the store, throw the milk in the backpack. Just walking outside is so good for your entire body, for your entire chain of— and when I say your chain, you'll understand when you read the book, but the chain that starts at your feet, dries up your whole body. It's just so good for all your ligaments, all your muscles, your bones, for everything. Just that extra movement, just the extra getting out there. It's also really good for your brain. [00:11:18.240] - Tony Roig Right? Talking about the mind. Because your body— you're, you're going back to the basic premise that the most important function of your body is to move from point A to point B to get you food. Think of how much brain power and how many nerve endings are associated with that function. If it's the most important function of your body, it's got to be a lot, right? [00:11:42.940] - Tony Roig So if you walk in the way that you're designed to walk, which is outdoor forward walking, you will be triggering all of these sensory parts of your brain and of your, of your nerve endings and things like that that otherwise lay dormant. So that is about being more attentive and intentional in your walking. And then the, uh, the last thing I would suggest to you is you may have to rediscover some movement patterns. And this is, this is normal, folks. This is very normal. [00:12:14.320] - Tony Roig As we get older, you you know, we lose balance, we lose some mobility. I've been seeing a couple of videos recently came across my feed about, you know, folks learning how to jump, right? And these are adults learning how to, like, learning how to jump because they don't remember how to jump. They don't know how to make their body move in the way to jump even, you know, a couple, you know, 3, 4 inches off the ground. And, um, uh, actually, to be honest with you, when I saw the video, I was like, well, let me check myself, you know. [00:12:41.740] - Tony Roig And I, I don't have a great jump. I can jump a little bit, but I probably If I was going to jump higher than I can jump now, I'd probably have to work on it some to rediscover how to fire those muscles. And what happens is, is it's not that you did anything wrong. It's not that there's something wrong with you. It's just you haven't done it. [00:12:57.780] - Tony Roig And so, you know, even take walking as an example, right? I mean, like, there's a ton of videos on YouTube about how to walk. And it's not a— it's not a joke. It's not a funny thing. It's not— it's just, you know, it's just we don't know how to do certain things in the way that our bodies are designed. [00:13:13.880] - Tony Roig I myself probably don't walk as correctly as I could if I knew how to walk better, right? So there may be some things in here that you're going to want to rediscover about your movement. And don't, don't feel ashamed. Don't feel like bad or less than because you, you know, because you need to do a little bit of work on this front. Put the work in. [00:13:34.860] - Tony Roig Why not? Why not, you know, enjoy this one time, you know, one trip around the sun that we have, um, as well as we can, right? And not be held back by silly things like, you know, I should know, I should know how to do that. I, you know, I, I can just know how to do it. I mean, doesn't make any sense right now. [00:13:52.830] - Tony Roig There's two ways that I'm thinking about this that you could do it. One is, I, I don't, I don't know that we use, uh, physical therapists enough in our lives. Um, and here I'm talking about, obviously, you know, you're welcome to see an orthopedic and things like that, but Usually those strata of the healthcare field normally, or most of them as far as I know and as far as I talk to folks and like that, they're usually more dealing with like, you know, like I need a knee replacement or I need a surgery or something like that. Whereas physical therapists are dealing more in the, you know, like preventative kind of stuff, right? Like training you how to use your body seeing how you're using your body mechanically and determining if there's a, if there's a problem with your, the way you're walking or things like that. [00:14:41.100] - Tony Roig For instance, you know, like, uh, like a lot of times when people have problems with their knees or have problems with their backs and things like that, stems from the feet, right? I mean, the, the, there's a problem with the way their feet are moving, and so that problem with the feet then, then goes up the chain into the knee, into the back, and things like that. So one option is, um, to find a physical therapist or someone trained like that in your area who can help you, you know, figure out what's the best ways for you to move. If there's some areas that you could use some rediscovery and movement, help you out with those. I think it's perfectly good thing to do. [00:15:16.560] - Tony Roig The other thing you can do is you can, you know, if that's not available to you, whether there's no one in your area or just financially not something that you're in a position to do, then you're on a real full discovery mission yourself, right? It's, you know, look at it, You know, but here's my suggestion. Don't just follow the first thing you see, right? You know, either one, acquire enough knowledge for yourself that you can discern what's real and what's not, and/or number two, find enough consensus in what you're looking at, right? Like, you know, this doctor, I double-checked them and they're from, you know, Harvard School of Medicine, and here's what they're saying. [00:15:52.530] - Tony Roig And I saw 3 other videos from same kind of folks and this is what they're saying. Okay, that makes sense to me. I'm gonna start doing that. I do have to put a caveat here. I'm not— I can't give you medical advice, right? [00:16:01.820] - Tony Roig Obviously over a, over a podcast. And also I'm not trained in the medical field. But, but, you know, those are— but you can, you know, you can try and see if you can get the information yourself or you can get professional help. Those are the two ways. But don't be ashamed about having to, like, rediscover some movement things that, that you think you should already know how to do. [00:16:21.880] - Tony Roig Because listen, at the end of this, it's about you. It's about your life. It's about living the best life you can. On and off the pickleball court, right? So on the pickleball court, you're going to play better. [00:16:29.650] - Tony Roig Off the pickleball court, you're going to feel better, you're going to move better, you're going to live better. Um, highly recommend you pick up a copy of the book, um, you know, if nothing else, to get a different perspective on, or a fuller perspective maybe, on, um, on how our bodies operate, how our bodies work, and, um, and how we evolved, and see if there's stuff that you can do that allows your body to have more of that nutritious movement, as Katy Bowman refers to it in her work. So that's this week's podcast. I hope you enjoyed it. We went into the body, talked a little bit about the mind, but it's just so important, right, to live our lives as fully as we can while we're still here. [00:17:11.410] - Tony Roig So if you enjoyed the podcast, please take a moment to rate and review it. Really appreciate you doing so. If you want to check out our book, Pickleball Therapy, I'll put a link in the in the show notes as well. That's only about the mind, not about the body, but it'll help you out with that. And as always, if you enjoyed it, please share with your friends, because if you enjoyed the podcast, they probably will too. [00:17:31.850] - Tony Roig I hope you have a great week, and I'll see you next time on our regular episode. Be well.