Dr Rusin – Foundation of FHT

come to for help.

Hi, I’m Dr. John Rusin.

I’ve built the reputation of being the strength and performance coach that other fitness experts come to for help. Especially when they’re hurting and can’t perform the way they used to.

Most programs assume people are in perfect condition before they start. But I know most people have been coached improperly or have something to work around.

So the way I approach things is different: My programs are reverse-engineered to keep clients from getting hurt AND to maximize their strength and performance.

You see, most other experts fall into one of two camps:

• Strength coaches who are great at helping people get stronger—but don’t understand how to coach movement and keep people pain-free.
• Physical therapists who are great at keeping people healthy—but don’t understand how to help people build muscle or increase strength.

I believe both of these extremes are wrong. They each have short-term benefits, but neither create athletes that are strong and resilient for the long term. That’s why I pride myself on being both a strength coach AND a doctor of physical therapy.

My programs are built so that you get stronger, without getting hurt (or hurt again).

We think recovery means “do nothing”.

As a Physical Therapist, it upsets me to know that a lot of my “colleagues” are to blame for this. PT’s with little to no exercise experience try to treat complex problems by essentially ignoring them—and telling their clients to rest and wait for the injury to heal.

Sure, these PT’s may give their clients a few small little exercises to help…but that’s usually where they stop. After the first few sessions, the client may have less pain, but they have ZERO idea what to do next. When can they start working out again? What kind of exercises should they avoid? How can they get back on the wagon?

This way of doing things is BROKEN. I’m often left trying to re-educate my clients on why “doing nothing” or avoiding a movement pattern all together might help them feel better in the short-term, but will only make things worse in the long-term.

Here’s what most PT’s won’t tell you: “Rest” is only important when you are truly dealing with a serious injury… broken bones, torn muscles, debilitating pain, you get the idea.

After that, you know what injuries need? Blood flow, movement, and practice.

Which is why it kills me when a months or even years after an injury, my clients feel nervous to work out again. Whatever injury you have now, it will only get worse if you continue to “rest” it forever. It will never get better.

Training, when done properly, always improves injuries. ALWAYS.

Reason #2 for why we get stuck:

We follow the same program that worked before
…that also left us injured.

But the problem is the training that got you here—got you here.

It wasn’t just life that knocked us off the wagon, it was the style of training, the exercises, the amount of time and energy we dedicated to it. It was those exercises and that “all or nothing” mentality that left us injured, immobile, and burned-out.

If we want to restart and succeed, we have to do something differently: