#34 - Treating Elite Athletes on a Global Scale: Interview with Dr. Todd Riddle

Factor, spelled F-A-K-T-R, stands for Functional and Kinetic Treatment with Rehabilitation. Over the past decade, this unique approach to treating pain and dysfunction has been utilized by healthcare providers on 6 continents, serving as a framework that guides clinical decision-making in patient visits around the globe on a daily basis. With this podcast, our goal is simple: to bring the best and brightest in clinical education to the forefront and empower practitioners with cutting-edge, evidence-based content that improves patient outcomes and inspires healthcare providers to continually evolve their approach to treatment. In each episode, we will feature a training or interview with some of the top minds in healthcare in a short format that is easy to digest with actionable information that you can implement into practice right away. Let's get started. Alrighty. Well, thank you so much, Dr. Riddle, for joining us today. I think it's no surprise to our audience that we are a husband and wife team. So it kind of feels weird calling you Dr. Riddle, although I think it's important for me to do that for our audience, just so they can kind of get some context. ...into the reason for today's conversation. As much as I would love to just sit down and interview my husband, my close friends and loved ones, there really is a purpose behind today's interview and this special edition of our podcast. Oftentimes, people listen to our Factor podcast and they learn from different instructors around the globe on different topics of interest when it comes to clinical care or even business prowess and how they can become better practitioners and better business owners. But today we're going to talk a little bit about a specific niche within the healthcare realm, which of course is treating elite and high-level athletes. You, I know, recently have been traveling a good bit with the World Games. Previous to that, you've also had experience in the Winter Olympics. You've also had experience in the World Cup, most recently here in our Olympic year. And one of the main reasons I thought it would be great to have this interview is in response to the inquiries that we get on a regular basis from different students and healthcare practitioners around the globe who are interested in working with these sports teams, elite-level athletes. They see practitioners like you that get to travel the globe and go to these exciting events, and they have questions. They want to know, how did you get there? How did you have this opportunity? What can I do to get there? And then likewise, what are some best practices, behind-the-scenes things Tips, advice, and guidelines that they can pull from in order to reach a level where they can be a sports healthcare practitioner working at a high level. For those of you that are listening, Dr. Todd is a chiropractor, so he's a sports chiropractor. So our conversation today will involve a lot of discussion around sports chiropractic specifically, but hopefully today you'll walk away with some information and insight that is not only applicable in the realm of sports chiropractic, But really within the umbrella of sports medicine in general, and in that elite-level care that is offered to these athletes. So thank you again for taking some time today. Let's go ahead and set the scene and talk a little bit about your most recent Games that you had the privilege of attending. Tell our listeners a little bit about where you were this past July.

So first of all, I want to say that I feel very blessed to be able to 10 of the games that I have been. That'll become important later on as we talk about how these opportunities came up. But most recently, I was at the World Games in Birmingham, Alabama, and I was there as a part of a delegation of sports chiropractors with FICS. And within the States, that's a lesser-known organization because it's an international organization, the Federation of International Sports chiropractors, and I was part of that delegation, about 40 to 50 chiropractors that were able to go out and treat the athletes from all over the world in sports that were being considered or already into the Summer Olympics. So it's kind of a neat thing. A lot of people may have heard about World Games but are not really familiar with what they are. The year after a Summer Olympics, they hold the World Games. And part of the reason they hold the World Games is it's kind of a tryout for new and upcoming sports that they're considering for acceptance into the next Summer Olympics. So part of my role as the delegation I was assigned once I'd gotten there was to work with parkour, beach handball, speed climbing, and breakdancing. It was more than speed climbing. It was climbing in general, but there were 3 disciplines within climbing. And it was a really great experience for me, not ever having worked with those sports, but it was a really amazing experience for a variety of reasons. I was able to serve with many of my friends who I have done work with in the past and was able to meet a variety of new practitioners, sports chiropractors, in the process.

Wonderful. I think it's really exciting, and it was exciting for me to hear the sports you were assigned because As you mentioned, these are not necessarily common sports that a lot of people, when they aspire to be a sports practitioner, think about, oh, I'm going to serve the parkour team one day. They think about big sports, your big sports like the NFL, the NBA, MLB. But there are so many other elite athletes out there doing a variety of different sports. And I know when a lot of sports practitioners kind of aspire to treat sports teams or to work with elite-level athletes, That's probably some of the ones that are at the forefront of their mind. But I think it's important to note here that there are so many more other sports that need what healthcare practitioners have to offer, especially those that treat musculoskeletal injuries. All of these athletes have instances where they may be injured or just need some extra help to perform at their best. So I want to kind of hit the pause button here for a second and Give a little bit of insight and background into your history specifically, and how you became a sports chiropractor. We have a lot of listeners that are students that are currently in school to graduate and become practitioners, and they're choosing their specialties. They're trying to figure out which path to go down in order to be able to achieve a level where they can treat athletes in this way. What are some things that you were able to do along the way, and this could be early on, this could be your undergrad coursework, things that you did while you were in chiropractic school. Tell us a little bit about how you were able to truly become a sports chiropractor as opposed to a chiropractor that treats athletes, because there is a big differentiator between a true sports chiropractor and then someone who is a chiropractor that treats an athletic population.

Yeah, that's a great question. So I'm going to answer that from 2 different viewpoints. I'll answer the first part. It's the more simple way to answer from a clinician standpoint. So obviously, I also teach at Texas Chiropractic College. So it's a little bit easier for me to answer from the clinician academic standpoint. What I would always recommend For anyone coming into the profession or even considering coming into the profession would be to have some sort of exercise science, kinesiology background. So I came into chiropractic having a background in exercise science, but specifically with a concentration into kinesiotherapy, which— it's kind of a long story. I had originally intended to go to school to be a physical therapist, but also had an athletic scholarship. Could not do both, so was pressed into a situation where I had to choose. Obviously, I chose to take the athletic scholarship, but was very fortunate because of location and timing to be able to choose a program at the University of Toledo called kinesiotherapy. So it was a concentration within the exercise science program. So I was able to actually get something similar to physical therapy through the kinesiotherapy program. Which more or less set me up for the chiropractic school that would come later on. My first couple of years outside of graduating from the University of Toledo, I actually worked as a kinesiotherapist, primarily working in aquatic therapy, which was a great foundation for me from a therapeutic standpoint, but realized pretty quickly that that wasn't the only thing that I wanted for my career. So I kind of shifted into athlete performance. I gained my CSCS, which is a Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist, on top of my registration as a kinesiotherapist. So at that time, I was accumulating knowledge and accumulating certifications that I felt like would help me to be more impressive when the time came to start working with athletes, with strength coaches, with coaches, or with teams. And through a weird happenstance way, I Ended up playing some arena football, and there happened to be a chiropractor that worked for that team. So I was already a kinesiotherapist. I had already been working with athletes at that time and was able to play a little bit of arena football, but that was insignificant to the fact that I was introduced to chiropractic at that point. I decided to add chiropractic to my tool belt, to my wheelhouse, so to speak. So when I put all those things together, I felt like I had a chance to improve the lives of the people that I really, really was interested in serving, which was athletes. And so to kind of get back to my point here, going into chiro school or even coming out of chiro school, I think it's important to have a background in exercise physiology, to add on extra certifications like strength and conditioning, but also to have a very specific emphasis on understanding sports. You don't have to have played the sport that you're interest in working in. I'll be very clear with you. I've never breakdanced. I've never done parkour. Never done handball and I've never done climbing to the extent that these climbers do. But because I have a background in biomechanics, because I have a background in sports performance, it's a little bit easier to understand the needs of the athletes and to break them down even though I've never played the sports. So, there's a wide berth that a lot of Students and even practitioners have to be willing to accept that they have to cut in order to work in sports. And there's a lot more that goes into this, and I'm sure we'll dig a bit deeper into that, but that's the ground level is coming into the profession. It really is helpful to have an exercise science kinesiology background.

No, absolutely. And I know I've heard that over the years from different students and other practitioners that we've chatted with and had teach courses for us. Another question for you here, and it just piqued my interest. I'm not sure if this is something I ever asked, but why athletes? Like, what was your interest in working with sports? Was it because you were an athlete yourself? Was it just because you have an affinity for working with athletes for a specific reason? Tell us a little bit about why you prefer working with athletic populations.

There's a couple of different angles to take there. First and foremost, I'm an old beat-up athlete, so I went through my fair share of Injuries in high school. The most significant was, was a pretty significant injury to my neck and to my left shoulder that left it more or less my left arm paralyzed for the better part of about a year due to a football injury, and spent a great deal of time with physical therapists and athletic trainers, which stimulated my desire to want to be a physical therapist at the time. And again, the story that I just told kind of went a different direction, but It started with my own experience as an injured athlete. As an athlete, I also understand the desire to get back on the field. Now, as a chiropractor, it's a bit easier to melt those two together with my experience as an athlete, with my experience as a coach, as a strength coach, and now as a chiropractor. I feel like I have the best opportunity to impact athletes because of my own experience. We have a mantra in our office that we never do things to people from a treatment standpoint that we haven't experienced ourselves. I can extend that a little bit further. It's easier for me to work with people that I understand the best. I understand athletes the best because I am and have been an athlete. I still try to continue to be an athlete. So I choose athletes because they're highly motivated. They want to get better. They quite honestly, they really don't want to see me if they don't have to see me, but they understand that sometimes I am necessary, or chiropractors, sports chiropractors, are necessary in order to get back to the field of play. So it comes full circle. Me being an athlete, understanding athletes, and then setting up my entire professional career around wanting to serve athletes was the impetus for choosing sports chiropractic as the main focus of my practice.

Now, I would say it's pretty commonly understood that when you treat athletes at this level or you treat teams at this level, You end up being one member of a healthcare team. You work with other practitioners, you work with medical doctors, you work with sometimes massage therapists and body workers, athletic trainers, etc. How important has it been to have some credentials or some certifications that are not specific to chiropractic when it comes to working with other professions as part of that healthcare team?

Well, I think the first thing to emphasize there is that you're working with other professions, and sometimes those professions don't have a working knowledge or even the Practitioners of those professions don't have a working knowledge of what chiropractic or even sports chiropractic is. So the first thing you have to accept in a sporting environment as a practitioner, whether you're a medical doctor, chiropractor, physical therapist, is you're part of a team. So you're not there to be an individual, you're there to serve other people, and you have to understand your role. And that was the one of the very first things that I had to understand, but also have to impart upon the people that want to be Sports practitioners— I know we're speaking mostly to chiropractors, but anyone from an athletic trainer, massage therapist, physical therapist, or otherwise— you're part of a team. So it is important to realize that and to know your role and to establish your role quickly. Meaning, if you are going to be part of an Olympic team, if you're going to be part of the NFL, MLB, MLS, whatever, you're going to be part of a team and have to understand where you fit in in that process. Now, that all being said, yes, it is important to come in with certain credentials, with a specific background in sports. Many professional sports, many elite-level sports now do require you to have some kind of sports specialization. Obviously, from a chiropractic standpoint, I chose the CSCS, which is, as I mentioned, the Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist. I also have my CCSP, which is a Certified Chiropractic Sports Practitioner or Physician. And then most recently, I gained my International Certified Sports Chiropractor through FICS, as I mentioned earlier. So having those has obviously put me in a position to at least put my name into the hat, so to speak, or throw my hat into the ring to work with international teams. Now, that being said, many other practitioners not within the chiropractic realm may not understand what my certifications are. So I think it is important to have other certifications, to have other training that does cross professional boundaries. So that being said, having a master's degree in human performance, having a master's degree in exercise physiology, having extra training that as a chiropractor, a physical therapist could also acquire, that an athletic trainer could also acquire, is exceptionally important because then I think then we're all speaking the same language. The language is common and they understand what your training is. They understand what you know how to do. And it makes it easier to assimilate you as part of the team.

Absolutely. And I think too, it's important to note in the business workshops that we host, we have a principle called the learn it or earn it principle. And essentially, that explains expertise. So, there are 2 ways to earn and have expertise in any subject. One, of course, is to learn it by furthering your education, getting these credentials, certifications, degrees. The other, of course, is to earn it. And that involves experience. And anyone who's ever went out for a promotion, a new job, a new position, who has tried to get on with a team, even in this instance, you'll encounter situations where people are going to ask, what is your experience? And a lot of times that stops new grads in their tracks because they may say, okay, well, I've got all these letters behind my name. I've taken all these courses. I've earned all these certifications. But I don't have the experience yet. How did you gain some of this experience to complete the other side of the coin? Because obviously you have the CSCS, you have the CCSP, you had your undergrad work, but when it comes to treating some of these athletes, as you mentioned before, the healthcare team wants to know, like, what experience do you have? Have you ever done this before? Because it's one thing to look good on paper, it's another thing to actually say, I have done this or things similar to this. If you could talk a little bit about that experience and gaining some of that experience piece and how you really came about working with teams in general.

They go hand in hand. It's an interesting conundrum with anybody in the workforce. You want to go for a job, but they want experience, but you can't get experience until you get the job. You have to be willing to do a lot of volunteer work. In order to amass the earn it part, but at the same time, you have a responsibility in the background to be doing the learn it part too. Within the sports chiropractic realm, it's difficult to land a position with a team, whether it's a professional team or at the Olympic elite level, without having a special certification. I actually just had a conversation yesterday with another practitioner that was looking for opportunities. And this practitioner has a great deal of practical experience. They've been working with a lot of teams, but they're having a hard time breaking through to the next level because they haven't done the learn-it part of the experience, meaning they didn't get the extra certification. That's becoming a more important part of ending up at the elite or professional level as a practitioner because they want to see that you've also got the experience, but as well as having done the certification parts. So it's a bit of a dichotomy, but you actually have to have both. They want to see that you can learn and you understand, and we can all speak the same language from a practitioner standpoint. But they also want to see that you've accumulated time. And that was one of the conversations that I had with this practitioner and many other practitioners is you have to make yourself available to be at events. And many times as a new practitioner or a practitioner that's trying to break into a You have to work your way up. You have to be willing to donate your time, to volunteer your time at events. Many of us have started working 5Ks. We got our start working 5Ks or working peewee football, Little League baseball, where we were just out there stretching people out, doing education about injury prevention. And eventually we got that one opportunity that was able to catapult us to the next place. So one of the best things that I could say aside from the earn it and learn it is also just make yourself available. If you're just going to sit in your office and send emails and play on social media, that's not going to go nearly as far as actually being out there and being a part of your community, because being a part of your community is actually going to springboard you to the next level.

No, absolutely. And it's so funny because reflecting back, I remember early on At our first practice, you were volunteering your time for local cycling teams. You were volunteering for one of the local colleges' rugby teams, and none of that was paid work. And that was hours of your time. That was you taking all of your own equipment, you making sure that you had a med bag ready to go. You footed the bill for all of that. So I remember very well the days of the volunteer work that was done. And I think it's important to note here too. And I know this has been very true in my career. Many people I've known have often said that it's not always just what you know, it's who you know, and it's developing relationships, developing a community of colleagues that you can call upon or that can help open those doors for you. How important have those relationships with your colleagues or with different organizations within sports chiropractic been when it comes to these opportunities that you've been given to travel to these really great, incredible sporting events?

Well, let's start all the way back at the beginning. My very first experience with the Olympics was all the way back— I mean, it started back in the early 2000s, about 2002. I was working with one of my high school and college teammates who had bumped around NFL training camps and really didn't feel like that was a great fit for him. And as it happened, I received a fax message, for those of you who still remember what a fax machine is, Looking for athletes for the U.S. Bobsled and Skeleton Federation. So we sent in his information. He was a great athlete, fit the criteria. Very long story short, he ended up making the 2006 team for the Italian Olympics, the summer— the Winter Olympics in Italy, in Torino. So that set me on a path there. So that's kind of where the story starts. And once you lay that foundation, I was able to actually go— And be with him for that. But once you lay that foundation and you've set, especially in that instance, a niche, there aren't a lot of people having grown up in Ohio— he grew up in Ohio, I grew up in Ohio— that end up doing Winter Olympics for bobsled. So it definitely set both he and I on a course professionally. But making myself available to be there and to go learn and understand and be a part of his experience Then put me on a path for bobsled and skeleton moving forward. So that's where I have ended up, and in that process have met and learned from a lot of really great people. When I ended up at Texas Chiropractic College, it was kind of the same thing because of my background in bobsled and skeleton. I had a student that came through that ended up starting the Federation for Nigeria and Her team ended up in the 2018 Games, which I was able to attend with them in South Korea. Part of that process had me meet several great people, some of which I'd already known. One of my good friends out of Montana, Dr. John Wilhelm, he and I have had a lot of great experience working together. He's been a chiro for the U.S. team for quite some time. We were able to spend some time together and even get to know each other even more in South Korea, which Led to another opportunity to go to Germany and work World Cup with him in 2021. So it's about being available, it's about making relationships, it's about being open for new opportunity and being willing to work whether you're getting paid or not paid. And that's another thing that I wanted to really reinforce here is some of the gigs I get to work are paid, but I'm still volunteering a lot of my time for other things too. So I, I will never say that I have made it in this profession, but I Have had a lot of really great experiences and still am willing to go out there and work for free so that I can say that I have been there and done that because I really enjoy what I do when working and serving athletes.

And I do think that's an important element to highlight here. Even as a student, there are so many opportunities for you to volunteer your time and get out there. And we've had so many dozens of students over the years I know that have reached out to you to say, hey, can I have a phone conversation? Let's have a cup of coffee. I just want to pick your brain. We've had dozens of students, whether they're athletic training students, chiropractic students, that have come through our office in shadowing opportunities. So I would say too that that's a huge thing to take advantage of while you are a student, is soak up as much information as possible. Take those opportunities to gain wisdom from people that have done the things that you want to do. If you know that you want to specialize In a specific way, if you know that there are certain sports you want to work with, or a certain population of patients you want to work with, and this goes beyond sports, this could even be other specialties within your profession, reach out to others who are doing the things you want to do. Find your mentors and just ask. It never hurts to ask, hey, I'd love to shadow you for a day. I'd love to find out more about how you got to this level or how you were able to transition your way into treating this specific population, etc. And as you mentioned before, it's really important as you are even coming up through the profession to make those relationships and to continue fostering those, continue staying in communication with people. I think that was a very valuable lesson that I learned very early on my first exposures to the world of sports chiropractic and to chiropractic in general was through Dr. Tom Hyde. And he, of course, is a legend within sports chiropractic. He is in the Sports Chiropractic Hall of Fame. He has literally helped to jumpstart so many different sports chiropractors' professional careers over the years by helping them get opportunities with teams or helping to make sure that he gave them advice and guidance. He's just been a wealth of knowledge over the years, and one of the Huge things that I learned from him, just observing him, is that he is a master at creating and maintaining those relationships and helping out the next generation, making sure that he puts people in touch with, hey, you need to meet this person because this person would help you connect on this level. And that's another thing that, to be honest, like, you do a really great job of as well, is that you continue those relationships after the first encounter. I've seen you meet people at a conference or encounter someone when working at one of these events, and then you continue that relationship beyond just that event. And I think that's so important when it comes to developing yourself as a professional, developing yourself within your career trajectory, whichever one you choose, is to make sure that along the way you're aligning yourself with like-minded colleagues, whether they're in your profession or in a related profession. But then beyond that, coming to the table with not only how can this person help connect me, but how can I help connect them? Because the larger your community becomes, the larger your reach becomes in terms of the different relationships that you have, the better you can serve those people that you consider friends and colleagues so that when they have a need for a connection, you're always able to step up and say, oh, I know somebody that would be perfect to help you with. And I think in the long run, that makes you just a much more well-rounded professional when you have colleagues you can call upon, when you have a network of other practitioners that you can reach out to if maybe you're encountering a difficult case with a patient, maybe you are looking for someone to refer one of your patients to in a different city, a different state, a different country, or maybe when you're just looking for opportunities to become a part of different sports that you haven't worked with before, attend some of these sporting events. Again, it's not always necessarily just what you know, it's who you know, it's those relationships that you fostered along the way. So when it comes to actually attending these events, when it comes to providing this care, I know it's a bit different than being on the sideline at the local high school football game. I think it's different in some ways, but I'm sure there are some similarities there as well. What do you feel like are those crucial tools? And by tools, I mean things that are physical, tangible tools, but then also those tools that maybe just come from knowledge, experience, and skill sets that you have found that are really crucial to have in your arsenal when it comes to traveling to these events, being there for these athletes in this way, and sometimes what can be a high-stress environment where a lot of things are going on at once.

That's a multifaceted question, and I really enjoy that one. And the first and the most important tool that someone can have is to have a good attitude. And by that, I mean be adaptable. I don't think I've worked a high-level event yet where something that was supposed to happen did not happen, or there was some significant thing that we had to work around. And I've got multiple examples of that. So for instance, last year in Germany, COVID was still at its height. And because of that, and because of national regulations in Germany, we were unable to be with the athletes indoors in a close environment, which meant that we weren't able to be in the locker room, we weren't able to be in the start house for bobsled or skeleton, which is traditionally where we would be working with athletes. So instead of that, We had to be out on the loading dock where they keep the bobsleds or the skeleton sleds outdoors. And in some instances, it was covered. In some instances, it was not covered. And in Germany in December, the average temperature could have ranged from 30 degrees all the way down to 0 degrees. So it made for a climate that was less than ideal for treating athletes, but that was the opportunity that was given to us to work with athletes. So most of the time, matter of fact, I can't think of one time when we were actually trackside where we were actually indoors treating athletes. So that's the adaptability. You have to be willing to work with the environment that you're given. The last World Games, we were supposed to have indoor climate-controlled opportunities yet again to work with athletes, and for a variety of reasons, we did not have those, so we ended up working outdoors. with a climate that was quite hot this time. So, it's kind of interesting having worked now in the winter and summer type games where the heat index for one of the several of the days actually was about 105 to 110 degrees.

Wow.

So, being adaptable and being malleable to the environment is certainly going to be a very beneficial and adequate tool For the sports practitioner. Outside of that, being as well-rounded as possible. I have learned so much being around other practitioners. It's easy to show up at a Games and go, I feel like I have this under control, and then you work with other practitioners and you're constantly impressed by the things that they're doing, and you're constantly impressed by the things that they know, that it encourages you to increase your knowledge. And one of the most significant things I've gotten out of serving in several different games and events now is my learning is never done. Sometimes I walk away feeling like I don't have the same level of skills that other people do, and other times I walk away feeling great. Yeah, I really know what I'm doing. But that's just a constant reminder to me that my learning never stops, and I constantly have to keep pushing to be the best practitioner possible. So that being said, I think being as well-rounded as possible and a bit agnostic in your treatment is definitely going to be a benefit. In the last World Games, there were several things that we weren't allowed to use with athletes because of the short time that we had with athletes that didn't allow us to follow up and therefore made other treatments probably not a great idea. So for instance, one of the things that I teach and I'm very well trained in is instrument-assisted soft tissue manipulation. That's a type of treatment that usually requires a little bit of follow-up because of the potential for a skin reaction or other soft tissue reactions that the athlete may have. But sometimes our interaction with an athlete is a one-and-done. They come in, they need something right there on the spot, and we may not be able to work with them again. And therefore, we have to pick and choose treatments that are going to be best for them in that one-and-done environment. And if you are very reliant upon a specific treatment in that environment, that will not serve you well because now you are basically limited or hamstrung, so to speak, by your lack of a tool belt. So having as much in your tool belt or toolbox is going to be very beneficial. So having soft tissue, having manipulative skills if that's in your skill set. But I'll be honest with you, I think one of the most important things you can have Is assessment. My assessment skills served me far better than any of my soft tissue skills, than any of my adjustment skills, because it helped me to get to know the athlete and helped me to choose the thing that was best for them based upon the tools that I had available to me. In Germany, I had all my tools available to me because I was working with one team. At the World Games, I was working with athletes from 100+ different countries and was limited in the tools that I had because of that follow-up. So being malleable, but having a very wide availability of tools or things that you can use is going to be helpful. And I used that word earlier, agnostic, not being ascribed to one or even two different techniques or treatments, but having as many things as possible to deal with the circumstances that you have.

No, I can, I can absolutely see where that can come into play, especially when it comes to being in situations, as you said, where Post-COVID, there's a whole other level of complexity on top of even your approach to treatment and the facilities that you have at your availability and at your disposal and the different ways that you can use what you have.

That's so true. Like, we had to treat through layers and layers and layers of clothing for World Cup outdoors. And obviously, as a hands-on practitioner, that makes it really hard to treat athletes. And fortunately, they were willing to accept that circumstance because they needed things too. So we all had to adapt the way that we treated people, and they had to adapt the way that they wanted to be treated in order to get by. And it worked. We figured it out. But that's what high-level practitioners and also high-level athletes are willing to accept. We adapt and we overcome. We figure it out.

No, absolutely. And just as a note for our listeners, when he talks about Germany, he's Specifically referring to his experience with the World Cup. And remind us again, the World Cup, you were traveling with bobsled and skeleton, correct?

Yes. So I was given an opportunity again, kind of back to what we were speaking there. I had a relationship with Dr. John Wilhelm who had asked me to come out and be a partner with him as he was working with several teams, but in more specifically with Australia. So we were back and forth between Altenburg and Winterberg, Germany for that portion of the World Cup tour with Australia bobsled and skeleton.

And it's so funny for our listeners to note as well, that experience in Germany, you had a rental car and you were actually having to drive through the streets of Germany in the winter at a time where a lot of shops and locations were shut down due to COVID. If you have any stories or insight you can provide on how to survive when you get those left curveballs thrown at you.

Yeah, that just goes back to being willing to be adaptable. Obviously, working with a federation in those circumstances, you have to be willing to adapt to whatever was going on. And because their plans change quite frequently, and maybe at the very last second, you have to be willing to adapt to that too. And the circumstance that I found myself in was the athlete that I was working with at that particular time, and the one that I was relying upon for transportation and whatnot, was having to leave a little bit early, which meant that I was going to have to navigate Germany and my travels through Germany to some extent by myself. So I ended up with a car, and fortunately it was a car that I was familiar with driving. It was a stick shift car, but I hadn't done that in quite a while. So driving in Germany with a stick shift through streets that are much, much more narrow than I am used to, it was really made for a very interesting driving experience, especially since I'm used to driving a very large truck through the streets of Texas. It made things a bit more Interesting, but it was, it was a lot of fun. And I cherish those times and those experiences driving back and forth between Winterberg and Altenburg on the Autobahn with my friends in a car that I was not familiar with driving. It was fun, but again, it was about being adaptable.

Well, and I think what's interesting about your experience is that you've now treated at events that are in the winter and are very, very cold, and you deal with one extreme of temperatures and weather. And then most recently, having worked at the World Games with the whole opposite end of the spectrum, where you're dealing with extreme temperatures on that end, what has it been like winter versus summer? If you had your preference to say, I really prefer working in this environment versus the other, what are some challenges that were presented based upon weather and climate? And how did you and your healthcare team adapt to those? And what were your takeaways? Like, what advice would you give to people working at either ends of those extremes?

The first bit of advice I would always give is ask someone else who's already done the thing that you're going to do before you get there. Fortunately, for the winter side, I had a lot of people that I could speak to about what I needed to take with me, what kind of gear I needed. So I showed up at the winter stuff prepared with all of the winter gear. Now, having grown up in Ohio and being familiar with the cold weather climate, it was— that was a little less Of a problem than showing up at the summer-type games where you obviously now have to deal with the heat side. So wearing the proper wicking clothing, making sure that you're hydrated. You deal with a lot of the same issues that athletes deal with. Obviously, they're performing at a very high level, but they have the opportunity to step away, to go back indoors, to go hydrate, to go feed, whereas if you are working at an event, There were several days at events with the team that I was assigned with, we were outdoors for 12 to 13, 14 hours at a time.

Wow.

Fortunately, underneath a tent, but we were still outdoors having to deal with the heat. So the extremes of weather present different challenges. Obviously, with the cold weather, having to try to treat through clothing, sometimes the athletes needed some very specific work, so they would have to remove layers of clothing. And our timeframe for treatment was very, very short because we had to get them back into clothing before they got too cold. Obviously, treatment out dockside is really more to get them ready to compete as opposed to for just pain treatment necessarily. And on the flip side of things, in the more warm environments, you have to take into consideration that you're sweating and you don't want to get that on them, and they're sweating as well. Which means if you're going to be doing something like taping, it may not stay on as well. So having someone who is able to coach you through that, having a mentor, and I tried to amass as many of those as possible, is very helpful, especially if you're going to a— your first Games environment and you're into your first competitive environment. You're not really sure what to expect. I've been very blessed. To have very patient mentors that were willing to walk me through the process. So I feel very fortunate to have people that I can call upon and now also feel fortunate to be one of those people that people can also call upon to ask those questions. So as much as I have been given, I look forward to giving to other people because I want to see this continue. I want to see our ability to treat athletes and serve athletes from a sports chiropractic continue to elevate.

So that leads us into the next segment and to wrap things up for today. What are some things that you would advise students, young practitioners in? And I guess specifically for students because they're still in school, they're taking all of these classes, they're learning all of these things, but maybe they've already decided, I want to become a sports practitioner, I want to specialize in this way. What are some classes that they really need to be paying attention in more than— and I don't want to say more than others, but what are some skill sets and pieces of knowledge that they need to walk away from school with right out of the gate, having a great understanding of in order to pursue an opportunity with a sports team?

I have some regrets about chiropractic school or just my learning in general, even in my undergrad. Were classes I wish I would have paid better attention to, and some classes that I did pay attention to. But looking back across my academic career, I wish I would have paid more attention in my neuro classes. Now as a clinician, I see the definite benefit to having a better understanding of the brain and the nervous system, obviously as a chiropractor. And it's a little harder to answer the question because I also understand as an academic That the school of thought is going to be a little bit different from school to school and profession to profession. So the things that I would pay attention to are going to be a little bit different to— or if I could have it all over again, what I would pay attention to are going to be a little bit different than what others would. But across the board, to be as general as possible, I would say pay as much attention as possible to the assessment component of your care. So whether that's Neurological testing, whether that's orthopedic testing, whether that's cardiovascular testing, get really good at taking a patient history. So anything you can do to learn assessment, that's the majority of what you're going to use as the criteria for diagnosis and therefore set the stage for treatment. So that's one of the things that I really emphasize myself, and one of the things I take pride in is Being a good assessor so that I can choose the appropriate diagnosis and then choose the appropriate treatment based upon that diagnosis. So those are the things that I kind of wish I would have paid better attention to in school and had to go back and make up for lost time because at the time I didn't really understand the value of those. But outside of all of that, aside from the assessments, because I'm a chiropractor, the hands-on component of what we do Is incredibly valuable. I've heard time and time again from students and practitioners say they wish they would have spent more time learning adjusting skills or manipulative skills, that they wish they would have had more time with hands-on type skills. So whether you're learning that in school or you have to make the extra effort to learn it out of school in a continuing education type course, those are the things that I hear hear many practitioners and students talking about. So those are the things I probably would say pay a lot of attention to, is your assessment and then your hands-on skills, because at the end of the day, that's really what you're left with is your brain and your hands, and that may be the only thing you're allowed to use in certain situations when you're working with athletes.

I think that's a huge point to drive home there, and I've heard it called over the years pin the tail on the donkey healthcare. Like, you don't want to have a situation where You're at an event, you have a limited time period with these athletes, and you have to sit there and try to keep trying to throw things at a wall to see what sticks, so to speak. You have to really zero in on what's going on quickly and then be able to treat that in an efficient manner. And going back to what you said about using your 2 hands and your brain, there will be instances along the way where you will be at a sporting event or working with an athlete and you may not have your your tool belt. You may not have all your tools and toys at your disposal, so you really have to be able to treat them in an effective manner, in an efficient manner from a time standpoint, using sometimes just your manual skills and the 2 hands that you have. So, wrapping up our conversation today, and again, thanks so much for taking this time, and I hope our listeners have gleaned a little bit of new knowledge and insight into taking a peek behind the curtain there. What's next for you? Of all the sports that you've worked with, the events that you've gone to, the travel that you've done teaching, what's up around the corner? What's next? Where does your passion lie?

Well, my passion will continue to lie with serving athletes. I've mentioned his name several times because he's an important person to me. John Wilhelm has a saying that he likes to use, helping athletes achieve, and I want to give him credit for that because he's a mentor of mine. So, my future will continue to hold helping athletes achieve, and wherever that opportunity presents itself, I will take. Most recently, we worked a local strongman event. We've got several marathons and 5Ks coming up here locally. So, whether it's local, national, or international, wherever an opportunity presents itself, I'll still be there to serve, and my own education will continue to press on. I've got several classes that I'm interested in taking. I've got subjects that I would like to learn more about. I think at this point, as I mentioned a moment ago, my significant interest right now is learning more about neurological assessment because I don't feel like I spent enough time understanding that. And as a chiropractor and as a practitioner, I think that much of what we do is driven by what the nervous system does and how the nervous system responds to our treatments. So I would like to try to marry those 2 things together, athletes and neurology. And I know it's already being done, and there are a lot of people out there that I could learn from, and I'm going to seek them out and continue to do that.

Wonderful. Well, thank you again. I really appreciate this information. And for those of you that are listening, we would love to have more of these interviews, more of these conversations, but all of that is dependent upon you. So let us know, let us know who you'd like to hear from, submit your questions in the Q&A link that we have in our show notes. And let us know what burning questions you have for some of our instructors that we featured in the past, or maybe even someone that we have not yet had the privilege of hosting here on the podcast. Let us know who you want to hear from and the topics that you want to learn more about. So thank you so much, Dr. Riddle. We will go ahead and sign off for today.

Thank you.

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