An athlete trapped by his own body
An athlete trapped by his own body
Mike has a tall and muscular build, the frame of someone who was built to move powerfully. But for years, chronic lower back pain has defined what his body can and cannot do. He spent over a year in physical therapy. He continued to live in fear of his back locking up without warning. As a former D1 college basketball player, he was no stranger to pushing through discomfort, but this was different. The pain did not come from one identifiable movement or injury. It manifested from years of accumulated imbalance, the kind that builds silently when the body moves in repetitive patterns without correction.
He has had periods where he could not get out of bed. His back would completely lock up and the unpredictability of it was as debilitating as the pain itself. He loves golfing, but when there is no single movement that directly causes the problem and instead the pain comes from a lack of movement variety, even something as simple as a round of golf became a gamble. He might feel great while playing and then be bed bound the next day.
The root issue turned out to be spiral line asymmetry, meaning his muscular imbalances wrap around his body like a helix. When both sides of the body are asked to work together in compound lifts, the stronger side compensates for the weaker one, reinforcing the pattern rather than correcting it. The likely origin: years of basketball at a high competitive level, where the body is asked to rotate, jump, and land in the same dominant patterns thousands of times.
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Pain free days are no longer the exception
After six months of training together, the last two months have marked a turning point. Mike is experiencing multiple consecutive days with no pain. Something that felt impossible when he started is becoming a regular occurrence. He can take long flights without them being excruciating. There have been days where he has played a full round of golf completely pain free for the first time in two years. And not only pain free, he is getting into swing positions better and hitting the ball further than he ever has.
In the gym, strength gains are showing up and the movements are progressing. The work has been careful and deliberate, isolating the imbalances rather than loading compound movements that would let the dominant side take over. He cannot do hinge movements like squats and deadlifts yet, but the trajectory is clear. That is where the program is headed, and the foundation being built now is what will make those movements safe and sustainable when the time comes.
Mike's story is ongoing. It is not a story of a dramatic finish line. It is a story about what happens when the right approach meets a body that traditional methods could not figure out.