Adam Ster: Self-Care For The Endurance Athlete
About This Episode:
In this week’s episode, Adam Pulford interviews Adam Ster a movement specialist, healer, and guide for the athlete. They talk about how Ster’s “Protocols” help athletes/everyone recover and prevent injury and why this form of self-care is so important for the endurance athlete. For this episode, open your mind to Ster’s form of movement practice as it strays slightly from the hard science.
Episode Highlights:
- Treating NFL, Red Bull, and other professional athletes
- Maintenance through movement
- Protocols that help recovery and prevent injury
Guest Bio – Adam Ster:
Adam Ster may go by many names movement specialist, healer, guide for the athlete, Master Body Worker. To most, he is the renowned man who has helped so many professional athletes stay in competition, perform better, and recover. Ster has worked with athletes from the Olympics, NFL, UFC, and even Red Bull athletes. Being an endurance athlete himself he understands the importance of recovery and performing your best. Ster believes this practice can help everyone professional athletes, recreational athletes, and anyone living with gravity (spoiler, it’s everyone) that he has made the basics of his work accessible to everyone and has started a paid program to follow his more advanced works.
Read More About Adam Ster:
Website: http://masterbodyworker.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/masterbodyworker
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MasterBodyWorker
Twitter: https://twitter.com/masterbodyworkr
Ster’s YouTube Channel and Protocol videos:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLeyqF0lObIOjI837yOFqsA
Ster’s On-demand Classes:
https://flowzone.teachable.com/p/home
Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, or on your favorite podcast platform
Thanks To This Week’s Sponsor:
This episode of the TrainRight Podcast is brought to you by Stages Cycling, the industry leader in accurate, reliable and proven power meters and training devices.
Stages Cycling offers the widest range of power meter makes and models to fit any bike, any drivetrain and any rider, all manufactured in their Boulder, Colorado facility. They’ve expanded their offerings to include the Stages Dash line of innovative and intuitive GPS cycling computers covering a full range of training and workout-specific features to make your workouts go as smooth as possible.
And now, Stages is applying its decade of indoor cycling studio expertise to the new StagesBike smart trainer. Check out their latest at www.stagescycling.com
Episode Transcription:
Please note that this is an automated transcription and may contain errors. Please refer to the episode audio for clarification.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
[inaudible]
Adam Pulford (00:19):
Self care for the athlete. It’s crucial for physical and cognitive performance, as well as just general wellbeing for the athletes soul. But what is it? How do we do it? And how does it fit into your journey as our listener and as an athlete yourself, we’ll explore those questions in more on today’s episode of the train ride podcast. And I brought an expert for today’s conversation. I’ll admit I haven’t met too many people like him, Adam stir. You’ll get to know him in just a second. Uh, he is our guest and he, he calls himself a healer, a guide for the athlete or a master body worker. Now fair warning. This episode may go down a few rabbit holes and off the beaten path of science that we normally have trod down in past episodes. But I feel it’s important to do so because there’s a lot of lessons that can be learned from people like him, people that are in tune with what others may not be. Okay. Kind of a different level or dimension of the human body. It sounds weird, but as we get into the episode, uh, I think you’ll understand what I’m talking about here. So whether he, or people like him, um, are, or not on that next dimension, there’s something applicable that we will talk about. In this episode, we call them protocols, little movement protocols that our listeners, uh, can, can learn from. So let’s, let’s just get right into the show and you’ll, you’ll see what I’m talking about.
Adam Pulford (01:55):
So welcome to the show, Adam stir, how are you?
Adam Ster (01:59):
I’m good. How are you? Thanks for having me.
Adam Pulford (02:02):
Yeah, no, no, this is, this is great. I, I I’ve, I mean, have corresponded with you. I mean, we’re text messaging machines, but email calls, video calls you’ve even come to my house. Um, so it’s, it’s good to have you on the show.
Adam Ster (02:18):
Yeah, I’m still, I’m stoked. I love this kind of stuff. And you know, as, as you’ve seen with working with me in person, I have some different concepts, but they work and I like to be able to share it with everyone. So
Adam Pulford (02:30):
This is true, and this is true. As you heard on my, on my intro, uh, Adam, uh, stir, we have two items on the podcast today. It is me and it is, uh, Mr. Stir here, but you are a bit of a unicorn. You are a unique individual. Uh, and I appreciate that. Yes, but you know, I, I want people to get to know you and specifically, I want them to understand what you have to offer, whether it is just learning few, what we call your protocols here to help them move better as an athlete, or they go deep with you on some of your, you know, uh, crazy left field things that do seem to work for, uh, all the people you’ve worked with w which we’ll get into, but, um, I don’t want it. Why don’t you tell our audience a bit more about yourself and what you do?
Adam Ster (03:19):
Um, okay. So first off, it’s very, very difficult to explain the hands-on part, but for the most part of a movement specialist, um, I’m a healer. Uh, and I also, you know, I, I tell, I see the body differently than most, uh, things that are, that we have access to. So, um, when I say, you know, I’m a movement specialist, what that really means is I see the body as a rotational being, we, we are like a spiral staircase as opposed to a two dimensional piece of paper or a poster on an office wall. And so when you look at the body from a rotational standpoint, our relationship with gravity, which is a coined term for me, but our relationship with gravity is so much more important in a rotational capacity than the typical stuff. So when we do things in a two-dimensional manner, like even, let’s just say a squat, for instance, love the love, the exercise at a lightweight, we can go into that.
Adam Ster (04:15):
That’s a different rabbit hole, but the point is, is that that’s very, two-dimensional, I’m standing with my feet parallel. My body is parallel. I’m doing one motion in one plane. I’m going down. I’m going up now, when I’m walking down the street, am I doing that at all? No, I’m not. And so what, from a power sports standpoint, that exercise works, but I’m more interested in us as humans. How do we interact with gravity? How do we move around? How do we prevent injury and by doing so and so I’ve come up with these ways because, you know, for me as an athlete, I don’t, I haven’t trusted too many people to, to put their hands on me. Uh, since a few years back when I was trying to get my pro card and I had these therapists that more or less, I was just kept coming back and spending a lot of money and I was never getting out of pain.
Adam Ster (05:07):
And so I took it upon myself to figure out a way to fix it. And then I went down that rabbit hole. Um, and then that’s where this all began. And then I started working on people, um, prior to doing this and working with the, you know, the elite athletes of the world. I was an athlete myself, but I was also a bartender. And I worked in every vacation spot from islands to the mountains of Alaska to park city, Utah, you name it. I traveled, I learned, I dealt a lot with food beverage, um, you know, that kind of stuff, but in these really, really high in places where you better know your stuff, or they’re going to chew you up and spit you out. So, um, and I think that that’s where I have a benefit, you know, benefit people now is I work in an industry now in elite athletics, where they’ll you up and spit you out. If you, you better be good and you better be, you better be able to back up what you have to say. And so, you know, and that’s a big thing for me. So, um, but yeah, I I’ve, uh,
Adam Pulford (06:10):
Yeah. Yeah. And that’s it. And we’ll kind of pry in a little bit more into your background cause I think it is, it is interesting, but to just recap that, I mean, you, you work like hands-on type of, kind of physical therapy and massage techniques of sorts, and that’s probably won’t, I mean, that’s what he does folks, but not to like what you like fully understand a massage therapist to be is very different. Okay. Right. Um, and, but you also work with movement patterns and whether it’s virtual or face-to-face, um, it we’ll, we’ll get into this a little bit later, but it is, um, uh, a movement, as you said, movement specialists.
Adam Ster (06:51):
Yes. Uh, absolutely. Um, and, and also a healer. I mean, there’s, there’s also been instances where we’ve had, you know, from a concussion standpoint, I can deal with those in a different manner. Um, I can get those to disappear fairly fast over the residual effects. And I mean, fairly fast, like usually within an hour or two, um, um, you know, there’s,
Adam Pulford (07:12):
Which is crazy, first of all, for people listening, they’re like what I mean,
Adam Ster (07:16):
And I, I very much am that, um, I am the, the, you know, if something sounds too good to be true, but I’m the exception. So when I w and I really truly do that, I want to make somebody healthy immediately. Like my goal is not to need a month to fix something. My goal is to literally fix it in 10 minutes. And have you go, wait, wait, wait, what? No, that’s possible. How is that even a thing? Um, you know, and, uh, and so when it comes to the healer aspect, I do use movement with that because gravity is our killer. Everybody needs to pay more attention to what gravity does to them. Um, we’re in it all of the time, we can’t do anything, not one function that we do in our entire lifetimes does not have gravity in it. They always do
Adam Pulford (08:06):
Living on her space. Like if someone listening to this,
Adam Ster (08:10):
I was going to say that that was like ILA. Elan’s probably going to be pushing us somewhere so soon enough, we’re going to be like, well, now we gotta redo this again. But, um,
Adam Pulford (08:22):
Exactly. So w with average recreational folk, like myself, you work on them, but you also mentioned that elite athletics. Uh, who else, who else have you worked with?
Adam Ster (08:33):
Um, well, I mean, the list is heavy at, for, for this, uh, you know, level we’ve, you’ve got the Kate Courtney’s of the world, you know, world champion. Um, you’ve got the Von Millers, the Chris Harris juniors, the, you know, bunch of NFL guys. My, my main source, at least up to this point has been, uh, NFL, tons of UFC, um, really, really big names. The guy that started the UFC. Um, I think we all know that guy’s name. Um, but, uh, you know, you, you might say that you’re not an elite athlete, but I’m around them a lot and you really do produce so anyway, uh, but, uh, you know, I, I think, you know, pay some, a Kelvin is another one tons of red bull athletes. Um, red bull is also a very main source. You know, I do a lot of work, um, with them also, Paul [inaudible] who, uh, has a movie called any one of us. I may or may not be in this movie as well, but it’s an Emmy winning, uh, movie about him being paralyzed. And, uh, and now walking and riding his bike and, and jumping again. Whereas when, when I met him, he was, you know, barely able to stand up with canes. So, um, you know, those, those are the kinds of crazy,
Adam Pulford (09:50):
Sorry, folks, you should watch that and you’ll understand a little bit more of like where Adam spends his time and how he spends his time. It is pretty crazy. Um, in that regard, in fact, we had to kind of go back and forth on, on to schedule this podcast because, uh, you were working with the Ravens and they were in the playoffs and we couldn’t really do it, um, until they were done. Now they’re done just here, which I’m thankful for, but, sorry, man. Sorry. Sorry.
Adam Ster (10:20):
That’s all right. I already have, I already have a ring with the Broncos for super bowl 50. I got one. I wanted another one. I got a little greedy, but, but you know what I was, I wanted to chase Brady down, you know, like I, I want one for each finger. Oh yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.
Adam Pulford (10:43):
Okay. So, uh, the majority of our listeners are not NFL, uh, football players. They are endurance athletes. Yes. Let’s talk about what I call self care for the endurance athletes, self care for athletics that you specialize in. Okay. And I already, I talked about what self care is a little bit on the intro and this month, uh, Hillary, my co-host and I have talked about base training and setting up your 20, 21, your, the listener here, um, for a better 20, 21. And the reason why I’m talking to you, Adam stir, uh, about where that fits, where self-care fits into this, making someone better and a better athlete is because when they are moving with gravity better, when they are less injured, when they’re sleeping better and all these other basic self-care things that we’ll talk about, they are performing better. Okay. But for you, the specialist here, um, what is self care?
Adam Ster (11:44):
Um, okay. So, you know, for me, self care is the, the little stuff that you do when you wake up and when you go to bed, those are my most important pieces of my day. When I wake up, I do a baby protocol, um, and I have my protocols and they’re all on demand. And we’ll be talking about those shortly. And they’re designed for everybody, not for professional athletes, just professional athletes use them, but I do a baby protocol. It takes me between two and five minutes to get my body moving. Um, and you know, and do my, you know, my workout, stuff like that. My nighttime program is a little bit slower pace, a little bit of meditation in there. I’m always right before I get into bed, like at the foot of my bed, ready to ready to sleep. Um, and it does help with sleep and things like that.
Adam Ster (12:30):
But self care to everyone, especially if your training and your training as an athlete, I think we would call them weekend warriors, even though I think that’s a little derogatory of a statement, but, um, but the, the, the fact of the matter is, is anybody that takes their physical being seriously. It’s the little tiny things that you think aren’t doing a lot that actually make the biggest difference down the road. And so if you’re doing something that takes you 60 seconds in a day, and you’re doing it well, and it’s efficient, and you do that every single day, you may not notice how much it’s helping you, but down the road, if you weren’t to have done that, that compounds and actually puts you in injuries way, it puts you in harm’s way by not taking care of yourself. Um, you know, back in the day, when, when athletes would train hard, and this is me as well, I’m an, I’m an endurance athlete.
Adam Ster (13:27):
I mean, I have three ultras this year. I have every level of man, uh, an Olympic triathlon in there. Uh, and then all three Spartan races, uh, on top and endurance and nut as well. I’m a big fan. This is, this is me. This is me. And how I take care of myself without any help, because there’s not another me. You’ve asked me this question. I think more than once who works on me and the answer is me. And the thing is, is, is I had to develop a way to fix myself because nobody really understood sports on that level, back when I was trying to compete. And so as an avid, uh, endurance athlete, and I also do what I call life and death training, which maybe we didn’t talk about later, but, um, but, uh, you know, I have to take care of myself because I’m, I ha I have to work as well.
Adam Ster (14:19):
And my body is also my paycheck. I have to be able to, um, to go and lift and move 320 pound dudes, you know, and I’m legitimately lifting and moving them and tossing them around all day. I have to be able to not only be an endurance athlete, but I have to be a power athlete as well. Um, and so those little tiny things that I do on a daily basis and I, and I’ve made them to this point, to this point, I’ve made them so efficient and so easy that even, I second guess myself, like, was that enough? And then the next day I wake up and I’m not sore. I’m on day six of, uh, getting back to, you know, triathlon season. And I wasn’t even able to really train for over two months. And I just jumped right in. And I’m like, okay, I scheduled it out.
Adam Ster (15:05):
And today, even I’m itching to train and not because I’m, I’m overzealous or pushing it, like my body feels good. And I even second guess the, the ease of this and why things work. But it really does come down to those little things that you do, whether it be eating a salad instead of eating a pizza. Right. But on some days those extra calories are good. All right. There’s nothing wrong with having them here and there. But the point is, is that for me, self care is using these little things that don’t take a lot of time because you just spent a ton of time on your bike. You just spend a ton of time, you know, training and getting ready and getting your water bottles and making sure your bike is ready by the time you’re all done for the day. That’s a four hour excursion.
Adam Ster (15:51):
The last thing you want to do is sit down and spend another hour moving around. Like you want to be doing something else, including probably sitting on the couch for a little bit, you know? And so, and so for me, that was always the thing that got me. And so what are these easy things that we can do that will compound for the better later, right? So you hear about the 1% theory, you know, and, and so for me, that’s what self care would be. It’s the, it’s the little stuff. It’s the little tiny stuff and making the right decisions. But also that’s a very tough thing. If you don’t have access to things that are that efficient, you know, if all you have is a 90 minute yoga class and that’s all you know, to do, and this is the only thing that you’ve found to work, it’s really hard to make yourself do 90 minutes of yoga. If you’ve just been training for four hours on your bike at, at, at a high output. Yeah.
Adam Pulford (16:43):
And I was just about to say that, cause not, I mean, self-care, it’s many things as we just discussed. I mean, from the basics of making sure that you’re sleeping properly, right. Self-care is, is sleep and it’s recovery. Um, it’s nourishment, as he, as you mentioned, there’s nothing wrong with pizza folks. Pizza is good time and place for it. Don’t over do it. And it’s meditation, it’s meditation, it’s bodywork, it’s, it’s these things, but movement in particular and you kind of hit the nail on the head there. It’s like, okay, we all have heard, you know, yoga has benefits and stretching it as a whole other thing, stretching and all these like move all these things that are outside of the normal sport thing. There is a lot of confusion out there. Do I need 90 minutes of hot yoga to get the benefit? Or can I just do this right.
Adam Ster (17:33):
Well, and I can, and I can touch on that really, really fast. Cause I, I, this is one of those, this is one of those major points. Yeah. And, and, and then I just stepped ahead of you and we’re on the same page. Yep. Okay. So here’s the thing. I love yoga. Okay. And I’m not talking down on it ever because there is a time and a place for it. And there’s something just very relaxing about it. When you do it for 90 minutes, you’re done. You’re done. You feel good? Okay. The biggest thing for me with yoga and sports and being athletic is yoga deals a lot with ease centric tissues. Now, what I mean by East centric, tissues is long, tight tissues, hamstrings your back, things like that, where we’re more, they’re more like guitar strings. They feel they work the best when they’re stretched properly, but they also break down if you don’t shorten them.
Adam Ster (18:25):
And so when that happens, okay, you put yourself in harm’s way, your hamstrings are overly stretched, which means that they pop it. If anybody has ever noticed most of the time, when people pull a muscle, it’s like a hamstring. And the reason for that is because the hamstring is already in an elongated position. So that’s one thing that I do not like in terms of sports with yoga, but here’s the thing. If people are working out they’re training, they’re, they’re doing their sport and they don’t know much about stretching, which stretch and hold is not exactly great for us as humans. Um, but they go and they’ll do yoga because they haven’t done anything else. And that’s why yoga has such a good benefit, but in my opinion, and dealing with, you know, and not dealing, I don’t really like that word. I don’t know why I say it, but, you know, working with the best athletes on the planet.
Adam Ster (19:21):
Okay. I believe that there’s a more efficient way to move your body in the realm of athletics and taking care of yourself, um, then yoga. And that’s where, that’s where I come in. I’ve I have that for people now, but in my opinion, that’s I think that yoga works great because most people don’t have anything else, but in terms of athletic movement and it specifically athletic movement, not for meditation and things like that, specifically for athletics, working out things that are gonna make you sore or imbalanced, or have, uh, you know, uh, an imbalance you’re not balanced with gravity type of thing. I believe that there’s a more efficient way.
Adam Pulford (20:02):
Yeah. That’s, it’s a really good way to put it in, in the main premise of this, add onto this, Adam, if you like is as athletes. And when we’re talking about performance, a high performing athletic muscle is not loose. It is not supple it’s, it’s, it’s, uh, it’s a balance between, uh, tight, ready
Adam Ster (20:24):
To go, but mobile through
Adam Pulford (20:26):
The range of motion, it needs to do its thing.
Adam Ster (20:29):
Yep, exactly. Well, and also a balance between the two. So, uh, you say the word tight, and this is I’m going to, I’m going to throw a little entry to a rabbit hole. Everybody can choose where they want to go with it. The word, the word, the word tight to me actually has two different meanings. And if I say that, uh, you know, a long, so that’s a hamstring long, tight means that most likely when it is in prime perform mode, that tissue is right on the border of polling at all time. But it’s also working the best as a performer in that state. So when you’re not using it in that state, in that lengthened tight state, you should be shortening it. So doing like a hamstring curl and doing more rep base rather than power, okay, these are just examples. I’m not trying to give you performance situation or like training.
Adam Ster (21:17):
What I’m saying is is that if my hamstring feels tight, I actually should stretch my quad. If I stretch my quad because it works antagonistically so one has to be short while the other is long, right? So if my claws, my S my quads are super, super short, tight. See what I did. You have short, tight now, and you have long tight. If my quads are still super short tight, then I want to lengthen those. Okay. That tightness is telling me that I need to lengthen that tissue. Now, hamstrings, on the other hand, when they feel tight, that generally means that they need to have some relief from the tension. Okay. And then, and so when you can decipher between those two kinds of tight, now you can create a balance between the two tissues and they’re your performance goes through the roof. I’ve seen anywhere from seven to 15% performance gains just by balancing those two tissues.
Adam Pulford (22:09):
Exactly. And that’s, you know, as I said, alluded to intro is we’re gonna, we’re, we’re getting off the path of tried and true science that we’ve gone down before. But I think it’s really important because of the way the body moves. It’s not in the way that we measure things. We’re not there yet in terms of being able to like, put the finger on it. However, there are some different people in the world. Yes. The body a little differently. And I, and I do think that some athletes can do this. They’re aware of them, but that’s just, it, there are balances that need to be essentially trade-offs in the body and having somebody with a keen eye to demonstrate that, and kind of cue you up is that’s what you need in life. And I think I kind of want to, I want to transition, cause you, you mentioned Kate and I know that you worked with her. She had a bad injury in 2019.
Adam Ster (23:05):
So, uh, gee, what’s the 2019, where are we at? 21. So 20, yeah, 19.
Adam Pulford (23:11):
19. Yeah. So do you want to talk to me what
Adam Ster (23:14):
Yeah. Uh, yeah, I would love to, I, I, she’s one of my favorite people on the planet. Um, I actually was, was at a retreat, um, and red bull, my red bull rep, uh, Aaron, Luzzi the dude
Adam Pulford (23:29):
Chime in just for a separate for listeners who, who don’t know Kate, Courtney. Um, she, I know she was at well, she’s an amazing mountain biker. Uh, yes, good friend. And, uh, she’s been on the episode before. Go check out her, uh, her story, Jim Miller, her coach, um, but, uh, uh, mountain bike, world champ, uh, red bull athlete and a heck heck of a person as well. So anyway, uh, go ahead.
Adam Ster (23:56):
Yeah. Sorry. I guess I should have Kate as a, everybody should know Kate it’s like Michael Jordan. Like you should know, you should just know that I say I know. I know for sure. So, um, so yes, it was her first year. It was rookie year XC and you know, my, our, our, well, her red bull rep, my good friend who also pretty much just sends me everywhere that red bull needs me. Uh, Aaron Luzzi, he sent me, uh, or he said, what’s it going to take to get to work with this person? I didn’t know who Kate was. I didn’t know her name. I had no, I don’t know, mountain biking, all that. Well, besides a couple other, uh, red bull athletes. And, uh, he’s like, we’re going to pull her from the world championships if we can’t fix this knee, um, you know, where are you?
Adam Ster (24:44):
And can you go? And I was legitimately at like a, uh, a retreat, like with a shaman for real, like, like not exactly the place where I could just dip out of. Um, but it’s red bull. They always take care of me. And I was like, dude done. I ju I borrowed my friend’s car. I drove like six and a half hours up to Tahoe where she was. Um, and you know, she’s worried, everybody thinks that we’re going to have to pull her. They were probably a day away, maybe 24 hours away from Polander. Um, and you know, we did our work and then, you know, I went to the hotel and she was like, well, what can I do now? I was like, get on your bike and go. I was like, I’m here. So go and try and hurt yourself. And I don’t mean it in a way, like trying and like actually go hurt yourself. Don’t don’t hold back too much. Like don’t nurse it and tell me what it feels like next morning, I come back. So I had stayed at a hotel up by there next morning, I come back to do a follow-up session and she’s like, what? Wait, it was a, it was very much a, a what w how did you type a situation? Um, and then, uh, she, you know, I came back about a, what a week later
Adam Pulford (25:59):
Now that was like some of the hands-on, uh,
Adam Ster (26:03):
Yeah, that was my hands on. Yeah, that was my hands out stuff. Yeah. That was the table work stuff, for sure. That was, that was in person a little bit different, um, than what I can offer it virtually, but, um, you know, the magic stuff. And, uh, and, uh, and so she, uh, you know, I came back a week later just to check up and through that entire week, I think it was like a week or 10 days. I can’t put my finger on exactly the timing, but I went back up on my way up to the Pacific Northwest and stopped up and worked on her again, just to, just to see how she was doing. And she had been training, you know, and that energy was different. The, she it’s like the equivalent of going zero a hundred, you know, she went from, Oh, no, I’m going to be pulled out my rookie season.
Adam Ster (26:48):
There’s all that doubt. And is my knee going to hold up? And am I going to be able to do this to this? Like, I’ve been training, I’ve been able to do all of these things. I feel good. Like, and, and it was this, that’s what I love about what I get to do is that look that look like, Oh my God, I can actually do this thing. So, you know, fast forward, I’m back in Denver, uh, you know, I’m working with the Broncos at the time and, you know, didn’t think anything of it. And I get a phone call from Aaron that is Kate, just one world. And I started crying. He’s crying, I’m on cry now. Uh, like it was, it was a very intense situation because for me, I do my work. I get, get the person feeling good that they can trust their body again.
Adam Ster (27:35):
Um, and, and that you don’t have to live by the old way of, if you hurt something, it’s going to take forever to fix it. Now there’s every situation’s different. But the fact of the matter is, is she trusted it. She trusted me and she trusted her body and she went and won as a rookie. Uh, and you know, and so she came back out of that. We did some more stuff through the off season, and then wouldn’t, you know, it, the very next year she comes in and she wins the points title the next year, which in my opinion is harder to do than anything else. Cause that’s a consistency situation. So yeah, that’s, it, it was a very awesome situation. Um, and also I got to make, you know, I got to make a cool friend, like she’s a very awesome person, not just in front of cameras or on her bike, she’s genuinely like a bad-ass cool person, excuse my language. So, um, you know, that’s true, but yeah.
Adam Pulford (28:29):
Yeah. And, and the reason why I wanted to, to, to share that story is because you have some of the, you know, the whimsical magic thing going on, which I think is actually part of the, a good healer or a good hands-on therapist is they’re in tune with that to whether the right terminology is to, uh, you know, unlock the muscle or free up whatever is guardian in order to have the athlete go out, perform, um, and then come back and then what, I’m, what I’m hearing correct me if I’m wrong. But what I’m hearing is you then worked with probably a remote or virtual type of, uh, movement pattern to make sure that those things that you did on the table stays in place and it’s kind of a maintenance program. Right?
Adam Ster (29:11):
Absolutely. And that’s, that’s where my, where the on-demand comes in. It’s now recorded. I never recorded it before. Cause I was kind of, you know, kind of, uh, weird, it’s kind of like stayed frame maybe. And like you’ve alluded to a few times now, like I’m, I’m, I’m that guy where you really have to kind of trust the rabbit hole. Um, because I look at things differently and you know, so I always, maybe there was like a self-conscious like people are just gonna shoot me down. Like I know how to prevent ACL injuries, but doctors will rip me apart if I tell anyone, you know, like that kind of thing. So, um, but with that, uh, I have this, this protocol, I call it protocols. Um, and it’s what is going on? Can you still hear me?
Adam Pulford (30:03):
Yeah. I think what people may be hearing is my domestic life in DC is much different than living in Colorado. There’s a helicopter or
Adam Ster (30:15):
No, I, I, it was re it was like thunderstorming, uh, outside a little bit ago. So I thought for sure, you guys were going to get a rainstorm in the background. So, um, but, but yeah, the, the protocol itself is a very basic protocol that I put together for myself, both as a preventative maintenance, but also to keep my rotations proper so that my, especially my knees, which in this case with her, with Kate actually makes sense. And there’s a, there’s a certain stretch in there that I call Sheniqua. Um, and it’s, uh, the, the name Sheniqua came from one of my football players. It was like 330 pound offensive lineman. And, uh, and I was teaching him this, this movement to do as his war part of his warmup. And it doesn’t take long, super, super simple. I mean, you can do it in 30 seconds or less if you’re really wanting to, um, and it opens up the rotations of the body all the way into the fingertips, down to the toes, the whole deal.
Adam Ster (31:09):
And I had her doing this protocol twice a day, just like I had mentioned in the very beginning that I do for myself twice a day, uh, not taking it too seriously. Don’t take it too far, no stretching and holding that kind of stuff. And what it did is it, it helped keep what I was doing on the table so that she could continue on. And the thing is, is once you get that and get good at it, it is legitimately what I’m going for on the table that I have to do to fix injuries and things like that, but a preventative situation. So you’re getting the same thing in the same, uh, somewhat of the same outcome on maybe a little bit of a lesser level by doing that protocol. And so virtually I was running through and doing those protocols with her as well.
Adam Pulford (31:56):
So to kind of summarize and, and I’ll speak to what I’ve experienced as well, because I had a knee thing going, which pops up every once in a while, uh, before Adam came down and I’ve got basically no, uh, meniscus cartilage left in my left knee, had an ACL repair, uh, reconstructive surgery back in like 2001 old wrestling injury. Um, uh, it, it does, uh, cause problems, especially in heavy periods of training, um, and, and not practicing good self-care with hydration, that kind of stuff. So he came down and did his thing. Uh, meanwhile, before that we had done a virtual, uh, thing where he had me doing the movements and stuff like that, but I didn’t really understand until we did the, um, the table work, because then I was like, Oh, he’s putting my body in this position, which is similar to, let’s just the Sheniqua sequence of sorts.
Adam Pulford (32:51):
I was like, Oh, that’s why we’re doing it. Oh, that’s how it should feel. And then it allowed me to then when I went and practice Sheniqua on my own, uh, to, to move a little bit different in feel what I should have been feeling on the table. Um, so it’s to our listeners, it’s a little abstract right now because we’re talking about, uh, these names and in this guy doing magic healing techniques. So what I want to say right now is for those listening, say on the bike, doing a workout or whatever, be sure to go back to our landing page for the episode landing page on train, ride.com and, uh, linked to Adam stirs, mastered body worker, uh, videos. We’ll, we’ll have it all in there for you. Um, but bef as you click that and you learn that, and you try that, Adam, kind of back to you in terms of what the master, uh, bodyworker protocol does. Like, what do we need a gym for this? Like, do we need a big room? Like, what do we need to do this,
Adam Ster (33:54):
Man? I, you, you can literally do this protocol on a little section of floor. I have, I actually on my like Instagram and stuff, I’ll do it from time to time. I do like a time-lapse, but I’ll do
Adam Pulford (34:08):
Instagram.
Adam Ster (34:10):
It’s it’s like, uh, you know, in hotels I’m doing them, you know, you can do it in a gym, you can do this. I do it at the foot of my bed, uh, on the carpet, like that’s, you know, maybe four feet by six feet. Um, and I do an entire protocol, the entire thing, uh, right there full there’s, no restrictions there. Um, besides maybe having to kind of spin around a little bit here and there. And if you watched the protocols, you get, you understand what I mean by that, but for the most part, you don’t need anything. And, you know, there’s, there’s ways to do it, where we, where you can up it using a roller there’s certain things that we mix in there. Um, you can use the end of a bed, a couch cushion, a pillow, a yoga ball for, for one of the movements.
Adam Ster (34:58):
But for the most part it’s meant. So that any person in any form of being a human, whether it’s an athlete or just at the park or at your house, um, can do this with nothing, nothing, but you, and that’s all you need. Um, and it will, it will increase your relationship with gravity tenfold. Um, now that’s, I’m saying tenfold, I’m not going to throw down some study that I had some college do for you. I apologize. I’m not, I didn’t mean to put it like that. Um, but you know, with 25,000 hours developing this, I will say that it does pretty well, but the point is, is it’s it’s for everyone and you don’t need to do a heavy set up. You don’t need to do a heavy breakdown. You don’t need a bunch of equipment. You don’t need a special space. You don’t need anything besides you, and a little bit of open area to do some of these movements. And honestly, you don’t even need a ton of time. Yeah. So how much time are we talking here? Well, my warmup the other day before a max effort, uh, I was going for a PR write off no training. Don’t do that folks. Right.
Adam Ster (36:13):
Well, I wanted to test my cell phone and see where it’s at and, you know, I’m sure any of the listeners are probably just have done the same thing. Um, but you know, like w we all like to push ourselves way farther than we think we should. So, um, I, it took me 48 seconds. Yeah. And, and that was it. And literally that protocol is sitting on, on an Instagram, like it’s there, that one’s not even a, time-lapse now the best part about this is that this exact same protocol, all you have to do is slow it down or speed it up, depending on what scenario you’re in, if you want to do for meditation. And recently I had somebody testing this, um, a very, uh, predominant, uh, Ninja, like Ninja warrior. And he has, you know, some real depression issues and things like that.
Adam Ster (37:03):
And, and I’ve been working with him for a couple of years now, uh, you know, just trying to help them through some things. And he started doing this right before meditation, and he was getting much deeper meditations. Um, and, and, and, and it was helping a lot more towards the, the, the depression anxiety side. And so I was sitting there and I was like, well, that was unexpected. I wasn’t really going from that. But the point here is that now you can slow this down and it can take 20 minutes and it 20 minutes session, and then sitting for a couple of minutes in meditation, because I don’t know about you, but sometimes meditation is hard to, to sit there and sit still. And sometimes it’s uncomfortable. So I knew this before I meditate. And, you know, your meditations are much more efficient and you can get what you want out of them.
Adam Ster (37:52):
I also do this right before yoga, to be honest with you, um, I’ll do this before any heavy effort. I’ll do this to cool down. I do this before bed. Like, all you have to do is speed it up or slow it down. If you’re getting ready to go outside, you speed it up. You don’t have to go as deep into the movements and it, it opens up your body just enough so that you can guard against injury. You can put yourself in a position, kind of triggering the sympathetic nervous system, kind of get the blood moving, so to speak, um, and go off on your way. You didn’t take a lot of time. You don’t waste a lot of energy getting warmed up, and that means more energy for you in training or in competition, likewise at night. And you take your time and now you’re more sympathetic, nervous system triggered. And now you can relax, go to bed, recover
Adam Pulford (38:41):
Beautiful. And in, I think to zoom back out of the magic rabbit hole that we’re going down, because I mean, yeah, as I’m sitting here listening to this Oh, 48 seconds and I can be deeper meditative crushing some PRS. Oh, this, so let me, let me just describe it a little bit in the context of how are we as coaches, we, as physiologists, are we as healers already using this, it’s essentially a dynamic warmup. And when you link to the videos and you look at it, you’re like, Oh, okay. Maybe you’ve even done some of these movements before. Okay. And not to take away from the, the protocol that Adam has created, the, the kind of curated protocol that he has created, he’s done. So in specific ways to do a specific thing, and I’m not dumbing that down. However, we use dynamic warmups all the time in various sports.
Adam Pulford (39:37):
And so it is a version of a dynamic warmup that I do think, uh, that I do think cues flow States and kind of hits the sweet spots in the range of motions in order to put yourself in an environment to focus and succeed in whatever is next gym session meditation. Uh, but you know, cycling workout, run, workout, whatever the case is. And so I don’t want listeners to view this as a hokey thing. It’s a very basic thing. The challenging part behind it is actually doing it though, is the time putting the mat down. I like to use a yoga mat by the way. Um, and that’s my little space to do it. And it doesn’t in I’ll ha I have short version. I have long version just as Adam talked about, you can stretch it out. Or if you’re already late to the group, I’d still do the thing to get going with a minute or less in. It does actually help. So with that being said, Adam, um, as somebody go ahead
Adam Ster (40:42):
To that, to that effect, you know what I set this up, and this is for me, this is why I set it up for myself this way, but now it applies to everybody else. There’s no excuses. If I give you something that you can do for one to two minutes, and it has a, a decent impact for you both before and after any kind of movement or doing whatever it might be in your life, it doesn’t even have to be athletic. But the point is, if I can give you something that takes you one or two minutes, and you have to focus on it for one or two minutes, and it benefits you, there’s no excuse to not do it. And the thing is, is I had to do that for myself because I will, after a hard effort, the last thing you want to do is do more work.
Adam Pulford (41:22):
Yeah, exactly. That’s the other point? I mean, I think he’s like super beneficial is because when you’re in a heavy training period and you want some like off the bike work or off the run work, something that is not your primary sport, but you don’t, you don’t have the energy and you still want to recover. You don’t want to do the hot yoga session when you just did a four hour ride in 98 degree weather, you know? And so, but then as you’re sitting on the couch doing your good recovery of two hours, like, God, I’m just sore. I need to do mint of some kind, rather than just lay on a foam roller, you can do something for a few minutes. Exactly. That’s what I said, but you can, um, you can do something that, you know, is benefiting you, that doesn’t require energy.
Adam Pulford (42:06):
Really. It’s not even, it’s not burning substrate. Um, it’s not, you know, taking substrate from your muscles that need to recover is what I mean. And, um, it’s short, it’s done. You can then, um, kinda clear the mind afterwards and know that it has benefiting you as far as I’m concerned. And in my experience, it hasn’t taken anything from me, meaning it hasn’t hurt me at all. Um, and so I think it is, I think is really interesting. Um, if people do want to try this or if they go and they start checking this out at them, you’ve got it broken down into like five different videos right now. Right? Like the basics, the five basic steps, right?
Adam Ster (42:43):
Well, yeah, actually, uh, so now we, we actually launched the, the on-demand, so there’s a much more in-depth than it was. Um, so, uh, what we, what we are doing now, um, to make it easier for everybody is the YouTube channel we’ll have a level one. So it’s the three most basic things. It’s what that 48 second, uh, warmup was, but you can look again, you slow it down. It’s a great place to start. That’s free on YouTube and everybody can go. And then what we did is we’re setting up an entire library of all my secrets. It’s not just like the protocol is the first part. There is three levels. There will be seven different levels of this all the way up into an expert level. Um, you know, going way deeper than that, but you have to get good at the basis first, which is the level one level two level three.
Adam Ster (43:33):
Anyway. So it’s good to jump off and start at the YouTube level, which there will be the, you know, the three I’ll probably throw in the, the role, the basic roller on there, just because it’s easier, um, to have it on there. But the, the, the basic layout is there will be a YouTube for the BA the first basic level. The on-demand will be, uh, we’ll be linked there on teachable. And that will have, you know, it’s going to be like a member situation, but there will be live classes. There’s all kinds of good stuff. So it’ll be, it’ll be much more in depth with me rather than just having something on YouTube and just go figure it out. Um, and you know, and I want to be able to help as many people as possible. Now, the cool thing about the on demand is that we are actually, uh, donating, um, proceeds from that to, uh, to Jim Miller’s, uh, Olympic, uh, program to the,
Adam Pulford (44:34):
Uh, I did not know that that was cool.
Adam Ster (44:36):
Yeah, it’s a, it’s a, it was a new development. Um, but we were forced to charge an amount for the webcam carrier and things that I didn’t, I wanted to make it much less expensive. It’s not even expensive at all. I’m just saying that I wanted to make it much less. So I was like, what can I do? And, you know, in the cycling world, there’s a big gap between super elite and not, and, you know, they’re, they’re, they have a scholarship program. So I was like, you know what, I’m going to take a little bit here and donate that to their scholarship program. And if we have our way, we’ll be able to fund a couple of scholarships for a year, which would be awesome. Um, you know, and also help people feel better at the same time. So, um,
Adam Pulford (45:20):
That’s really cool. And for our listeners, uh, that’s Jim Miller, who’s ironically been on this podcast a couple of times as well. He’s, uh, uh, head of elite, uh, performance over at USA cycling, which is a scholarship that Adam stir is talking about. So that’s really cool. Yeah.
Adam Ster (45:36):
Yeah. It’s a, the, it’s a thing it’s called the, the cycling Olympic development Academy. They just like started it. And so, you know, it’s, it’s all about getting people involved in a sport that, I mean, let’s face it cycling like tennis and other things it’s expensive. So, um, you know, but we, we have to figure out a way to grow these sports and, and get people more, more, uh, get them, uh, an opportunity. So I was like, you know what, since I have a sense of being forced to charge more than I wanted to, I’m going to donate a good, solid portion of that to help other people. Um, because my, my intention with these protocols is not to make money. My intention to these protocols is to teach everybody on this planet. Anybody that’s a human being, that there is a very low impact way to be healthy without.
Adam Ster (46:26):
I mean, I love the bells and the whistles, and I love the equipment. I mean, I’m in my gym right now. If you could see it, I have, I’ve tried everything, right. I have tried everybody’s protocols. I buy them by, you know, with my own money. So I can see and not have a bias view because people send me stuff for free all the time. I want to know and train and find the things that work and make it super efficient. And the fact of the matter is, is my protocols that are put together here. I want as many humans as possible to be able to do this and give them an quote unquote, easy way to really impact how their body moves in gravity, how their health is impacted by moving properly and gravity and start paying attention to the body as a rotational beam we’re rotation. We’re not, we’re not a two dimensional poster. And, you know, the more that we get used to that, that notion the better we’re going to feel. And I want that for the whole planet. My I’m the crazy guy that thinks he can heal the planet. And really am I it’s, it’s actually like this mantra. That’s been on one of my freaking notebooks since I first started helping people. And like
Adam Pulford (47:38):
He is, he’s the crazy guy that thinks he’s going to, I’ve, I’ve known Adam for now for over a year. And it’s always, that is always on the forefront of his, of his mind. Um, and I think it’s, I think it’s amazing. We need more, more people. Yeah.
Adam Ster (47:52):
So my intention is to fix it. My intention is to help and, and we’re as humans, man, we we’re, we’re going through it right now, all of us. And so like,
Adam Pulford (48:03):
Well, and, and,
Adam Ster (48:03):
And the fact is though, is if we can find a way to make our body and our mind connect properly. And, you know, you said something about flow States, uh, uh, flow States.
Adam Pulford (48:16):
I don’t know how,
Adam Ster (48:17):
What kind of timing we have on those, but, but the name of the protocols is master bodyworker protocols, but the actual like on-demand is called the flow zone. And it is legitimately to set your body up so that you can be put into a flow or into a zone state, or for an athlete, you know, playing out of your mind, being in the zone. That’s what we’re looking for. Um,
Adam Pulford (48:43):
Yeah. And, and I think there that, that is actually something that I wanted to make sure that people knew about as well. It’s not only, Hey, you know, go to the YouTube channel and check out the free, basic movement patterns to start in on that. I would say, do that, get to know it very well, be efficient at it as an athlete, because that will cue you up for many things. If you want to go deeper into it, tune into, um, his on demand stuff, because that, that is new. I haven’t been a part of that truth. Be told, I think instead pacing has brand new okay.
Adam Ster (49:16):
Brand new. Um, it, well, it was always in the works. It’s been nine months in the works, got to get this right. And we just launched like yesterday or day before. So, um, in terms of to the public. And so, um, and then obviously certain individuals will be doing, you know, on there looking it through. So I’m sure that there you’ll find your way on there.
Adam Pulford (49:39):
Yeah. I will close that browser right now. Focus on the podcast. Yes. Flow States. If we had more time at M a or maybe we do another episode, I’m not sure, but flow States are very important too, when it comes to not only performance pertaining to athletics, but happiness as it pertains to human beings. And we’ve, we’ve had some great discussions about it. So I think we should probably cue that up for next time, but I could start with the body first because if you get the habits down physically, the mind will usually follow. And that’s where I really like your process is because the body cues it in the mind has been set for it.
Adam Ster (50:22):
Yep, absolutely. And I think that the, the happy accident with, you know, gentleman I was talking about with the depression problems, um, you know, all of a sudden I was like, well, I didn’t really, I I’ve always done it, but I never thought about it. Like as it being, you know, the protocols being the precursor. Um, but you know, we, we like to say the pre, uh, we are the precursor or, uh, of all successful human movements. So, um, you know, the, the fact is that the body does need to come first and it to get into those flow States, the body needs to come first. And I agree with you a hundred percent. Um, and you know, when, when your body is happy and efficient and gravity, it’s not wasting its energy or in some kind of a protect mode all the time, your, your brain tends to relax a little bit. Your mind, your mind tends to relax a little bit is a little easier, is a little easier to walk down the street and not be mad if you stub your toe. You know what I mean? Like, I mean, that’s infuriating anyway, but you understand my point?
Adam Pulford (51:22):
I know I do. I do. For sure. Um, yeah, and I think, I think that’s just the event. And I think when, and that’s where I’ve always been fascinated by training is because it’s, it’s kind of the gateway to everything else. You, you know, you, you get the body going in, in a good training direction in watch out what an athlete can do. Right. Meanwhile, they can’t even, you know, get, get the leg over the top tube, all the excuses, all the things. It’s nothing that a coach can do with that. Right. Yep, exactly. So, um, but you know, as we wrap here out them, um, you know, I think we made a good case that a little bit of maintenance through movement, an athlete can practice that self care that they need, you know, away from their primary training modality. And as they incorporate that into their life, it doesn’t require more energy requires a little bit of time, but it it’s time. Well spent, you know, we dug deep into that, but I guess if you could add the final word here in terms of, um, kind of pressing this home to the athlete, to make our listeners actually do this in, in give it a shot, what would you say to them?
Adam Ster (52:37):
What I would say is, um, you know, I mean the, the level of athletics that I have been, uh, blessed to be a part of and to impact and change for the better, um, should speak for itself. And if, if it works for the world, champions of the, of the world, it’ll work for you too. And when you start to focus on efficient ways to make your body more efficient in gravity, I guess, um, you know, but, but when you, if you allow yourself to do just a little, even if it doesn’t feel like it’s a lot, like it, it doesn’t feel like it’s enough, um, that will change things for you because everybody can train. Everybody can lift, everybody knows to go and do high efforts or high volume or all of that stuff. That’s sports specific, but you really need to focus on you as a human being in gravity, because that’s the part that’s getting overlooked.
Adam Ster (53:45):
And, you know, I think that that’s our goal, um, to help people do. Um, but well, yeah, I mean, I would like to see more people paying more attention to themselves in gravity as a rotational being, you know, my right foot goes forward, my left arm comes up type of thing. That’s all we walk, it’s legitimately how it walks. And so when you focus on yourself and gravity, as just as a human being, not as an athlete, human being, not as a gardener, human being, not as a, you know, a computer program or human being, you’re just a human being that has to be in gravity. And when we go back to that basic, then all the other things benefit.
Adam Pulford (54:29):
Hmm. That’s cool. I couldn’t agree more. And it’s so well said, uh, right there folks, and
Adam Ster (54:35):
It took me a second y’all I had to work myself through my thoughts to get that one out, but all right, nailed it.
Adam Pulford (54:40):
Yeah. You nailed it right over the fence. So, uh, Adam, thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it. I think our listeners at the very least were like, Whoa, this crazy dude. I have to check this out a little bit. Okay.
Adam Ster (54:57):
However, we got them to, however we have to get them to do it that crazy. Yeah.
Adam Pulford (55:03):
If they want to check out more of who this crazy dude is, I mean, Instagram, Twitter.
Adam Ster (55:09):
Yep. Yep. Instagram is master bodyworker. Um, and then Twitter is the same. I mean, Twitter is, you know, it is what it is, but it doesn’t have, yeah. It doesn’t have the, ER, it just has an R at the end. Um, and then, uh, and then, you know, the, the website obviously is master bodyworker.com. There’s a lot more on there. Uh, YouTube is master bodyworker. So I think the theme here is it’s master bodyworker. Um, and then, uh, and then we have, uh, the on-demand, which is float zone.teachable.com.
Adam Pulford (55:45):
Cool. And I will make sure that those are in our show notes on our landing page for this, or list her, go there and get all they need of the crazy guy.
Adam Ster (55:58):
I will be that. All right, my man. I appreciate it. Thank you so much for having me. Yep. Take care. Bye bye.