Joe Gambino DPT

Are you too cautious when it comes to working around an injury?

It’s a common mistake I see a lot of people make.

If you feel like you fall into this category, DM comment 🖐️ below.

Pain can be very difficult and hard to understand.

When pain increases - it’s hard to know why, did things get worse, what do I do now!

If this is you and you want to learn how to listen to your body better as to avoid feeling like this…

DM me the word PAIN and I’ll send you a 3-step guide on how to listen to your body and adapt your workouts!

I know great golfers who have limited range of motion.

Despite not having “enough” mobility for the golf swing, they’ve developed enough skill to make up for any compensations that they create.

But that isn’t an excuse for you to slack on improving your mobility for golf. And odds are, you’re not that golfer 😅.

Improving your mobility will improve how you feel, not just today, but in the very distant future as well.

Having fewer aches and pain has enough benefits on it’s own and will carry over into every aspect of your life, not just golf.

On top of that, having better mobility give you MORE OPTIONS for your golf swing.

High handicappers like myself have a limited number of movement options to complete a task. The less options you have, the lower your skill, the harder it is to be consistent.

By opening up your mobility (and yes, your golf skill) you can create more movement options. We call this movement variability and is what separates you from a lower handicap and better performance.

Whether you want a better golf swing or simply feel better on and off the course - focusing on mobility will help.

DM me the word GOLF and I will send you a free mobility routine!

Need ibuprofen to get through a round?

Have to constantly stretch on the course in attempt to feel better?

Feel like the way you feel is impacting your swing?

Figuring out what your painful triggers are will allow you to make adjustments and create a plan to feel better on and off the course.

It can be a certain amount of volume that causes your pain. 2 rounds in a week. Playing 18 holes vs 9 holes etc…

It can be the swing itself - every time you swing, there is pain.

It can be the individual movements that make up the golf swing - bending, extending and/or rotating your spine causes pain.

Once you identify the issue, you can change build mobility, stability, strength, modify volume, intensity etc..

Initial goal is to bring down pain 1st.

Then build qualities to help your body tolerate the golf swing better. Then ultimately to performance.

DM me the word WARM-UP and I’ll send you a golf warm-up routine that can help you feel better on the course.

Here’s a little humor for you.

But in all seriousness, today’s marketing strategies offer quick fixes.

7 minute abs
Lose 20 lbs in 4 days
Get flexible in 15 minutes

The truth of the matter is, long-term changes take time.

Real results don’t happen in days, or even months sometimes. Consistency is key to reaching your goals.

If we look at physiology when it comes to fitness and mobility, it takes anywhere between 4-8 weeks to start seeing adaptations.

This doesn’t mean you’ve fully reached your goals, it just means your body will have started to positively adapt and they will stick around unless you stop training it.

Remember if you don’t use it you lose it. Think about getting stronger. You spend years building strength, and if you stop training you get weaker.

The same goes for all other fitness qualities, including mobility.

Let’s get you started on the right path. DM me the word HUMOR and I’ll send you a free mobility routine 🫡.

Do you listen to your body?

If you start to notice:
🔽 your mobility decreasing
🔽 tightness increasing
🔽 starting to hold yourself back because your not sure if you’ll have pain after or not.
🔽Flare-ups that happen periodically that force you to rest.

If any of this sounds like you, learning to listen to your body and change your approach could be just what you need.

If you need help creating a road map of how to do that, DM me the word PAIN and let’s chat 💪.

How not to build mobility 🔽

1. Not do it at all.
2. Only perform it during your warm-ups

Point 1 is self explanatory- if you’re not focusing on it, it will not change.

If you want better mobility and this is you - it’s time to get started.

Point 2: if your mobility is only part of your warm-up and you’re doing dynamic work, foam rolling, and some light stretching - this is not enough to make mobility changes.

This approach misses adding load and strength to your end range positions which does 3 things to help you:

1. Improves load bearing capacity of the joint - even at the end ranges which are typically the weakest positions of any joint.

This helps to reduce injury risk.

2. Increases movement variability - more active mobility gives you more options to completing movements like picking up your kids, swinging a golf club, or lifting weights.

The combo of having more mobility + practicing the movement can have significant carry over to how you move, feel, and perform.

3. Having sufficient active mobility will reduce compensation and allow your body to function better helping to reduce pain.

The approach I mention here requires a more dedicated approach than what warm-ups offer and blends the concepts of mobility and strength training to give your body the tools it needs to do whatever you want with your body.

Do you agree with this post? Drop your thoughts in the comments!

Pain is Normal and can be Scary.

It’s very common for someone to avoid movements in fear of making their pain worse.

This may help short-term with pain, but it’s not an optimal long-term strategy as constant fear and avoidance can make those positions More Painful.

There are ways to make all movements easier.

So find a starting point that suits you so you can build confidence in your body and progress as your body allows it.

Feeling Stuck? DM me the word PAIN to chat 💪.

When it comes to pain, there is a lot of sh*tty advice out there.

The reason I think it’s sh*tty is because all of it promotes a fear based approach to recovery.

Pain is a protective mechanism, and does not mean you are frail.

The best way to overcome pain is to respect it and continue to stay active.

Do what you can, and slowly work back to being able to do the things currently struggle with.

Want to chat about your lower back pain? DM me the word “ LOWER BACK” to chat 🤙.

Everyone is busy and there is rarely ever a perfect time to start working on getting out of pain and back to working out.

So, if you are waiting for that perfect time to get started - that is a strategy that will keep you stuck where you are.

If you want to get back in the gym
Play more golf
Show up for your kids day in and day out

Figuring out how to get started today will help you get unstuck.

Not sure how? DM me the word ROUTINE and I will send you a free mobility routine that can be done with no equipment, in 10-minutes or less to help you get started!

Old Joe in 2015…

My body was broken.

I was stiff, in pain, and had a couple of massive flareups every year that would leave me on the couch for a couple of days.

This progressively got worse to the point where it started to affect my ability to workout, play golf, and trust my body.

I had to stop lifting heavy and spent more time foam rolling, warming up, and performing corrective work. This became time consuming and made training less fun.

If I wanted to play golf, I needed a couple days to recover after because my back would hurt.

I tried everything to get better. Yoga, pilates, massages, chiros, acupuncturists, cryotherapy… you name it.

They all offered temporary relief, but every time I started lifting heavy again or went out for a round of golf my pain would come back.

But once I started focusing on my joint health and mobility by using a more active approach… everything changed.

Fast Forward to today:

✅ Able to train hard without feeling my back the next day

✅ Can play a round of golf without paying for it after

✅ Can play and toss around my kid without worry

✅ Can get out for a day of yard work and feel like I still have the ability to show up for my family afterward

What are the main factors that led to my life changing forever?

Here are the 3 main steps:

1. Stop relying on passive modalities like foam rolling, massages, and acupuncture. These gave me short-term benefits but never addressed the root problem.
2. Put a greater emphasis on active mobility training. This helped me gain better control over my movement and made long-lasting changes to my pain and mobility levels.
3. Stopped trying to activate my core and glutes. I felt like I always needed to activate these muscles to play golf, train, or feel better. But once I improved my spine and hip mobility, these muscles are as awake as ever.
4. Figured out EXACTLY what was needed to get out of pain and reach my goals through a thorough assessment. This helped me get laser-fcoused on my approach and saved me time from doing unnecessary mobility and corrective work.

P.S - if this sounds like you… let’s chat

📲DM me the word “PAINFREE” and we can map out a game plan for you.

Most people think they need more foam rolling, massage guns, or whatever self-manual techniques are out there.

As much as foam rolling can be helpful, reliance on it to feel your best is not an optimal strategy.

If it was, your pain and stiffness WOULD NOT return.

So use self-manual techniques to improve how you feel, but layer that with mobility and strength work that helps improve your ACTIVE MOBILITY and load bearing capacity.

What this means: add movement to your manual practice so you can improve your bodies limitations and strength to move and feel your best.

P.S I’m looking for 3 more motivated people who want to improve their mobility and strength in the next 90-days.

I am looking for 5 motivated people who want to kick off the new year and improve their mobility and strength so they can get back to working out without nagging pain or stiffness.

If you’ve been dealing with nagging discomfort that:

Makes it difficult to workout the way you want

Makes you feel older than you actually are

Makes you feel pain or stiffness even if it doesn’t restrict you from being active.

Will make an upcoming vacation a challenge

DM me the word “READY” and I’ll send you more information 💪

The next time you have a craving for that pint of ice cream or delicious donut - remember, your joints love snacks too 🤣.

Moving your body throughout the day is a great habit to create as it helps combat the repetitive nature of our daily lives.

I aim to sprinkle Controlled Articular Rotations throughout my day, and hit specific mobility training 2-4 times a week depending on what I’m working on.

Want to snack of movement more? DM me the word ROUTINE and I’ll send you a free total body mobility routine 💪.

Too busy to workout?

There are ways to overcome this - but exercise has to become a priority in order for you to make time for it.

Just remember, when times are hard, you don’t need perfect. You just want to aim for some consistency 💪.

DM me the word ACCOUNTABILITY if accountability is more so your issue.

Happy Valentine’s Day to and

To the 3 most important ladies in my life - a day wouldn’t be complete without you.

Happy Valentine’s Day everyone!

Injury does NOT mean stop being active.

It MEANS taking a different approach so that you can continue doing things you love, while getting better.

Have you had similar success? Had the opposite happen to you? Let me know your story in the comments!

Merry Christmas from our family to yours!

There are way too many fragility posts and comments on social media, especially when it comes to the spine.

For some reason our training has to be done in neutral spine but outside of the gym we spend a lot of time outside of neutral spine.

Every athletic endeavor requires us to move out of neutral spine.

When you walk, move, and run your spine does not stay in neutral.

On top of that, all joints need movement to remain healthy. Training your spine to flex, extend, rotate, and side-bend are all important to creating a healthy, resilient spine.

Human bodies are not frail, they are highly adaptable. Way more so than we ever give it credit for.

Not sure where to start? DM me the word DAILY and I’ll send you my daily mobility routine for FREE.

Early in my career, I witnessed how stress can impact the human body and effect human performance.

It didn’t really hit me at the time, but as I’ve learned more and more, this story stands out and really highlights the fact that stress can alter the way you move, feel, and perform.

Want to improve how you move. DM me the word CARS and I’ll send you my FREE daily mobility routine 💪.

(Not so) Fun Fact: I’ve been dealing with lower back pain since my early 20s.

Through sports and training, I worked my body pretty hard.

I never took time to focus on recovery or making sure my body moved better and that lead to being very injury prone.

This led to pain, stiffness, and many stretches of time where pain was unbearable it was hard just to get through my days.

Working on joint health, mobility, optimizing sleep and recovery, I have been able to manage all my injuries which has allowed me to play golf,
go hiking, and continue to enjoy all the things I love without the fear of injury or pain.

Shoot me a DM with the word “DAILY” and I’ll send you my free total body mobility routine!

Returning to activity can be tricky.

That’s because once you start feeling better, most return to pre-injury activity levels.

In many cases, this tends to be more then what the injured tissues can tolerate leading to a flair up.

In these cases, let your symptoms come back down, adjust volume or intensity, and continue doing what you were doing that helped you feel better!

Not sure what to do? DM me the word “HELP” and we’ll chat about it :)

I’m super pumped to announce the newest member of the Gambino clan, Baby OG - Olivia Paige.

and I have long awaited your arrival and I’m pumped to have my new workout partner here and ready to go!

I couldn’t be happier to join the ranks of the club.

Lately, I have had a lot of people tell me that after having pain with a particular movement that they just need to keep trying the motion so that it gets better.

Now sometimes this works, but sometimes it doesn’t.

In case it works, it’s where there is low level pain during the movement, an improvement in symptoms after with no increases in symptoms for up to 48 hours post activity.

But a lot of times, poking the bear will make it angry. This can make your pain levels worse if you irritate the tissue too much, too frequently.

The key here is too much, too frequently. No one needs to be scared of pain, it’s actually quite helpful.

But understanding when to back off, maintain volume, or turn it up is important to getting back to the things you love doing.

Questions? DM me the word “QUESTION” and let’s chat!

The next time you have a craving for that pint of ice cream or delicious donut - remember, your joints love snacks too 🤣.

Moving your body throughout the day is a great habit to create as it helps combat the repetitive nature of our daily lives.

I aim to sprinkle Controlled Articular Rotations throughout my day, and hit specific mobility training 2-4 times a week depending on what I’m working on.

Want my daily mobility routine? DM me the word “CARS” to get it.

Looking to improve your ankle mobility?

Building strength at your end ranges is the strategy you’re missing.

Using end range isometrics is one way you can accomplish this and expand your mobility.

Perform 3 Rounds of PAILs/RAILs (shown in the image).

Each round includes a 10 second PAILs contraction at max effort followed by a RAILs contraction at max effort.

Want to learn more about mobility training. Comment the word “MOBILITY” and I’ll give you access to my daily mobility routine 💪.

When it comes to moving closer to your goals when it comes to any component of fitness, you can see progress quickly.

But if you want to create long lasting results, you NEED to be CONSISTENT in the long-term to allow your body to adapt.

Use those early gains to help build motivation, then create habits that allow for real change to happen that will enrich your life 💪.

I’m looking for 5 motivated people who have been held back by pain that want to improve their mobility and strength over the next 90-days. Shoot me a DM with the number “90” for more details.

When injured people do one of two things.

1. They keep pushing through pain without making any changes to their activity levels which may eventually make things worse.

2. They stop doing all activity in an attempt to get better. This typically helps short-term, but pain returns when returning to activity.

The goal when dealing with pain should be to modify movement/activity that hurts.

This could be a reduction in volume, intensity, or be choosing a different variation of the activity.

For the movements that don’t impact your symptoms, you typically can continue doing them as is.

The moral of the story.? You don’t need to stop doing things you love just because of injury. You just need to make short-term modifications to make long-term results!

Struggling with this? DM me the word “PAIN” and let’s see if I can help 💪.

The importance of moving your joints daily is overlooked.

Yet, it’s such an easy thing to do while being packed with immense benefits.

It doesn’t need to be complicated either.

✅You don’t need any equipment
✅Takes less than 10 minutes
✅And can do it just about anywhere.

Add that with a daily walk and you have 2 easy ways for feeling better and improving your health.

DM me the word “MOVEMENT” and I’ll send you my 9-minute daily joint movement routine.

There will be times in your life where exercising at the frequency you want will not be realistic.

Case-in-point:

My wife and I recently moved and have had a lot of house projects.

We are expecting our first child in October

I am transitioning between jobs.

Because of this I have been very busy to the point where I don’t have the same amount of time commitment or the resources (gym member and equipment) to workout the way I like.

But by modifying my workout schedule, the length of my sessions, and the intensity of my workouts, I can still get in some joint care and strength work in.

It all comes down to being comfortable with imperfection so you can stay consistent.

In times of busy, do your best and DO SOMETHING.

Need help figuring out how to do that. DM me the word “HELP” and let’s chat 🤙.