Dr. Kelly Starrett distills his years of accumulated knowledge to lay out the basics for “playing the long game” of life to build better individuals who build better communities. 

In a far-ranging Episode 026, Jason and Rich cover a lot of ground with Kelly from his origins in the mountains of Germany to the origins of humans and back. In his new iteration and focus on maintaining a The Ready State for an active, long life, Kelly talks about the “unsexy basics” of optimal health: sleep, movement, eating whole foods, doing preventative maintenance, and having a tribe/team/clan/community of like minded people with you on your journey. As he says, “we are hardwired to need people.”

Kelly is most well known as the Supple Leopard (based on his first book) and mainstreaming if not inventing many of the buzzwords like “mobility” that surround functional fitness (which he apologizes for). He advocates for using movement -- particularly loaded movement (aka rucking) -- as a diagnostic tool to optimize what our bodies are naturally built to do. Kelly says that “pain is information for change” and this conversation lays the groundwork to tapping into our bodies’ natural ability to adapt, a little bit at a time, to perform better for longer. 

Kelly weaves his information with humor and stories from his time working as a rafting guide, as a competitive athlete paddling whitewater slalom canoe on the US Canoe and Kayak Teams, as a physical therapist for professional athletes and now as a father facing down 50. Along with his wife Juliet, Kelly is co-founder of The Ready State, the next evolution of his years of teaching, coaching and producing content on optimized movement and self-care. 

Links:

• The Ready State
• E.O. Wilson
• “Muscles and Meridians” by Phillip Beach and Leon Chaitow
• “Unbroken” by Laura Hillenbrand
• “Deep Nutrition” by Kate Shanahan 
• The Fan Dance Race Series (SAS Selection Challenge)
• The Soft American - John F Kennedy
• GORUCK Star Course
• GORUCK Blog: Dr. Kelly Starrett on Rucking for Longevity
• Glorious Professionals podcast website
• Learn more about GORUCK