The Strength Running Podcast · Jason Fitzgerald

How to Learn From Any Injury (So You Stay Healthier) with Physiotherapist Brodie Sharpe

·1 hr 10 min·5 clips

Brody says the body is a cup: running fills it, sleep empties it, and stress can fill it again.

Coach Jason Fitzgerald opens the episode by introducing Brody Sharp as a physiotherapist, host of the Run Smarter podcast, and author of Run Smarter. The conversation quickly moves away from treating injury as a one off event. Instead, it treats injury as something that can teach runners how they train, recover, and respond when the body starts complaining. Sharp describes the boom bust cycle he sees in runners who have been injured for a long time. They feel a little better, get hopeful, and then return to running too hard or too far. That pattern often resets the problem and keeps the injury going. He points out that many athletes arrive with a strong memory of what used to feel normal. Those old standards can become a trap when the current body cannot handle the same workload yet. The episode also widens the lens beyond training load. Sharp talks about lifestyle factors that can shape whether an injury settles down or lingers. Emotional state matters. Personality matters. The way a runner thinks about progress matters. He notes that type A and perfectionist tendencies can be useful when training is going well. They can also push runners to do too much and take too little time off. That tension makes recovery harder. Fitzgerald keeps the exchange practical and focused on real running problems. The discussion stays rooted in familiar injury patterns rather than abstract theory. Sharp keeps bringing the focus back to whether a habit is helping or hurting the runner right now. The episode does not treat motivation as the same thing as readiness. It treats those as separate questions. It also suggests that runners should examine how they have handled past injuries, because history has a way of repeating itself when nobody names the pattern. There is a clear bias toward sustainability over ego. The conversation values staying healthy long enough to keep training, not just making one urgent return. That makes the episode especially relevant for runners who are stuck in recurring flare ups. It also speaks to coaches who keep seeing the same athlete make the same too soon comeback. The tone stays warm and direct throughout. The practical lesson is simple. If your injury keeps coming back, the fix may involve changing how you think about progress, not just how you stretch or strengthen.

As heard by us

A steady look at why runners keep rushing back before they are ready.

Episode 432 sits in the practical middle that runners recognize: not panic, not miracle recovery, just the hard work of figuring out what went wrong and how to avoid repeating it.

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Why you'd press play

Learn why your injury keeps cycling back before you push for another comeback.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

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