Samuel Reardon

I’ve been working with Olympic bronze medallist Sam Reardon since he was 11 years old, and I never imagined then that I’d be writing about his Olympic journey. What started as routine sports therapy turned into one of the most remarkable rehabilitation experiences of my career. Read on to find out more. Sam showed athletic promise from an early age. His parents first brought him to me to help him overcome typical sports injuries, when he’d been doing too much. Yet his parents always believed he’d reach the Olympics. Since those early appointments, I treated Sam a few times and got to know him and his family well. Over time, I’ve got to know the history of his previous injuries, his capabilities and his rehab. And, of course, I’ve seen him develop over time into the athlete he now is. That really changed things. The life of a professional athlete is quite different to most people, certainly to anyone I’d worked with before, including semi-professionals. In September 2023, as Sam was preparing for his winter season and to defend his British 400m indoor title (won in February 2023), he came to see me with his coach, Nigel. I did some performance testing with him, using the Force Decks system, to see where he was at and what we needed to change. We did power tests, comparing the strength of his left and right leg muscle groups and set him some goals. We also assessed his jumping ability on both legs, with various jump tests, to gain more data. A major focus of his rehab was isometric strength training, which was safe for him to do, as he was still fearful. We gradually built up the strength, the difficulty and how quickly he could produce force with more sprint-specific exercises, and introduced more explosive exercises. After that, we used the Force Decks technology again to work out what he could and couldn’t do. It was useful to have the data from back in September to measure this against. Armed with both sets of data, I set him some goals and we came up with a meticulous plan to help his hamstring recover safely, while ensuring his other muscles didn’t decondition much. We needed him to be stronger even than before his injury. Nigel and I got him training on a static bike – this kept his heart rate up and still gave him the lactic acid feeling you get with running, but without the strain on his hamstring. Over the next few months, we kept at it but it wasn’t a straightforward rehabilitation. When Sam started experiencing back pain and nerve symptoms, I had to think outside the box. Adjusting my approach to avoid his back being a problem, I ensured we addressed not just the hamstring, but other niggles as they occurred too, such as with his left shoulder. My approach was 80% targeted exercise rehabilitation and 20% manual therapy and massage, always focused on his specific needs. By April, Sam was in a much better place and we did the Force Decks testing again. It was good news. Despite his hamstring injury, Sam had improved on his September data. We saw a 25% improvement in the right hamstring force production, with significant gains in both strength and the speed of muscle activation. The technology allowed us to track his progress with scientific precision, giving us confidence in his recovery. But instead of defeat, this became a catalyst for extraordinary performance from him. In the weeks following, he ran a personal best in Dublin and won convincingly at the Diamond League against people who’d already got into the Olympic squad. A few weeks later, fate intervened. Another athlete was forced to pull out of the Olympic squad due to injury. I’ll never forget the call I then received from Sam. Before he left for Paris, there was a lot of excitement and a bit of confusion initially, because it all happened so quickly! I saw him for a massage just before he left. And then I knew I had to get to Paris somehow, despite the Olympics having already started and most accommodation being sold out. I managed to get Eu