Why Rekinetics Works: 2 Studies and 3 Theories

Rekinetics is the only approach that focuses on the source of pain and movement: the brain. The brain is fundamentally protective. When you experience injury, whether that injury builds over time or is from an acute incident, your brain sets a dimmer switch on a muscle or joint so that it can heal. But even after the muscle heals, the brain doesn’t necessarily remove that dimmer switch. So pain and weakness can continue thereafter. Conventional rehab and physical therapy do not address the changes in the brain. But Rekinetics does, which is why it is the perfect complement to other approaches. Since the brain changes instantly, Rekinetics exercises work instantly.

To help understand this, think of the body like a computer. A computer needs both the hardware (bones, muscles, joints) and software (how the brain communicates with the hardware) to work properly. Whereas all conventional rehab and physical therapy focuses on the hardware, Rekinetics addresses the software. That's why you'll see immediate results even if you've been struggling with something for years.

Below are 2 Rekinetics study summaries and three of the most prominent scientific hypotheses for how brain-based approaches work.

Study 2: 120% Hip Strength increase in 1 Week

In a study conduced with 77 participants of varying ages, activity levels, and injury histories, people performed either 1 Rekinetics exercise or 1 similar conventional exercise. Those in the Rekinetics group outperformed the conventional strength training by over 100%. Interestingly, those with hip pain in the study saw massive results. After 1 week of a Rekinetics exercise (3 minutes / day), participants with hip pain saw a 120% strength increase. This was from 40 pounds of force to almost 90 pounds of force.

Bilateral Access Model - When you make a movement on one side of your body, this model says that you develop blueprints for that movement. Those blueprints are accessible to both hemispheres of the brain. If one side of the body has a better blueprint, the hypothesis is that Rekinetics can effectively transfer that blueprint to be used by the other side. An example of the blueprint would be the neurological pathways the brain uses to communicate with and activate a muscle.

Cross Activation Model - During movements of your left limb, for example, your neuromuscular system activates the right limb. Since Rekinetics exercises were developed for how the brain processes movement, this cross activation may have more of a pronounced effect than in similar experiments. 

Hemispheric Synchronization - When the brain's hemispheres are firing in sync, both cognitive and physical advantages can be gained. Since Rekinetics uses both bilateral and unilateral exercises, the technique may be leading to greater synchronization and more neurological activation.

The Brain as the Next Frontier

The below quote from "Dustin Grooms, PhD, and Gregory Meyer, PhD, Updated Hardware, 2016" speaks to the future direction of sports rehabilitation. References are included in the Recommended Reading section.

"We now know that ACL [and other ligaments] provides more than simple mechanical stability, and the injury and recovery process has systemic neuromuscular effects. Rehabilitative interventions are needed to restore dynamic knee stability. However, looking beyond the joint for optimal development of dynamic stability may be warranted. Emerging evidence indicates that ACL [and other ligament] injury induces a mild neurological insult to the central nervous system (CNS), causing neuroplastic changes due to the lost mechanoreceptors, pain and developed motor compensations. Neuroplastic disruption likely begins immediately after ACL injury (and perhaps even before as the noncontact mechanism is a motor coordination error) and progresses until altered motor strategies become the norm. Restoring baseline function becomes a fight against maladaptive neuroplasticity developed in the wake of the altered CNS input and subsequent motor output compensations. The answer could rely on evolved neuroscience technologies that can now add the brain as a key rehabilitation target."

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