Look Inside a Lab Hacking Athletic Performance

[Narrator] Every sport makes different demands

on an athlete.

A soccer player needs to sprint

repeatedly for 90 minutes

and change direction in a heartbeat.

A baseball pitcher needs to turn

rotational energy into a blazing fastball.

A sprinter needs massive

straight-line speed and acceleration.

Different types of athletes

are suited to different types of sports.

If you want the absolute best performance

you need to train that athlete

to optimize their strong points

and minimize their weaknesses.

That's what they do at Sparta Sports Science

by focusing on the attributes

of each individual athlete.

The golden question we get a lot is

who's the best athlete?

And our response tends to be what's the best pain?

My name is Phil Wagner.

I founded Sparta Performance Science in 2008.

[Mark] A tailored approach to evaluating

and improving athletes is at the forefront

of the sports science world.

Biners work with many professional athletes,

including major league all-star

Tyson Ross of the San Diego Padres

as well as Los Angeles Lakers guard Jeremy Lin,

helping him go from a marginal NBA player

to a phenom.

[Phil] When an athlete comes into Sparta

for the first time, his movement signature is captured

by performing a vertical jump on a force plate.

How we interact with the ground

explains so much of how an athlete

is in their sport and it's all based

around how you time your movement.

Some are shorter and quicker,

others are really explosive,

others are just slow and strong.

We're looking at how much force

is put in the ground initially

and then how well that force is transferred

from that initial creation

to the final prolonging of force production.

The three phases are the load,

which is how quickly you can develop that force.

The second bar we explode is how well

you transfer that force.

And the final bar is how long you

produce force when you drive.

You want it to be relatively level

and the number one risk is any signature

where one value is exceptionally high.

We see baseball players with an extreme drive

because most of their movements

tend to be producing force for a longer period of time.

If they don't have enough load

to initiate that force, we've been able

to statistically associate it with elbow injuries.

We'll give squats to that player

to improve their load but still have

that drive there at the end to create

that rotational movement.

Over time, as the weight increases

on a certain movement because you're getting better at it,

your force plate signature changes

in a certain way as well.

And so we've associated the two trajectories

of the exercise improvement and the force plate improvement

and start coming up with a true treatment plan

that's based off evidence.

I've been plagued by injuries the majority of my career,

I've had three knee surgeries

and since working with Phil and Sparta

I've found out why and how to protect myself

as well as trying to get better.

We've seen more and more personalization

in every aspect of our lives.

By applying that same mindset,

one that almost seems like part of Silicon Valley,

to the sports world, Sparta is helping

each of its athletes to try and realize

their full potential.