How the World's Strongest Man Bounced Back From Injuries and Beat Pain

Reigning World’s Strongest Man Martins Licis is a busy man. After winning the WSM title in 2019, he picked up where he left off in 2020, winning the Arnold USA Strongman Classic and placing third at the Arnold Strongman Classic in March.

Then came quarantine. Licis has kept up a consistent training schedule for himself with virtual livestream workouts with fellow strongman Hafthor Björnsson and a series of isolation squats–but he’s also been rehabbing his body in the process. Even while he was training and winning events, Licis was working through pain. He took the competition break as an opportunity to fix his issues, working with Dr. Aaron Horschig, DPT, of Squat University, to help heal his body when he started to struggle with injuries and pain.

Licis has discussed his rehab at length in his popular YouTube videos, showing fans the exercises he’s doing to beat the pain—but now, Horschig has shared some details about the pair’s work together on Instagram.

“Martins wrote to me recently that he had been dealing with left knee pain for 2 years and right hamstring tendon pain where the muscle attaches deep in the back of the hip for the past year and a half.❌,” Horschig started the caption of his post.

In the video, Horschig went into more details of his injuries.

“An MRI of his left knee showed a slightly torn meniscus and a little degrading cartilage,” he says. “Not all meniscus injuries or cartilage problems are severe enough o require surgery, even though picked up by an MRI, which is why his medical doctor did not believe he needed surgery at this time, meaning physical therapy was the best choice.”

Licis and Horschig linked up, and Horschig assessed the strongman to find out what movement problems, like poor coordination, stability, and limited mobility led to the injuries developing in the first place.

The evaluation showed Licis had “difficulty in the single leg squat getting into a deep position on the right side due to hamstring stiffness.” The strongman also had problems with his left leg during squats, as he noticed instability and noted that his quads weren’t activating smoothly during the ascent.”

Digging deeper, Licis’ ankle mobility was good, but found he had hip issues. The issue was with extending and externally rotating his left hip as much as his right during the FABER test, along limitations with internal rotation. Licis also found he had issues with his right hamstring, and couldn’t fully extend his right leg in a single-leg bridge.

Dr. Horschig came up with a plan that included 5 moves:

Within a week and a half of putting the plan into action, Licis tested how his body felt while doing a 506 pound squat.

“Painless! A week and a half in working with Aaron Horshig from Squat University, and 506 pound squats are painless. I cannot tell you enough how grateful I am for that. A great step forward,” says Licis in the below video.

After Horshig posted the assessment video, Licis quickly responded with gratitude.

“There’s no better physical therapist I’ve ever worked with 🙌💪,” he wrote.

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