Dr. Marcus Elliott is a Harvard trained physician specializing in performance enhancement and the development of elite athletes. As Founder and Director of P3, he is dedicated to applying cutting edge science for optimal athletic achievement. He has trained some of the world’s best athletes including those at the U.S. Olympic Training Center, the New England Patriots, stars of the NBA, and many more elite athletes. Dr. Elliott’s primary focus has been on peak performance and injury prevention and on this episode Dr. Elliott discusses some of the elite science they’re using to allow athletes to perform at their very best! For any elite performer this is an episode you won’t want to miss!
If you’re at a dinner party and someone approaches you, how do you describe what you do? (03:20)
Dr. Elliott, founder and director at P3 is a sports scientist applying data and technology in the world of sports
- There wasn’t a career track or job description when he first decided he wanted to go down this path
- “I studied the body really hard and [P3] applies that science in professional sports.”
- His goal is to optimize and reduce injury risk
Went to his dad at a young age and told him “he’s going to study the body really hard and apply it to professional sports.”
- Him and his dad knew there wasn’t a clear career track but his father bought him a subscription to the American Physiological Society Journal to help him reach his goals
Love for Sports Fueled his Career Path (06:15)
“I was a good student, but I wasn’t very committed to school… but I loved sports.”
- The objectives and rules were so clear around sports that he was always driven back to the world of sports
Dr. Elliott had an emotional anchor with working in this field after suffering a knee injury in high school
- “I spent a year being depressed. Half a year not really getting out of bed. My best friend moved into my position and started dating my girlfriend. But that really locked in this path of wanting to stop people from going through injuries they didn’t have to go through.”
How Innovation and Creativity Shaped this Field (12:10)
This path Dr. Elliott took didn’t feel innovative when he first started; it felt obvious
Dr. Elliott first started with the New England Patriots who had two training programs at the time: one for speed athletes and one for strength athletes
- “You’re trying to optimize these athletes that you’re paying a reasonable amount of money to and the athletes are doing the best to optimize themselves, and [New England’s] approach was ‘you get two prescriptions.’”
- Dr. Elliott understood that bodies are way too unique and complex to have such few options, so they approached it with research and analysis that felt more obvious than innovative
The approach to P3’s analysis remains the same from when he started, to now
- “Instead of us having a workout for you, a training program, having some idea of what you need to be as a professional athlete, we need to collect information on your body. We need to know how your body works.”
- Testing like this wasn’t done for 20 years in professional sports and it is now a constant evolving part of the industry
Assessing Athletes at the P3 Facility (19:00)
The P3 Facility in Santa Barbara has become a hot spot for athletes to come during the off season.
At P3, they collect traditional data, like joint mobility, static measures, but the things that create the biggest value is in movement
- P3 isn’t so focused on the performance side, but rather in how the body executes movement
- “How the body moves has huge implications for the good and bad things that happen to the body.”
They are able to work with great athletes across the industry of professional sports, including Houston Rockets’ James Harden. (Link to article on James Harden without paywall)
- James Harden was excited to learn his assessments but knew he wasn’t going to stand out compared to others
- He was either average or off the charts
- What P3 noticed was that Harden excelled in braking in his movements
- “He’s not the best at starting, but he’s the best at stopping.”
P3 is also able to assess the future talent of athletes in the professional sports world
- A Slovenian teenager came over that didn’t seem that athletic at first glance, but he stopped/braked better than 50% of NBA players
- It was current Dallas Mavericks’ player Luka Dončić
“What we’re doing is creating value…” (34:20)
P3 doesn’t spend time on marketing or outreach but instead relies on the value of their work
- “There’s no selection bias at our facilities because they had to make an effort” to come work with P3.
They have become established throughout the leagues because the athletes have trusted in their work
“I was very confident we were on a path that made sense.”
- Dr. Elliott knew there was value in what this would provide for athletes and for all humans
Conviction also played a large role in shaping Dr. Elliott and P3’s path
- “That’s the one thing that I give myself credit for, is having conviction. When people were standing in my path saying, “Don’t bring that around here,” when I knew it had value, I would bring it there.”
The Future of P3 and Solving the Problems of Tomorrow (48:00)
“We spend all of our time putting our heads down, doing the work. We don’t have a marketing arm, we don’t promote what we’re doing. We’re just trying to really get it right. I feel like we can do almost anything in pro sports right now.”
- They’re working to solve the problems of tomorrow and they know most people haven’t seen what they have to offer
P3’s future is about facilitating for others, not just professional athletes
- They want others to see the value in movement currency that many athletes are locked into right now
- “Your body carries you around. Having a body that works well is an amazing part of a good life, an integral part of having a good life, whether you use it for sports or don’t.”
- P3 wants to unlock the role of movement in humans to share with everyone
Dr. Elliott’s Approach to Learning New Things (01:00:30)
A lifelong approach for him was to follow things that were interesting to him
- “It’s super easy to ingest new information when you’re doing things that are just interesting to you.”
He reads every night, whether it be nonfiction, journals, or fictions
- Podcasting is another favorite learning tool for Dr. Elliott
“The biggest thing people can do is find something you’re passionate about, and learning in that space.”
