Aaron King (00:02):

Welcome back to the modern old school training podcast. I'm Aaron King with coach Bob King and today's episode is brought to you by the second school. They really are the latest innovation in just technology that makes sports safer. And this today's topic is, is perfectly relevant for them as we're talking about more of personal experiences in head injuries and the great thing about secondary school, and I'll throw some graphics up here for the audience that tuning on YouTube or other video channels, but they have this lightweight XRD technology that it replaces instead of like a normal foam inside. They put this technology in there in it, it absorbs it just hardens at the last second and absorbs the impact. And so you're just not getting as much impact into your head, which is

Coach Bob King (00:51):

No that's important for not having concussions.

Aaron King (00:54):

Right. And you know, one of the things, you know, I, I personally my career, I wear glasses. Usually, they're sitting right here. I wear glasses because of concussions. And my career was ended because of a couple of pretty bad ones. But the scary thing is that you don't know really how many you're getting. Yeah.

Coach Bob King (01:13):

There there are micro concussions. They talk about where you, the lights go out for just a, just a flash of a second, getting your bell rung. And it's highly, highly repetitive, especially, in sports like football. And I know you know, we like to say, well, I'm not a doctor, but I play one in the weight room, but we, we, you and I have some really incredible personal experience, which is nothing to brag about. This, this whole concept of the second skull, it kind of blows my mind pun intended because coming out of the sixties into the seventies and football, we wore, if anybody can even think about what this looks like, a suspension helmet, it had kind of a tether inside that was webbing and it just separated you from the plastic outside. And I got knocked down.

Coach Bob King (02:04):

See, I had a knee to the temple in a game in high school. And you know, I was going to go block this guy. And then I woke up looking at the stars and I'll give my side and you, you have equally dramatic stories to go, but I have had two hospital stays, one in college and one in high school. And the one in high school was probably the worst of the two because, or the one that I remember because for, you know, the next day I was, I was still woozy. And it was just not pleasant because I didn't, I was in Lala land for 48 hours. And then in college, we still had to suspension helmets. And in one day in practice, I got whacked and man, it hurt. I tell you was like, I didn't have a helmet on.

Coach Bob King (02:53):

And then I got whacked again, but it was really subtle because the suspension had given way gave way. And so the helmet was sitting on my head and it took the helmet off and finally realized there's no suspension, which was, it does not even air if I say airs because there's the helmet and then a suspension. And if that, if that gives your right onto the plastic and it's just, you might as well go ahead and get a sledgehammer in there. And whack me probably by early, no, the late seventies, 67 - 77. We started getting the padded helmets in the air and it was really an awkward technology. And so, you know, we had a couple, but it's like, it was uncomfortable. It was bulky. It was, it was a good attempt. But my goodness that, those two hospital stays because of the intensity of the concussion. And here's where it gets. Interesting.  

Aaron King (03:46):

You got back on the field pretty quick.

Coach Bob King (03:48):

It was still a new, a new phenomenon, a new injury. It's like there wasn't five, or there was a three, five, seven, or whatever days because you were you know, how many fingers am I holding upright. To

Aaron King (04:00):

Go, yeah. You talk about the, the suspension was gone. I think that might've been a situation where with me, and I think a lot of folks, they don't have enough air in their helmet. So you have guys that I've seen guys just call the trainer over to get more air I've, I'd done it a time or two. And you're looking back, you're starting to realize that now that guy's getting, he's not just uncomfortable, he's actually getting a lot of force and his brain's getting damaged and we're learning so much about head injuries. And obviously, anyone listening, there are two coaches here, athletes here. They're not any doctors on this, on this show. Okay. And so we are not speaking from any medical advice. We're simply talking about things that are catching our attention, especially as people that are in coach at these high levels.

Aaron King (04:47):

But when I, when I look back at some of the things that would happen, it's actually kind of terrifying to think through, as we're learning so much about the repetitive hits, those small hits, that is what does all the damage. It's not necessarily just those, those big impacts. So I, I, my last concussion, or my second to last was the one that did the most damage. Cause I, I apparently it was on the ground. And then the trainers were walking over to me off the sideline. And I was looking around thinking as someone hurt. And they came up to me and I was

Coach Bob King (05:17):

Like, what are y'all doing? Are

Aaron King (05:19):

Are you okay? I was like, yeah, I'm fine. Do you know? And they were like, well, you laid down for a while. And like, I don't remember. I got hit apparently was out and got up and walked off the field. And I finished the game wall snap, the game-winning field goal, but definitely should not have been playing. I had on that. Just here's a scary, the dark side. And I, I spoke to, I think it was Newsweek or someone I told them the dark reality of concussions is if you get if you get on a Wikipedia or something, just look at post-concussion syndrome, you can see symptoms. And that was writing my biography. I mean, it was your, your cognitive ability is, is, is mitigated because your brain's having to rewire scrambled Ryan. So normally if you have frustration, you have memory, you have these different cognitive things when you are concussed or dealing with post-concussion syndrome, as far as I understand it, you are, your brain is having to reroute and so different parts of your brain that really are not designed to deal with certain types of thoughts, emotions, whatever are having to deal with it.

Aaron King (06:25):

And so that's why people are just, you just act differently. And so I dealt with that the first time. It was probably eight months after that concussion before I started feeling good. So just in time for training camp swell played. And then when I got the last concussion, I blurred my vision, which is still blurry to date. So that was seven, eight years ago. My blurred, my vision still blurred, and I barely got hit, but that one that lasted over a year where migraines every day. Yeah. And so if you told me that I could wear anything, any sort of preventative paths, I would be all over. So second school was something that I, I, I'm so glad that we're able to, to work with them because I'd be wearing this. And then bobsledding, I wore this really thick padded like skullcap and, you know, just for an extra little absorption on the vibration, but to have something that prevents mitigates any sort of blows I think that it is, it is, it's something that everyone needs to be thinking about.

Coach Bob King (07:26):

Well, there's you and football and your bobsled, but just so that people listening will understand that is not an exclusive sport for concussions, as well as you know. And so yeah, throughout the years, I know I had two hospital stays as I mentioned, but one of my concussions occurred in my freshman year, in college at a game. And we were playing Arkansas and in the first half I got blasted, I don't remember it to this day, but I remember him in the locker room at halftime. They have phones and the phones ring, and the referee saying, the coach got two minutes. And so the phone rings and I'm kinda coming back to it. And I started laughing. I go, what's the matter I go, it's, it's his wife. She wants him to bring milk home after the game.

Coach Bob King (08:15):

So, King, you're not back in this game. And so it just does things with the reason I mentioned that just what it does to the brain and scrambling it. And from a coaching standpoint, we're going to, I'm going to kind of be all over the map. But I had an athlete that I would work with. I had a player that was a great soccer player. And as on my football team, I had no kickers. I mean, the people that were kicking were, you know, default and we needed to kick her and this guy had a leg and I said, look, all you have to do is kick and walk off. You don't have to make a tackle. You have to do anything. And he said, well, I think I can do that. He talked to his parents and he went and to his coach, who's from another country and threatened him with his life or not playing him, show him.

Coach Bob King (09:00):

So he said, I can't do it, coach. And I'll be dadgum. If that kid didn't hit a goalpost in a soccer game and get a concussion now I played, I, I, when I got out of college, I didn't believe my football career could possibly be over. It was, I played a year of the semi-pro ball and I immediately took up ice hockey. And there we go again. Just so the people listening if they don't know the ice is really hard. And so getting into those micro concussions when, and if you don't know if you're listening if you don't know what getting your bill wrong or whatever means you get blasted in the head and the lights, it's just like taking a light switch and flickering it. And you're kind of shaking it, like what just happened, but it's so fast. You just, you just shrug it off. And so, you know, getting banged around on the ice and things like that the lights go out frequently and a lot of guys and gals don't talk about that and they need to,

Aaron King (09:55):

That's the that's what we're finding out more and more it's those small, repetitive hits is what's causing things like CTE. But again, I can barely speak on that because the research is so fresh and I barely even know the current what we do now, but that is what guys that play those repetitive hits linebackers. You want boxers, the MMA, and boxers they're signing up for. And they know that you can see it Saturday, seem like Joe, Rogan's been posting some stuff about boxers, and it's terrifying to see these world champions that they can't even,

Coach Bob King (10:27):

They can't feed themselves. Mohammad Ali, bless his heart, man. He was really, so bad at the end,

Aaron King (10:32):

You start to think about those types of things. And I, I remember, I remember going to taco bell and ordering stuff that wasn't on the menu and just the day after now, I'm better. But you know, it really isn't terrifying about that. And, you know, it's not just, you talked about other sports there's, there are two different use cases here, particularly. Fortunately, they had the skull cap that goes under the helmet, but then also the headband, you know, I can think about just flag football and soccer teams that you've just collided heads with guys. You know, I'm now wearing ankle braces when I play basketball. I'm the guy that's like, just, I don't want another injury.

Coach Bob King (11:15):

Well, you're, you're, you're hitting on a point that I guess I'm going to get into it right now. And I want to make a real clear statement about these concussions or injuries as a whole. I'm not big on the word prevention, because if we could, we wouldn't have any right now. Here's what we can say. If you have some sort of a PR you know how protective equipment like a second skull, may prevent one that you might've gotten that's true. And or in other words and conditioning and so forth, you might lessen the severity. You get banged in the head, but it doesn't ring your bell like you normally would. So it's, it's just reduction is a big, big part of it. And I've got lists of things just short, but I want to make sure people understand it. We're talking about our experiences, but neither one of us would not have done what we did because I would never for a second and say, don't be sports involved or active because of fear of having some sort of concussion, because it's an injury, it's a severe injury.

Coach Bob King (12:18):

And we want to do the things that we can. First of all, I think that, you know, the strength and conditioning area we always talk about it as a great mechanism to help offset, because you may be able to be strong and fast enough to avoid a concussion that might have caused that a big hit. So just make sure that, Hey, you are getting all the equipment available to you to use in, in competition or practice, whatever you're doing. And secondly, just don't avoid competition or play because you're afraid of that because that's just, that's not a good reason. The other thing that I want to mention it goes into this as well as injuries are I'm I think, as a coach and as a parent, I'm I follow doctor's orders. So if you ever have an injury, make sure you follow the doctor's order, be a good patient. If the doc says, man, you've been your, you had your bell rung, you've been rung up pretty good. So nothing for five days and come see me well, don't do anything for five days and go see him. So that's, I think a big, big takeaway is to say, be a good patient because this is serious business.

Aaron King (13:21):

Yeah, it, it is. And I'm a big advocate of anything we can do that I even I've been hearing some, some interesting, I can't talk about them now, cause I think they're still under research or whatnot, but some technology or Medicaid, it's something that actually helps the brain prepare itself for impact. So I'm not talking about gear it actually helps. Something is from a, from a cellular perspective, it helps the brain prevent like absorb impact or repair. It. It's very fascinating, long story short. There's a lot of cool stuff coming out. And there's a lot of resources, a lot of research in the last decade that has accelerated at crazy times, just cause some of the things we were learning and the other doc that we've spoken to activity coming back, you know when I had the last one I needed, they wanted me to just sit in a dark room for however many days and do nothing, but that's a little bit contrary to what we're learning.

Coach Bob King (14:23):

It's starting to evolve to where, okay. The thinking muscle, the brain needs to have some physical activity, not returning to the sport, but just to whether you ride a stationary bike or do something to stimulate blood flow or, or make the brain have to be in a coordinating mode or something like that. So they've changed. It is starting to change that thinking a little bit as far as a and they're not in a hurry to get you back on the field, but they just want you to recover fully. So that's, that's starting to evolve, right? Yeah. There, there's

Aaron King (14:52):

A lot of good stuff coming out. And I, and I, I'm very glad because sports is such a great thing, but anyway, we just wanted to take today and talk about head injuries from our personal experience for rolling into this new year with a lot of different topics, trying to get very holistic to the athletic process. And, you know, I think we're going to have some good opportunities to bring in some other doctors and some other professionals over the course of this year to really shed light on this. And, you know, we've, we've been focused on speed agility, performance training, but there is no, I mean that you cannot separate these. They are

Coach Bob King (15:26):

It's they're hand in hand, so you have to talk about it, ignoring it. Doesn't make it go away. You have to be ready for it. We don't, we don't prepare because we're going to get hurt. But if you know that it's a possibility when something happens in it, don't be devastated and, and, and overly surprised. It's never good to have an injury, but we want to know, we want you to know that we work on it. And when these issues come up, like the CTE, it just stimulates in a, for better or worse, even companies that have a business interest, but the outcome is good for the consumer or in this case, the athlete. So we need to stay abreast of that because we talk about speed and strength and all that. So what does that mean? You're going to run into somebody a lot harder than you did a year ago, right?

Aaron King (16:10):

Well, yeah. So if you have any questions you can hit us up on social media. I am @DeepSnap on Instagram and Twitter coach. Bob King is @CoachBobKing, and you go to second skull.com and check out what they're all about. I'll have some links in the descriptions. If you're in the newsletter, we'll also have some stuff there as well, but I want you guys to check that out and we'll, we'll work on some promo codes for newsletters. So keep in touch there, make sure you sign up there@themost.fit for speed daily, where we send out newsletters and workouts each week. But for coach Bob King, I'm Aaron King, we will talk to you guys next time.