May 6, 2025 • 10 mins
Pro Rehab's Dr. Larry Benz discusses proper procedures for transitioning from winter to summer workouts to avoid destroying dormant muscles.
Also, since Larry is Chairman of the University of Louisville's board of trustees, we take a minute to profile the school's new leader Dr. Gerry Bradley.
Also, since Larry is Chairman of the University of Louisville's board of trustees, we take a minute to profile the school's new leader Dr. Gerry Bradley.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Doctor Larry Benz joins us, founder of Confluent Health pro
Rehab around these parts. Larry, welcome back, Thank you, Cherry.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Great to be here.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
Yeah, we're playing some rhythmic music here from the nineteen eighties.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
I loved that. That's good stuff.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
That's how that is. You're also on the board University
of Louisville and are you the president of the board
right now? And I can't keep up with a lot.
I think they call it chairman chairman. You're a chairman
of the board like he's chairman of the board. We
have a new president in place. I got to meet
him not too long ago. Really an affable fellow. But
he's got a long time experience already on campus at
(00:36):
U of L.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Yeah, he does.
Speaker 3 (00:38):
He actually has been here about nine years and he
came in as the dental dean. He's an orthodontist by training,
which means he made his money sticking metal in young
kids mouths and charging a lot of money for it.
But it has to mean he's a friendly guy, right.
He sold his practice, got back in academia and he
(00:59):
has really been the architect behind a lot of our
success at University Louislle In terms of what we have
to do most the best, which is graduate kids.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
And our graduation rate is way up because they have.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
Retention what they call the Students' success Metrics or KPIs
number of kids living on campus, those kind of things,
so very exciting times. You know, we have two dentists
as presidents of the largest two universities in Kentucky because
Eli Cappoluto up the street is as well.
Speaker 2 (01:25):
And that's interesting.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
I'd totally forgotten that. See, thanks for catching me up
on that. What is there is there financial strength now
in place for the University of Louisville. Do you feel
like it's you know, it's moving with enough funding for
various things because we all know there's a shape shifting
going on in academia and with universities across America.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
Yeah, no, it's a great question, Terry.
Speaker 3 (01:50):
We have the largest enrollment the last two years in
freshman class or an undergraduate in the history of U
of L. And you have to have you know, what
they traditionally in business acumen called scale, and so we
have a large infrastructure and geared towards more and more students.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
In the state.
Speaker 3 (02:09):
Public universities are at an advantage because of the cost,
and so.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
We are well positioned.
Speaker 3 (02:16):
I think our financial status, you know, frankly, in terms
of number of days of cash, those kind of things
that you would you'd want, they're the best they've ever been.
And so the university's in great hands right now and
in a great status. Obviously, our student success metrics are measured,
but you also have to look at athletics and you
have to look at research. You know, those two are
the you know, windows of the university, and in particular,
(02:39):
we've just been on.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
A roll the last few years as you will, as
you well know.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
And our new president is obviously very research oriented because
that's really where we make our beans in the world
of academia.
Speaker 3 (02:53):
That absolutely is you know, we're what is known as
an R one university, which may not mean much to
some people, but means we're one of one hundred and
seventy eight universities across the US, and that our stands
for research and means you have to have a minimum
of I think it's like seventy million in research funding.
We have, you know, quite a bit more than that,
(03:13):
and so we've got a lot of responsibility towards the
research community and over time you've heard of terms like
bucks for brains and all those things are really relevant
to the cardiac and other kinds of research that we
do at the university that is, you know, created some breakthroughs.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
And doctor Jerry Bradley, our new president, is this right?
Does he get up at four point thirty in the
morning run six eight miles or something or other?
Speaker 3 (03:40):
Yeah, I mean there's two people I tell folks at
the university you never want to run with. One is
Josh Hurd for the obvious faction right track guy in college.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
And then Jerry. He runs fast, but he also runs
really early in the morning.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
And you know he also has an Irish acceset for
very good reason. And so you know we attribute with
those kind of accents with being smarter than us. In
some cases that's not true, but in his case it
absolutely is true. So he's a very smart runner who
talks in a nice Irish accent.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Well, if he's getting up at four thirty in the morning,
a board meeting can't last beyond six pm. I mean
he's got to go home and have dinner and go
to bed, right.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
Yeah, we start at one, they better not go on past.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
So well, sometimes you get those talkative people. Well, doctor
Ben's actually I was going to talk with you about
getting into summer workout regimen, but I've just just dawned
on me run at the second there when you jumped
on that. You're the chair of the board. So yeah,
good to know, and we'll get doctor Bradley in here
for a conversation on the radio. Let's segue to your
(04:41):
physical therapy realm. It is the time of year now
where people bust out. They start doing more things. It's
more pickaball, more tennis, more walking, running, bicycling, all those
things for extended hours. What sort of advice do you
give people who've been in a slowed down exercise mode
for months.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
You know, it's interesting if you look at the two
busiest times of year for exercise. One is the obvious,
the old New Year's you know, resolution time period, and
that's why when you go to your local fitness center,
every machine is on and then that tails off, you know,
let's say by the end of February, and in Kentucky
and many other states where you have a true break
(05:21):
and seasonality. The second favorite time is right around now.
It's actually sort of you know, mid to late May
a Memorial Day is a big landmark in the exercise
world where people get out and they move. And my
advice is still always, you know, the same from year
to year, which is that be mindful that your heart
(05:42):
is the number one sort of thing you want to
take care of. And so we call it, the industry
calls it level one training, level two, go up to five,
which really is a progression of how hard you're working.
And level two means you can effectively talk to somebody
as you're walking fast to even jogging, and as it
turns out, that's that's one of the more important features.
(06:05):
And so you want to try to do that twenty
to thirty minutes, you know, three times a week. There's
been some newer research that really suggests that you should
be highly variable. You should maybe you know, do that
for an hour one day, another day for thirty minutes,
another day for forty, and then another day maybe.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
Increase the intensity.
Speaker 3 (06:25):
But everything we've known about aerobic you know, we've known
for many, many years, and so even if there's been
some additional add ons, it's not groundbreaking. And so I
just help people stick with the basic stretch, of course,
but get into the warming of your muscles before you stretch.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
I see too many injuries where people you know, hop.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
Right off the of the off the chair from their
desk or the pouts and they start stretching and statically
doing it and all of a sudden, you know, hand
egos or something along that line. So get those muscles
nice and warm, get them stretched, and then get that
heart moving. And think of how many times a week
you break a sweat and for how long that you
do that?
Speaker 2 (07:05):
And keep things simple and sustainable.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
And when you're at work, you know, they'll say, oh,
Jimmy's not here today, Hey Bob, can you play softball tonight?
And Bob played a few years ago, and so that's
one of those things where you can get a guy
hurt that way. So you got to graduate yourself into
that sort of thing.
Speaker 3 (07:23):
Yeah, you know, the best example we see in the
clinic you'll get a kick out of this is when
you know, somebody with an eight year old son wants
to go out and throw baseball, and you know, sort
of late late February, we get a nice breakthrough of
a day or March or even April or May, and
you know, Dad hasn't thrown much in a while he
throws that first one bam. And it's because he hasn't
(07:45):
had any warm up, hasn't done anything with that type
of reproduction of movement or intensity. And that's when bad
things happen. You know, they happened at initial and they
happened in the fourth quarter. I like to say your
last run when you've gone skiing, the last pickleball game
of the night, or the very very first one in between.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
We tend to be okay, all right.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
When you do a twenty thirty minute whatever work and
you work yourself aerobicly, let's say it's thirty minutes, how
many minutes of stretching should follow? For someone middle aged.
Speaker 3 (08:22):
That's a really really good question. I generally look at
for every thirty.
Speaker 2 (08:27):
Minutes that you exercise, you do about.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
Twenty to thirty percent of that same amount of time
and either stretching or some type of activity like core
strengthening or that kind of thing. So if you're going
to do thirty minutes, you want to afterwards do five
to ten minutes of stretching in various capacities, particularly or
lawn and muscles first, which would be in your legs,
(08:52):
in your arms, and then certainly your spine, and then
get down to the achilles and your wrists and elbows
and start law.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
And small and that's a good way to look at that.
So and also give yourself time so that you're not saying, oh,
I got to meet Barbara at noon, So I'm going
to exercise at eleven fifteen until eleven forty and then
I'm going to run, jump in the car in my
sweatshirt and go see her or whatever it is I
got to meet exactly right, You got to have the time.
You've got to give yourself that window.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
No, you absolutely do.
Speaker 3 (09:21):
And you have an advantage because your muscles are already
warmed up and so you'll be able to get better
stretching than you ever have and do it in a
way that is, you know, best for you. I find
that people who sit a lot have to get their hamstrings,
you know, logger and in a mode that will prevent
a lot of back pain and will prevent a lot
(09:42):
of strains. And for those who stand and do those
kinds of activities just the opposite. You want to stretch
more of your quads in the front part of your legs,
and so you have to be you know, paired up
with with where you've done statically or positionally all day.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
Well, it makes sense, Doctor Ben's great talking to you again.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
Of course, anytime, all right, Larry Benz.
Speaker 1 (10:04):
He is chairman of u of l's Board of Trustees,
but also the founder of Confluent Health, known locally here
as pro Rehab
Doctor Larry Benz joins us, founder of Confluent Health pro
Rehab around these parts. Larry, welcome back, Thank you, Cherry.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Great to be here.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
Yeah, we're playing some rhythmic music here from the nineteen eighties.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
I loved that. That's good stuff.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
That's how that is. You're also on the board University
of Louisville and are you the president of the board
right now? And I can't keep up with a lot.
I think they call it chairman chairman. You're a chairman
of the board like he's chairman of the board. We
have a new president in place. I got to meet
him not too long ago. Really an affable fellow. But
he's got a long time experience already on campus at
(00:36):
U of L.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Yeah, he does.
Speaker 3 (00:38):
He actually has been here about nine years and he
came in as the dental dean. He's an orthodontist by training,
which means he made his money sticking metal in young
kids mouths and charging a lot of money for it.
But it has to mean he's a friendly guy, right.
He sold his practice, got back in academia and he
(00:59):
has really been the architect behind a lot of our
success at University Louislle In terms of what we have
to do most the best, which is graduate kids.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
And our graduation rate is way up because they have.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
Retention what they call the Students' success Metrics or KPIs
number of kids living on campus, those kind of things,
so very exciting times. You know, we have two dentists
as presidents of the largest two universities in Kentucky because
Eli Cappoluto up the street is as well.
Speaker 2 (01:25):
And that's interesting.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
I'd totally forgotten that. See, thanks for catching me up
on that. What is there is there financial strength now
in place for the University of Louisville. Do you feel
like it's you know, it's moving with enough funding for
various things because we all know there's a shape shifting
going on in academia and with universities across America.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
Yeah, no, it's a great question, Terry.
Speaker 3 (01:50):
We have the largest enrollment the last two years in
freshman class or an undergraduate in the history of U
of L. And you have to have you know, what
they traditionally in business acumen called scale, and so we
have a large infrastructure and geared towards more and more students.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
In the state.
Speaker 3 (02:09):
Public universities are at an advantage because of the cost,
and so.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
We are well positioned.
Speaker 3 (02:16):
I think our financial status, you know, frankly, in terms
of number of days of cash, those kind of things
that you would you'd want, they're the best they've ever been.
And so the university's in great hands right now and
in a great status. Obviously, our student success metrics are measured,
but you also have to look at athletics and you
have to look at research. You know, those two are
the you know, windows of the university, and in particular,
(02:39):
we've just been on.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
A roll the last few years as you will, as
you well know.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
And our new president is obviously very research oriented because
that's really where we make our beans in the world
of academia.
Speaker 3 (02:53):
That absolutely is you know, we're what is known as
an R one university, which may not mean much to
some people, but means we're one of one hundred and
seventy eight universities across the US, and that our stands
for research and means you have to have a minimum
of I think it's like seventy million in research funding.
We have, you know, quite a bit more than that,
(03:13):
and so we've got a lot of responsibility towards the
research community and over time you've heard of terms like
bucks for brains and all those things are really relevant
to the cardiac and other kinds of research that we
do at the university that is, you know, created some breakthroughs.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
And doctor Jerry Bradley, our new president, is this right?
Does he get up at four point thirty in the
morning run six eight miles or something or other?
Speaker 3 (03:40):
Yeah, I mean there's two people I tell folks at
the university you never want to run with. One is
Josh Hurd for the obvious faction right track guy in college.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
And then Jerry. He runs fast, but he also runs
really early in the morning.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
And you know he also has an Irish acceset for
very good reason. And so you know we attribute with
those kind of accents with being smarter than us. In
some cases that's not true, but in his case it
absolutely is true. So he's a very smart runner who
talks in a nice Irish accent.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Well, if he's getting up at four thirty in the morning,
a board meeting can't last beyond six pm. I mean
he's got to go home and have dinner and go
to bed, right.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
Yeah, we start at one, they better not go on past.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
So well, sometimes you get those talkative people. Well, doctor
Ben's actually I was going to talk with you about
getting into summer workout regimen, but I've just just dawned
on me run at the second there when you jumped
on that. You're the chair of the board. So yeah,
good to know, and we'll get doctor Bradley in here
for a conversation on the radio. Let's segue to your
(04:41):
physical therapy realm. It is the time of year now
where people bust out. They start doing more things. It's
more pickaball, more tennis, more walking, running, bicycling, all those
things for extended hours. What sort of advice do you
give people who've been in a slowed down exercise mode
for months.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
You know, it's interesting if you look at the two
busiest times of year for exercise. One is the obvious,
the old New Year's you know, resolution time period, and
that's why when you go to your local fitness center,
every machine is on and then that tails off, you know,
let's say by the end of February, and in Kentucky
and many other states where you have a true break
(05:21):
and seasonality. The second favorite time is right around now.
It's actually sort of you know, mid to late May
a Memorial Day is a big landmark in the exercise
world where people get out and they move. And my
advice is still always, you know, the same from year
to year, which is that be mindful that your heart
(05:42):
is the number one sort of thing you want to
take care of. And so we call it, the industry
calls it level one training, level two, go up to five,
which really is a progression of how hard you're working.
And level two means you can effectively talk to somebody
as you're walking fast to even jogging, and as it
turns out, that's that's one of the more important features.
(06:05):
And so you want to try to do that twenty
to thirty minutes, you know, three times a week. There's
been some newer research that really suggests that you should
be highly variable. You should maybe you know, do that
for an hour one day, another day for thirty minutes,
another day for forty, and then another day maybe.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
Increase the intensity.
Speaker 3 (06:25):
But everything we've known about aerobic you know, we've known
for many, many years, and so even if there's been
some additional add ons, it's not groundbreaking. And so I
just help people stick with the basic stretch, of course,
but get into the warming of your muscles before you stretch.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
I see too many injuries where people you know, hop.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
Right off the of the off the chair from their
desk or the pouts and they start stretching and statically
doing it and all of a sudden, you know, hand
egos or something along that line. So get those muscles
nice and warm, get them stretched, and then get that
heart moving. And think of how many times a week
you break a sweat and for how long that you
do that?
Speaker 2 (07:05):
And keep things simple and sustainable.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
And when you're at work, you know, they'll say, oh,
Jimmy's not here today, Hey Bob, can you play softball tonight?
And Bob played a few years ago, and so that's
one of those things where you can get a guy
hurt that way. So you got to graduate yourself into
that sort of thing.
Speaker 3 (07:23):
Yeah, you know, the best example we see in the
clinic you'll get a kick out of this is when
you know, somebody with an eight year old son wants
to go out and throw baseball, and you know, sort
of late late February, we get a nice breakthrough of
a day or March or even April or May, and
you know, Dad hasn't thrown much in a while he
throws that first one bam. And it's because he hasn't
(07:45):
had any warm up, hasn't done anything with that type
of reproduction of movement or intensity. And that's when bad
things happen. You know, they happened at initial and they
happened in the fourth quarter. I like to say your
last run when you've gone skiing, the last pickleball game
of the night, or the very very first one in between.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
We tend to be okay, all right.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
When you do a twenty thirty minute whatever work and
you work yourself aerobicly, let's say it's thirty minutes, how
many minutes of stretching should follow? For someone middle aged.
Speaker 3 (08:22):
That's a really really good question. I generally look at
for every thirty.
Speaker 2 (08:27):
Minutes that you exercise, you do about.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
Twenty to thirty percent of that same amount of time
and either stretching or some type of activity like core
strengthening or that kind of thing. So if you're going
to do thirty minutes, you want to afterwards do five
to ten minutes of stretching in various capacities, particularly or
lawn and muscles first, which would be in your legs,
(08:52):
in your arms, and then certainly your spine, and then
get down to the achilles and your wrists and elbows
and start law.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
And small and that's a good way to look at that.
So and also give yourself time so that you're not saying, oh,
I got to meet Barbara at noon, So I'm going
to exercise at eleven fifteen until eleven forty and then
I'm going to run, jump in the car in my
sweatshirt and go see her or whatever it is I
got to meet exactly right, You got to have the time.
You've got to give yourself that window.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
No, you absolutely do.
Speaker 3 (09:21):
And you have an advantage because your muscles are already
warmed up and so you'll be able to get better
stretching than you ever have and do it in a
way that is, you know, best for you. I find
that people who sit a lot have to get their hamstrings,
you know, logger and in a mode that will prevent
a lot of back pain and will prevent a lot
(09:42):
of strains. And for those who stand and do those
kinds of activities just the opposite. You want to stretch
more of your quads in the front part of your legs,
and so you have to be you know, paired up
with with where you've done statically or positionally all day.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
Well, it makes sense, Doctor Ben's great talking to you again.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
Of course, anytime, all right, Larry Benz.
Speaker 1 (10:04):
He is chairman of u of l's Board of Trustees,
but also the founder of Confluent Health, known locally here
as pro Rehab
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