Why Spring Is Peak Injury Season (And How to Train Smart)

It happens every spring without fail. And in the latest episode of the Movement Driven Podcast, Dr. Greg Goldberger breaks down exactly why — and what to do instead.

The warmth hits, the motivation spikes, and most people treat that as a green light to pick up right where they left off — or jump straight to where they want to be. But your body didn't stay at that level through the winter. Even if you kept moving, the change in temperature, environment, and routine means there's a real deconditioning element at play. You just can't feel it yet.

And that gap between how you feel and how prepared your tissues actually are — that's where injuries happen.

Your muscles might feel ready to go. Your tendons are a different story.

Tendons are made of collagen, and they adapt to load much more slowly than muscle tissue. When you ramp up your training before your tendons have caught up, the forces moving through your joints become uneven. Nothing dramatic happens in one session — it builds quietly over time, across a series of workouts where you pushed just a little past what your body was ready for.

Dr. Greg points to throwing athletes and runners as the clearest example of this pattern. The two highest-injury windows in any season are the very beginning, when volume spikes before the body is prepared, and the very end, when accumulated fatigue finally catches up. The mechanism is the same either way: too much, too fast, without the foundation to support it.

Pain is not always the first signal. A plateau — suddenly not lifting as much, not running as fast, not recovering the way you were — can be an early indicator that you've increased load faster than your body can adapt. Most people push through it or blame sleep and stress. Dr. Greg explains why that plateau deserves more attention than it usually gets.

So how do you actually build back up without setting yourself back? The answer is simpler than most people want it to be: change one factor at a time.

Don't increase your weight, your reps, your mileage, and your intensity all in the same week. Pick one variable. Let your body adapt to it. Then adjust the next. It's less satisfying than going all-out from day one — but it's how you actually make progress without ending up sidelined a month into a season you were excited about.

The foundation matters here too. If you haven't been doing strength work, mobility work, and endurance training through the winter, that's where you start — not with speed and power. You build the base before you build the output. Dr. Greg also points listeners back to the podcast's earlier episodes on post-activation potentiation (PAP) as a practical framework for how to prime your nervous system correctly before you push hard.

Wanting to get back at it is a good thing. That drive has to be there. But motivation without structure is how people end up frustrated and injured just weeks into a season they were genuinely excited about. Your body needs a path forward that respects where it actually is right now — not where it was last fall, and not where you want it to be by summer.

Having a physical therapist in your corner as a regular part of your routine — not just when something goes wrong, but as a proactive check-in every six to twelve months — is something Dr. Greg believes should be standard practice for anyone who's serious about staying active. A second set of eyes can catch what you've stopped noticing before it becomes a real problem.

This spring, your body needs a plan — not just motivation.

Listen now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube.

The Movement Driven Podcast is your go-to resource for performance, injury prevention, and training smarter — built for active adults in the Jacksonville and St. Johns area and beyond. If you're ready to stop guessing and start building, visit movementdriven.com to book your discovery call.