And I am not talking the babbling drunken playboy character played by Dudley Moore or the amorphous aardvark of children’s animation.
A little over 3 weeks ago, a legend and somebody incredibly influential in our field and in a lot of my thoughts passed on-Arthur Jones.
For you students and “young things” of PT, perhaps you have never heard of him-this is indeed unfortunate. For others, you can only recall his flamboyant character and penchant for “faster plane, younger women, and bigger crocodiles”-this may even be more unfortunate as it dilutes the significant impact that he has had in fitness,strength/body building, and in physical therapy. Many folks including the WSJ (Sept 1 edition), will try and “throw him under the bus”-but not EIM and those who can look beyond his faux pas and appreciate his legend.
Arthur essentially made extinct Delorme instruction and many of the cockamany things that we were conventional wisdom about body building. He simply put them and a lot of “gurus” to shame. He brought strength and training to the modern age when he brought Nautilus to market. He exposed more athletic trainers and sports medicine folks to on-going, hi intensity fitness training in a few years than has ever been accomplished since. After selling the company (which has been bought and sold numerous times and now seems to be on solid ground), he ventured into solving the world’s low back pain problems-a well intentioned effort that we should appreciate. Although he obviously didn’t solve the problem, he brought many items to bear-including the fact that strengthening the lumbar spine is not easily accomplished because of isolation issues (he should know-he and his team tried to manufacture hundreds of different devices) . It took Edison a thousand failures to get to the light bulb-who has been bold enough to follow Arthur’s lead?
Arthur had an interesting way that he marketed his products-he simply flew people in to his Nautilus studio and his palatal home or research center in the case of MedX (a marketing technique perfected for years by total joint implant companies before the FTC harangued them). He lectured, entertained, and educated with a very impressive team and I believe this exposure continues to have an impact in sports medicine today.
But, he was a complete character. Many folks in the PT and sports medicine world (particularly athletic trainers and PT’s) have their favorite memories of Arthur. I have a ton of them and only spent time with him on 3 separate occasions. I would like to share a few with you and invite you to share yours to this blog’s community.
The first was when I was an 18 year old athletic trainer attending a sports medicine “camp” at Miami of Ohio University in 1980. Arthur attended every year, co-piloting his own plane and letting his 18 year old girl friend pilot into Hamilton, Ohio. I can tell you, as campers we were mesmerized by both of them. Here are some of his precious quotes from that event:
“You can take everything we have ever known and will know about the physiology of building muscle and print it on one piece of paper-its not that complicated-quit acting like it is and get over it” (I think he invented the “get over it” phrase).
“Playing basketball didn’t make Wilt Chamberlain taller. Some athletes will simply reach their genetic peak and when they do it can be maintained easier than it took to get them there” (wonder what Arthur thought of Barry Bonds and steroids).
A few years later, I got to visit his nautilus studio (this was still before I became a PT). I distinctly remember 3 instances. The first was his comments regarding specificity of exercise and relating it to shooting elephants in the Congo: “the notion is ridiculous, just like you can’t train the ways and positions that you have to when you shoot an elephant”. The second was his expository on guns,ammunition, and their impact on various biological parts when fired from close range which still leaves me squeamish and I spent 5 years in the Army. Lastly, his fascination for crocodiles and and the on-going perplexity of his visitors over their sunning themselves with their head above water in extremely hot weather “God didn’t give them much of a brain but He put something better between their eyes-an internal thermal regulator that when exposed to the sun cools them off. Unlike a lot of humans, at least they maximize the little brain that they have”.
However, my most fond memories of Arthur came years later as we went on the journey back to Florida to see his MedX equipment and research institute. These were some real gems:
-He showed a slow motion video of some unfortunate volunteer going very quickly on a cybex back machine (I hope that there is not one of these devices in the world still in existence) and the flailing away of the person’s head as they were attached to that bombastic device and reproducing tons of repetitions of “whiplash” to the cervical spine. “Let me tell you something about acceleration that you will never forget. Let’s say that I place my fist against your forehead and push as hard as I can (by the way, I was the volunteer that he put is fist against my forehead), you will not find it painful and in fact it is tolerable. However, give me 3 feet and allow me to accelerate my fist into your head and I will break your skull (by this time I had backed away 10 feet). That is the problem with the fast speeds of these machines and acceleration.” (note: I have never forgot).
-In response to my questions about average strength (or torque or something). “Let me tell you something about averages. Let’s say I am flying my plane and I have two men who will parachute into a defined and safe target. Let’s say the first one misses the target by 250 ft. to the right and he dies. Let’s say the second guy misses the target by 250 ft. to the left and he dies. What was their average?” (note: the term average has never meant the same in my measures of central tendency lexicon).
-When asked by an attendee about a mistake thought was evident, Arthur’s response: “Mistake? Let me tell you, I only made a mistake once. I thought I was wrong about something”.
Absent his machine (which was the only true method and he had data to prove it), Arthur pulled me aside and told me that the best way to strengthen the spine was in the sense of stabilizing the pelvis while doing extension in a Roman chair or in the case of a patient, a prone short motion extension exercise while also stabilizing-a technique that many incorporate every day.
You don’t always have to agree with a person to appreciate them and you have to appreciate the legacy of Mr. Jones.
Thanks Arthur, you will be missed
Larry@physicaltherapist.com
