You already know Tom Brady’s long list of accomplishments — seven-time Super Bowl winner (and a favorite to win again in 2022 per MyBookie sportsbook), the best football player of all time, and a supermodel as a wife in Gisele Bundchen.
However, with his patented TB12 Method, Brady is also venturing into entrepreneurism in the health and fitness space. The program eschews the techniques that have kept Brady atop his game despite being on the cusp of 44 years old (his birthday is in August).
“Tom Brady” by Cliff Welch/Getty is licensed under CC BY 3.0
So what’s the “method to Brady’s madness” anyway? Welp, here’s a quick overview of the principles preached in his TB12 program:
Pliability Is Key
Some fitness programs stress endurance, others go for strength. But Brady? He’s all about muscle pliability. Per the TB12 site, this is defined as “preparing your muscles for the demands of your life and enabling them to fully recover so you can keep doing what you love.”
This makes all too much sense with Brady’s profession — NFL quarterback. He’s constantly being targeted and tackled, which for most, can pile-up the injuries. Not Brady, however. He’s suffered only one major injury during his 20-plus-year career.
Some of that has to do with his quarterbacking style, which involves quick throws to minimize the hits he sustains. But Brady claims pliability is also a major factor in his ironman-like healthiness.
Along those lines, pliability is more about “prehab” than “rehab.” To prevent injuries in the first place, Brady is a believer in “keeping muscles long, soft, and resilient, enabling them to absorb and disperse forces — in both sport and daily life.”
In terms of how to get pliable, there’s two methodologies. The first is to roll those muscles before and after a workout using rollers, spheres, and other like-minded equipment. As for the second method, we’ll cover that in the next section.
Inflammation Is The Devil
Diets high in added sugar, refined carbohydrates, fried foods, processed meats, and alcohol are giant no-nos in Brady’s book. That’s because these foods promote inflammation within the body.
Avoiding inflammation is the second method to becoming pliable. But it’s not all about food. Sleep and hydration are also critical components in taming inflammation — bad sleep and lack of hydration, as you’d guess, are not ideal in this regard.
Going back to diet, Brady also vouches for anti-inflammatory foods such as vegetables, fatty fish, and Vitamin C-rich fruits. If it comes in a box or bag, it’s probably not on Brady’s to-eat list. That means no bread, cereals, or pasta — we know, all the good stuff, but hey, it takes sacrifice to achieve Brady-like results.
“Tom Brady” by AP Photo/Brett Duke is licensed under CC BY 3.0
Exercise The Brain Too
The word exercise conjures up images of physical activity — stretching, running, lifting weights. However, Brady hasn’t forgotten about his other muscle, the brain. It’s this muscle which Brady must flex to make split-second decisions on the football field.
TB12 has a partnership with BrainHQ — an online program that includes games to stimulate the brain. In particular, the games focus on improving visual processing speed and accuracy. This could be beneficial to even non-quarterbacks who need to be cognizant of their environment at all times.
Outside of brain activities, the usual things also affect cognitive performance — good sleep, rich diet, and regular exercise. You must balance all together, per Brady. There’s no getting away with eating right, but then having restless sleep if you truly want to maximize your thinking.
There’s Products Too
While we’re on the topic of sleep, Brady also has physical products to help you in this regard. To catch his own zzz’s, he uses a king mattress designed by online start-up Molecule that runs for $1,900. Other athletes like Russell Wilson, Alex Morgan, and Michael Phelps can be found on the company’s site — which raises the question if they’re actually just good marketers or true sleep product experts.
But that’s not all, Brady’s website itself sells sleepwear items which are made alongside Under Armour. For the small price of $70, you can buy a tee shirt to wear to bed — no, we’re not kidding. There’s also jogger pants, which all stress “recovery.”
That’s the TB12 Method in a nutshell. Certain aspects make sense, others are head-scratchers, but hey, can you really argue against Brady when it comes to achieving high performance? Probably not.
Author’s Bio
Per ask, below is a headshot of me. Here’s also a short bio: Eric is a twenty-something-year-old that spends a lot of his at-work time sitting in an office chair. To combat these possibly-degrading effects, he is prone to running like he did during his athletic prime in high school. The longer the distance, the better Eric runs. Eric is also a sports fanatic. While Eric lacks the athletic prowess to compete in it, he’s used his creative spark to market within the sport industry for years.
