Body Engineering (BE)™ by David Reavy, PT, OCS
The missing link to sports performance, fitness, recovery, and injury prevention. Perform routines consisting of releases and exercises created and curated by licensed physical therapists to attain better mobility, prevent injury, recover faster, and improve performance. Body Engineering™ is the perfect complement to your current lifestyle and fitness regimen. Discover your missing link to optimal body performance with Body Engineering™.
+ Designed by PTs
Our Physical Therapists designed quick and easy to follow routines you can incorporate into your daily schedule.
+ Meet Your Goals
Schedule reminders to stick to your routines and discover your optimal body performance.
+ Targeted Approach
Target specific areas that you want to work on, and create and share your own custom routines.
From the creator of the Body Engineering (be)™ app
Once you experience Body Engineering™ by React Physical Therapy you will never look at the human body the same again. With over 23 years of experience and over 14 of those years of working with professional and elite athletes, the human body continues to amaze me. I believe taking people out of pain is the ultimate form of recovery.
David Reavy is an Orthopaedic Physical Therapist by trade,
Owner of React Physical Therapy and creator of the Reavy Method.
Getting Started
+ Is the Body Engineering™ app for you?
The simple answer is, yes! From business professionals to professional athletes, students to seniors, mom to be to parents on the go, Body Engineering™ will help you feel and perform at your best.
Whether you are using your body to sit all day or using your body to perform at the highest level, it is imperative that you use it efficiently. Your body is in a constant fight against gravity and it will eventually give unless you counter act it properly. Or succumb to the number of ascending no’s you tell yourself. “I have a bad knee so I can’t run.” “I have a bum foot so I don’t do legs.” “It hurts when I throw so I can’t play catch with my kids.”
Research shows that musculoskeletal imbalances lead to pain. When you have a blood imbalance or a hormonal imbalance it leads to medical issues. The systems of your body work more efficiently when they are balanced. Musculoskeletal imbalances start off as tightness, then progresses to occasional pain, and eventually the straw breaks the camel’s back.
If you are not using your whole body to move, you are compensating and your compensation patterns will limit your performance and increase the chance of injury. Optimal performance is utilizing the biggest muscles together – your abdominals, lats and glutes.
Body Engineering™ allows you access to physical therapy-based routines that you can do from the comfort of your home or on the go. There are no excuses to not find your missing link for optimal body performance.
+ How should this app be used?
The Body Engineering™ app is the perfect complement to your current lifestyle and fitness regimen to assist you in attaining better mobility, preventing injury, recovering faster, and improving performance.
Your body follows the path of least resistance and your movement is based on reflexive patterns. This app is designed to teach you how to identify your weakest link, turn on muscles you never had or stopped using. By following the curated routines and accessing physical therapy-based exercises, releases, and stretches, Body Engineering allows you to follow the specific order based on your reflexive system, prevent compensations and allow you to use your body properly, together as one unit by utilizing your biggest muscles together, your abdominals, lats, and glutes. Using your biggest muscles together will help you absorb and create force equally and together as one unit improving strength, flexibility, range of motion, motor control, body awareness, and preventing injury – making you a better mover.
+ Why should I use the Body Engineering™ app?
Body Engineering™ was designed to enhance the reflexive powers of the human body. Your body is one unit and should function as one unit. It is interconnected and it all works together. The way you move is one giant reflex pattern via the stretch reflex. You have been moving the way you move for decades. If you want to change it you have to take what the body gives you. You have to work around it to get to it. When you are able to release a tight muscle, it changes how you feel and how you move.
There are many ways to move as the body is amazing and can compensate. However there becomes a point when you can’t compensate. The thing that was your norm becomes your enemy. “I have never been able to touch my toes.” “I have always walked like this.” That’s the issue. The straw will eventually break the camel’s back unless you stop making excuses and do something about it and invest in yourself and your body.
Less than 2% of collegiate athletes will become professional athletes. The majority of professional athletes will never obtain a second contract as the average professional career across sports (NFL, MLB, NBA and MLS) is 4.5 years with NFL at 3.5 years. There’s a point in life when your body stops working like it used to. With pro athletes, t’s around 25-26 years old and with everyone else it is your 30’s.
No one teaches you how to move. No one teaches you how to use your body. You can either do it or not. Sit up straight. Stretch. There’s a reason why you don’t. It hurts. It doesn’t feel right.
+ Why does order matter?
Order matters. All of our routines are designed by licensed physical therapists using their education and expertise in how the body creates powerful movement patterns. Our curated sequence of actions is designed to get the most out of each routine, it’s key that you follow the sequence in the right order to get the desired effects.
Releases aren’t new but the order you perform them is crucial to making the necessary changes. Many people have rolled out their quads or IT band but they only feel tighter. They stretch but never get loose. If I had a dollar for every athlete or weekend warrior who tore their ACL or Achilles by participating in their sport even though they told me they couldn’t get loose but they played anyways. There are many excuses people are told and convince themselves with such as “I have always been tight,” “It is genetic,” “I was built this way.” “I have a bad knee.” NO! It is how you use your body. I always ask my patients if this is true then why doesn’t your other side hurt? If you want to make changes then you have to perform actions in a specific order.
Body Engineering™ takes the guess work out of the order and provides you with routines that allow you to target specific areas that you want to work on, as well as gear towards the activities you enjoy to improve performance, avoid injury and execute pain free.
+ What is a muscle release and why is it important?
A muscle has contractile properties meaning it shortens and lengthens. Fascia / tendons on the other hand are not contractile. They lengthen and then return to their original length. So then why are IT bands, patella tendons, achilles tendons, and any other tendon taught at rest? Because you told them to.
The way you use your body is a reflex. An overused muscle will cause your bone to mis-align and consequently cause the antagonistic muscle to become passively insufficient. In order to change how you use your body, you need to do so reflexively. When your body is in neutral it is most stable and strongest because it creates balanced co-contractions. When your muscles and tendons are taught at rest it tells me that you have a muscle imbalance (passive and active insufficiencies) which limits your ability to perform and therefore increases the risk of injury because your ability to maintain a neutral position is compromised.
Research has shown that muscle imbalances cause pain. Muscle releases in the right order, your reflex pattern, will allow muscles to relax. Muscle releases are performed to release restrictions by relaxing that particular muscle as your muscles should be relaxed at rest. When you are performing a muscle release your goal is to get it to relax.
To perform a muscle release you apply pressure, the deeper the better, and then actively shorten and lengthen that muscle. There are more advanced releases where you can perform a release by actively contracting the antagonistic muscle. There is a significant benefit to performing releases as I believe it is the best form of recovery as I use it to take my patients out of pain. Muscle imbalances turn into muscle tightness, decreased performance, pain, and then injury. Releases will increase your range of motion, joint mobility, and flexibility, improve your motor control, force production, and bony alignment, turn on muscles that have shut off, and improve body awareness.
+ What does it mean to activate a muscle and why is it important?
Muscles are your first line of defense. They create and absorb force. When you don’t use your body actively, with your muscles, you use it passively, with your fascia / tendons, bones and joints.
Activating your muscles before activity will improve your performance and prevent injury. You do this by eccentrically loading your muscles to activate your stretch reflex preparing your muscles for activity. If you don’t feel it, you don’t have enough concentric strength within that particular muscle.
+ Glossary for Body Engineering™ App Terms:
Action – Release, Exercise
Routine – Group of actions in a sequence
Collection – Group of Routines
+ Tips for getting started:
Check out our featured routines
Use the Browse tab to find routines by your goals, activities, target area, action type or based on the equipment you have available.
Consistency is key. Schedule reminders to help you stay on top of your routines and to obtain optimal results.
+ How to access a personalized shared routine:
For Professionals
+ How to create your own routine:
Body Engineering™ allows you to create your own routines to utilize for your clients, players, patients, and more. We provided a step-by-step walkthrough to show you how to create your own customized routines.
+ How to share your customized routines:
Behind the scenes
+ Why David Reavy, PT, OCS decided to create Body Engineering™?
“I was hit by a car when I was 18 years old. I “recovered” but didn’t feel the same. I was a good high school athlete and thought that I would eventually heal. I was naïve. I had pain that wouldn’t go away. I couldn’t kneel at my church pew. I couldn’t sit on the floor. I couldn’t walk barefoot. I felt constant tension in my back. I avoided many activities. When I played basketball, my teammates would cheer when the ball went in, because my shot was now awful. I felt clumsy. I used to be fast, when I played high school football, I rarely left the field. After my accident playing pick-up football, I was slow and got beat deep. I never got beat deep. I didn’t know why my body didn’t work as it did before. I know why now.
Nobody should have to stop doing what they love. I created the Body Engineering™ app for all the people who had to stop doing what they love due to restrictions being placed on them by their bodies. For all the non-contact injuries that should have been prevented. For clumsy people. For people who never felt their glutes work. For the people with no calves regardless of their hours in the gym. For the non-athletic kids who are now adults. For everyone who wanted to dunk. For the majority of the population who is suffering silently. I created this app for YOU. You don’t have to settle, reach your body’s optimal performance!”
+ About the creator of Body Engineering™:
Body Engineering™ was created by David Reavy, PT, OCS, owner and founder of React Physical Therapy.
“I received my credentials from the University of Illinois at Chicago and am a Board-Certified Clinical Specialist in Orthopedic Physical Therapy. I feel fortunate to be a regular contributor to Men’s Journal. I especially enjoy seeing my work translate into higher levels of function in my patient population. My past and current clients include Matt Forte, Dwayne Wade, Gilbert Arenas, Tracy McGrady, Tommie Harris, and the many clients that come through React Physical Therapy every day.
I currently work out 7 days a week and perform releases and stretches one day a week. I use my entire body to move through a full range of motion so it doesn’t tighten up even when I lift 300 pounds or my body weight. I am using everything so it doesn’t compensate. I am 46 years old and I am at my strongest, most flexible, and most athletic than I have ever been. I am moving better than I did before my car accident at 18 years old. I designed Body Engineering to share my methodology and expertise so others can perform at their best”
+ About the Reavy Method©:
The Reavy Method© focuses on balancing the body through dynamic assessment, weakness/restriction localization through muscle testing, muscle release, and muscle activation. The goal is to not only bring people back to the level of functioning they had previously known but to help them become balanced and stronger than ever.
Rather than focus only on the site of the injury, we use the Reavy Method© – a whole-body approach to physical therapy developed by React PT founder and creator of Body Engineering David Reavy, PT, OCS – to treat the cause and the symptoms of your pain.
Free Download
From your first routine get to work releasing muscle restrictions and restoring natural movement for immediate impact. Start engineering your future today.