Joe Rogan Experience #1766 - Ben Patrick
Joe Rogan (host), Ben Patrick (guest), Narrator, Narrator, Narrator
In this episode of The Joe Rogan Experience, featuring Joe Rogan and Ben Patrick, Joe Rogan Experience #1766 - Ben Patrick explores fixing Knees, Rethinking Exercise: Ben Patrick’s Radical Sled-First Philosophy Joe Rogan interviews Ben Patrick (Knees Over Toes Guy) about how he rebuilt his surgically ravaged knees and created a training system focused on strengthening joints through full range of motion and backward sled work.
Fixing Knees, Rethinking Exercise: Ben Patrick’s Radical Sled-First Philosophy
Joe Rogan interviews Ben Patrick (Knees Over Toes Guy) about how he rebuilt his surgically ravaged knees and created a training system focused on strengthening joints through full range of motion and backward sled work.
Patrick explains the science and history behind backward sled dragging, knees-over-toes training, and why traditional advice like “never let your knees go past your toes” and chronic icing are outdated.
They discuss how his methods have helped Rogan’s own knees, why sled work is uniquely safe for all ages, and how building strength in overlooked areas (tibialis, hip flexors, hamstrings, QL) can dramatically improve performance and reduce injuries.
The conversation also touches on discipline, social media, parenting, nutrition, and how finding something you love (for Rogan, martial arts; for Patrick, basketball and coaching) unlocks obsessive focus and life-changing work ethic.
Key Takeaways
Backward sled dragging is a low-risk, high-reward foundation for knee rehab and longevity.
Because only you move the sled (it never moves you), it safely loads the knees through a knees-over-toes pattern, builds strength and circulation, and is suitable from pro athletes down to fragile 80-year-olds.
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Avoiding knees-over-toes positions has likely contributed to weaker, more fragile knees.
Patrick argues that pressure in deep ranges (knee over toe, full bend) stimulates synovial fluid and tissue adaptation; avoiding those angles lets joints biologically age faster and lose capacity.
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Train the “forgotten” muscles to unlock performance and prevent injury.
He emphasizes tibialis raises, Nordics, hip-flexor work (monkey feet or low-cable knee raises), and QL side work as crucial for jumping, kicking, sprinting, running a strong guard in jiu-jitsu, and protecting knees, ankles, and backs.
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Frequency of sled work beats occasional heroic sessions.
Patrick sleds every workout (often six days a week) with moderate distances and loads, arguing that consistent daily circulation and light strength stimulus do more for healing and bulletproofing than sporadic long, brutal sessions.
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Full-range strength training can replace much static stretching and reduce stiffness.
He prefers exercises like full-range split squats, deep Romanian deadlifts, Jefferson curls, and weighted “butterfly” groin work over passive stretching, building strength in extreme ranges so flexibility is usable and stable, not flimsy.
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Textbooks and institutional coaching often lag years behind emerging best practices.
Patrick recounts a D1 strength coach banning his knees-over-toes work—even though it got him there—illustrating how slow educational systems are to integrate new data on joint loading, motion, and recovery.
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Aligning discipline with passion beats forcing yourself to care about the wrong things.
Rogan’s story of hating school yet obsessing over martial arts, and Patrick’s monastic focus on knees and coaching, both show that “focus problems” often disappear when people find something they deeply care about and structure life around it.
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Notable Quotes
“The farther and stronger your knee can go over your toes, the less chance of knee injury you have.”
— Ben Patrick
“The sled never moves you—you move the sled. That’s what makes it so safe.”
— Ben Patrick
“How the fuck did I not know about this? How am I finding out about this from Jamie and Instagram?”
— Joe Rogan
“The thing I was worst at is now what I’m best at—my knees.”
— Ben Patrick
“It wasn’t that I didn’t have the ability to focus; I am fiercely opposed to focusing on something I don’t give a shit about.”
— Joe Rogan
Questions Answered in This Episode
What would a minimalist weekly program look like for someone with severe knee pain who has no gym access and only a small space at home?
Joe Rogan interviews Ben Patrick (Knees Over Toes Guy) about how he rebuilt his surgically ravaged knees and created a training system focused on strengthening joints through full range of motion and backward sled work.
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
How can a coach or physical therapist start integrating sled and knees-over-toes concepts into a traditional setting where colleagues still follow older protocols?
Patrick explains the science and history behind backward sled dragging, knees-over-toes training, and why traditional advice like “never let your knees go past your toes” and chronic icing are outdated.
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
For someone with significant cartilage loss or multiple surgeries, how should they progress backward sled work safely from “barely walking” to meaningful loads?
They discuss how his methods have helped Rogan’s own knees, why sled work is uniquely safe for all ages, and how building strength in overlooked areas (tibialis, hip flexors, hamstrings, QL) can dramatically improve performance and reduce injuries.
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
How do Patrick’s views on icing, NSAIDs, and motion-based recovery align or conflict with current sports-medicine consensus and large-scale clinical research?
The conversation also touches on discipline, social media, parenting, nutrition, and how finding something you love (for Rogan, martial arts; for Patrick, basketball and coaching) unlocks obsessive focus and life-changing work ethic.
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
What are the most common mistakes people make when they try to copy ATG exercises from social media without coaching, and how can they avoid overdoing it?
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Transcript Preview
(drumming music plays) Joe Rogan podcast. Check it out. The Joe Rogan Experience. Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night. All day. (rock music plays) Welcome. What's happening, man?
Hey, man.
We should thank Jamie, because inadvertently, Jamie's the reason why this podcast got started.
You're welcome.
(laughs)
Thank you, guys. Thank you, Jamie.
Jamie t- What... Jamie told me about you, like-
It's probably three years ago-ish?
A couple.
Yeah, at least.
Yeah, for sure, at least a couple. And I've always had, like, weird issues with my knees, for years. You know, I've had-
Yep.
... both knees reconstructed. As... You've had a bunch of knee surgeries as well, right?
Yep.
How many knee surgeries have you had?
Well, I had, with my left knee, partially artificial kneecap. It was a strange-
Artificial kneecap?
Really strange thing. Yeah. Um-
What's an artificial kneecap? What's it made out of?
Some kind of, like, rubber plastic kind of shit. I was super depressed. (laughs)
Wow.
I was, I was...
So, like, when you feel it-
I had missed my senior year of basketball, so I was getting... They said, basically, that my kneecap had fractured off, like the upper left side was just fractured, so they had to take it out and put something else in there.
I've never even heard of that before.
You can... Yeah, you can still see kind of where it juts out.
Ooh.
Yeah.
And can you sit on your... Well, obviously he can't. I've seen you. Be on your knees, no, no issues at all with that?
Yeah, yeah, no issues.
Do you, do you get a-
But I had issues a long time after that.
Yeah?
Until I started, you know, figuring out some alternative training stuff.
Did you... You got a meniscus replacement too, didn't you?
Meniscus transplant. Yeah.
Now, that is wild.
Yeah.
What did... What, what, what happens there?
Uh, apparently they, you know, put in a cadaver meniscus and it's-
And how long does it take-
... takes.
... before your body takes it?
Don't know. But that one didn't seem like a problem at all. That was e-... That one was easier.
Really?
Yeah.
So, when they put the cadaver-
(clears throat)
... meniscus in, how long before you were able to really work out again?
Um, that one I would say was, like, in a matter of months I could feel that spot actually felt fine again.
A matter of months?
Yeah.
Really? How old were you when that ha- happened?
18.
'Cause I looked into that, and they said they don't recommend it for people over a certain age. It was like... So, I think it might be 50.
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