WHEN I SIGNED UP for a movement and musculoskeletal assessment with a new performance-optimization company in Austin called 10 Squared, I was dreading the VO2 max test, when you’re strapped into headgear that measures how much oxygen you breathe in and out while you run on a treadmill and the speed is ratcheted up until you tap out. But I’m struggling already, we’re only 30 minutes in, and I’m doing… eye fitness drills.
Beth Lewis, a movement and exercise specialist, is holding an eight-inch vision stick with letters on it in front of me and then moving it toward my nose and from side to side and up and down. My eyes are meant to track it in and out. This drill tests visual dexterity, how quickly and accurately your eyes move across the visual field. My eyeballs strain as I focus on the letters on the stick. I push my gaze to various extremes and hold it there. It’s surprisingly hard. Lewis has big, big energy and intensely watches my progress, jotting down notes and making technical observations to Kyler Brown, D.C., a cofounder of 10 Squared and a sports chiropractor.
“How your eyes move and shift drives your stability,” says Lewis. “You know your eyes are more important for stability than a six-pack? You noticing his left eye, Kyler? Might be saccadic. And that hypertonicity in his neck?” “Yes, I caught that,” says Brown. “Many people who spend all day in front of computer screens lose dexterity and peripheral vision. But don’t worry, we can work on that!”
Earlier in the session, Brown ran a series of gentle tests on my back to screen for structural or nerve-related problems. I’d told him that I had a history of lower-spine issues, and Brown put me through a sequence of exercises that stressed it in different ways. “We
