Ballistic: The New Science of Injury-Free Athletic Performance

by Henry Abbott

A Next Big Idea Club Best Science Book of 2025



Injuries are not destiny. This revolutionary new account of the science of injury prevention shows how “ballistic” movement can help you get strong, stay healthy, and be elite.


The biggest victories of medical science—over polio, smallpox, heart attacks, and the like—are stories of prevention. Then there’s sports, where we just run around until something breaks, leading to pain, frustration, and sometimes even expensive surgery. Injuries are a major cause of society’s growing mobility crisis. What if we could predict and prevent them?


Blending cutting-edge science with gripping storytelling, award-winning data journalist and competitive amateur athlete Henry Abbott reveals that we are on the cusp of a new era in sports medicine, built around the science of ballistic movements—leaping and landing—and the unique fingerprint of your body’s physics.


Abbott’s inspiring narrative tells the story of sports scientist Dr. Marcus Elliott and the Peak Performance Project (P3), who use technology to study how athletes move and why they get hurt. Applying machine learning and lessons from biomechanics, medicine, and physiology, doctors at P3 can now detect elevated risk of an ACL tear or a pulled hamstring like an echocardiogram can see warning signs of a heart attack.


Their data-driven findings are full of surprises. Your body’s most important defense against knee and ankle injuries are the little-known muscles in the lower leg and hip area, which typical workouts rarely target. Similarly, the glutes—not the core—do the most to prevent back pain. Transformative benefits flow from training underappreciated kinds of athleticism like rotation, deceleration, and relaxation. Most of all, science shows that the best athletes don’t avoid ballistics—they master them.


Through riveting stories of elite athletes overcoming injuries and pushing themselves to the limit, Abbott presents an evidence-based case for intervening early to protect our bodies. And he suggests that we can all harness the science of ballistic movement not just to run fast or jump high but to move with joy and lead fulfilling athletic lives.

Genres: Science, Health, Sports, Nonfiction, Fitness, Self Help

298 pages, Kindle Edition

Published May 6, 2025

Reviews

[John (LHBC) · Rating 3 out of 5]

In Ballistic, Henry Abbott takes a deep dive into the pioneering world of P3, a performance center run by sports scientist Dr. Marcus Elliott, where elite athletes don’t just train—they get analyzed like fighter jets. If you're the kind of person who watches slow-motion replays of dunks or marvels at the efficiency of a perfect stride, this book will speak your language.

Abbott is at his best when he’s narrating the origin story of P3, blending NBA data journalism with the fervor of a lifelong amateur athlete. He brings you into the room with scientists and players, breaking down how things like leaping and landing—ballistic movements, the kind that make your joints nervous—might actually be the secret sauce to staying injury-free. The idea that explosive, high-impact movements can prevent injury seems counterintuitive, and that’s what makes it so compelling.

And the science is compelling. Like, Minority Report-meets-physical-therapy compelling. P3 can predict injuries before they happen, using an arsenal of data and tech that reads like a Marvel origin story for your hamstrings. Abbott builds the case that most injuries aren't bad luck or freak accidents—they’re predictable consequences of how we move, how we train, and what we ignore.

That said, I kept waiting for the book to shift gears into something more actionable. I was hungry for more than insight—I wanted tools. After being dazzled by P3’s ability to pinpoint micro-imbalances and make NBA veterans move like rookies, I was left wondering: what about the rest of us? There’s no appendix with a DIY ballistic warm-up, no flowchart for tweaking your squat mechanics. Maybe that's not Abbott’s mission here, but it left me feeling a bit like someone shown the keys to a Ferrari—only to be told I couldn’t drive it.

Still, there’s no denying that Ballistic changes how you see movement. It reframes injury not as a risk of doing too much, but as the consequence of not doing the right kind of hard. The takeaway? The couch won’t save you—and neither will the elliptical.

If you've ever found yourself rehabbing the same injury over and over, or wondering why your PRs come with a side of physical therapy, this book offers a provocative answer: “You’re training wrong, and your body’s been trying to tell you.”

For me, this was a solid 3-star read: fascinating science, strong narrative drive in the first half, but lacking the practical translation I hoped for. I’d recommend it to coaches, trainers, and sports science fanatics—but if you’re an everyday athlete looking for your next training guide, you may be left with more questions than answers.

Thanks to W. W. Norton & Company for providing me with an Advance Copy for review.

[Lexi · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a reading experience this was a 3 but the blueprint for working out as an older performance athlete was a 5, I only wish the author spent less time biographing his friend and his friend’s company and more time explaining the insights it has on the human body.

This didn’t quite teach enough about what one is supposed to do to prevent injury, and the p3 website has almost no literature for the public.

Regardless, I got a personal trainer and used many of the core principles from this book with him and it’s been a good time, so I am grateful for this book.

[Dolorentiu · Rating 5 out of 5]

orice s-ar întâmpla mișcarea nu trebuie oprita
orice diagnosticuri/operații iti recomanda vreun doctor, tu trebuie sa continui sa te miști, oricate medicamente/tratamente care ei spun ca iti îmbunătățesc viața si sa ajungi mai rapid sa fi bine, sunt doar bani mai multi in buzunarul lor si statut social mai ridicat
cine iti spune sa te opresti din mișcat, incearca doar sa profite de tine in urma vânzării unui produs
un om care nu se mai misca este mai aproape de moarte decat de viață, cel adevărat viu este in continuă mișcare
to live is to move, corpul se mișcă asa dupa cum a fost creat, nu sa fie intretinut de operatii/medicamente, si Totul are un aliniament care daca e neglijat creează probleme, nu trebuie sa fim surprinși ca suntem bolnavi cand aceste semne sun reacția corpului la nepăsarea noastra, si de multe ori chiar nu ne dam seama ca oricat de mic ar fi un lucru, acesta ne poate influența tot corpul peste cateva zeci de ani, pt ca pur si simplu nu ne-a păsat
asa faci filosofie pana si dintr-o carte de biomecanica
madre mia chicos

[Kayleigh Medhurst · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was a little disappointed with the book because I thought it would be more applicable and a guide. The book is about P3 Peak Performance Project, a company that helps athletes and teams with their performance. I wish they had given more practical tips for the every day person but it is a good look into a new approach in sports medicine.

[Forrest Stieg · Rating 2 out of 5]

A Marcus Elliot puff piece. Too superficial for the people in industry and too tangential for people out of industry. Henry Abbot seems to have a man crush on subject and frequently derails his line of thought for the former. He may have interested the minds of certain coaches and rehab professionals but he didn’t get into enough depth to capture them. I don’t see the lay person getting that interested in this book.

[Vinay Reddy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book! I liken it to Moneyball but for the biomechanical revolution that's happening in athletics. It's more of the story of the origin of P3 and its founder Marcus Elliott than it is a how-to on fixing one's own biomechanics but I appreciated both aspects.

[Jeff · Rating 3 out of 5]

Somewhat challenging to relate with the NBA stars used as examples in much of the book, but still a good reminder that our bodies do better when we let them move how they were designed to move.

[J. Joseph · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you to W. W. Norton & Company and NetGalley for the advance reader copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Ballistic is ultimately a story about the science of prevention - prevention of injuries we can experience from movement, that is. Abbott, an NBA data journalist and amateur athlete, follows Dr. Marcus Elliott and the Peak Performance Project (P3) team as they work through some of their innovative methods for identifying and fixing injuries before they happen. This largely focuses on examining leaping and landing - how these movements effect the body, how the body handles impacts, how the body affects the environment prior to or just following these movements, and so on. While most readers won't have access to the same machine learning systems, devices, or spreadsheets at P3, Abbott does still give many examples of how we can move our own bodies - along with artistic renderings - in our own homes. Throughout this book he also draws heavily on elite athletes from a large variety of sports, focusing on their narratives and relationships with injury and recovery.

I'm usually not big on non-fiction sports books, but if you make it about sports medicine now you've got this clinician and runner's attention! I really enjoyed how Abbott connected the topic to real athletes and real stories, as it would have been all too easy to just focus in on the hard science of sports medicine and treat this topic more like an exercise (pun unintended!) than a learning opportunity. The book also felt appropriately geared to its audience - a general public who nonetheless has preexisting knowledge of sports and the athletes in those sports. The only critical thing I'd want to raise is that the title of the book, and parts of the blurb (depending on which retailer you look at), gives expectations I'm not certain are captured by the book itself. By this I mean it at first appears like it'll be more of a wide scope of research, but in reality it's focused on the P3 team's specific research and practices. This, unfortunately, did make it feel a little like an advertisement at times rather than a full science/medicine book.

[Taro Yamashita · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the story of Dr. Marcus Elliott and Peak Performance Project (aka "P3") in California.

This book describes Dr. Elliott's professional history as one trying to find ways to prevent sports injuries, rather than just treating them after they occur. Primarily, he's looking at motion capture and force plate data. Biomechanics with very detailed views. His programs are individualized, precise, and steeped in data analyses. Ultimately, the anecdotes suggest the programs are also highly effective at giving athletes longevity, even after recovering from injury or surgery.

Here's a guy (Dr. Elliott) who has a passion for figuring out how to make elite athletes more durable and less prone to injury, and the organizations that he works with (not "for") really treat these same athletes as fungible. People, even extraordinarily gifted athletes, are expendable to such organizations as NASCAR, NFL, NBA, and MLB. The sort of frustrations you have probably felt because you're working in an environment that is steeped in "tradition" or other set world views are mirrored in Dr. Elliott's professional life, also. It's really all sort of disheartening.

But, he persists, as we do, trying to affect incremental change and improvement in our corners of the world. It's actually a nice follow-up to 2008's "Warrior Girls: Protecting our Daughters Against the Injury Epidemic in Women's Sports," (See my review here: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3...) because it shows the state of the art of sports injury prevention is progressing. There is MUCH better understanding of injury mechanism described in this book than was known in 2008.

The most frustrating thing about learning about P3 and places like it is that I am left feeling like this type of detailed, motion-capture-based injury prevention programming is accessible only to the elite athletes and others who can afford quite expensive treatments not covered by insurance.

I bought this book (hardcover) at a bookstore while traveling. Worth it. I'll keep it.

[J Kromrie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this eARC in audiobook format.

Ballistic: The New Science of Injury-Free Athletic Performance by Henry Abbott, narrated by Andrew Joseph Perez

In Ballistic, Henry Abbott doesn’t just rewrite the playbook on athletic performance—he reengineers the field itself. This isn’t your typical sports science manual. It’s a kinetic, data-driven narrative that pulses with urgency and optimism, revealing how the future of injury prevention lies not in ice baths or grit, but in understanding the physics of how we move.

Abbott, a seasoned data journalist and competitive athlete, centers his story around Dr. Marcus Elliott and the Peak Performance Project (P3), a cutting-edge lab where biomechanics meets machine learning. Through vivid storytelling and real-world case studies, Abbott shows how P3’s technology can predict injuries—like ACL tears or hamstring pulls—with the precision of a cardiologist reading an EKG43dcd9a7-70db-4a1f-b0ae-981daa162054. The science of “ballistic movement”—how we leap, land, and load our joints—becomes the lens through which we see not just elite athletes, but ourselves.

Andrew Joseph Perez’s narration is a perfect match for the material. His delivery is crisp and confident, with just enough warmth to humanize the science. He handles the technical passages with clarity and the personal stories with empathy, making the audiobook feel like a TED Talk crossed with a locker room pep talk.

Abbott doesn’t just speak to coaches and clinicians—he speaks to anyone with a body. Whether you’re a weekend warrior, a parent of a young athlete, or someone recovering from injury, this audiobook offers a new way to think about movement, risk, and resilience.

For listeners who crave the intersection of science, sport, and storytelling, Ballistic is a game-changer—equal parts revelation and revolution.

[CadmanReads · Rating 4 out of 5]

Henry Abbott’s Ballistic is a fascinating deep dive into the inner workings of a unique, elite group of professionals whose mission is nothing less than redefining what’s possible in human performance. This is not a book about making money or building a brand. It's about a dedicated crew obsessed with outcomes, results, and pushing athletes to the absolute edge of their capabilities.

The audiobook, narrated with precision and clarity, is the perfect format for this kind of storytelling. The narration matches the seriousness and intensity of the subject matter, pulling you into the world of high-stakes training and relentless experimentation. The pacing and tone make it feel less like a textbook and more like an oral history of innovation and obsession.

Abbott crafts a compelling narrative about people working behind the scenes: scientists, coaches, thinkers, who have collaborated with some of the world’s best athletes to achieve measurable, often stunning, results. These are not your typical sports gurus offering motivational quotes. They are technicians of the human body and mind, grinding away at the margins to find what actually works.

That said, as a reader looking for personal takeaways, I found myself a little frustrated. This is not a book full of quick wins or actionable advice. There are no “10 steps to train like a pro” lists here. The story is more about them, the elite and the extraordinary, and less about what the rest of us can apply to our own lives. I was hoping for more insights or even hints on how a mere mortal might adapt some of these principles into their own performance goals.

Still, Ballistic is a compelling read (or listen) if you're fascinated by performance at the highest level and the people who dedicate their lives to making it happen. Just go in knowing it’s more about their journey than your to-do list.

[Mike Cheng · Rating 3 out of 5]

To appreciate this book it’s important to distinguish what it is from what it isn’t. It is not a how-to guide to become a more explosive or bulletproof athlete (though it does have some illustrations of movement training). It is, rather, a first hand look by author Henry Abbott into Peak Performance Project (P3) based in Santa Barbara and its founder Marcus Elliott. As a fan of the NBA, Mr. Abbott says that he was inspired to write the book because seemingly it was a fait accompli that severe injuries were not a matter of if, but when. P3, through mobility, plyometrics, and balance training seeks to correct this, and its bigger name clientele have included players such as Paul Millsap, Kyle Korver, James Harden, Luka Doncic, and Aaron Gordon. Mr. Abbott himself also details his own disc herniation and subsequent recovery with P3. Notwithstanding the qualification up top, there were advices interwoven throughout the book: hamstring injuries often happen when such is significantly weaker than the quadricep; the Squat Snatch Press is an exercise P3 uses to correct posture - get in a squat position with the barbell on your back and with a wide grip do presses while remaining in squat position; Harden and Doncic, though seemingly unathletic, are superstars because of their ability to decelerate quickly - train this with a modified box jump whereby you hold dumbbells in each hand, squat down to drop them, and immediately jump onto the box; contrary to conventional wisdom, heavy squats and deadlifts (if coached properly) can prevent injury by training the body to recruit and use the right muscles to work together; do not neglect the psoas, which becomes weak from sitting and needs not only movement training but also regular myofascial work.

[Jake Brydson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Weaves between being a biography, history, sports science, and memoir at the same time. Somehow wonderfully, though at times a little ill equipped for covering such a vast scope.

As someone who has worked in athletics for over a decade, it still delivered some very interesting insights from a sports performance standpoint. I could have probably read 1,000 pages on P3’s research, methods, biomechanics data, and implementation. The itch was still scratched there with what was in the book.

I do believe Henry Abbott does a wonderful job in presenting things in a way that does all four parts of the story justice. It’s a balancing act, but it hits the notes in a wonderfully harmonic way.

There were parts that do not interest me, and the presentation of Marcus Elliott at times is sometimes a little too larger than life. I would have liked a few more things in depth at certain points and a few less trips on a hike in Santa Barbara leading to an unsatisfying point. I did not spend the years working on or writing this book, so I do not believe the author was in the wrong.

All things considered, it’s a tremendous book and a much more palatable read than I was expecting. Never slogged. Never went off the rails.

In some ways, the book became what the subject was all about: an excellence performance, without injury.

[Will · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sometimes, it is both edifying and damning to see yourself so clearly being spoken to by a book. So, as a past-their-prime-but-still-trying-to-keep-it-up athlete who recently had a mystery ailment that turned out to be glute- and hip-related, as well as someone who grew up in the basketblog era of which Abbott was a godfather, this was for me.

This book is also very well-written in both of its main tracks: 1) the biography of Dr. Marcus Elliott and P3 2) his team's work on trying to move biomechanic science towards athlete injury prevention, rather than injury mitigation. Abbott brings the right balance of science and anecdote, as well as the keen eye of someone who has been around high-level athletes for a long time. I found myself oohing and aahing at ideas that seem obvious and inevitable, but have not been part of the medical establishment's thinking on injury, and are related to the larger epidemic of chronic pain in the modern world. I found this book an incredibly breath of fresh air, it made me REALLY want go to P3 to have them tell me all the shit that's wrong with my movement patterns, and it serves as my reminder to keep up the dynamic stretching. Had a blast reading it, learned a lot. You love to see it.

[Tom Anichini · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow. Enlightening and inspiring book about Dr. Marcus Elliott and his Peak Performance Project (P3).

Eye-opening to learn about cutting-edge PT and injury prevention methods. This book name drops too many NBA stars and other pro, college, and world class athletes for the reader not to respect P3.

I happened to read this while rehabbing a minor ankle injury. Having gone through a couple bouts of PT over the past 24 months, I appreciated more why my therapists were focused on some aspects of my movement that were not obvious to me.

My only disappointment in reading this book was learning that P3 has practices only in Santa Barbara and Atlanta.

Great reporting job by Henry Abbott.

One topic of curiosity I have is on achilles ruptures. I suppose it was too late for publishing, if not Abbott's manuscript, but over the 2024-25 season and playoffs Damian Lillard, Jayson Tatum, and Tyrese Halliburton (none of whom were mentioned in the book) all tore their achilles. I look forward to learning what P3 can do to project and help their clients prevent achilles injuries in the future.

[Brian · Rating 2 out of 5]

I gave this book 2 stars (it was ok) because the actual content did not deliver what the blurb on the cover said "Ballistic, the New Science of Injury-Free Athletic Performance". I thought there would be a lot more description of this new science, in a scientific way, with much more information on how injury-free athletic performance can be achieved. Instead the book tells the story of how the Peak Performance Project (P3) was established and grew. It does come with interesting details of the analysis and work done by P3 to help athletes (basketball players in particular) stay injury free and improve their performance. I liked how P3 developed equipment and data to measure how basketball players jump and land and their development of predicting when athletes might be liable to injure themselves. It was also interesting to see how established coaches were not convinced of P3's methodologies but that over time more and more basketball teams started using them.
My takeaway from the book is that ballistic type movements (e.g. box jumps) should be incorporated into training for sports so as to reduce the risk of injuries and help improve performance.

[Don Gorman · Rating 3 out of 5]

(3) For a geriatric fitness nut like me, this was a really interesting read. I have heard about places like P3, where they diagnose every part of your active body to help prevent or recover from injuries, but this inside look and massive background material takes it to another level. Abbot's involvement with Dr. Marcus Elliott is fascinating and his recounting of his own interaction with the P3 process and their work with so many other athletes really gives you a new look at how elite athletes become even more physically complete. Good stuff.

[Anthony · Rating 4 out of 5]

I like how it was an informative book that told a story. I'm an NBA Junkie, so reading about players that I've watched on the court over the years was really cool. I got more insight into the things they did to become better at their craft. I also learned how to take better care of myself into my 50's and beyond so I can continue to be active. My only problem with the book is that I don't have a better reference as to how to do the exercises. It would be nice if there were links to actual videos to see how to do them.

[Carol Fischer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although relatively active, I am by no means athletic, yet I enjoyed reading of the three "characters" in the book: the founder, the author and collectively, the various athletes featured. The focus is the work being done to determine why common injuries occur and how to prevent them. My main takeaway is the stretches discussed - I have already incorporated some into my routine.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

Little confused of the purpose of this book…like I get how their mantra is custom training for each individual but given how amazing P3 is I wish it shared more exercises and secrets, almost like becoming a supple leopard, instead of this weird soft publicity narrative.

Still good reminder that the goal is to be a good athlete! Explosive and injury free.

[Pierce Bishop · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an absolute delight and compelling throughout out, even (and especially!) with all the time spent talking about psoas. Can I find it? I tried but that’s not important! What’s important is the book made excited to go run and jump and scramble around for years to come.

[Carol Orrell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gets to the root causes of athletic injuries and the way forward

Very engaging discussion of true movement training versus static like weight lifting. Good anatomical descriptions. Inspires one to move more and learn how and why of moving better

[Angela · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a must-read for every athlete (amateur and professional), coach, parent, doctor, and therapist. I’m giving it to my son next and gifting copies to his coaches. (He will be embarrassed. But he will not get injured.)

[Katie Bruell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Super fascinating and engagingly written. My only quibble was that there was sometimes too much detail. Don't go into this expecting that you'll get practical tips for helping you stay injury-free--it's not that kind of book, despite the title.

[Joshua J. Holland · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great book for those looking to improve athletic performance and enhance quality of life in general. I have highlighted and bookmarked more pages in this book than most I’ve read in the performance space.
Well done everyone involved!

[Judy Goodwin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book changed the way I think about my body and how it moves! An absolute must read for anyone who has ever had knee or lower back pain and wondered why.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

prevention, prevention, prevention.

[Sam Osterling · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoyable and insightful even though I wanted it to be way more prescriptive than it is

[Eric Semsak · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed the biomechanical prespective in lay terms. "Story line" was a bit thin at times, tho the examples w/ athletes was interesting.

[Joy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Educational, entertaining and intriguing all at once.