What Girls Aren’t Always Taught: “Cleared” Isn’t the Finish Line

A conversation with Dr. Fury on return-to-performance, risk, and the mental side of coming back

TL;DW - here's a succinct summary of our conversation with Dr Fury!


In many girls’ sports environments, getting injured often comes with a single target: get cleared. But Dr. Fury — a sports medicine orthopedic surgeon and author on return-to-sport frameworks — argues that “cleared” is not the finish line. It’s the beginning of the most important part: rebuilding performance safely and confidently.


What Girls Aren’t Being Taught


A lot of injury recovery is still treated as calendar-based: 6 months, 9 months, 12 months — as if healing is a countdown. Dr. Fury doesn’t dismiss timelines entirely (tissue biology matters), but he emphasizes that relying on time alone can be misleading. Because athletes don’t want to “return” just to participate. They want to return as themselves — the version they recognize, trust, and feel proud of.


That shift in language matters. When “return to sport” becomes the goal, athletes can end up back on the field as a weaker, more vulnerable version of themselves — and the risk of reinjury climbs.


The Real Risk We Overlook


Dr. Fury frames return-to-performance as risk management, not certainty. There is no perfect test that says:


“You’re 100% safe now.”


Instead, the goal is to stack the odds in an athlete’s favor using objective data and progressive exposure to sport-specific demands.

He describes using batteries of tests depending on the injury (for example, in ACL recovery), often looking at:


But he’s also candid: even our “best” tests aren’t perfect. Some “normal” uninjured people can’t pass certain benchmarks — which reinforces the bigger point: every athlete has a different baseline.


The Hidden Factor That Changes Everything: Psychological Readiness


One of Dr. Fury’s strongest messages — especially for younger athletes — is that physical readiness and mental readiness aren’t the same.

He describes recovery as a progression of identities:


And sometimes the body tests well, but the athlete says: “I need more time.” That matters. Because high-impact sport isn’t safe if you’re thinking:

“Will my knee hold?”

“Can I trust this landing?”

“What if it happens again?”


For gymnasts especially, Dr. Fury notes that confidence isn’t just performance — it’s safety. So part of return-to-performance is proving to yourself, step by step, that you can:


Not in one leap — in a progression that rebuilds trust.