Trent Salo
PHYSICAL THERAPIST | STRENGTH + CONDITIONING COACH | PERFORMANCE STRATEGIST
With experience at the highest levels of sport, I’m passionate about bringing high quality care to athletes of any stage.
Through in-person care at The Tendon Lab to athlete and organization consulting designed to help optimize interdisciplinary performance in a team setting, my work is focused on elevating the standard of care for athletes at every level.
Services Offered
Strategic Consulting for Athletes and Organizations
A decade inside elite sport taught me that performance problems are rarely just performance problems—they're systems problems. How decisions get made under pressure. How operational execution connects to strategic vision.
I primarily work at two levels:
With individual players and their agents. Every athlete is surrounded by stakeholders—medical staff, coaches, trainers, the front office, the agency—each working from their own piece of the picture. Rarely does anyone have fluency across all of them to connect the dots and hold the whole process aligned. That's the gap I fill: making sure the training, development, and return-to-play decisions add up to one coherent plan built around the player, not a set of competing agendas.
With organizations, on restructuring, high-performance culture, and the operating systems that turn strategy into execution.
Specialized Achilles & Patellar Tendon Solutions (via The Tendon Lab)
The Tendon Lab is a concierge practice focused exclusively on Achilles and patellar tendons.
We pair advanced assessment — ultrasound tissue characterization (UTC) and force-plate testing — with evidence-informed, progressive management, whether you're working through persistent tendon pain or building the capacity your sport demands.
Every plan runs on the same logic: measure where the tendon is now, define what your activity asks of it, and close the gap through structured, individualized progression. The same standard applies to local active adults and youth athletes as to elite competitors.
Get To Know Me
I'm a dad and husband first—
everything else is built upon these roles.
My journey started as a collegiate point guard with NBA dreams, but when my playing career ended, I discovered something even more fulfilling: helping elite athletes achieve theirs.
Working as a dual-role athletic performance coach and physical therapist for the Detroit Pistons, I both designed weight room programming and guided players through injury rehabilitation. Over the years, my role continued to evolve. I ended up serving as Vice President of Player Health and Performance for the Charlotte Hornets before exiting the NBA to spend more time with my family.
The Tendon Lab
Founder + Owner
University of Copenhagen
PhD(s) Tendon Health in Basketball Athletes
Charlotte Hornets
Grand Rapids Gold
Medical + Performance Consultant
Vice President of Player Health + Performance
Faculty Instructor/Human Performance Lab
University of St. Augustine for Health Sciences
Strength + Conditioning Coach
Calvin University
Doctorate of Physical Therapy
Detroit Pistons
Senior Director of Athletic Performance
Sports Performance Director
Sports Performance Coordinator
Why Tendons?
Back in 2017, I was introduced to groundbreaking ultrasound technology that could monitor tendon structure and it completely changed how I viewed these complex injuries. This technology aided in a player’s remarkable recovery and subsequent major contract signing (which is featured in this LA Times article). It validated what I'd begun to suspect:
We can treat tendon injuries so much better than the conventional approach.
This exposure ignited my passion for tendon research—a field where I'm now pursuing my PhD.
All of these experiences — from playing to coaching to treating to leading — have crystallized my mission: translating specialized research from the lab into real-world application that reaches beyond professional sports. Whether it's with tendons, athletic performance, or on-court basketball skills, the pursuit of excellence drives everything I do.
I would highly recommend ANY athlete at ANY level to work with Trent. While his knowledge and curiosity for learning is elite as it gets, his character and work ethic is what sets him apart.
I’ve seen him lead countless players and coaches throughout his professional journey and I hold him in the highest regard.
Jordan Brink, New York Knicks
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