Chris Gauntlett
Chris is a passionate myotherapist and former elite athlete. He has previously competed in Muay Thai kickboxing and trained extensively in boxing, Wing Chung Kung Fu and Tai Chi. His early training in these arts and the injuries he sustained first sparked his interest and curiosity for myotherapy and strength and conditioning training. Chris still trains regularly and enjoys teaching and coaching in these disciplines. Chris is an avid reader and retains a deep love of literature from his early university days. However, currently with the demands of running a small business, leisure time for reading is not as abundant as it once was.
Chris Gauntlett was born to parents Douglas and Frances Gauntlett in Melbourne in 1978. Chris’s father, Doug worked as a meteorologist and was the deputy director of the Melbourne Bureau of Meteorology. Doug encouraged Chris to have an enquiring mind from an early age and much of Chris’s early childhood was filled with scientific adventures using chemistry sets and science-based discussions around the family dinner table.
Chris attended St Kevin’s College High School and excelled in science and mathematics. However, the influence of two brilliant literature teachers, Mr Mark Stratman and Dr Frank McCarthy, refocused Chris’s academic interest on the humanities and Chris developed a subsequent passion for literature.
Chris’s university education consisted of enrolling in an Arts degree at Melbourne University, majoring in philosophy and literature. At this stage of his life, another passion also emerged, in part out of studying Taoist and Buddhist philosophy, training in Wing Chun Kung Fu.
After developing a chronic hip injury from intensive Kung Fu training, Chris unsuccessfully sought treatment from several medical specialists, including doctors, surgeons and physiotherapists. Ultimately, Chris’s Kung Fu teacher, Dana Wong, suggested he seek treatment from a friend of his, John Leckie, a clinical masseur and strength and conditioning coach. Out of desperation, Chris gave John a try and was simply amazed by John’s technical skill and therapeutic efficacy. With a combination of manual soft tissue therapy and targeted strength exercises, John was able to effect Chris’s return to full-time training in a matter of two weeks.
This early success marked the beginning of a lifelong interest and passion for injury rehabilitation and athletic performance optimisation. Chris continued seeing John regularly for both strength training coaching and myotherapy treatment. During this time, Chris discontinued his arts degree and enrolled in a diploma of remedial massage at Victoria University.
After completing a diploma in Remedial Massage in 2007, John Leckie opened a larger clinic and Chris became his first employee. Working for John, the learning curve was steep, but Chris thrived on the challenge, and much of the early experience and knowledge gained from working alongside John still informs Chris’s clinical approach to this day.
Chris left John’s clinic in 2009 and started his own business in Caulfield. The business quickly grew however, as Chris began treating increasingly more complex patients with chronic pain and injuries, he noticed that something was lacking in his approach; treating just the muscles and their associated fascia, while providing relief, did not always produce a lasting change or injury resolution. In some cases, it actually made the condition worse
Recognition of this deficit in his approach led Chris to begin exploring the groundbreaking osteopathic research and manual soft tissue approach of Jean-Pierre Barral. The Barral Method was subtle and challenging to learn; a revolutionary manual therapy approach that regards muscular tension as a symptom rather than the main causal driver of musculoskeletal pain and movement dysfunction. Instead of treating the muscles directly, the Barral Method focuses on releasing tension in and around the ‘noble tissues’ of the body: the viscera, neural and vascular tissues, which the muscles tighten up to protect.
Chris first began incorporating the Barral Method into his clinical practice back in 2015. The positive effect on treatment outcomes and lasting soft tissue change was immediate for Chris’s patients. The Barral Method now forms the backbone of Chris’s clinical approach and has enabled Chris to effectively treat a more diverse range of complex chronic soft tissue pain and dysfunction. Chris is currently the acting Barral facilitator for Australia and regularly travels throughout Australia and New Zealand working as a Barral teaching assistant.
Teaching has become an increasing focus for Chris in his later career and is now a driving passion. Teaching enables Chris to connect with the next generation of therapists, and also informs his clinical approach and keeps his technical skills sharp and up to date. Chris is a believer in the adage that “you can’t understand any discipline or skill deeply, until you begin to teach it.” Despite Chris’s love for teaching and sharing knowledge, his primary interest remains in the opportunity teaching provides to expand his knowledge and skills.
You deserve the best health possible.
I personally invite health professionals to talk to me about providing broader care for their patients.
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