PT and Biomechanics Analysis

I'm not sure if I've mentioned this before, but I work in the orthopaedics department at a major hospital. I mainly do basic research in the development of implantable devices, but the clinical half of our lab works directly with patients and is expanding to a number of gait studies. This is really exciting for me, since the majority of my work has been engineering-based, which makes sense since I'm an engineer. But I've always wanted to work on the clinical side - the point where I've debated returning to nursing school or getting a certificate in clinical research so I can shift gears.

Now I was chatting casually with one of our clinical research staff/PTs at the coffee machine last week. She was asking about how my IT band issues were coming along, and I, in turn, brought up the fact that they were great compared to the stress fracture. I dicussed my visit to Sports Medicine the week before, and how I wasn't sure if I was going to return to my traditional running shoes or the Vibrams.

Now my doctor has worked with the clinical labs in our department over the years, thus my coworker was familiar with him and his experience. She started to tell me about the new offsite gait/sports medicine facility they're currently getting set up along with a number of new biomechanics studies that I might be interested in -- and ultimately a new sports medicine PT that arrived last year. This PT apparently has extensive experience in running gait analysis. I perked right up at that. She said she would talk to him for me, see if he could help me get back running again. She also said that they'd be thrilled to have me help them out with the gait studies they'll be starting later this year.

So wait, let me parse this down for you, since I'm ramling:

(1) I get to work with an accomplished PT to determine weaknesses in my biomechanics and ultimately how to fix them to run healthy.
(2) I have been invited to participate in running gait analysis research, which will ultimately be cutting edge research in the sports medicine/orthopaedic field and help answer all of the questions that have arisen in the wake of the minimalist running fad (it's now my word too).