Marc P. Pietropaoli, MD, has spent nearly three decades treating injured knees. A fellowship-trained sports medicine orthopedic surgeon and regenerative medicine expert, he completed a sports medicine fellowship under Dr. James R. Andrews before founding his practice in 2001. He served as team physician for the Auburn Doubledays and also helped cover the Syracuse Chiefs when both were affiliates of the Toronto Blue Jays. Over the years, the Doubledays’ parent clubs included the Houston Astros, Toronto Blue Jays, and Washington Nationals. During his fellowship, he assisted with spring training for the Tampa Bay Rays and Cincinnati Reds.
On October 29, 2021, Dr. Pietropaoli performed the first FDA-indicated Bridge-Enhanced ACL Restoration/Repair (BEAR) surgery outside clinical trials anywhere in the world. BEAR uses a biologic implant and the patient’s own blood to help the patient’s own ACL regrow and heal rather than replacing it with a tendon graft. That December, Congressman John Katko formally recognized the achievement and Dr. Pietropaoli’s team in the U.S. House of Representatives, with the recognition entered into the Congressional Record.
So it says something that one of the biggest parts of his mission is not surgery at all.
Dr. Pietropaoli is founder and CEO of Victory In Motion, Home of Knee Repair, NOT Knee Replacement®, a company built around preserving and repairing natural knees, frequently without surgery. Its mission is explicit: End The Need For Knee Replacements By 2043.
“We must move healthcare away from being predominantly reactive and toward becoming proactive, preventive, restorative, and focused on lifelong optimization,” he says.
The math behind that ambition is generational. A teenager who tears an anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) faces an increased risk of developing knee arthritis years later. For some people, arthritis eventually leads to knee replacement. Preventing the injury in the first place can reduce the number of people who face that chain of events.
The frustrating part, Pietropaoli says, is that prevention already works. Evidence-based neuromuscular training programs, including Sportsmetrics, teach young athletes how to jump, land, cut, and strengthen their bodies more safely. A 2025 systematic review found that these programs reduced ACL injuries by 61% among female athletes in the studies analyzed. Some prevention routines can fit into ordinary team warm-ups with little equipment. Yet consistent adoption remains far from universal.
He wants that changed. His goal is to see validated ACL injury-prevention programs implemented in every youth sports league, junior high, high school, and college athletic program in the country—taught with the same seriousness as strength and conditioning.
“Imagine a future where injury prevention is as much a part of sports participation as practicing, conditioning, and competing,” he says.
For knees already damaged, his company applies The Victory Method, an established approach combining comprehensive diagnostics, nonsurgical regenerative medicine, and V-Motion Fit—Total Body Fitness, Strength & Conditioning, integrating therapeutic laser technology and genetic-based nutrition. When necessary, innovative knee repair surgery remains an option.
Victory In Motion tracks regenerative medicine patient-reported outcomes through DataBiologics, a national outcomes research registry. The practice reports ranking in the 98th percentile for pain improvement and the 96th percentile for functional improvement among participating clinics. Those rankings reflect patients who provided follow-up data; they do not guarantee an individual result.
Spreading both sides of the message has turned Dr. Pietropaoli into as much an educator as a surgeon. He travels nationally and internationally speaking to healthcare professionals, coaches and the public about knee repair, regenerative medicine and injury prevention. His Amazon No. 1 bestselling book, Repair NOT Replace, includes a foreword by Dr. Andrews. Victory In Motion also holds live seminars and webinars around the country.
Partnerships are central to achieving the 2043 mission. Dr. Pietropaoli wants to collaborate with surgeons, researchers, universities, athletic associations, and foundations to expand ACL injury prevention and knee-preservation research. Equally important, he wants to scale The Victory Method by training and supporting additional teams, because neither he nor his current team can accomplish the mission alone.
Two approaches, one mission: protect the knees that are still healthy, and preserve and repair those already damaged. Prevention can change what happens decades from now; better treatment can help people facing decisions today. Both must spread if the goal is to become reality.
That is the ambition behind the deadline: End The Need For Knee Replacements By 2043. The surgeon who built his career repairing knees would rather the next generation never need him.
