There's a sweet spot where stuff is beneficial and then outside of that it's not. Good morning. Happy Monday. I have no coffee in hand and it is perfect. All right. I think I'm fully recovered from the Thanksgiving holiday, so looking forward to a big week. Quick housekeeping item, getting a lot of foundational questions at theaskavilleheartman at gmail.com email. I truly appreciate that. However, a lot of these questions have already been answered and they are up on the YouTube channel. So if you have not been to the YouTube channel, please go there. That's where all these videos end up anyway. And so chances are, if you've got a question that's already been answered, go there. If you're not subscribed to the YouTube channel, then please do so so you can get notified when the new stuff goes up. All right. Digging into today's Q&A, this is with Manuel. Manuel is actually a recent attendee of the Intensive. And we're working on some squat issues, especially this front squat, where we're actually improving his ability to expand into your posterior and showing him how it influenced the outcome in his technique which it didn't improve and so Manuel came back on the recent coffee and coaches conference call with a question about well can we do this with another activity and the answer is yes but we have to be concerned with the influences and then to produce the outcome. So for instance, what we're actually going to end up talking about here is the seven components of force, the seven components of force right over here, magnitude, location, direction, duration, frequency, variability, and rate. Each one of those has an influence on how we will behave in response to an activity. So let me give you a for instance. So we talk about suitcase carries influencing our ability to recapture relative motions. However, if we increase the magnitude of the load, so the amount of load increases to such a degree that it actually starts to compress the space around us. We've actually reduced the space where we can capture relative motion. So that may not be the desired outcome under those circumstances. So we always have to consider how these these seven components of force influence each element of the outcome. So we can't just say that a squat does this or a suitcase carry does this or a press does this. We have to consider the context. And so that's what this discussion is about. I hope it's going to be useful for a lot of people. Remember, go to the YouTube channel and subscribe so you get all these videos and get your foundational questions answered. I will see you all tomorrow.

Hey, Bill. I have a squatting question. You know how we were working on that anterior to posterior expansion over the weekend? So sometimes I get people who can't rack the bar the way I do, like with a full grip and whatnot. So I was thinking about a potential workaround. And I was wondering if I was correct in thinking this way. So one of the things I could do with somebody is take a safety bar, like a safety bar squat, the one with the handles that come forward. It's like a big pad that sits on you. Because sometimes they can't get their elbows up or get that grip. With the safety bar they have that they're a little bit more supinated instead of pronated. So that can open up the space, but also the pressure of the bar goes over the scapula and the clavicle because the whole thing just sits on you rather than just sit on the front. I was wondering, does that pressure of the bar, as it pushes you down, would that expand you anterior to posterior? Would that kind of open you up that way just through the force of it and get you to breathe for people who feel really compressed and they can't even get up here? So then, I don't know, I was thinking if that would be a solution. If that could work.

All right.

So you know how we were working on that anterior to posterior expansion over the weekend? Yes. So sometimes I get people who can't rack the bar the way I do, like with a full grip and whatnot. So I was thinking about a potential workaround. And I was wondering if I was correct in thinking this way. So one of the things I could do with somebody is take a safety bar, like a safety bar squat, the one with the handles that come forward. It's like a big pad that sits on you. So because sometimes they can't get their elbows up or get that grip. With the safety bar, their hands are a little bit more supinated instead of pronated. So that can open up the space, but also the pressure of the bar goes over the scapula and the clavicle because the whole thing just sits on you rather than just on the front. I was wondering if that pressure of the bar, as it pushes you down, would that expand you anterior to posterior? Would that kind of open you up that way just through the force of it and get you to breathe for people who feel really compressed and can't even get up here? So then, I was wondering if that would be a solution. If that could work.

So the correct answer to this is maybe. And then here's the maybe. How much load are you applying downward?

Okay.

And then here's the maybe. How much load are you applying downward?

Okay.

So remember how we were talking about like a suitcase carry? If the weight is too heavy and it's pulling you into a strategy that does not allow you to capture the relative motion like we would use. So like if we're doing a suitcase carry for relative motion, it would be a lighter weight because we want the response of the body, but we don't want to take away the relative motions, right? So the same thing's going to happen here with the safety bar squat. Yes, you're putting load there. Yes, it's going to create a downward position, but if the weight is heavy enough, my response will be to push up against it, to hold position. So what you're going to have to observe, then, is you're going to have to observe dorsal rostral posterior lower and sternum to identify whether they're able to capture the expanded representation under that load. Because again, if you put like 10K on each side of a safety spot bar, that's going to be what, 120 pounds-ish somewhere in there. And that might be the weight that you're using to work on the expansion. And then if you ramp the weight up and you're taking them more towards where they have to create more force output, you know you're going to squeeze. Right? So again, same concept. You just have to figure out what that threshold is that gets you the expanded representation. And then that's where you would start. And then maybe you can build that up to where they actually maintain it under a higher force.

Or a different bar.

Correct. Yeah. So ultimately the goal is to be in the rack position without the hands being open, right? Or without like arching excessively. You don't want to see a bunch of compensations. You want to see somebody that's actually got a useful representation of a rack position. So your strategy, your thought process, is useful. You just have to be really, really careful about how much force you're driving. Because again, you take somebody past a threshold and right away, you're gonna squeeze. They're gonna compromise.

Yes, so I was just wondering about, first of all, I'm aware of the threshold. I was wondering if the exercise itself, if the thinking of the placement and the pressure was accurate.

Yeah, I think potentially. And then make sure you have like a test retest. So in this case, your simple test is, let's rack a bar. Let's see what it looks like. Let's go over, let's do the safety squat bar activity to promote the AP, and then let's go back to the rack position and see if we were successful.

One thing I wonder about with that as well is that if you're creating that downward pressure, that could reinforce what wide ISAs experience. Because they're the compressed linky, so they're getting compressed and going laterally.

That could also be interference for those correct right absolutely so it's just it's like anything else right there's a sweet spot where stuff is beneficial and then outside of that it's not so let's go all the way back to Ian's question at the beginning we were talking about okay where are you going to drive the pan position for a chop it's like well what are you trying to achieve it's like if I want to hang on to relative motion I got to put it in a specific place I have to have the appropriate magnitude of force because high magnitude in the right place might still steal some relative motion if I move it to the outside I'm definitely giving up relative motions under those circumstances so again it's like take an exercise that might work in one situation with one set of constraints take the exact same exercise by name it's not the same exercise if you put more weight on the bar and then that changes the response I am totally cool with the experimentation under this circumstance because your reasoning is useful right it's just a matter of the execution now and refining it narrows can go the helical angle would be this way on the narrow it's going to be this way on the wide do you see that?

If you would like to participate in a 15 minute consultation, please go to askbillhartman at e-mail.com, askbillhartman at e-mail.com, put 15 minute consultation in the subject line so I don't delete it. We'll arrange that at our mutual convenience. Everyone have an outstanding Tuesday and I'll see you tomorrow. Ivan.

Hello, Bill. Hello, Ivan. First, I want to say I'm smiling because of your great jokes. You have a good sense of humor. Thank you. I try. And because my mind is exploding constantly while listening to these conversations. Basically, my question is I've got a new client with fibromyalgia and trochanteric bursitis and calcifications on the hips and herniations in the neck and lumbar spine. She's just really compressed. I think she's a sway back, but I'm not completely sure because her measures were bigger than I expected. However, when I looked at the videos of the measures in slow motion, I could see a lot of compensatory motions in the body. But still, if she's a sway back, I shouldn't really try to do much of pelvic tilts to increase that posterior lower compression, right? So I was thinking more like right side-lying and maybe first manual rolling. She basically just breathes and nothing else. But because my session is like one hour, what else could I do to fill up the time?

So you have to be very careful with it.

So I was thinking more like, right side lying and maybe first manual rolling. So she basically just breathes and nothing else. But because my session is like one hour, like what else could I do, you know, basically to fill up the time that that's my question.

Okay, well, so if you can, the step number one is you got to create some space to work in, right? That's what you're trying to do with the rolling. So you take a little bit of gravity away and you should be able to increase space, right? That would be the favorable result. So you do the rolling and you expand the anterior posterior space on the sides and it slowly, she starts to create the turns, right? Okay, and so we're tying all of this in. So this is like an Ian question and this is like a Misha question today, right? So Misha's representation is very, very similar in regards to where the spaces are that you have available to you. The problem is if she's a narrow ISA, you don't have like crazy wide space, you just have a smaller box entered a posterior. So she's working inside of this space, right? So she's within her pelvis and she's got a little bit of turn. So all of the stuff that would lighten her is available. So anything where she's pulling something down should be useful. Anything where she is reaching out to the side should be useful. But you can probably get her into supine asymmetrical. So she can do things like that teaching her like some of the armbar stuff would be available to you, right? So she can start to turn, right? And create the anterior posterior expansion here. She's gonna get lower cervical spine to start to move, which is probably gonna be really, really useful, especially if she's got the representation of the herniated disc there. You got a lower cervical spine that's not turning. If she's got a lumbar herniation, she's got a lumbar spine that's not turning. Okay. The stepping away from midline. So I think you and Misha should probably have a conversation, right? Because you're gonna structure a very similar representation. Misha's client's gonna be able to take a bigger step away from midline. Your client's gonna take a shorter step away from midline, but in the same directions. Because again, the spaces are in the same place. It's just a smaller representation side to side. Okay. Yeah.

Does that make sense?

Yeah, it does.

And I was wondering.

Sorry. So why does, why does the narrow ISA have less space than the wide? I would think it's the other way around.

Okay. There's space started deeper front to back, not wider side to side. So hang on. Extreme representation. Narrow ISA (Inferior Segment Alignment) is anterior-posterior, wide ISA is okay. The overlap between the two. So if I compress the narrow, if I push back here and I push this forward, the space is gonna compress into the overlap. So it's gonna be in this box right here. Narrows can go, the helical angle would be this way on the narrow. It's gonna be this way on the wide. Do you see that? We're looking top down. I'm standing above them, looking down on their feet. So if I compress this anterior, so it goes back this way, and I compress posterior, it goes this way. They don't get wider. Their helical angle doesn't change. It's just the space gets compressed anterior and posterior. Okay. This person's already compressed anterior-posterior, but they had a wider helical angle to begin with. So they can't go this way, but they can go that way. Okay. So Ian's space is right there. Misha's space is right there. Okay. Does that make sense? And again, it's an extreme representation for a fact, but that's basically the shape that you have available. Does that help you, Ivan?

Okay, so let's figure out a way to get there. How can we get there while we're training?

Well, with various exercises like chopping for an example.

Okay, but let's go back to Ian's representation.

So when we go to middle, you're going to have to have a lot of bend in the hip, aren't you? All right. What if I bend the hip too soon before she has access to that motion?

Okay.