Hi Sample,

Today I want to address the #1 thing I usually address on Day 1 with a client. 

This is a farily “low hanging fruit”, meaning it’s a simple thing you can fix that most people will struggle with and it should make a difference in their movement and their ability to train pain-free. 

I will briefly discuss the concepts and link you to more information on them if you are curious to dive deeper. 

Get Them A Zone Of Apposition 

A Zone of Apposition (ZOA) refers to the space where the diaphragm begins in the ribcage, all the way down to the lowest ribs. 

The benefit of the ZOA is that it allows you to access a completely netural biomechanical position that will allow you to freely move in and out of any given joint action you need.

A ZOA means you can set your ribs in a position that will allow for a full inhalation that will expand both their belly and ribcage synchronously. 

At the ribcage, it should expand in all directions. Front-to-back, and side-to-side. If it doesn’t, usually that represents and inability for proper respiratory mechanics and therefore a loss of ability to maintain a stacked thoracic diaphragm on top of a pelvic diaphragm: 

If they can’t do this, then they will struggle to learn how to properly stack their ribs over their pelvis under load as well, which can lead to it’s own host of issues, such as a lack of ability to get proper intra-abdominal pressure under load. 

How to Coach A ZOA 

A problem with 90% of the clients I see on Day 1 who are in pain is that they don’t have the ability to create a ZOA. I will almost always start them in a sidelying position teaching them how to properly get a ZOA like this: 

Some people need a bit more flexion to achieve a ZOA because they are really extended with lots of anterior pelvic tilt. If that’s the case, they really need to learn how to bring those front ribs down and open up their back ribcage with something like this: 

If they are stuck in a posterior pelvic tilt, then we need to still cue them to learn how to expand their ribs better, but we may do something to give them a bit more of a neutral pelvis by pushing them into a minor amount of lumbar extension (anterior tilt of the pelvis) to get that. 

If you want to learn more about how to cue a ZOA under load, see this article I have here.