Being my first trip to Virginia, I was excited to be able to share the science of PRI to many first-timers. We had a very good mix of strength and conditioning, rehab, and sports medicine professionals in the audience. Virginia Commonwealth University were great hosts for our weekend of exploring how the polyarticular chains influence our every day lives, as well as our sports performance. Many thanks to Eddie Benion and his crew, James, Jason, Ray, Christopher, and John.

We spent our first day going through the patterns of the L AIC and R AIC. We discussed how the patterned behavior facilitates some muscles, while inhibits others, on each side of the body. And we had a great discussion about while is it awesome to be Batman, being Bruce Wayne is much more valuable. We talked about "good" Boy Bands, and "bad" Boy Bands.

The best part of the weekend, in my opinion was the amount of time we had for lab. We spent nearly half of the day on Sunday in lab, where everyone got a chance to find and feel the muscles that we need to facilitate, and inhibit, if we are to get into L stance and off the R leg properly. My thanks to my lab assistant, Eileen Kokosinski, PT. You were a great help! We were able to go through an inhibition lab as well. And we were able to link the activities back to the Hruska ABDuction and ADDuction Lift tests.

My thanks to Sara Creger, DPT, for letting us use her as our lab demonstration model. As well as Drew Coulter, DPT, and James Benzel, ATC, and Jason Castleman, ATC, for allowing us to learn from them as well. As always, we had a great room of learners, and we had a ton of great questions. My thanks to Joshua Jordan, Leanne Dunaway, Scott Burch, Tom Loyd, Ethan Saliba, Edwin Santiago, and Jason Turner. It was so great to hear this mix of health care professionals ask questions, and learn from each other about how human asymmetrical patterns affect our daily lives and sports performance.

The spacious auditorium of St. Luke’s Hospital was the weekend home for 44 course attendees. The science of PRI continues to expand its reach to professionals from a variety of disciplines (PT, OT, PA, DC, PTA, ATC, and CSCS), with the lively Marquette University training staff well-represented.

This course dives right into discussion of our asymmetric diaphragm, creating lateralized patterns of air flow and obligatory patterns of movement, defined as the L AIC, and R BC. Attendees learned: the correlation between PRI tests and a person’s ventilatory – thus walking – strategy; how to identify joint pathology that can develop when the typical human patterns of the L AIC and R BC go awry; and how to identify pathological breathing strategies that develop from patterned position and activity – namely superior T4 and PEC syndromes.

Lab provided a kinesthetic and aural dimension to assessing activity of the left and right AIC, BC, and PEC, the quality of ventilation, and the degree of rib cage pliability/restriction. Our rib cages benefited from manual guidance to fully exhale and expand. Further lab was devoted to experiencing non-manual techniques that reinforce sensing of opposition muscles that shape the left diaphragm’s ZOA and shift our center of mass to the left while rotating the upper torso back to the right.

Special thanks to:

- The models who donated their bodies for the benefit of all: Cathy Curran, DPT, Audra Hawkins, PTA, Elizabeth Majszak, DPT, Steve Schmidt, DPT, and Brandon Yoder, ATC. ,

- Mary Jo Herrick and Selene Wang, DPT, of Aurora Healthcare, for the set-up, break-down, and keeping us hydrated and fed.

- Gabe Champeau, DPT, and Anita Panagiotis, MSPT, PRC for assisting during labs and sharing your clinical pearls.