Mokhtarzadeh H, Anderson DE, Allaire BT, et al. - Since no studies have assessed load‐to‐strength ratios (LSRs) throughout the spine for a large number of activities in a sizeable cohort, researchers conducted a cross‐sectional study in a sample of adult men and women from a population‐based cohort to assess which activities cause the largest vertebral LSRs and to analyze trends of LSRs along the spine for these high‐load activities. Subject-specific musculoskeletal trunk models were used for the assessment of vertebral compressive loads for 109 activities in 250 people (age 41 – 90, 50% women) from the Framingham Heart Study. This research illustrates the need to consider a range of lifting, holding and non‐symmetric activities in the evaluation of vertebral LSRs. In addition, key activities were identified that produce higher loading in multiple regions of the spine. Such findings provide the first guidelines about what activities should be included in the evaluation of vertebral load-to-strength ratios in future research, including those investigating dynamic motion and vertebral fractures biomechanics.