Class #894

Fletcher Towel Work®

15 min - Class
131 likes

Description

We are proud to feature the first Fletcher Towel Work® class on Pilates Anytime and who better than to teach it than Ron Fletcher's protégé Kyria Sabin? In this 15 minute introduction, you will open the shoulders and chest, learn to work the arms in relation to your back muscles, strengthen and stretch the sides of your body through lateral flexion and rotation of the spine. To get the most out of all your (future) Towel work classes and to find out why the Towel is Red and braided (and where you can buy one), be sure to check out the 5-minute History of Fletcher Towel video.
What You'll Need: Braided Towel

About This Video

Nov 28, 2012
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Transcript

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Okay. I'm curious Saban and I'm introducing the Fletcher. Tell work with Ms Staffer Mendosa. So this is a licensed body of work where we're happy for you to do it at home. Um, if you would like to teach this work, there is a licensing process.

So what I'd like for you to do, Deborah's first just stand right in the center of your towel. Let's just warm up the shoulder girdle to begin with. So we'll begin by lifting the shoulders up and pressing them down. And again, inhale, lift up and press down two more times. Lifting up and pressing down. Last, I'm lifting up and press down and then just do a dummy play.

Reaching forward. Sure. It's it folding at the hips. Sure. Feeling the connection of the arms into to the back last time.

Breaching forward and pressing tall. This time play, reaching forward and then contract into your upper abdominals. Continue rounding forward and then place your hands right in the center of the towel. And then from here, rolling up, straightening the legs as you roll up through the spine and circle the shoulders and think of placing the shoulders on your back. So let's begin by folding the towel in half. And I want you to place the folded end of the towel at one end of your shoulders. And then the loose ends of the table at the other end of the shelter. So basically what we're doing is doubling the width from shoulder to shoulder and then hold the towel at double that width. So if you're wider, it would be a wider grip and then hold the towels.

So you form an oval between the arms and the towel. And from here I just like for you to think of expanding that oval as you breathe into the sides of the body. So even though the towel isn't taught, we're still working with the towel two more times. Breathing. Why? Okay, last one. And then take a full breath to pull wide and pull the tail taut.

So the knuckles are facing the floor, the wrists are long and the arms are engaged from the back. From here. Inhale, lift the tail up just to chest height and exhale, press. Sit down. Feeling the connection into the back. Okay, two more times. Lift up, press down and set. One more time. Press down this time. Lift up to chest tight. Hold position.

And think of reaching the elbows wide to the sides. Pull the tell taught from here. Inhale, pull and exhale relays. And inhale, pull. So you want to feel one continuous line of energy across the back. Keeping the width between the SCAPULA and release.

Yeah, few more times. Pull and release and pull and release. And then pull the towel taught Keith. It taught as you press all the way down to your hips. Pull it totter and release it without releasing the chest or the back.

Circling the shoulders and place. Okay. And again, circle and place two more times. Circle last time up and [inaudible] around. Pull the child charge and lift the towel up just to sternum height.

And from here, lift the tail so it's right over the crown of the head. And then press it down to your chest. Try to feel the role of the arms. And the shoulders and press. Inhale, lift. Exhale, press. One more time. Lift and press and it lift the arms up.

One more time. Overhead. And from here, glide this shoulders up. And as you glide the shoulders down, think of wrapping the arms for words and again, glide the shoulders up and think of gliding down and forward. And again, feeling the width across the shoulders and feeling the connection into the back. Two more times, lifting up and pulling down. Last one, lift up and pull down.

And from here I'd like for you to keep the [inaudible], bend the elbows and think of touching the tail just to the crown of the head. And then push up from the back. And again, pull down image. The tail is a weight that you're lifting from your back. Beautiful. And again, pulling down and lifting up, closing the ribs and pulled down and push up from here. Continue that movement and pull the tail down behind the head. And as you do so, stretch the back of your neck and then push the tail up from your back.

Looking straight ahead and again, pull down, stretching the back of the neck and purse up and lengthen. And again, pulling down and pressing up and pulling down. And press from here. Same thing, pulling the tail down to the chest. Sorry. So push the tail up one more time. Pull the tail down to your chest. And as you do, it's a slight extension through the neck.

Pull and press, uh, expand the chest and press, uh, avoiding hyper extension and press last time. Pull and press up. Inhale, pull the child taught and exhale. Press it all the way down. Release the towel and circle the shoulders. Okay, so from here, let's turn out from the hips. And um, what I'd like to do is what's called the lateral hip stretch.

So it's adding more spinal movement to what we just did. So you found that the connection into the back, maintaining that connection to move the spine. So pull the tail Todd, and then take a full breath to lift the tail up so it's right over the crown of the head. And again, draw the shoulders. Ah, and think of wrapping them as you pull. The shoulders down, reach your hips to the right hips to the right and feel how the spine goes to the left. And pull the hips back to center. Shh. And then reach the hips to the left and pull to center. Try to go a little further. Ah, and to the sides. [inaudible] shuttle further. [inaudible] she's adding a small pulse up and to the side.

And pulse the hips. Try to keep the towels stills. [inaudible] two more sets. [inaudible] and draw the hips back to center. Okay. Length in the waist. Reach the hips to the left and pulse.

[inaudible] keep the engagement in the back. Okay. And lift up and press down. Rolling the shoulders. Okay. Try the legs back to parallel.

And what I'd like for you to do is stand about right here and stand sideways to the audience. Good. So from here, lift the child up to sternum height and then bring it up over head. Pull the tail through a w, shape through that arm, the bend of the elbows, all the way down to the upper back. And then extend your arms behind you. So we'll do a little post to your, your range of motion without hyperextending the elbows. What I'd like for you to do is just lift the towel, expanding the chest and lower down. And think of lifting and opening from here and lower down, keeping the child tot lift and lower.

One more time. Lift up and lower this time. Lift up, lower the towel, wrap the towel around your hips and contract. That's it. So been through the spine. Straighten the legs, expand the chest, reaching behind you, lower the towel and can track [inaudible]. Nice. Two more times. Oh, fun.

[inaudible] lower and can track last time and expand the chest and lower and contract. Heal that opening through here. And then just pulse in the contraction. [inaudible] [inaudible] and extend the legs, opening the chest, bend the elbows, push the tail up and lower it all the way down. [inaudible] good. So let's face back to the audience again and we'll come out to a second position. Think of lining up the heels, pull the tail taut, reach the tail out in front of you, and then again, find that engagement into the back.

And let's take a full breath to rotate the spine around to the left and full center. [inaudible] right. [inaudible] keeping the hips still and around. [inaudible]. [inaudible] sure.

Shin from here, lift up. Press down, lift up, press down. One more time. Lift up and draw the shoulders down your back. So the final movement will do today as as a full side bend. So we'll take an inhale to lengthen up and an exhale to bend all the way over to the side. Inhale, lift and lower the towel down. Lengthening, ah, and bending over to the right. Lifting up and brush down. And again, lift and a little further. Lifting. Oh, [inaudible] hang up. Draw the shoulders down. Bending side to side.

Keeping the hips still. Yeah, four more. Sure. And Center. Lower the towel, keeping the chest open. Release the towel and draw the toes in. Try the heels and toes, heels and toes. And an Adobe play. A [inaudible], [inaudible], [inaudible] and Lauer. So that's an introduction to tell work.

Comments

1 person likes this.
Feels great and pretty at the same time!!! Thanks for posting.
I recently received this towel and after just a few times using it, my shoulders feel more opened and not so tense. Looking forward to more towel classes! Thank you!
Notme
1 person likes this.
Managed with a tea towel held at the ends. I'm relatively small. For the work behind me I changed to a theraband as I'm really not flexible enough to get the tea towel over my head and behind my back:)
Really enjoyed. Shoulders feel wonderful. Will do more of these. Easy to follow, useful when using an iPad!
1 person likes this.
Hi kyria & Deborah, nice to see some towel work, than you :)
1 person likes this.
Love the towel work - I feel taller and open through the chest and shoulders.
I used my most resistant theraband (blue/heavy) that I already had on hand which and then doubled it. This limited any chance of my stretching it <g> and offered an easy grip Here is a link to purchase the Fletcher towel. http:/ /www.fletcherpilates.com/our-produc ts/towel Much better price than on Amazon.com.
1 person likes this.
Just an add on to Joni's. Click here for where to buy the towel on the Fletcher website.
2 people like this.
I love Ron Fletcher towel work. It would be great to have more of this type of class, or a combination of this and pilates.
1 person likes this.
Interesting...I look forward to learning more. Love Fletcher teachings! Thank you
1 person likes this.
Thank you for the class.
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