Quick Cadillac Flow

Hey everybody, this is Amy. Um, we're gonna do up. Primarily what I'll be doing is just a short section of the standing arms springs, uh, on the outside. Um, and maybe just a couple of little things in here. So an easy warm up in case you haven't done anything yet or uh, just to get you in your body. And this short class might be something nice to tag onto after maybe some jump board work or a leg workout or something. But for just the beginning, feel that I'm gonna Start You with your knees bent. Feel the feet push into the frame, establish a very vertical lifted spine.

Can a nice, easy roll over your pelvis, across your lumbar. Feel your shoulders reach back and down. So I've got a little bun. My hair might not get all the way down. And then head and chest Milt, your spine against the mat. Curl up as much as you can. Lin, you feel like you need a little something to change. For me, it's going to be right there, my knees to come up onto my sits bones and take a look at the wrist and feel it. So as we go through this standing arms series momentarily, I'm going gonna really want to watch and feel for that alignment from shoulder through the arm to the wrist.

[inaudible] to maximize our effort and of course have good alignment. I'm going to do two more. And, and what I mean is, uh, especially for new teachers that might be watching, check into that. If your clients are caulking, they're rubbing up their wrist. You need to break that habit early. Don't let them get away with it because they're gonna just cheat for as long as it can. So look at the whole picture.

What's supposed to be moving is the spine anyway, not that and the Rola that said, I'm not perfect in my mind. I might move every now and again as well. Ah, holidays is a journey. Constantly being checked into taking a journey. How all the time. So feel yourself for a moment. So in the standing arms series and any arm exercise, and I know this very well, the rib cage is consideration.

So watch and feel for any extra rib movement. What I'm going to have you us do just five times. It started to feel the springs feel where the work comes from in the center body. That could be your stomach. But for me it's my back muscles feeling the back feeling, the relationship of that to the stomach or the abdominals, energy out the tail. If it's as if it's out there by my feet and energy out my head is if it's back there on the push their bar. If I were so tall I would cover the entire mat.

Right? And nothing has to lift. So that doesn't have to distort. We want length, top and bottom. Right. So the pulling of the springs for me helps me establish that and improve my sense of height. The feeling of a height from top to bottom. I'm a five three and I really like to always kind of picture myself as being five, five or something as I'm doing the springs. Just to kind of get that sense. All right, so that's it. That's the warmup.

I could have done more, but we're not and I'm taking this down. Don't need it anymore. Put it right down on the ground. So standing arm springs on the outside. So how I like to measure is that the uh, bar is right shoulder level or a little bit around the collarbone height. And for me, I've got that set.

I've got the long arms springs from balance body and I'll be using the handles rather than the loops. All right, so first thing is facing back facing the table. All right. And how do you know if you're in the center, if there was no mirror here, you have to really get that center. I bowl and do your darndest to get yourself centered so that you are not right or left of the Cadillac. Pretty important. Sometimes overlooked. All right, so I like to stand in the [inaudible] v I like the feeling of getting the seat involved and that deep activation, my stomach muscles. So scoops, we're going to start with scoops. So as we scoop and I'm going to actually test it first guys and just give us a couple little scoopy dupes. I know fairly well where I need to stand, but every now and again I think I'm out there and I need to scoot back like right there. So scooping.

Exhale first two. I'm going to reach into the springs and I'm going to lower my arms back. My elbows are slightly bent. They're not locked, but they're certainly not too bent in a bicep curl. So again, arms are moving, but the rib cage is not. I want to heighten my sternum minister taking it into circles now. So Pool and control as the arms come up to frame the head, all opening the arms. I can see them in my peripheral vision the entire time.

[inaudible] work to keep even tension, even work going through both arms. There's my five, five, maybe it's five, six, three each. And I like to stay on this slight incline forward as if the wind is at my back leaning me. I'm holding myself through that wind now reversing the circle. I'm reaching out slightly in front.

Here's the humeral rotation to bring the arms back down and why? Back muscle goals. If you're a person who likes to arch their spine, work a little more on holding your tail under and your rib cage back. So you've really got to get your intercostals and the high external obliques to wrap and hug your ribs to keep that back wide. So that was the series there.

I'm going to next go into the salute and I'm going to lean again. Stabilize the ribs or organize and then and in so triceps active of course, reach your elbows out toward the window and the wall. So the triceps actually shorten. Now try sets can lengthen and five to eight repetitions. And I'm going to take two more today. Seven feeling pretty good.

And Eight, I'm going to hold and open the arms out into the hug. A tree mindful mom to let them go behind. I'm looking straight forward, but I can see them out of my periphery and I'm going to exhale. Okay. And each time they pull those arms springs, I'm thinking, okay, am I as tall as I can be? Are My ribs as organized as possible. Keeping your back muscles wide on your spine will avoid that arching back.

All right, just one more of the hug a tree. So like I said, three to five repetitions, sometimes five to eight and rest for just a second. So I'm going to do a bicep curl for this one. Step forward if you can. Um, I think you can start with your arms quite far behind you. And I'm going to have you focus on your upper arm for a moment that humorous and keep it right back there. Now Ben at your elbows and pull those fists up toward your side chest and then reach the fist back. And again, so ideally, upper arm doesn't travel. It stays there.

Work to have long trapezius muscles from your skull to your shoulders. And again, I didn't mention anything yet about the risks, but here's a huge place where the risk could start dancing around. No risk movement. This is an elbow joint and an elbow joint activity and up. Sometimes the biceps can handle a few more repetitions.

So I'm taking one more and falled and back. All right, I'm gonna step back again and come to Tra triceps here. So arms at upper arms again at a nice level, uh, angle to my shoulder top. So I'm going to extend my elbows and press the wall forward. Control the bend back in and again, wrap the ribs.

So so far everything we're doing is two arms moving at the same time. Feel free to start unilateral movement and I'm going to go in there now and just kind of swap one and two. Hello. Little different sense of control needed across the ribs and the hips. [inaudible] a more one to really try to hold that upper arm in place. Steady. Five, six, and seven and eight. And pause.

All right, another one facing out. I'm going to go back into my hug a tree position. I'm gonna let the wind be out my back and lean me forward. I'm going to widen my back again and start to add that I like a little side bend of the spine. Now I'm not going to think of the side bend at my waist. I'm actually going to think of the side bend right up here in Thoracic.

So as you're taking the movement, think more at your sternum, uh, in the side bend so that you have that x extension and a little side Bin. Action. Pull those springs so those arms don't go behind you. You're a large monarch butterfly. Big Butterfly Wings catching the air and one more each direction and, and fine and rest. Okay, so facing out, quite a few facing in. We'll do a few.

Starting chest expansion. I like to hold the strap with a fist for me. I get a different use of my arm and it helps me hold my collar bone, uh, more effectively. That's just me feed about a sit bone with the part. And then before I begin moving the springs, organize the ribs and collarbone in head. Five, five. Here I go.

Inhale, pull, whole turn, turn, center, release. The inhale is the whole turn, turn center release. So are your trapezius muscles as long and broad is they can be asking that of that musculature from your skull to your shoulders. Pull, turn, turn center. I'm going to do one more pattern each direction and think long triceps. You long gated muscles down my arms. One more and pool and turn.

Turn Center release. Huh? Okay. So another bicep with squats. And so getting some legs in here. So I am going to have a feet hip with the part. Test your squat. You know about where you're going to be. I think I can back up a tiny bit.

Okay, so starting, maybe not starting up in those 90 degree right angles here and check those shoulders. Where can they go other than up, down, pull on the springs a bit. Watching ya wrist. No revving. And here I go squatting. Now I can go down, you know, pretty low. I'm going to test myself today. I've got to keep even tension. Now what gets me up? Pull on the springs, glutes, quads, back muscles. Now open the arms. Keep resistance. Do a little forward flection with the tiny bit of tricep.

Press. Keep resistance. Bring him up. Now if you don't want to squat that low and your knees aren't great and you don't love that, don't go that low. Go here halfway. It's still fine. Keeping this springs open is my goal. [inaudible] I may do one more of each. I'll see if I can go way back down again. And even though I'm going to the ground, I'm thinking I'm going up through my head ways.

I've got a cord through the top of my head. I'm going around, I'm going to do one more half squat or halfway down and up and that same little forward flection and center. So little a adaptation. I'll try two or three, probably three repetitions. Think rowing from the reformer rowing, facing back, and while I want to do it standing, you could do it seated there, but the standing to really feel if one arm is leading in the rotation or starting sooner than the other one, but also just to get a different sense of front back and what has to happen around here in some rowing. So I'm going to go knuckles to chest and to take a little knee bend and I'm going to go into flection here. Pull in now holding that pelvis and the rib cage right where they are.

Nothing's going to deviate. I'm going to hold, I'm going to press the arms out. Now my arm is, I want to pull my arms a little lower and deepen the contraction of the abdominals as I press the arms behind. Now here's where I'm gonna think. Stretch the arms away from the body. Keep the springs. Really start to let external rotation happen at the humerus and come back up and repeat. Inhale. So quite a bit of trunk activation, meaning external obliques, intercostals, lats, deep abdominals to rise up, shoulders, everything in there. And now as I go from the back to the front, I want to reach out the circumference around my body. Way Out there, wide and up. Just one more time.

Feel free to add repetitions as you like. Press the arms open. They're traveling at the same speed, same rate, deeper flection, deeper use of those arm extensors. And why don't let those coils of the springs shorten keeping control, rotate, rotate, and all the way to standing. Okay, so I'm going to turn off eco and I'm going to put my top hand above my head and the other hand right here in front of my hip. Um, this arm is going to have the palm up and the shoulder down. A little first position to stand some lunging out to my side, my right side.

This top arm has to stay directly above my head, push and close. So that could happen. The idea is that I can land, come back in with complete control and up through the top of the head, [inaudible] up through the top of the head and lunch and up. Meanwhile, my other leg here are the ones close to the table. Active glute. Whoops. One more open lift and rest for a second.

So the leg is active as well. I'm letting know the inside spring. I'm going to hold my arm. I'm going to go back out to my lunge. I might need to come closer to the table. I learned this, this walk it. So I'm taking my arm and stretch three times. Upper arm is high as the shoulder third one and open.

Now I'm going to start to lift the arm and side bend toward the table and turn that poem up and just stretch and circle. So I'm going to do a little circle of this arm comes up, palm up, press open, stretch the spring. I love this stretch here. My traps, my scalings and my trapezius three and around. And that's going to be enough for me. So other side. So we're starting top hand overhead.

Palm up inside arm is right at the belly button. Organize your rib cage. Here we go. And you're lunging and push off. Come in with control. So the inside arm here still has some job to do. It's not giving up, it's still holding that Spring and lift. Remember, how tall do you want to be? Can these springs help you achieve that sense of height than your spine?

But strong shoulders in a nice position down and center. And at any time can you melt through your upper trapezius and your deltoid up there? One more to go. Took eight repetitions and center. Okay, dropping the inside spring. So walk [inaudible]. So parallel inside, turned out outside leg in three times from the chest one and in two and in rib cage should be right over the pelvis. Three. Now arc the arm, look toward the table, turn the palm face up and we're going circle down around.

Keep your profile, lift the arm palm face up and stretch down around one more time and three and down and around and rest. Okay, so those are the standing arms springs from the outside that I'm doing. One more little luscious yummy from up on the table. Um, and it has nothing to do with the arm springs but it may feel really nice in your spine and your in your body. Okay, so I'm going to have no spring out, the push through bar end, I am going to crawl in, bring that up, loop my knees over the other side of it and I want you to start and I want to start well in near this end. All right, so feel long again for a moment. So we're going to take that beautiful straight line that we achieved and we're going to bend it and then re lengthen it from right here at this end. So tail, sacrum, Lumbar, lovelies, a little stretch. So the further I'm going up my spine, I want to think of my back extensors lengthening up just like I did in my standing work. Pardon me here.

Now I don't want to go too far on my neck, but I can think of continuing to lengthen my lung, my muscles in my spine, to my legs, to the bar, breathing in. And if I come down, it's as if I leave my knees on the ceiling in. This comes down first. I'll say that again to myself. I can leave my knees up on the ceiling, but try to come down here and so I'll do another one. The little extra stuff at the top.

We come down and we're going to stretch the spine all the way. Breathing in, exhale, and we create and a lot of activation in the abdominals, but quite a bit in the back. Body, hamstrings, glutes, back extensors. No, I've got my knees together. I'm going to stretch my right leg up parallel and bring it down. If you've seen another Cadillac class of mine, I've done this before.

I like this, I like this a lot and it feels really nice to help keep thinking. Okay, can I keep stretching my spine up toward the sky? One more on the left and then we're going to play with two in both feet at the same time, both legs and up. So hopefully kind of in my jackknife position. And then I'm going to slow, slowly begin to roll down my spine, trying to keep my toes up over my eyes. Ah, this just feels quite nice on my lower back, my entire spine and this part here on the hamstrings.

So I'm going to have us hold right there. Reach those, the tips of the sacrum all the way down. If you think you're down, go a little bit further. [inaudible] we bend the knees, we're going to take that little journey one last time and curl really feeling the rotation and how that transitions into extension. We're going to start left leg and up and down. So this is a great opportunity as well to study your pelvis. You can see, hopefully it's upright and I do have a little obliquity. I do have a slight rotation so I can study it. I what can I do?

How can I calibrate and take a little bit of that rotation away? It's often from here on me in my back, but we all know mostly it's the whole body. So up I go. Now can I curl under a little more there and left? Yes, I can. Breathing in. I'm going to slowly begin to spine. [inaudible] just going to melt.

So I've chosen to take this arm series and this slowly, by all means, you can go faster, but please enjoy. The challenge of growing taller is stretching your spine whenever possible. Even here, there's a two way thing going on out the head, out the tail. We bend the knees, just hold and unloop. All right, so that's the class little mini-class. I've hope you've enjoyed it. Thanks for taking class with me. I'll see you next time.