Open Hips and Chest

Hi, I'm Adrian and I'm going to be teaching Andrea my student here, the small barrel. Um, for those of you who have home barrels, this is a great tool to work on. Just everything really. You can work on your powerhouse always, but it's a great stabilization to find your lower back. Um, and you could do some artwork on here too. So we're going to start by how to get on. So I'm gonna have her step forward and she's going to sit down on top of the barrel. And what I'd like her to do is sit slightly forward. That's good. Maybe not. Yeah, maybe a little bit further back. Great.

She's going to take a hold of the barrel with two hands and bring one knee into your chest and drop your chin to your chest. Because what she has to do is control herself down so she has to use your tummy muscles. Good. You're gonna keep your chest open, not using. Those shoulders are hunching up and I'm going to have her start with her knees in, towards her chest. And it looks like she's placed pretty well. If anything, how do you feel you're comfortable. Okay. And her back is nice and supported. And what I'd like you to do is have your knees open, heels together, toes apart.

So you're starting in your plotty stance. Great. And let's just start with a few little presses where you just slowly push out like a frog and then you're going to bend your knees and come in. And what we're looking for, what I'm looking for is to make sure she's not testing her shoulders, but also that she's keeping her ribs down and her tummy in and up. Good. Now though to go quite so far out. Go a little higher with the legs, right? And then I have her stop. Bring her knees back in and rest. I'm going to have your knees hip with apart your feet apart as well.

So open your feet more parallel part and relax your feet. You're going to take one leg and slowly lower it down towards the mat and pull it back in. And what she's working on is stabilizing her back muscles. So she wants to get her ribs to drop and she can go as low as she wants. She can tap her big toe on the mat if she wants, as long as she keeps that back strong. So in other words, she's not arching as she goes down, she's keeping her telling muscles tight and not tensing or using your arms.

Maybe one more. And then I'm going to have her switch legs and now to the other side. And this is good cause from your view you can see what's happening in her spine. And let's bring this knee in just a little bit more for support. Good. Maybe three more. Keeping your shoulders soft. Neck is soft. That's it.

And in Nash, she's going to take both legs. She's not going to go all the way down. She's going to go maybe two or three inches down and then back in and a little bit down. And as she comes in, I want to see her ribs drop a little bit. That's a beautiful [inaudible]. Good. So don't go quite so far that you lose that stability in your spine.

Two more shoulders relaxed. And one more and rash. You can go ahead and bring your knees in and rest for a moment. Good. How are you feeling all alright, I'm going to have her take her legs. Now I'm going to have her actually get into some leg exercises where she extends her legs out to about maybe 60 degrees with her heels together, her toes apart and she's going to start with some circles.

She's so she is holding on and I think Andrea, I'm going to actually have you move towards your head a little bit. So bend your knees to do that. Yeah, you're a little high. That's better. Now she can really stabilize her, her upper back. Good. Now take your legs back out. Shoulders and chest is open. Neck is long. You can gaze down towards your belly button. Good.

And she's going to start with small circles so that she's an open her legs and bring them together. What I want you to focus on while you're doing this is keeping the legs really long or reaching for the opposite side of the room. The lower the legs go, the more challenging this becomes rich. The legs bring them together and I want to the whole, so that's st down into your spine. Pull in, pull up shoulders, squeeze your seat. Very nice. And then left and open together. Lift, circling together, lift [inaudible] and as you go down, careful not to tense your shoulder. Reach the legs out by your back. Good.

And that's what's nice that you can see that when she fixed herself, squeeze your bottom and lift. Make sure you come up as well. [inaudible] it'll come to too high, but about the same place you started. One more time and left. Now I'd like you to reverse those so long. Pretty legs. Squeeze your seat. We're wrapping. Open up and together.

[inaudible] shoulders, relaxed, elbow, soft holding, light, laser. You're not gripping. Maybe four more and together reaching out and together. Can you feel your hips when you go down, you can feel that strength in your, in your back. And that's what you're working on. Getting it really strong. Squeeze your seat, drop your ribs open and together. One more time. Reaching the legs out.

Not Losing that control of your spine and bend in rest. Great. Okay. She's going to once again, take her legs back out to about 60 degrees. Still in your plotty stance, and let's go into a little walking exercise. So like little steps down and you're going to count to eight and on the last one on the eighth couch, you're going to come back up. Okay, so let's start at about 60 degrees and now begin lowering the legs. One, two, three, four, six, seven, eight, strong, back up to five, six, seven, eight and one, two, four, a little bit faster. Five, six, seven, eight. Use your seat. Two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. Again, relax those arms.

Relax your shoulders. Use your seat. Two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. Walmart, set. One, two, four, five, six, seven, eight, two, four, five, six, seven, eight. Bend your knees and rest. Good. Starting to feel this. Very nice. All right, so now she's going to once again go back up. Just a great little tool to have the borough to be able to do some of this at home. Good. You're going to now go into beats. So she's going to open her feet, clap her heels together. For a counselor, you're going to stay in one place right here, so you're not going to go lower and open. You're in Cla, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight and Holt. So just eight times. Now you're going to challenge that. You're going to challenge your back and your tummy muscles.

You're going to lower your leg a little bit. Legs hold, use your seat, squeeze. Good. And now eight beats here. One, two, little bit wider. Four, five, six, seven, eight and stop a little bit more. Feel where you are. Shoulders, chest, open more and beat. Two, three, four. She's keeping the length, which is nice. Her legs are long, her back is still long and anchored. Six, seven, eight. And do you feel I can go a little bit lower? Okay. A little bit lower.

So the idea is to get really strong. You can get lower each time, but always stay where you're comfortable, where you're back in. Handle the, the weight of the legs. Six, seven, eight and hold. I'm going to go a little bit lower now. Find those ribs, chest, neck as long as one, two, three, four. Get those rooms down. Six, seven, eight national and go up a little bit and she's going to hold there and beat again. So now you're working your way back up to five, six, seven, eight little bit higher and one, two, three, four, six, seven, eight little bit higher. You're holding lightly onto the barrel, right? Two, four. Use your seat. Six, seven, eight, a little bit higher. Pinch your seat. Two, four, five, six, seven, eight. One more set. One, two, three. Breathe naturally for no huffing and puffing.

Six, seven, eight and bend. Good. You're going to take that into a bicycle. So one leg at a time. Alright. Move debris slipping down a little bit. So yeah, just always double checking you. You will know your placement more than, than many. You want to make sure your neck is long, your back is good, you're fine. Open your knees, heels together, toes apart. You're going to take one leg at a time and begin to stretch it away from you. So down and now you notice how low she went. That's fine.

If your back is now, there you go. You're going to try to skim your heel on the mat, find the barrel with your heel as simultaneously the other leg reaches up and goes down by and your back. Good. And yes, it's kind of getting the coordination of it first. So one leg is stretching as one Leigh is coming in and the idea is to keep your back anchored while you're getting the length. Turn your hip out a little bit while you use your bottle. There you go.

Now come down, find the barrel with your heel. Don't let that right hip lift. Keep both hips anchored. You feel you feel your right hip. Okay, so I'm specifically giving her correction to make sure that your hips don't move around. Well one leg is going out or coming in. That's it. That's it, right? Yes. Good. You felt that good bye. Your back. Aha says those ribs and let's go ahead and reverse those.

So he'll find the barrel. Then try to find the floor. Bind your bottom. Use it. There you go. And then the same idea here. Use your seat. God lift those ribs back in bend so it takes some of that energy from your toes and relax your feet so you can find that stability in your powerhouse. Good. Bring both knees into your chest, relax your shoulders, and then you're going to glue your knees together, your feet together, and you're just going to kind of tick tock.

So your knees are going to roll to one side, pulling in toward your shoulder. And then you're going to bring the knees down a little bit and go to the other shoulder. You can just kinda loosening up your lower back. And then the other way and one more to the other side. And then what I'd like you to do is keep those knees together for you together and go into kind of a circle. So keep the knees bent though, so the knees are going all the way around and then you'll reverse like a cork screw all the way around. So I wanna move. You'll do that on your own. And as she's circling, when your legs go down, don't let your hips pop up.

So keep those ribs down. Yes. One more time. And [inaudible] hold. Let your knees relaxed. Let the knees open. Now take it off of here. I'm going to have her get off. I want her to kind of push the barrel away from you and let your bottom drop. Don't lift your head, keep your head down, shoulders down, always relaxed in the neck. Good.

And your legs can just stretch over the barrel and you just rest. Hey, let your little back relax. So you give your second yourself a moment. Good. And now I would have it bring her knees back into her chest to set up and I'm going to have her turn around and face the other direction and grab those small weights. So I didn't mention this, but you may have noticed I have small weights and um, a bar that I'm going to have her use. If you don't have the weight, you can do that without this exercise, without the weights. What I'd like you to do is move forward because you're going to end up lying down on the barrel.

You want your upper back right below the shoulders to be supported on here. So maybe move up a little bit more and your head will drop back. Yeah, if that doesn't feel comfortable for your neck, you can always use a small pillow for your head. Now you know are those weights are good. Paraphraser bench. She's gonna have her knees hip with the part and I want you to just relax and I want you to go ahead and let your back arch a little bit and you can see kind of, I don't know if you can see that curve.

I want her to now pull that curve down. Good. Relax your hips though. Use your ribs to drop Nash. She's going to stretch your arms out with the weights. If you don't have the weights, just stretch your arms out long. Try to keep your neck long by dropping the chin a bit, but the head is just resting and she's going to go into arm circles, so she's going to take her arms up to the ceiling first. Inhaling, she's going to stretch as far back as you can. Exhale, circle around, bring the arms back into your hips. Good.

As she's moving, we're looking to make sure that your rib stay down and that you don't let your back pop up and down, that you're keeping that engagement going. Good, and then the other thing is your arms circle around. Make sure your chest stays open. Don't let your shoulders roll forward. That's better too. More keeping your legs relaxed. Arms in neck long. Very good.

It's a good way to loosen up the shoulders. Now you're going to reverse your circle. You'll go down, open your chest and stretch behind you. Just like you stretched with your legs away. You also stretch with your arms, shoulders down, chest opens, getting that mobility in the shoulders. 31 reach back, lower. Reach away too. Good kid in the chest to open, but the power has to stay strong and last one, both arms can arrest at the mat.

You can go ahead and put the weights down and now I'm going to actually grab the bar and have you hold the bar. Now, same kind of thing. Let's go ahead and straighten your legs for a moment. It's a little more challenging with the legs long. Go ahead and let your back relax. Let it arch a little bit and now show how you sync. Those are the down. Good.

Now take your arms behind you and stretch as far back as you can even think I was long nick. Kind of grip this bar cause I'm going to give her a stretch and I pull her and as I pull you, I want you to drop those ribs. Good. Take a nice inhale. Just your arms are going to lower. You're going to keep your head still all the way down. And exhale. Inhale the stretch back, getting your waist really long.

Wrap your thighs deep. Breath in and arms come down. Exhale, hold the down. Let your shoulders drop back. Good. Three more. Stretch back, deep breath dance ribs and exhale chest opens. Walmart, two words, excuse me, which back believes my camp. Reach long waist and exhale and last one. So she's reaching behind herself and pulling back down as the arms come back down, keeping her neck long and soft. You place the bar at your side. That's it.

Do just two stretches without the bar so you can see, you can do this without props, but sometimes the props are useful tools to kind of put you in the right place. Just relax your knees and feet. Good. One more time. Reach and stretch. Find your back. Good and arms all the way down. I want to have her do one more so this time she's going to reach back and come up into a roll up. So she's getting curl her chin, tummy pulls in and reach for her toes. Flex your feet and hold and now start to come back.

Now remember there's a barrel behind you find that lower back control, but yes, with the Rep. Very nice. Go ahead and stretch all the way back and arms come up. Sion curls. You stretch and flex and come back down. I'll have her do three more. It's a nice way to finish. After that, the legs and the arm work up and forward, flexing for extra stretch and all the way down, keeping herself centered and back and to left up over stretch.

Paul, tell me back all the way down. Last one. Reach away. Make it a good one. Get those sides long as you stretch all the way forward. Get a nice scoop. Put your nose between your knees and arrest, and that concludes the workout. Hope you enjoyed [inaudible].