Fluid Cadillac

Hi, I'm delighted to be here with Palati Sani time offering some of my favorite movements on the trapeze table or Cadillac. I call it usually trap table I have with me Laura to demonstrate. And so we're going to get started. I've tried to make a combination of approximately 10 pro pieces of movement programs that I really enjoy that I think offer a nice variety of flection and extension and side bending and rotation. And so she's going to be all over this table. All right. Thank you so much.

Let's get started with Laura rolling down to her back and we're going to put her feet in the leg springs. So she's going to go to here and let's have you circle your arms around and I want to feel where you are first. Yeah. So we're going to have her holding onto these poles and keeping her shoulders down as much as possible. She also has a choice to bring your arms down by the sides, which is a good thing to do. Um, all right, so we're going to take the leg springs and yes, now you can help yourself get in there. And we've got two springs moderate weight. Um, and we're going to start with this.

I like to start with this particular movement to really anchor, make sure that the student has an a good awareness of pelvic stability, which is such a key fundamental to all of our work. So basically, although it seems simple, this is what this is primarily about. So I'm looking at her whole body or shoulders are down, her neck is lifted, elbows open, and she's going to keep a neutral pelvis navel to spine, pubic bone to say Crum. And I'm going to have her inhale as she goes ahead and lowers her legs and exhale as she breaks at the hip several times. Go ahead Laura. Inhaling and exhaling. So I'm going to cue her to really keep that pelvis in a neutral position rather than her kind of riding the springs back up.

So she's got a really worked very low in the abdominals to bolt that sake. Crim down, certainly using her hamstrings, her inner thighs so her legs don't fly apart. Good. Sometimes when I'm teaching, I come down here and give a little help. Although she doesn't need it, feet can be pointed or flexed. Let's do one more beautiful and break it.

The hip. Bolt the sake down. Let's flex your feet now. Go ahead. Inhale lower and exhale. Stay there. Good. I'm going to have Lara do a little marching or running in two breaths. Breathing in, in, out. Uh, we can do different breath patterns, but the breath is part of the program and it's also part of the coordination of it. Tight legs. So you're almost going to have the ankle bones touching.

Keep going to within time with your breath. Good. Bringing the arms down by your sides. She's going to keep the legs going. Come up into a nice upper body contraction. Now in four, exhale, three, four, arms, two, three, four. Good. Two, three.

So the challenges that she's doing, her hundreds arm pumping, but the legs keep alternating. Good. Excellent. Couple more sets. That back is flat. Her belly is flat. One more set. Keep reaching to the end of the table and get Laura a down and point the feet. Beautiful. Let's do some circles. We're going to change the breath here.

She's going to inhale, open, exhale, clues. Zahn up in origin and close. So she, while she's here with her feet in the straps, we could do a lot of different things, but we're going to do a just this and then move on to something else cause I want to kind of give it a variety here. You only have maybe half an hour, 40 minutes, so you kind of get to a little bit of everything. Squeeze the inner thighs, keep the pelvis neutral. Let's reverse. Inhale up. Exhale down. So again, I'm going to say the breath now is a little bit different than the very first movement.

I think what's important for me is that you breathe. If you make a change, it's okay as long as you keep your breathing fluid to keep your movement fluid. Two more good. One more and good. Bend your knees and you can take your feet out. Good. Thank you. All right, we're going to move into now the breathing exercise.

So Laura, you might want to reach back there and get the wooden bar. All right, good. All right. So down she goes again. She's going to put her feet into this sling. They can be parallel, they can be turned out, but at least in good alignment. And then I think I want you to back up a tad and I probably should've done that first and bring your arms to perpendicular.

So now I'm going to tick the bar. Thumbs around on the trapeze table here. We want to have thumbs around everything we hold, unlike on the reformer where we have our thumbs forward with our fingers. So holding this bar here is work for the Scapula, all of that good stuff. Work in here, ribs, so she's not gonna just let the bar drop back. So she's in control of it. So this is a classic exercise called breathing. She's going to inhale, boost her hips up, she exhales and brings the bar down towards her hips with straight arms, the bar returns, and she rolls down. Closing those ribs.

Yes, all the way to neutral. Boosts the hips up. Great. Exhale, press inhale up and rolled and oh and I can give her a little traction. Exhale. Inhale up, sorry. Exhale, press good. And there's that nice stretch boost again. Press those hips high. Now do three presses, one and up to keep those bums high up.

She's got a great diagonal line and rolled in. I'm good. Want some more? Boost. Good and thorough. Represses so this exercise is called breathing and there's a lot of it and hold it perpendicular. Beautiful control. Ribs in sync, the waist lengthen and excellent. Beautiful exercise. So actually you can take your feet out.

That breathing is quite specific and it should be done as Lara just did. Alright, so we're gonna take the trapeze bar away and we're going to have you come up please and go into our clunker roll back. So she's going to turn around and put her feet against the metal sidebars. And again, I'm going to hand this to her and her hands go around the outside and I'd like you to press the bar down so your arms are horizontal. So Laura's got a beautiful straight back here. I'm going to cue the ribs.

The line of the spine is beautiful. This is part of the spine. We know that, but we want to really pay attention to how that alignment relates to the rest of the back. So there's a wall here. We'll let the ponytail help be the wall. She's going to take an inhalation and then she contracts the head gently bows, and she will roll [inaudible] down with Greg Control. Inhale and gently bring Chin over chest and we'll [inaudible] now lengthen. Nice. Exhale, contract. Good. The back rounds, because of the deep contraction, the shoulders are down. She's got a pretty darn flat back there without tucking.

We want to see the armpits come over the hips and then vertebra by Vertebra, by Vertebra. Axial belly tight. Good. So that whole rippling of the spine comes from that contraction. Let's pull the bar to your chest and extend four times. And I like that she's keeping her shoulders down. I'm cuing her to do so. Good one more and hold. Breathe in.

Now gently bow the head up and over. Don't drop the eds. Rounded, rounded, rounded, rounded, rounded around it. And then beautiful lift and ribs and [inaudible] and rolled down by Vertebra and her feet have moved and that happens. I'm going to give her a little traction here for poles and extent and inhale and exhale. Good. Keep the belly tight. [inaudible] good and hold last time.

And Yeah. [inaudible] a great way to teach rural back. Roll up on the floor. Now let's do a nice movement, fluid movement with this one. Breathe in. We're going to start again. Slightly different. She rolls down the same way. Shoulders down.

And then she's going to lift her sternum man contract [inaudible] or and lift control. A little slower and rural. So for Laura, I can cue her to drop her ponytail on the Mat and last time and roll up. Let's continue rounding for word and I'm going to give her a little stretch here. Good. And that just feels good to her. Nice control. Breathe in. I have the bar and you can roll up tall. Oh and rest. Lovely. So as I said earlier, if you heard me say this, it's a wonderful way to help teach people how to do the roll up.

On the Mat because I think we pretty much have figured out it's easier to roll down than it is to roll up. So here we have the aid of the bar and the student starts from an up position to go down. That's pretty s pretty simple but wonderful. All right, let's have you roll over to your prone position and we're going to work on the swan. I know some folks call it Cobra, some folks call it swan, different swans. Um, I like the swan better than the coke. Anyway, it involves good back extension and hyperextension. So we're going to start with what I refer to as the Cobra and then the swan dive. All right, let me have you move I think a little further forward. Tiny bit maybe. Okay, good. All right.

And so she's going to stay low and I want to make sure she doesn't lift her head. I'm going to bring her this bar and we wanted to one spring, right. Come back. Too many springs. I'm going to give this to Laura on the one spring. You could do too. She has enough strength to come up with just the lighter spring, which in this case is almost a little more difficult, so don't let go. We want to make sure there's no accident here. I'm going to stretch her out.

Make sure her pelvis and pubic bone are on the mat. Now she's going to start by bringing the elbows open and pulling the bar right behind her head. Let's breathe in and push it [inaudible] and you're not going to let go and bring it back again. You always want to cue your person not to let go. Can Be really dangerous here. Good. Bring it back again and let's lift the upper body. Nice neck line and take it through. Good.

This stays tight and lift and lift the upper body a little higher. Nice and through. Good Laura, we're going to go on now with another breath. So come on up. Inhale, exhale here. Inhale a little higher and bring the bar behind your head. And now we're working into almost full lifted extension bar behind coming up. Inhale, come a little higher. Exhale, good and loud stuff all the way up. Beautiful.

And then she pulls those ribs in. Pull your belly away from my hand. That's right. Good. Once more. Inhale, elbows are open. She's really strength. Uh, organizing her scapula. Nicely. Inhale, lift the sternum and now close the ribs in the belly. Lovely. And she pulls it down. Beautiful. How are you doing? Yeah, you could take a break here and sit back and rest, but I think we're going to go ahead with the Swan. So now with arms straight, scapula engaged, he's going to come up to a nice long line.

The bar comes towards her sternum on the inhale and lower down. Exhale and again, ah, good. And her legs have parted a little bit and that's okay. They don't have to remain glued together. Some you're fine. Some people feel better on their back if their legs are a little bit open, just not too wide and up and lower.

Nice. Good. We'll come up again. Inhale up. Let's go ahead and do the swan dive forward up. Keep the chin up forward and good and don't let go. Now you can let go. Keep your head down and the bar comes through.

And Laura is going to sit back on her heels and stretch her back out nicely. Great. So we've had some neutral pelvic flat back experience we've had flexing the spine. Now we've been arching and extending and hyper extending the spine. Great. You feel okay? All right, let's have you sit down this way now and face that way and we'll go into going to go into the spine stretch. Another wonderful way we can work mat work onto the uh, Cadillac. All right, so I have her on a blue and a red.

You might want to do lighter. Both are fine too. Depends on your choices and shoulder strength and control. Let's have you pull down and up and down just to get the feel of it. And, and, and uh, so she feels the way to the bar. Works her arms a little bit. Great.

Now pull the bar to your chest tight. Now she's going to bow. I'm going to help her and go. Not too far forward. Good. We're going to take a breath here. The floor work. We don't do an extra breath. Come back up, scoop your belly, pull your belly into my hand and come up vertebra by Vertebra. She's controlling it. Now pull twice. Inhale.

Exhale. Inhale. Exhale, pull and bow. Let's make it move now fluidly. A little bit deeper. Breathing. Use your belly to [inaudible]. Back Up. Control, control, control God. And pull twice again. Good, nice.

And uh, we'll pull and bow the head. And I don't want to push too hard on this bar cause she could lose it, but I am going to give her a little more stretch. She's rounded, but her belly is scooped. I'm going to pulse her down here in Hail X, Hale in Hail. Nice rounded X. Hail. One more set. Good pulley. Beautiful. And now breathe. Hold the breath and then roll back up Vertebra by Vertebra. By Vertebra, by Vertebra, by Vertebra. Stretch your arms up. Good.

Let's hinge you forward on a nice line again. If I pushed the bar up too much, she could lose it. But this is a good, feels good on the back. Yes. How are your ribs in now? Right. Okay. And come back up. Good. We're going to lighten the spring. I'm wondering to do a little rotation, but your hands in the middle of the bar. All right, you're going to pull the bar as you hinge back on an inhale straight back.

Now take the right arm and reach out. You can look at the ocean and look back to this pole and center and the other way in the back stays on a hinge with her rotation and center and return it. Aw, breathe again. Hinge back. Exhale. Keep that back flat butt on it. [inaudible] oh yeah, good left reach. Look at your hand. Look where you're going. Good and center and other way.

Reach way out. That way you always want to look where you're going and center. Good, and then come up and good. Now hold the, it's it's light, but we're going to stretch you again. Don't drop the head. So the next day is in line with the spine. Wherever she is, right hedging forward. Vertical hand, Jean back rounded. The neck is in line with the spine. All right, lets having done that, let's hinge a little bit further. Take your right arm and let's do a little saw. So you're going to reach over your left toes, turn your head a little more good.

Come up and do the other side and reach. Good. So she's not rounding and flexing her spine. She's hinge ing forward and rotating, but really working the belly to protect this movement and Nice Center and the other direction. Good. Laura and center. Yeah. Very good. Beautiful. All right, let's have you do this since we're on the one spring.

Now let's do the sidearm. All right, so why don't you face that way? All right. Now you can sit a little bit closer. Okay. Sometimes we can cross the legs to anchor or leave them where they are. Take the bar under hand. Yup. Shoulders down. This hand can press down and let's do some poles down and ah, we'll cricket there and up and Paul and up and good and up.

So I'm just making sure all as well here. Here's a case. If someone had a little scoliosis or a weaker arm on one side and the other, you may want to really cue them to breathe more into one side of their back. You're going to be working a little more on the other side cause you're a little bit less on your left side. I see it. [inaudible] and that's good. Turn your hand the other way. Good. And let's take the a bar and pull it down and through and reach this left arm up. And I'd like to you to really stretch this way and oh, I'm going to give her a stretch a little bit like the mermaid.

I don't want to pull her arm cause that'll lift your shoulder up. Good. And come up and down and again up and over and up and down and lift up. Yeah. Don't only with the head hand. No. [inaudible] good and up. If I pushed too hard I'll lose Ya. And let's have you come back, bring the bar through and face the window.

You can look out at the beautiful ocean. All right, I'm going to kill you from this side and pulling down and up and I'm not, I'm going to come around here. So Laura has a little bit of atrophy on her left side, so I want her to really think of this. The better. This side of her back. Breathe into my hand here. Good. Not a heavy spring. One spring. Nice and one more and good.

Turn the hand and pull it down. Push it through and reach up first to the ceiling and then [inaudible] and up. Nice. This is a lovely movement. It's a little bit more of a feel good than it is. Super challenging, but that's okay and good. And Lyft and Uber, so this gives her a nice sense of anchoring and good. Bring the bar through. I think we did three on the other side and up. Nice.

Good. All right, let's go into cat now. So you're going to be on your knees. You could do this lighter spring, heavier spring, depending on your length and proportion, how far away you're going to be a little bit of variable. If you work quite close, you'll have the bar come right along the body. You do have the potential danger of feeling like you're in a flip through. So we don't want that.

Laura's fairly long so she's going to back up a little bit. Yes, thank you. Go ahead and add that second spring. Alright, so I'm going to can help her. She's an advanced person here, but where we're going to still make sure she doesn't fall. All right, we don't like that. Okay. Go ahead and pull the bar down and right away can track the ballet and then that takes you through arching to the cat X. Hey are there, here's the cat rowdy.

You look like a cat and black and hinges back and pressing down. Let's make it dance one and two and three. There we go. And foot four and fod. Doesn't that look better? Six and one belly and good arch. The back scoop who are around. I love it when it's fluid.

I just was probably my favorite principal. One more and Ooh and good rounding last time hinge. Go further back, back, back, back, back, back. Not your head, your whole body. Okay, good. There we go. Nice. All right, lovely. All right, let's turn around. Good. And do the chest expansion. Yes. Thank you. All right. So, uh, you don't need pads on your knees.

You're good. Alright, so I lovely. Relative of the, um, work on the reformer. Okay, let's put your thumbs there. Good. All right. So shoulders down anchored everything gorgeous. Let's just pull down to your hips or pelvis and return. I liked that her shoulder side, her seem of her outfit here. Hip Fi are one line. Good.

And we're going to have the head turn. Inhale, turn the head right and left and front return. So this keeps moving to left and right and front return pole. Right and left and good. How are you doing? A lot of our more work. Great for the triceps. Lats. Good. And sit back on your heels for a second and just go ahead and do a stretch.

That'll feel good. Cause we have one more thing for her to do up here. Feels good there. Yeah. Alright. Roll back up to your knees and we're going to go into the sitting down part of this. So she starts tall and pulls the bar one. She sits down to just break at the hips, come up, thery return the bar for good straight body line. Sit down. So the line of the body remains exactly the same.

There's no rounding or leaning. Good. Great thigh work and are more work. One more look good, Laura. Good and up. And I think I did enough. Good line. Okay. Nice feeling good. All right, we're keeping it moving. A little bit of a workout. All right, let's have you lie down facing the [inaudible]. Good.

And we're going to do now a teaser version. You can roll all the way down that I learned from Ron Fletcher. That is wonderfully challenging in part because there is no springs. Yeah, I won't, I won't draw bad teaching. Drop the bar on your student's face. No. Okay. All right, so this is a good alignment for you.

If anything, I'd back up a tad. Sometimes. I'm not sure where they're going to lie until I get them on here. But you are about exactly right now. Yeah, you're too far that way before. So let's go ahead now. Laura, take the bar. Good. And again, I want to say when you ha, when you're on this piece of equipment, your thumbs go around the Poles or bars on the reformer. Not, that's one of those that I guess it's an always or a never. We don't use those very often. All right, so no springs.

She's in control legs together. Belly tight. Excellent. So I want to talk briefly. I know you're waiting, but this is not too strenuous. This spine is in any long gated position. We have this discussion about neutral spine and all of that. For me, it's a neutral pelvis. There's a gentle curve that comes with the spine, but Laura has kind of a sweat. Go ahead and lose your control. She has a tendency to really have a sway back. So if she were to go completely, what I'd say neutral, natural, she wouldn't be doing much work.

So I'm going to take my hand out and ask her to use the belly and I say the belly. We're talking about the whole thing and the ribs. So now she has, I can't get my hand under there. She's not forcing her back down. She's using her abdominals to get her back closer. It's not flat, but it is lengthened elongated. Same thing with the neutral pelvis. So important in mat work, reformer work, everything we do. So it's a good opportunity with you here on this white bed with a black UNITAR. We can really see it. All right. There are no daylight under there. Good.

All right, let's bring the bar through. Inhale, exhale. Good. Bring it back. Inhale and no wait. Just in awareness. Yeah, without the shoulders. Beautiful. Inhale and exhale. We'll bring it through and hold it and good.

Now you're going to lift the legs. You need to be strong and rollover. Good. You Open, you'll feel the poles and roll down so you know exactly where your legs are and close again. Scoop beautiful. Her legs are exactly horizontal, open and rural, and you're not keeping your shoulders down and circle close all the way to the floor. Bring the bar through and up. Show and back. Inhale and exhale. Good. Here. You doing okay. Inhale through. Exhale. Good.

Inhale through. Exhale. Good. Now we're going to come up and do the teaser. Yeah. Alright. Coming through. Inhale up to the teaser. Exhale. Breathe. Grow Taller and rural. Sink the ribs. And uh, again. Inhale needs to flow. Exhale, lift.

Good at, pull in and down. Nice. Laura again. Inhale. Exhale. You'll come up and stay good and lower the right leg and to the left and the left. So one leg stay still while the other one meets it. Good job and hold. Let's grow taller. Exhale, roll.

Awesome. And [inaudible]. Beautiful. Inhale, come through again. Exhale, uh, uh, both legs down. Pull up with the belly down. Put up with a belly. Good. Pull one more and good. Let's grow taller and [inaudible].

Hmm. And I'll take it. Let go. Bring your arms down by your sides. Stay there and it's on. It's on. Unsprung. Okay. Hug your knees to your chest. What was I thinking? All right, so that's another way to do a teaser, which is kind of wonderfully fun. Good. All right, let's have you come up and do the hanging up. Woo.

Fun One. I love this exercise. It's, it is advanced. It is challenging, but I think it's more flashy than anything. Uh, so I'm going a little flashes and a bad idea ever. Can you reach that for me? Yeah. All right. I'm going to get Laura the grippers. Mind you, we do other things. I'm just selected these favorites of mine today, so she's just going to do hanging up. So I'm going to this while she starts with, and this is consult. We want this to slide. Good. Alright. And again, now you're going to have a, you may do that version because of what's coming up. All right, good. Okay.

Let's have one foot in and flex. Hello. Any other foot and flex and she's going to hang but not drop. Important. Go ahead. Inhale, use the bonds. Exhale. Don't overdo the neck. Inhale. And it's not a drop. It's to control. Back to teaser. Inhale, exhale better with the neck. If she hyperextends the neck, it's no good. One more. Inhale.

Exhale. Inhale and hang out quite so low, right leg up, cross turn. Look to the ocean and center. And then I'm just supporting this. If you're on your own, it's gonna twist, but that's okay. And back and good arch again. Inhale, exhale. Great. And come back and take one foot out and then the other and stand up for a moment. Shake your hands out. Good, good.

We find that the hands seem to get more tired than the body, so we just take a moment. Why not? Good. And then you're going to do your absolute favorite. Okay, so we're going to start again. You're good. All right. And this time the more flashy way to get into this is to use your abdominals and pull both knees in and through. Flex those feet. She's going to pull up to a nice plank and go up and down and good. Lift a channel a little bit and good so she can do what she feels. That's for.

Whoo good. The buns are tight, the core is strong. Good and down and good Laura and one more as a perfect and beautiful. Woo. Hang a bit. Needs to chest stand tall and say whew. Thank goodness that's over. Great. Alright. Feels good. I think, would you reach that for me since you're up there already? Good. All right.

So we give her sort of a wonderful finish here and a, I call it the foot in the backstretch because I'm going to put my foot against her back and this is like a nice thing to do for your students at the end of a really nice workout. So she's going to be just about underneath her bar hurt here. She's underneath the bar. Okay, go ahead Lauren. Take the bar, good thumbs around and I'm going to gently put my foot against the middle of her back. Now in doing that, I don't want your ribs to go out, so give me some back. Bring your ribs in. I'm hoping they look good. Pull the bar behind your head four times and uh, and to, and uh, for people that are in flexible and needs some stretch, sit tall, this usually feels great to them. Good whole stretch your arms contract and walk around and let yourself kind of hang here.

Her head's going to be off the edge. You want to make sure that that's okay with your person. Good. Breathe in and out and I'm going to give her a little stretch protecting myself here. Bring the bar through. Leave your head down, leave your head down. Leave your head down. Chin over. Chest [inaudible] [inaudible] sitting tall. Other side, pull on. Good.

Watch the ribs and two so our heads forward just enough for her to clear her head with the bar. Great for the Scapula. Good reach up. Contract ribs in rounding Vertebra by Vertebra, by Vertebra, by Vertebra. If your person doesn't want to be, have their head off the table, you're going to have to scoot him forward and you can do that as they adjust down. Good. Let's have you lift your right leg up. [inaudible] and lower left leg up and lower right leg up and lower left leg up and that's good and bar through carefully correctly. Chin over chest. Yeah.

Rolling. Let go and good. Breathe in and roll up Vertebra by vert. How many times do we say that? That Vertebra by Vertebra. By Vertebra. Good.

And she's done a lot of different movements and I think she feels [inaudible] pretty good. Thank you.