Cardio Reformer Circuit

Hi everyone. I have Andy with me again for another workout. Magic circle, your jump board, reformer, and a little mat mixed in. So we'll get started. A little unconventionally.

So sit facing the back of your reformer. All your springs mounted so that this won't move. And we're gonna start with some abdominals, so get your hips nice and close to the shoulder rests. You might have to wiggle into position there. Put the magic circle right at the base of your skull.

And let's angle the elbows not too wide, out to the sides where you might be inclined to arch your back and your chest. I'm gonna just have the elbows pointed a little more up toward the ceiling right there. And take a nice deep breath. So our feet are down on the headrest. Our pelvis is nice and neutral.

What I want with the magic circle, and why it's behind our head, is to just use it as a little reference to keep letting your head be supported by it. We're not pulling on the neck or the head with the ring, but as you exhale, let's go ahead and begin. Using your upper abs and your trunk flexors, to let your head stay hanging back somewhat in the ring. But look forward over the tops of your legs, making sure you're in neutral pelvis. So that's our exhale.

Inhale as we come back. And let's go ahead, exhale. So I want us to right away start thinking about the connection also from the intercostals in the ribs. Down those external obliques. How those assist for that rib articulation, as we flex forward.

Compress into your feet just a little bit. But do start thinking about the role of those external obliques in trunk flexion. And let's take a couple more. Exhale curling up. So you're getting a little higher than the tips of the scapula.

And one more plain one. We're gonna stay up this time. We're in level pelvis that entire time. Now let's change the pelvis on purpose. Exhale and lumbar flex.

So pull the tail up. Inhale and lumbar extend. Just a little bit of motion, four times, exhale. And inhale. So it's a little bit of rocking the pelvis.

And arching it forward. All the while the upper body is still in one position. And arc. And level. And then take your chest down.

Okay. Now take your right hand to this right side of your ribcage. Left hand still holding the magic circle. And just slightly use your hand to press in against your waist slightly. Take an exhale as you curl forward.

We're gonna go into some rotation to the right. So on an exhale, rotate right. My right hand pressing into the ribs, just helps me keep my ribs centered, so that we don't actually shift the ribs. And inhale facing your leg. Staying up, three more.

Exhale and rotate. And inhale center. And two more, rotate. And center. And last time, rotate.

And center. Come all the way down, so your head is down, and switch hands. We did four. Left on your ribs, right hand on the ring. Inhale prepare, exhale chest lift first.

So that outside hand referencing that inward press of your ribs. Ready, go. Exhale and rotate. Inhale center. Again, trying to let the head stay hanging back, in on the ring.

Using those abdominals to move the ribs and the spine. Center. Once again, exhale rotate. And center. Okay, all the way down.

Both hands in again. Bring your knees up, and cross the ankles actually. Take your chest, lift up. Now without moving the thighs toward the body too much, let's think about the pelvis, and then pull the pelvis up off of the mat a little bit, and inhale, level it down. And exhale.

So they're small movements. Trying not to let the thighs move at the hip joints. But it's the sacrum I'm almost just unweighting, and letting it come down. Exhale lift. Four more with the other leg on top.

Exhale and pull. And release. And pull. And release. And pull.

And release. And pull. And release. Knees together, head goes down. Now legs go straight up.

Let's do this with slightly pointed ankles or toes. Curl the chest back up. Same idea. Unweight the sacrum, exhale. Now if the legs start coming toward us a little bit, that's okay with me.

And inhale down. Two. So really focusing the movement at the lower end of the spine. And four. That's all I wanted to do there.

Bend the knees. Put the head back down. Now let's take the ring out from behind the head. Put it between the ankles, for the 100. Alright.

So we're rather close to the shoulder rest, I realize, but go ahead and take your legs up. Your body up in your 100 position. Take your legs down to a level where you can just slightly feel the blocks. There we go. And adduct, let's work those inner thighs.

Hold that, and then pump the arms we have in. Two, three, four, five, exhale. Three, four, five, two. Reaching your hands through the back end of that reformer. Keep working on squeezing the ring.

Squeezing evenly with both legs. Halfway there. Seven. Eight. Nine.

10. Exhale, three, four, five. Bring everything down, rest. Take the ring away. Andy let's go ahead and set ourselves up.

We'll get back to that in a little bit. We're gonna drop it down for some leg jumping now. So I'm gonna take us to two red springs. Headrest up. Okay.

So nice to get some abdominal connection before we start jumping. And we definitely don't wanna be jumping with an arch in that back. Of course you guys know that I think. So if you have bias yourself one way or the other, bias with a little bit of lumbar and print, okay or touchdown. So Andy let's do parallel legs.

Bend the knees, and let's just right away start jumping. We're gonna go for 10. I want us to start by articulating the feet more than how far we jump. So it's feet. And feet.

Yeah, articulate the feet. And eight. We're gonna keep going. Land in the V position, here we go, for 10 jumps. Try to keep the heels touching the entire time.

So exhale. Use that strong connection in your abdominals. Eight. Nine. Let's land wide V, 10 jumps here.

And one. Two, again articulating the feet. Three. Trying to land toes to the heel. Two more, nine.

10. Land in the middle of the board, and pause. Okay great. Extend your legs. Turn your feet or legs one direction.

So I'm gonna swivel toward the right. Let's do some swiveling in the middle. Bend the knees. And swivel, land left. And land right.

Try to hold the legs together everybody. Heels on the board, as much as you can. Seven. Eight. Nine, let's go for another set of 10 jumps, here we go.

One. Perhaps you're starting to pick up a little air time. Wanting to push a little stronger with your legs. That's fine. Five.

Six. Stomach down against your back. Your back down against the mat. Nine. Land in the middle.

Take a little rest. Extend your legs. Take one leg up, circle the ankle a little bit. Other way. Great, other leg.

Okay, now put both feet down on the board Andy. Look up for just a second, and walk your feet down the board. So everybody too. I want your toes right in line as if you're standing on the foot bar, okay? Now, put your head back down.

Lift your heels. Lower your heels. Heels, and up, and down. Level pelvis. And push.

So we don't have a lot of spring here. We're doing a lot of the work on our own, pulling our heels right up. And seven. Eight. Nine.

Hold them up there, 10. Bend both of your knees. Now I don't have a knee issue here. I don't think Andy does either. So we're gonna work on little pulses.

Alright. So you are going to feel that working the quadricep, for sure. It's what I'm looking for. Keep pulling your heels up. You might feel more work in your glutes.

And press, there we go. Press. Try to spread your toes as they're on the jump board. And we'll just take four. Push from your hips.

Three. Two. And then out there on the last one. Pivot to Pilates V, same thing. Little plies, or little pulses.

Heels up. So let's go 10. And nine. And eight. Level pelvis.

Pressing your shoulders back. Five more, here's five. And four, heels are pressed together, firm. And two. All the way out, last one.

We're gonna come wide. Toes away. We're in turn down. Heels are still lifted. And bend, here we go.

And 10. And nine. So we're wide. Try to spread the toes. Good, five.

And four. Three. And two. And then all the way out straight legs. Lower your heels.

And then just bring your legs back into the center. Okay, so zigzags. So we're zigzag, we're across the board. And not the swivel right in the middle. So pivot your legs Andy to one side.

Okay. Bend the knees and then we're gonna hop across to the other corner. So let's aim the corners. That'll be easy. Corner, good.

And corner. Yeah. So I'm feeling a little bit ready to push my legs more. Good, here we go. Push.

Still try to have that precision of how you articulate off the board, and onto the board with your feet. Right. And start to get a lot of unified work down the entire leg. Not just in your quads. Good.

Good, and let's jump. Four. Three. Two. One, in the middle, land hold.

Push the legs out again. Feet in the top corner. We're gonna start the other way. Now, when you land, let's think about how we land just for a second. Not just the feet, but think about putting the brakes on by squeezing through the glutes.

Okay, contract through the glutes. So let's go bend. Hop across to the other corner, and contract your glutes. And glutes, there we go. Good.

Yeah, try to get those knees nice and straight in the air. 10 more, one. Two. Three. Four.

A lot of strong abdominals, holding that spine down. One more to the other corner. And then one more to the middle. And then rest for a second. Take the legs out, shake one leg out.

Other leg out. So I wanna have us stay on the two red springs that we're on. If anyone needs it lighter, come up and make a spring change. Take one of your legs up in tabletop. The other leg stays parallel.

Four on each side. Going right to it. Four in a row. Two. Three.

Make the change now, land on the other foot. And four. Two. Three. Other foot.

We're gonna stay with the fours for a couple more sets. Allowing you time to articulate. Toe, ball, arch, heel. Try to get that heel down. Four.

Three. Two. One more set of fours. Use your quad in the air, stretch. You wanna pull that quad tight.

Strong contraction. Land on the other foot. Four. Three. Two.

Let's go to twos each side. A couple sets of twos. Two more sets on each leg of twos. Last set of twos. What comes after two in the countdown?

One. Single legs, so for 10 jumps. One. Push you guys, really go for a little jump. Three.

Or go for a big jump. Five, keep it clean though with your legs. Four. Three. Two.

Last one, land in the middle, rest. Take both legs up, shake. Great, okay. Come up and drop a little tension. These circles, getting in our way.

Take one ... (laughter) Yes, take one down. Great, come on down. Now, nudge down away from the shoulder blocks again. Enough that you can put your hands behind your head.

I'm gonna jump a little bit V position. Here we go. So it's very interesting. It's harder I think to keep tension out of the neck, but use the hands like the magic circle was earlier. So let that head just hang back.

Maybe we can get our heels all the way down. Two more here. Then Andy we're gonna land wide, top corners. Here we go, 10 times. And one.

And two. Three. Let's see some nice strong quads, four. Yep. Five.

Six. Seven. Eight. Nine. We're gonna keep our chest up.

Come right back to the middle. Keep going. Now land on one foot into little scissor. Let's count for 10. One.

They can be slightly turned out with the scissors. Three. Four. Continue to articulate the feet. Push.

Seven. Eight. Nine. Land in the middle. And then chest down, all the way.

Good. Let's come up off our back. And change the springs. I'm gonna go down for some single ... One single spring.

I'm gonna use a yellow today, something pretty light, but choose what you need to, Andy. Gonna go with some kneeling arm work. So let's face the back. And, allow our pelvis to get right up on top of our femurs. I want you to hook your toes back across the end of the mat.

Get your straps and cross them. Okay. Arms shoulder level. Pelvis nice and organized. Posture nice and organized.

And let's just do nice straight arms. Press your arms back in line with your shoulders. Making sure not to thrust the ribs. You've got a beautiful straight line. And then close.

Okay, so let's go ahead. Exhale. And inhale. So I have my palms facing down. Trying to kind of press the pinky finger into the side of the strap.

Andy's holding with the fist, that's fine. Concentrate on the hamstrings, contracting right up against that femur. Keep your pelvis right over your legs. Let's take two more here. Okay.

Now, just because I like to make sure things are even, I'm gonna cross the other strap on top. I don't know if it matters a whole lot. And I will now choke up on the straps. Come into a little hip hinge. Elbows right by your sides.

Fairly easy little kickbacks for the triceps. One. Going for 10. So I've chosen a light spring on purpose. It's actually a little more contraction for my core muscles, or my center muscles.

I'm also trying to work on less tension in my neck. Six. Feel your lower trapezius muscles, right on your mid to upper back. Okay, last two. Nine.

And 10. Okay, let's come up high kneeling. Set your straps down, both of them. I'm gonna turn to face the camera. Working my right arm first.

And why don't you work the other side, yep. Okay. So I think I'm gonna do the same thing, this time holding the strap. And a straight arm. And then pull.

So this is where the yellow feels good for me. Any heavier and it might not feel so good. Thinking rear shoulder. So it depends on how your shoulders are feeling. You don't have to ...

I'll just show a couple, you keep going. You can also just stop your arm right here, everybody, and pull. I'll do the rest of mine that way. Andy is gonna continue to let his arm cross all the way in front of your body. Really listen to what feels right in your shoulders.

Here we go. Five more. Was I counting wrong? What number am I on? I'm on nine.

He's on nine. I'll take his word for it. Here's 10 then, 10? Yeah. That works.

Okay, other side, though like this. Walk this way. Single arm hug. And again, just in front of the body. 10 times.

Two. If you know yourself to have upper shoulder and neck stuff, just make your shape come down lower like this. It's completely fine. Make sure our pelvis is forward. Our hamstrings still active against our femurs.

And press. Nine? I'm having one of those days. And 10. Okay.

So those two facing the other side. Here we go. So the outside arm that just got worked is gonna start right away. Up on your knees. You can hold yourself on the strap.

Again, make sure your hamstrings are engaged right against your femurs. And here we go. Straight arm, pull across. One. Control your return.

Make sure those ribcages don't shift side to side, or translate. Wanna keep those obliques right against those ribs. And pull. Let your shoulder blade move around the back ribs there as you pull. It can move.

You don't want him to move up, but you could move it toward your spine. A couple more. Last time. Alright, and then we'll change hands. Move a little bit closer to the jump board.

Side of the mat. Single arm, hug a tree. 10 repetitions, same thing with the ribs. Here we go everybody, and one. Your body like a cylinder.

Use those hamstrings, right in against your femurs. Four. How much length do you have up your spine, out the top of your head? Try to have a little more than you started with. Maybe your chest is feeling more open here.

Couple more, press. And open, last time. And press. And open. Okay, I need a spring change.

I'm gonna face the front of the reformer. I'm going in blue now, for upcircles. Okay. Here we go. Palms right by your thighs.

We'll get back to a little bit more jumping for the glutes in just a moment. Let's go five each way now. Breathe, exhale, up we go. Let's stay focused on how our heels are staying in contact with our shoulder pads. Chest stays open.

Same thing, hamstrings contracted right up against those femurs. Two more this direction. Last time. Reverse for five. I'm gonna make smaller circles this way.

Andy, you can make bigger ones. I'm paying attention to my shoulder situation today. Three. Four. Excellent, last time.

Alright. Good. Come down for just a sec, Andy. In a crouch down, we're gonna do one more up on this. And this is just, think a cat back position.

Yeah, these flexion. Now as we start to scoop the arms up, come out of round, up to a tall spine. And lift, lift, lift, lift. Now as we come back, start with the contraction of the abdominals, and round. Give it a little bit of knee stretch, quads kind of feel.

Just five of these. So I'm starting with my glutes, my hamstrings. Pressing all the way up. And lower down. Getting a lumbar curve.

Last three. All the way. Contract. Visualize your back being very wide and broad. Last two.

And down. Last time. All the way. Good. Okay, now we can put those straps down.

And I want us to stay on the one blue spring, for some seated jumping. Okay, so get kind of close to, your pelvis to the front of the jump board. Put your feet on it. And then stretch your legs. Okay, so what is this?

It's a lot of abdominal work. Legs of course, but control. Let's be in a flexion of the spine. Gonna bend my knees, and this time the heels won't stay on. Let's just jump.

Yeah, so when you jump away, body stays a little rounded forward. Yeah, stomach like crazy. That's it. Right, Andy good. Three more, eight.

Nine. And 10. Let's take a little break. Yeah, hold like this. I'm gonna put my hands behind my knees.

I just wanna get my back up a little. He's gonna take that kind of break. Let's go for 10 more, and then we're gonna turn around for jumps. Ready, go. And 10.

So this time I'm gonna try to take my legs up a little higher. Good Andy. This is not easy, guys. Hang out with it. Oh yeah, we've got five more, go.

And up, exactly. Who needs a teaser when you got this going on, right? Last two. And up. That's it.

Okay. Now, let's face the back. And let's do a little bit of jumping with the leg behind. So this is an interesting exercise. You've done this before, most of us.

Your pelvis may detour offline a little bit, but we're trying our best to keep our pelvis face down. So hands on the shoulder rests. Knees apart. One foot back on the board. Okay, now right away, just in that, take a quick glance, and if that hip opened up, try to minimize that, okay?

Then the knee that you're kneeling on, try not to shift and drop the hip out to the side. So almost kneel more toward the other arm. Here we go. Just a little jump. Trying to stay parallel.

Jump and contract your glutes. You do not have to lift your leg any higher. I do want you to try to get it straight. Okay. I'm gonna take my opposite hand off, and reach it out.

So I've just got my one hand and my one knee that's helping me stay more balanced. Three. Two. And one. Okay.

And other side. Knee, start out, so instead of leaning out, away from the work, kneel in a little bit. Five. Maybe with both hands on. Lift your head a little Andy.

Yep. Three. Four. Getting a nice straight leg. Okay, I'm gonna try the hand out to the side for five more.

Four. Stomach in, head up a little bit. Three. We have two more now. And last one.

Okay. Good. Let's come down and stretch our back. Okay, so headrest down. We're gonna do short spine.

Let's go back up to two red springs. We'll bring our magic circle with us. And we're gonna put it in between the ankles, once we get our feet in our straps. So we're starting in a nice hip stretched position. Our lumbar spine long and wide.

And right between the ankles, there we go. Perfect. We're gonna stretch our legs out now. Trying to control the magic circle. It gets a little squirrelly.

Okay. So guys let's very slowly start to take ourselves through. Let's do the hip fold version of short spine. Meaning flex, and allow the length to come through the hamstrings. Don't let go of that circle.

Peel up to your shoulder blades. You may have to wiggle into position. Flex the hips and ankles as well, breathing in. And let's unroll our spine. Gonna bring everything down in one motion.

Exactly Andy. Inhale away. Here we go again. Flex at the hips. Use those strong abdominals, and pull the hips up to the ring.

Inhale flex. Exhale begin to roll. Massage. It's hard to massage when you're also contracting your inner thighs though. Three more times, stretching long.

Let's let it flow a little more now. Rise the hips. Inhale bend. Energy out the top of the body, as we're rolling down to the bottom of the spine. Last two.

Good, exhale, rolling down. Last one. Flex at the hips. Peel up. Inhale.

Exhale and roll. When we get our pelvis down, just keep that down but take the ring away from the ankles. Extend your legs nice and straight, on a diagonal. And let's go for a little Peter Pan, so externally rotate the legs. I'm gonna take one leg straight out to the side.

The other leg folds, and flex the ankle. Hold that position for a moment. Pelvis should still be nice and flat. Okay, a little more pubic bone down if needed. Both legs rejoin in the midline.

Other side. Focus more on the bent leg side pelvis, staying over near the bent leg side. Not letting yourself tip. Alright, and let's carry on. Six more, just going through it.

So opening. And center. Inhale. Go for that feelgood stretch in that inner thigh area. Four more.

Three. Two. And in. And last one. And then I had planned four circles each way Andy.

So, parallel your legs. Come up to the midline right at 90 degrees. I'm going down first, so we go down toward the floor. Externally rotate. I'm gonna go wide circles today.

And center. Just four times. Keeping that pelvis and that torso nice and steady. Three. And four.

Four the other way. And after these circles, we'll just come up for one more quote thing. Part of the series. Last circle. And then fold the knees, take the straps off the feet.

No more jumping. Well I am gonna have us come up and use the board for ... And go into one blue or one light spring for yourself. A little shoulder stretch. So I'm gonna walk my knees kind of close.

I'm gonna be about a hand width away. And just push that, yeah, push yourself all the way. Let's let those shoulder blades really come up to the ... Yeah, so that extra push, push, push. Okay.

And just hold. I gotta get my head in line with my spine. Alright, good. And then bend the elbows to come in. Now, push out again, but with a little less of that upward shoulder rotation.

So just a moderate movement there. Okay, let's add one part of rotation. So Andy, I'm gonna stick my hand up over the board. Like that. So everybody, take one hand off the board, and kind of a thread the needle.

So I'm just gonna reach that hand under here, and rotate. Yeah. So a little bit of pressing with the jump board arm. I'm thinking really more about my thoracic ribs. My collarbone ribs.

And my neck ribs, and my neck vertebrae turning to the left here. And then let's take the other side. We didn't do a lot of rotation in this class, so here's a little bit, just of this stretch. So it's the ribs, the collarbone ribs, the cervical spine into rotation. Good.

And then we'll just finish with one extension. Come all the way in. Adjust your feet back. And lean your pelvis forward. I'm gonna do a little bit of downstretch.

Push. Just nice and light, so be a little mindful. I'm focusing more on the up, up, up, up, up, up. Two more, and press. Super light spring.

Can't go very far. Up, up, up. Last one. And all the way. Good, take your arms up.

Let's finish with a nice high release of our upper spine. Big circle. Thanks for joining us for this little fun mixed workout. Thanks Andy.