Day 18: Stretching

Welcome to class number 18 of your 30 session challenge. Today is going to be a little lighter in time because you've worked so hard in the last class we did the working with the springs was basically an hour reformer, so I hope you really got a lot out of that and we're going to do a lot of stretching today. We'll do some basic arm springs and leg springs and then get to a lot of Nice, enjoyable things including ballet stretches and our traditional ending, including hanging. So let's make sure you have everything that you need or you'll press pause along the way. I'm going to start off with my arm springs and then you also have your legs springs in place.

I'm going to use this strap when I'm doing my hip stretch from the tower and monkey. So that means I'm going to need my tower and monkey spring. I'm going to need my safety strap or chain. If you have a garage and then you're going to want to do the push through on the stomach as well as the teaser with the push through bar. So you want your spring ready to go for the push through. Like I said, we're gonna do ballet stretches in our fuzzies. So I've got my fuzzies hanging and ready to go and my trapeze is ready to assist me on those as well as with our traditional ending.

So see if you can locate all those things. And then we're going to get started with a nice, we're not going to do the hundred we're going to think of our arm springs like our hundred. Okay. So get into position, have nice long arms. Grab your springs and we're going to want to have your shoulders. Yeah, just shy of being under the handles. All right. You can either do this with bent knees or long legs. Okay. Either one. How about we try with long legs today I want you to really open up those hips, draw those in as they think about your reformer and how we just pull their belly in and up against those springs and we're gonna pull down.

Yeah. And you're going to exhale in with the year. Exhale in with year two more. Last one. Okay. And bend the elbows for a little break.

I'm starting with my leg straight and in this position cause so that I can really translate that to my traditional ending when I'm doing my pull-ups in hanging pull-ups. So now I'm gonna put my arm straight and do my arms circles, getting my spine nice and long and exhale down in with the air. Oh binning ground up. Pull the belly in and up against that spring. Squeeze those inner thighs. Everything's helping, but make sure the shoulders reaching away. Two more. So I really want to feel what my back's doing last one and go right into the reverse for five.

Exhaling on the way down. Inhaling on the way up. Okay, three more. Trust me, my arms are burning. Two more. These are not easy springs. Last one. Okay. All right.

Bend the elbows for small break and we're going to go into the tricep press again. You can either bend your knees or have flat feet. So I think I'm going to draw them in for this one. Really securing my pelvis down. Take a big breath and you're going to exhale squeezing out the air. And bend the elbows and press down for five.

I actually could feel my powerhouse more the other way. Connecting it all. Shoulders are trying to stay open and down to more strong risks. Last one. Whew. Stretch out even longer. Come on up. I could feel that. Let's transition to your legs. Spring's going to come up.

We're going to take off our arms springs, switch them for our leg. Spring. Yes. We're also going to lift up the bar that connects the springs a little higher. There we go. The leg springs, you know, hook up higher than the arm springs. All right, and we're going to get back into position doing a quick set of legs. Springs, straps at the same time.

Come on on my one foot man. The next, let's go to street. Arms. Hands are about five or six inches above the uh, mat pelvis down. And let's go for leg circles. Think of that reformer again, that footwork one too. Reaching out long, three, five, squeezing together and reverse one to shape those legs. Three feel them so that you can use them for the hanging pull-ups again and five and draw it in.

Rest your arms by your side for a little break and we're going to go into walking lengthening to squeeze the air out of your lungs. Draw that belly in and up and eight counts down. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight and up. Two, three, four, five, six, eight and down. Three, four, five, six, seven, eight. [inaudible]. Three, four, five, six, seven, eight. Again, two more sense. Feel those inner thighs. Feel the back of the thigh. That's obvious. Last one and that glue, but don't lose anything else. And up to three, four, five, six, seven. I lost countless. You're next during Justin Case, long body, long springs, lean hollow, waist and bend the knees. Rest your arms down. All right, we're going to go into bicycle arms here and we're going to reach one leg.

Stretch it out from the lower back. Reach the next leg down the middle of your body, scooping into your lower back, pelvis, staying nice and secure. Reach all the way for the end of the Cadillac. Pull something towards you. One more with the right. Pull something towards you. One more with the left and when you can't come in any closer reverse with the left and towed to your bottom.

Slide something away from you off the edge of that Cadillac. This is to with the right working the back of the thigh and the bottom. One more with the left, I mean the right leg and home. Mine slipped a little bit. We're going to now do legs. Circle like beats. Pardon me with your beats.

I want you to do them in the air. So we're going to have longer arms. We're going to do a set of 20 beats in the air scooping in. Exhale, stretch out. Have everything working in place cause we're now gonna. Press down in, lift up, press down with the legs. Lift up with the seat. Long. Lean line. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10 more. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. Hold. Meltdown with control.

Bend the knees and relax. Good. All right, your blood should be pumping now. Your muscles should be awake. Enjoy a stretch. You can even do a little inner thigh stretch here. All right, we're going to take the straps off and we're going to go to our push through on our stomach. So rolling up with control. Always. I'm going to add this spring almost thinking of my a long box, right? And I'm going to have my right cheek on the mat since I have this strap. Now I'm not gonna use it, but you could use it.

You could slip your ankles underneath there. This should be right between the bars, right cheek, down, long legs, powerhouse in and up. So much that you're going to lift up your sternum with it. [inaudible] dive your head down. Keep your arm straight as long as you can bend when you can't anymore. Okay.

Wow. Pelvis down. Belly-Up Ben, keep your head down, down, down. Okay. It has to come up, Dan. Stretch. Bend. You need to, yeah. One more. Each side. Big stretch here. How? Pelvis powerhouse.

Shoulders and joint. Okay. Head dives down. Bend when you need it. One more. Really squeezing my hips down, lengthening my lower back. Up, up, up, up, and head down. Switching sides. Okay, fantastic. I'm going to put one hand here, scoop up almost into horseback and come in here. Alright, teaser. So we're going to turn around.

Yeah, lie down evenly. It should barely go over your head. Lock your shoulders in joint. Send your legs that way. Squeeze the inner thighs. Draw the arches, inner her thighs, lower belly, and we're going to draw the shoulders open. Tighten the back of the arms, bend the elbows to the Mat, and exhale as you stretch from the back of your ribs all the way to your fingertips and in with the hair. And exhale, straighten your arms and it's like just a hair that was a little too close for comfort in. Have a look at your belly. And then exhale, come up into a teaser. [inaudible] legs dropped down.

Pull into your lower back one more and everything down at the same time, Ben, the elbows, really trying to open those collarbones stretch back in with the air. We're going to go in for shaving now. Inhale, look at your belly. [inaudible] bend the elbows, shave that shoulders down. One more. Keep lengthening up. Scoop your belly in. And Dan. One more bend the elbows.

Stretch back. I mean the SEC. This is going to be mainly stretching, but you have to get Lou work in first and then straighten those arms. This is going to be a combo and then we're going to dismount from being in a teaser. Here we go. Inhale, look at your belly. [inaudible] legs first, arms, legs, arms. There we go. Legs, arms, hold. Cross your right ankle over your left. Reach for your ankles.

Reach your hands to the back. Stretch forward, lowering with control. Okay, enjoy that. Okay, next we're going to do our tower monkey and hip stretch, so I'm going to get rid of this and I'm going to add my safety strap and then I'll add my spring. Might be that safety strap right in the middle. I'm going gonna fix that a little bit, but actually before we do Tom on Kim getting a little wild hair here, I want you to take these leg springs off. If you have a grots Cadillac, we're not going to be able to do this one.

I am dreaming of when I used to have a guillotine or access to a guillotine and I've been kind of playing with this. Um, so you can lower on a balanced body, the [inaudible] bar that holds the leg and arm springs. There we go. Slide all the way down. You might want to grab like a pad to do this because your feet might be tender and you're just going to put it right over it and we're going to stand on it. I love doing rolling in and out on a guillotine case. I'm going to put the ball of my feet here in a [inaudible] stance and I'm going to hold myself so my throats at this bar, maybe your higher and it'll work. Just work great for you and get a little deeper into all of your vertebra cause this is a lot of articulation. So I'm gonna Limbo under the Bar, pressing my hips forward, limbo, limbo, limbo.

And then I'm going to go into a nice thigh, stretch down to the floor, head to the chest, rolling into my lower back, lengthening my legs, pulling into my lower back, pulling into my upper back, back to the bar. Let's reverse it. Upper, lower back. Drop the knees to the floor. Not Literally pull yourself up and let's go two more each way. Limba drop the knees. Heaven. Roll it back. Lower back, pulling up into your upper back again, reverse it. Upper back, lower, kind of like spread eagle to bend the knees, dropping them down to the mat.

Stretch, pulling up one more each way. Skim that neck, drop the knees into the tie. Chin to your chest. Lower curve, upper curve here. Last one, upper curve, lower curve down. If you have a guillotine, by all means enjoy it on there instead. Okay, so now that I got that wild hair out, we'll just drop that and leave that and we'll go onto our tower. So you're going to get even more articulation out of your tower because you just did that, right? Lovely. So we want hands back, straight arms and I really want you to enjoy doing this so that we can do more advanced exercises in the future of lifting our bottom over our shoulders.

Properly. Push up with your belly, pulling in feet on that. Our hands go back in place. Let's warm up our pelvis by keeping our tailbone down and point and flex. I don't feel like I'm center. Okay. And little tricky here. There we go. And point and flex.

Point and toes back to your chest. They kiss your knees. Point last time. Flexing back to your knees point. Let's keep a nice strong ankle now like you do in your foot work and the tailbone stays down and draw the belly in to get those thighs. Stretch that pelvis as low as the knees can go without lifting the tailbone and straight two more.

This is your only kind of warm up stretch in this exercise. Now we'll hold it straight and everything else will go to tempo. So squeeze the hips, take a breath, and then exhale to lift all the way over. Very important to have the exhale. So your ribs are in the right place. Take a breath and exhaling [inaudible] plus she got in with the air.

Push up with that exhale and down you go. Use that spring to bull into every bone that you want to tell. Bone jam bent straight and back of the thighs. Exhale straight, rolling down. Okay.

On the guillotine he can do this one legged cause I feel the alignment's a little bit better with the bar going straight up and down and one more up, up, up. Trying to think right now if I could do it one legged, I think the physics do not lend itself nicely. [inaudible] but otherwise if you do have the gear 10 end, you want to do it there, then it mimics like balance control. Uh, we're going to actually keep your feet there, lift your head and pull yourself back. For Monkey, the bar should be chopping off your bottom and your shoulder blades might be off the back edge hands. And here we go up and flex and grow taller and point and flex and grow taller and point in my head. I'm growing taller and come down and I'm going to do this one legged here.

So one foot is going to go down or long and up and flex and grow taller and two and three and down the other leg. Slip Sender, right? Like here and working that hip, keeping my belly off, the Fi lifting out of my lower back and down. I think I'm going to do slide back. Just a hair more so I can get right up on my tailbone. I think that's a better position. And one more. Yeah, that feels better.

And town. All right. Hip stretches next. Since the springs on this side, I'm gonna lie on my right side first, sliding into my back edge. I'm going to use this strap to slip my bottom leg underneath from my elbow to my tailbone. I'm on the back edge. Okay. Now I'm going to push this up. Put My foot here as close to the center as I can and this front arm could grab to the front or right here is fine too. Okay. Squaring off those hips and point and flex and point and flex and point and flex. You're going to draw that knee back to your shoulder blades, keeping the hips square and straighten two more and last one back to the shoulder blade. Stretch, stretch, stretch and point bend a little bit to hold your bar and bring it back down and lie down flat.

I'm going to see if I can change it from here and unsnap and unsnap it from the side only to snap it over here and you can always get down to take up that other spring. Okay. Alright, I'm gonna put my back to you. Elbow against here. Bottom leg underneath to the front edge. I have all right. Getting my right leg as centered as possible. Actually straight back would be great, but we're talking Monica flexibility here. Okay.

Hips are trying to stay aligned and I'm going to point and flex and point and flex. It feels really good. Hope you like it. Two point. And now let's really keep those hips squared. Use your belly to hold them square. Draw your knee to your shoulder blades and straighten. And so every exercise in Pele's as you know, is stretch and strength.

So this is a both of those right here. Whew. Okay, we're going to grab it, lower it down, lie on your back to settle your back. I always think that's super important here. And then you're going to unhook it and lower it down somewhat quietly. And now you're just gonna push this up and bring your head up and roll right up. Leave the bar behind you and end with the forward stretch.

All right, now we're going to go into our ballet stretches in our fuzzy. So I'm going to get rid of this. Just going to hang. I'm going to grab my trapeze. I'm going to go around the back while I'm over here. I might as well grab these non-slip pads, preparing for my, um, hanging pull-ups and I'm going to kneel up, grab here. Let's stop and put the anthologist. Leave them up here. We don't need them right now.

And let's bring down the chat piece, slide it into position. You should be able to touch fingertip to fingertip. All right, now we're going to tighten them. Make sure they're secure. I always like to check these springs too. When you're putting up your trap ps and you've got your little covers sleeves, they can get tangled and then it's a mess. Okay, so we're gonna s have your bout a legs distance away from the front and your Palladia stance.

And we're gonna Cross your right leg and put it against your fuzzy and plant that foot so your hip should be able to be square while your foot's against that pole. I think you need to hop back just a hair. There we go. Lift from that left standing arch. Pull up through the body, crown of the head and walk your hands forward. We're going to do this forward stretch three times and coming up. Keep your hands here. Lift through your body for a nice back bend and forward. And there's many places to do ballet stretches.

This one might not agree with you if you have a bad knee can do it. On the ladder barrel and last time back up, or maybe you're really flexible and you can just put your leg up here or you can also kneel down if you have good knees and put your hands in the fuzzies. There's a lot. So now we're gonna take the leg, put it inside the pole and keep your legs straight as we walk out into a split. And that's a nice stretch. Walking back. You're going to keep your hands here, but pull back in the squared hips, eh?

Now we'll plant this foot. You're going to Relevate turn to the other side, lower the heel and open the foot so it's right under you and square. Both hands are underneath. Foot is pressing. Hips down. There we go. Long arm up and over. Oh over oh four and left and trying to get right by my head and over, over, over, grabbing onto here and switch again.

Over, over, over. Hey, keep pressing your hips forward, not behind you. And let's do one more straight up lifting in that standing like always and up through the body. Oh over. Great. Now let's walk into a side split. Keep your hips under you, letting the foot go as you walk. Delicious. Coming back, we're gonna pull our hips this way.

Leave your hands delicious. Put your foot here. You're going to do another limbo under the bar per resting. Your hips forward. Trusting that your Cadillac's not going to tip over. Funny making that sound Cadillac and now I'm going to keep my foot planted, but my left heel is going to come up as I scoop into my lower back coming back here. We're going to turn to Arab.

Bask in the back, so I'm going to rise up and pivot as I slip. Don't get stuck my foot out. Cross over to the other one and plant it. Now we all know, I know ballerinas is a big stretch for me. Trying to keep my hips square, my back leg.

This is my attempt to keep it straight. Keep it as straight as you can. Walk back when you can't. Keep it straight. Go ahead and bend the knee, lifting in your powerhouse, stretching that quad walk back. Now keep a really square and straight and use your powerhouse at the same time. The hands go down at the same time. The hands are here and at the same time they're going to, the floor slips inside and we're gonna split out again.

Okay. Delicious. Walking back. Plant your foot. Get your hold of your powerhouse to lift, to lift, to lift. Slide it out. Lift all in your body. Beautiful. Let's do the other side. So facing this way again, another legs distance.

You're going to cross your left. Plant your foot square off your hips and lift in that standing leg as you go forward. [inaudible] and you have stuck with this challenge. You completely deserve these beautiful bellies stretches to stretch and stretch and stretch. If he can't do, I'm here for any reason. I hope you enjoy them somewhere else. And one more.

Always lifting in your body. Yeah, keeping the hands there as I lift in, go back and now I'm going to split. Putting my foot in the inside. Both legs. Stay straight. Walking back, keeping my hands here, but pulling back in the hips, keeping them square. Plant my foot. Relevate Relevate turn lower. I didn't like my foot placement there.

Have it right under me. Squeeze my hips forward. Try to keep my left one down. Reach up from my standing leg all the way to my fingertips and over Amanda and switch. Okay. And two more. You could just do one of these, but why it feels so good or [inaudible] maybe even under the bar.

Yeah, I am trying to grab that bar and up. This one's always the easy one. And now we're gonna walk into our side. Split. Both legs are planted. Keep your hips pushing forward as you walk. Walk. Ooh, this one's harder. And walking back. Keep your hands here, but pull back. Hmm. Now we're gonna Limbo. So here and I'm going to press my hips forward stretching, and now keep my foot planted.

But lift this heel stretch, stretch, stretch. And now we're going to go into our arabesque. So we're going to Relevate rotate. Slip it out, slip it in. All right, come on. Straight leg, stretch, stretch. Lifting my powerhouse up to my chest so I don't take it in my lower back. Bending my knee when needed. Stretching, stretching, stretching and forward.

But that leg has tight. All right. Strong, straight legs, both hands, powerhouse. Here we go. Both are straight, split, split, split, split and forward. Lift in your belly. Lift, lift, slide out. Arms lift and [inaudible]. We're done with our ballet stretches. So now we're going to go into our traditional ending. One thing I did forget to mention is you probably want a little board for your spreadeagled, so let's get that. All right, so we're going to use something like this.

Whatever you have at your studio to do your spreadeagle. Let's put these springs out of the way. I'm also going to get this bar, put it back a little higher so I can do my hanging. Getting all prepared here. I hope you are too. Tighten up. Stay grab these. This is going to go here up. Forgot one more thing.

Get yourself a roll down bar and then get that too. All right, so we're going to hook up a roll down bar for our breathing. I'm gonna put these up for getting ready for my hanging my pull ups. Okay, and to start with, we're going to do breathing. So your bar, your straps are already in place, so you're going to be able to put your ankles in here. Here we go. And it should just lie nice and straight. Huh? I have to really reach up from my bar here. Hold.

Okay, grip around. Drop that pelvis breathing. We're going to take a big breath. Hold it for five counts. Exhale for five counts and do it to six. Then seven, then eight. Pull your shoulders into joint. Scoop in, squeeze those inner thighs. Drawing in and up. And here we go. In with the air. Two, three, four, five and exhale slowly. Yeah.

And now for six inhaler, no tension. It's all going to be releasing. No tension in the neck is what I mean in the shoulders. Yes. And your bottom seven. Okay. Yes in your stomach. And slowly releasing one more for eight. Try to keep straight wrists. Two, three inhale, five, six, seven and eight and exhale slowly to roll down another vertebra.

Articulate, stretch Han dam. Slip out your feet, let go of the roll down bar. Curl up with control. Spin around and you're going to put your feet parallel. And you're going to grab up above this bar so they get a little closer grab up and nice flexible feet, Monica. So you're going to have to push those straight.

Lift up into a lower c curve. There we go. As you come up, rotate your feet down. Exhale. We did this earlier. Both of these exercises with Christy and class two flexing down in with the air. Exhale, we didn't do all of the traditional ending though. One more. Rotating the feet, get the belly in flat lifting.

Lift more, lift more, lift more, and step out of it. And now we can put this down to the side. I'm gonna just lean it against the window. Actually. Gonna bring it all the way down. Voila. Okay. And now we're going to do our hanging pull-ups.

So my hands should be a little bit more here. Alright, pull ups first and then hanging. Pull ups, hand, hand. So we did our arm springs, we did our legs, springs. That's to give us an idea of space. But here our trapeze is in the correct position. We're going to try to lift up in front of this bar.

Hold your body in place. Here we go. Let's do three and forward to more belly and step down other foot. Turning immediately around, hands in the same place. Now they're going to go on top of the little padded part for our hanging pull-ups. Ready? And here we go. Opening and come up to a straight line. Looking at your belly back. Ben, look at your belly. Let's do three.

One, two, three, and [inaudible]. Hm. Slide your feet together and lightly jumped down. No swinging. Okay, let's get rid of these and let's end with some delicious hanging. The fuzzy should be basically in the same spot that you were with your hands for the hanging. Okay, so I'm going to go ahead and lie down. There's different ways you can get into it. We're going to just start from here.

Do half hanging, full hanging, and back to having, if you want to add some twists while you're down there, go for it. So anchor your shoulders, draw your belly in an app, and we're gonna control. Rolling up. Good in there. One. Hello. Silly. And to now, I'm going to just do an extra little circle and I'm going to hang into my half hanging, getting the back of my ribs, just enjoying it.

I like to swing my pelvis a little bit back and forth because I am clean of holding tension and other places, but by doing this challenge series, I really learned how to stop relying on my quads and to really get deeper into my powerhouse, not using my flight or fight and muscles anymore. So hope you've been doing that too and just really enjoy. I'm even going to scoot back a tiny bit and get a little more stretch in my middle back. Yeah, that feels great. Neck is completely relaxed and now we're going to go into the full hanging.

Okay, so we're going to grab back here. We're going to lift up our body. Keep your head looking at your belly as you lower yourself down into full hanging. Here we go, grab the other side, slide down, enjoy [inaudible] and just relax. If too much pressure goes into your head with the blood rushing to your head, don't hang out too long. If you've had any surgeries, definitely don't hang out too long, but if you can just enjoy that. All the stretch, all the relaxing. We're even going to go into a backbend. I'm going to put my hands here, squeeze my seat and look back.

Yeah, coming back. Hang again. Just letting all the tension release and then we're going to come up looking at your belly. As you inhale, crawling up. Exhale, slide back into place of your half hanging [inaudible]. Hope you enjoy those ballet stretches and the hip stretches and these hanging exercises. I bet. Pull ups and your hanging bullets are looking really strong. All right, that's enough deliciousness. We're going to slip out, slip out and roll down. Do a little massage on your spine one way and another way, and we are all set and I'll see you next class.