Day 4: Side Bending

Hi everyone, it's time for day four. Are you feeling a little sore? You should be. We've been doing some really hard work. We're now gonna go into side bending for day four and we'll start standing.

So you're gonna go into a nice wide stance with your feet and your arms are gonna move out to your side. We're just gonna do a little hand-to-hip side bend over and then bring that up. Switch other side. Take it over, and bring it up. Let's do that one more time each way.

Reach, a little further than you think you can. Other way, reach, get there, go farther, bring it up. Now we're gonna take this one to the side and then you're gonna take your body, keep it as long and straight through your back as you can, and turn that down towards the floor. Now turn it back and then come up. So the arm goes up and over.

We're side bending but we're long through the spine. Now turn to the floor, reach long, turn to the front, and come up. Again, to the side, reach long, turn, come up. Again, other side, over, turn to the floor, and come up. Adding a little more, take it over.

Turn to the floor. Now take the hand that's on your hip, reach it out and hold. Hold your legs nice and strong. Think about the way we worked our legs in our leg workout. Come to the center, hold here.

Come back to the side. Return the hand to the hip, turn to the side, bring it up. Other way, so we go to the side, use your strong legs. Turn your shape to the floor. Reach the arms out now reach that to the center.

Come back to the center, turn to the side, bring it up. One more time each way. Over, and turn to the floor. Let the arm reach out. Come to the center, back to the side, hand to the hip, turn, bring it up.

Other side, over, turn to the floor. Both arms reaching, take that to the side. Reach long, back to the middle, hand to the hip, arm to the side, over, and up. Now we're gonna bring yourself to the front of your mat, arms reaching high, chin to chest, roll down through your back. Hands to the floor.

Let's walk the feet out and find a plank. Stay there, energy out through the top of the head, energy out through the heels. You're gonna take your right hand, put it at center line, now turn, space your feet apart so you have two fee to stand on unless you wanna challenge yourself by just standing on the one heel. Turn back to the floor, center that. Other hand to center line, turn.

You can space the feet apart. Turn back, and again. Twist and hold it. Come back and center that. Center line with the hand, arm reaches up, and we come back and pause.

Bring your knees down to the mat. You're gonna bring yourself up to kneeling and face to the side. From here we're bringing hands to the forehead. Grow nice and tall, breathe in. As you breathe out you're gonna side bend over to the left and make it easy, don't try to go very far and then just lift yourself back up.

Take it to the other side and bring yourself up. This time, we bend to the side and we try to go just a little deeper by shortening through the waistline on one side and elongating through the other, minimal shifting, more side bending, and come up. We go the other way. Side bend over, and then when you get there it's almost like you're doing a crunch. You're gonna pull from that side waistline and bring yourself up.

Again, take it over, try to go a little deeper, let that side guide you, and you come up, other way, and just see, can you get a little deeper into that? And come up. Now progressing this, we're going over. We're gonna reach the hand down and you're gonna have to lift your knee to get the heel of your hand on the floor. Send your other leg out and just hold here.

Now what we're gonna do is just put as much weight in your foot that's on the mat and your hand that's on the mat and lighten your knee that's on the mat. Make that knee a little lighter, don't lift it, just a little lighter and you're gonna start to feel that bottom waistline pull so that it can lighten the knee and then release out of that effort. Do that one more time. So we push down into the foot and the hand and lighten the knee, just holding there, we lighten that knee and now bend this knee so that you can come back up as if it's an exercise. Side bend the other way and the hand comes down.

We lift the knee then send the foot out. Now from here push down into your hand and into your foot as you lighten the knee and the lighter my knee gets the more this side has to exercise to make my knee light and I get all that nice side body work and release out of that effort. Do that one more time. You push down into your hand, down into your foot. Think lighten the knee.

Don't lift it, just lighten it a little bit more and release. Bend the knee, try to come back up as if it's an exercise. We go the other way again. Side bend it over. Now bring the hand down.

From here, pushing down into the foot, pushing down into the hand, lightening the knee. Now from here we send the foot out and we're using that bottom waistline. The arm is there to stabilize you but this waistline is lifting you up. Now we add a big bend. So you reach your arm up high and you bend and you lift with those muscles along the bottom waistline.

Return to the T, bring the knee down but don't drop it. Bring it down, lightly place it down, bring yourself all the way up. I'm being very bossy aren't I? So here we go, over to the other side. Reach the hand down, plant the hand and the foot down.

Digging down into your hand and your foot you begin to lighten the knee. Don't lift it yet just lighten it. Find that feeling of when this engages so much that you can rely on it, not just your arm. And go, send the foot out, now the arm reaches out and we bend up using that bottom waistline and then back to the T. Thoughtfully bring the knee back and we come all the way up.

You can relax from there. We're now gonna come down for the 100 beats. So have a seat on your mat. Place the feet flat and roll down. Take a moment here, just find neutral position of the pelvis and find length through your spine.

Take a nice long breath in. As you exhale bring one leg up to tabletop. Continue to exhale as the other leg comes up. We breathe in, chin to chest, exhale, curl to come up. Send the legs out, pump those arms.

Inhale two, three, four five. Exhale two, three, four five. (breathes audibly) Begin to challenge the level of the legs. Remember, some days you got it some days you don't. So after the first few days of our challenge we might be feeling tired.

We might even need to reel those legs back in to a tabletop. Extend the legs if you'd like, continue on. Breathing in, two, three, four, five and out two, three, four five. (breathes audibly) One more breath. Inhale and exhale two, three, four five.

Let's rest the heels, take the arms overhead. We're just gonna circle the arms around to do a roll up to transition into our mermaid. Roll through the back and we're just gonna send the legs around. And from here we're gonna start the mermaid holding on to the top ankle or shin and the arm lifts to the ear, that's your inhale. Exhale bending over.

Now use the muscles that we found earlier as a tool to get a greater stretch. So think I'm gonna make it an exercise and as a result my stretch goes deeper. Breathe and come up and try to find a little balance moment here. Now we're gonna kinda lean over to the side reluctantly placing the hand down. That is making this side work very, very hard.

My elbow's gonna touch. Arm comes up and I bend, full side bend to the other side. Now this arm comes up. I'm gonna use the hand on the mat as little as possible as I come up, find a little moment, reach for the ankle, arm comes up, side bend over. If you're struggling at home that's normal, this is really hard.

So you come up. This little moment is one of my little sassy mean things. You hold it, you try to take it over, bring your hand down, elbow down, take it up and over. Bottom waistline lifts. Don't forget your bend.

This is a side bend. Arm comes up. We use the hand on the floor as little as possible. Come up find that moment, hand to the ankle, arm to the ear, take it over. We're gonna take another long breath.

Let's lift a little and as you exhale see if you can use the strength of your muscles to get you into a greater bend. Now from there you're gonna reach your arms kind of out and to the corner of the room. Tuck your heels underneath you, stand up. You're gonna kick your mermaid tail to the other side, sit down, and we mermaid the other way. So stacking the legs, arm comes up, inhale.

Exhale, side bend over. Ask your muscles to give you the strength to move a little bit further. Arms come up, there's a little balance, lean, find the floor, elbow down, and you bend. Don't forget your bend. Lift, arm comes up, use the hand on the floor as little as possible.

Find your balance, reach up and over. Use your strength. Ask your obliques to send you over to the side even farther. Arm comes up. Lean a little, bring the hand down, very down, big bend.

Arm comes up. Use that hand a little and then the hand to the ankle, arm to the ear, and we side bend over. We're gonna come out of that and go into the swan next. So lie down on your stomach, hands underneath your shoulders. Legs are nice and long.

Abdominals strong, shoulders rolled back and down. Float the head and the chest and the inhale brings you up and the exhale takes you down. And again, let the inhale bring you up and the exhale takes you down. Once again, inhale, lift and the exhale takes you down. Quick little pushup to the hands and knees.

Quick little sit back to the heels and we're gonna turn around and go through a series of crunches. Now for these crunches the legs are gonna be doing some little movements here so that we can create some bending at the waist. Really the bending is gonna come from the pelvis moving so just listen for the cues here. We're gonna start with the legs in a tabletop position. Take a breath in to prepare.

As you exhale draw the chin into the chest and get a really nice reach through the arms just to find your very best curl. Now that you're there, hands behind the head but try not to lose that curl. We're gonna leave the legs where they are and crunch for eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, we lift and hold. Now, the legs. My knees are gonna turn to the right, my toes are gonna turn to the left.

As a result, my left hip hiked. So I have like a mermaid-like feeling along that left side. Now I crunch. Eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, and hold. Now I'm gonna center my legs and crunch through the middle again.

Eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, hold on one. Turn the toes to the right and the knees to the left, that brings my right hip up towards my right shoulder and I crunch. Eight, seven, six, keep pulling that hip up, seven and eight. Now center it again. Turn the toes the other direction again so this left hip is hiking up.

Now as I'm hiking the hip I'm now gonna rotate towards it. Now I crunch up to the knees. So I'm rotating but I'm lifting forward. Two, three, four, five, six, seven, hold up on eight. Center that, turn the toes the other way, hike up the right waistline, twist to it, go.

Up, two, three, four, five, six, seven, and eight. Come back to the middle, we better balance it out. Eight to finish. Two, three, five, six, seven, and eight. Rest it down.

We've earned another swan. On your stomach. Hands underneath the shoulders, float, head and chest. Inhale brings you up. Exhale to go down.

Again inhale lift. (exhales audibly) And again, inhale bring it up. Exhale bring it down. Now, thinking back to the way that we started the class we're gonna tuck the toes under, put the hands down into the floor, and push up. So from here we're back to the original start position of the exercise. I'm gonna walk a little forward on my mat.

I'm gonna put my right hand on the center line, twist, and hold it. Now let's add a side bend in. Lift, up and over, bring it to the middle, and now center it, other way. Center line, twist and reach, big lift up, and over. Arm reaches and we turn and center it.

Hand to the middle, turn the feet, reach. Side bend up and over. You should be feeling a little greater range now that we've done that workout. Other way, reach, up, and over to the middle. Center it and from here draw the chin in, lift the hips, and walk the feet in.

We're gonna have the hands flat to the mat. Bend the knees and drop that head. Big inhale, exhale, see if you can stretch the legs up straight. Bend the knees inhale. Exhale stretch the legs straight.

Bend 'em, exhale stretch. Now from here bend the knees and we're gonna start to roll up through the back bone by bone by bone through the spine. The arms reach out and the arms circle around. Now we turn, move the feet out wide, arms reaching out, and we go for a flowing finish that we started with. Side bend over.

Ooh that does feel better than when it started. Big reach and bring it up. See, Pilates works. Over, bring it up other way, over, bring it up. Now we go over and we do the rotation and we reach the arm out.

Bring the hand in, turn to the side, bring it up. Other way, over, turn to the floor, reach the arm out, bring the hand back, turn, bring it up. Again like that. Over and turn, get that reach, really lengthen. Bring the hand in.

Big bend and lift. Take it over, turn to the floor, reach the arm, lengthen, bring the hand back, turn, now the center reach. Over, we turn first, reach the arm. Now go to the center. Now a little different than when we started.

Take this all the way over, put the hand to the hip, turn, bring it up, other way. Over, turn to the floor, reach, go to the center. Now take that all the way the other way, hand to the hip, turn to the side, bring yourself up and you're cooked for today. Thanks for joining me for day four. I'll see you guys next time.