Heat Up Your Core

This class will leave us connected to the powerhouse and moving from the center with power, efficiency and control. So stand tall, fold your arms like a genie, and I want you to press your thumbs into your elbows and your elbows into your thumbs. And we'll take a moment just to stand tall. Press your heels together and feel anchored down through the heels with a little weight into the toes and lengthen your head up towards the sky. We're zipping the abs in and up, reminding ourselves of where to powerhouse is, the seat the inner thighs are all on.

Now standing tall, lengthen. Imagine that your heels are glued down into the mat. You're trying to lift them up. Let's try and lift those heels up, but they're glued down. They're not leaving.

And then the glue peels off, press the heels together and lengthen up. Lift those heels up, reach the head up towards the sky and then leave the head up there. As we reach the heels back down, let's do that one more time. Press the heels together, lengthen up through the spine, head towards the sky, press the heels together, keep the head up there. And then reach the heels back down, as we lower them to the mat.

You should have felt that connecting to the abdominals and the seats, which is all part of the powerhouse that we're going to be referring to and using throughout this workout. So stand at the top of your mat. Let's fold those arms again and take one foot and fold it behind the other. Now remain standing tall and connected all the movement from the powerhouse today. So lower down towards the mat and onto your seat.

Okay, find a comfortable seating position, cross your legs or legs out in front. The key thing here is that we're gonna have a tall long spine. We start with a couple of breaths. So place your hands behind you or in front of you, resting them on your legs, and just lengthen your spine up. Feel your connection through your sit bones, anchoring down into the mat.

And as we inhale, lengthen up through the spine and as you exhale out, connect even deeper into the floor. And again, breathe it in, lengthen up. And as we exhale out anchoring connecting deeply into our seat. One more time, long inhale, lengthen tall. Exhale, anchor, and down.

Okay, let's move on to our backs. So bring our feet in front and lower yourself, gently down. Bring your heels just level with your sit bones, arms by your side. And let's take a reminder of what the powerhouse is. So we're scooping our core muscles, our abs scooping in and up, but also switching on our seat and activate in our inner thighs.

We also have that secondary core. That's a shoulder girdle. So draw the shoulders down into the mat, press the palms into the mat, femur rocks. So from here, just float your legs up to tabletop. I'm gonna start just by tapping one toe down and the next.

Just moving the Femur in the hip joint, keeping the upper body quiet, scooping the abs, keeping the pelvis still. Let's do one more on each side. And then we're gonna turn the heat up and see if we can challenge that a little more. Bring both the legs together, press the thighs together. Can you tap both the toes down together and bring them back up without changing the position of the pelvis or the lower back on the mat.

That's quite challenging. So don't be surprised if you get the shakes or you feel that that's a little work. Let's do one more. All right, bring those legs down and we'll take a stretch, reach the legs out, reach the arms out and bring them back down by the side of the body. We're ready to start our a hundred.

So I want us to begin a hundred a little bit back, dial it back, just a touch from what would be your point of challenge. And this way we can stay focused and really connected with the powerhouse. So that we're not over challenging. So we're looking for quality rather than pushing the exercise to the limits. So bring your nose to navel, chin, to chest, and float your legs up to tabletop.

For me, I'm gonna straighten my legs up to the seat and just take it to your point of challenge. Just back a little, arms lifts and we pump our arms strong. Inhaling, exhaling. Scoop the abs deep, exhale it out. Press the heels, press the thighs together.

Draw the abs in and up. Keeping the upper body lengthen and away from that powerhouse, legs reach in a way. Scooping the abs deep. Big inhales, big exhale out. Stay with me now.

Move those arms strong from the back of the body. Last set, big inhale, big exhale, everything out of the lungs now. Bend the knees in lower the legs, lower the head, head ready for the roll-up. So stretch your legs out long, flex the feedback and just reconnect with the powerhouse. So pull the abs in and up, seat, switch, thump, bring the arms to the ceiling.

Take that inhale, exhale round and over, reaching out beyond the toes, but still scooping those abs back strong in opposition position. Here we go, lower and back, inhaling, exhaling, reach, scoop, lower vertebra by vertebra. And as we lower back, we're reaching out through the heels all the way to the mat. Let's do two more of these. Scope as we reach and then lowering back, last one now, and then lower ourselves back with control, vertebra by vertebra.

Bringing the arms down by the side of the body, ready for the rollover. So the version of the rollover that we're gonna do is static. We're gonna use an isometric exercise for this so we can really connect with the powerhouse. So float the legs up to tabletop, place your hands on tops of the knees and you're pushing the knees away. And at the same time, trying to push the knees towards your eyes.

Of course, we're going to resist that they're not going anywhere. So your eyes stay safe. Now draw your shoulders down into the mat and press inhaling and exhaling. Staying connected with the shoulder girdle and the abs drawing in and up and you'll feel this. It hits us directly into the abdominals.

Just keep pushing and breathing. It looks like we're doing nothing, but we got working hard. Stay here one more breath. I'm in lower the legs down. That was a lot harder than it looked.

I can guarantee that. Leg circles, so stretch one leg out. That's flex that foot and bring the other leg up to the sky, hands behind the back of the leg. Give it a little, pull a little stretch. And then let's flex and point that foot a few times.

All right, now, keep those hips anchored and steady. We're not going for a huge range of movement here. We're keeping it all contained and controlled. Moving efficiently from the center. So press the palms, press the shoulders.

And we begin. We go across, down, around, and up. Abs bring the leg back up. Scoop those abs, press the hips down. One more reverse.

Out, down, across and up, scoop the abs to bring the leg up, two more. Reach long through that opposite leg, lower the leg down. Bring the other leg up to the sky. Give it a pull. Stretch that hamstring a little now flex and point just three times.

Bring the arms down by the side. Once again, stay anchored through the hips. Shoulders pressing down, everything presses down, just the leg moving. Across, down around, add up, abs spring, back up. Scoop, press the hips.

One more reverse. Out, down, across, and up. Abs bring the leg back up, and left two more. Last one, lower the leg down and just bring ourselves up to the front of the mat for roll like a ball. So stay with that theme of staying connected and moving from the center.

Let's do a variation of rolling like a ball that really brings us into our core muscles. So bring your elbows onto the tops of your knees. You're gonna make fists with the hands and bring them up by the ears. The goal of this roll like a ball is to keep the elbow and the knee connected throughout. And it's challenging.

Here we go. Let's pick the legs up, scoop the abs and we're roll back and return. And again, press the heel, the knees into the arms, and the arms into the knees. As we roll, abs in and up, we have one more to do, stay with me. Nice work, and then lower those legs down to the mat.

So it brings us into our abs series, which is all about moving from the center. Hug one leg in, stretch the other leg long, lift that leg up off the floor, and with control lower yourself gently onto the mat. Now stay really strong here. So the center is connected, the legs reach and away, and we're hugging here in opposition. Elbows wide, give it a couple of pools and let's changed and change, change.

Scooping deep, reaching long. Keep working, stay with me now. Get that heat generated from the center. All right, double leg stretch. So this variation hold the ankles.

We're gonna go a little bit old school here and just keep the arms and the legs together. As we reach the legs out, press the arms out and hug the legs in. Reach out as we inhale, scoop deep, as we exhale and bring the legs in. Let's do three more, reach away and hug it in tight. Reach the legs out, scoop the abs in and up.

Hug in, two more. And, in last one now. Reach away, scoop the abs back in and up. And hook those legs in. If you feel the knee just lower your head down to the mat now, and just take a little movement from side to side.

We want the focus to be on the powerhouse, not a sore neck. Bring your chin to the chest. Most of the navel for scissors. So my legs are up to the seat and I'm taking a hold of one of my ankles with both my hands. Now, normally we might want to reach this leg as far out as we can, but for the purposes of this exercise, to keep it centered, just bring your leg out a little less than you normally would.

So that's going to stay strong and we pull towards us pull pull. We change, and we change, work strong, deep abs. Keep those legs strong and straight to look at your navel, not towards your toes, scooping them in and up. scoop those abs in and up. Keep working, one more on each side.

And then once again, lower your head to the mat and just a gentle roll from side to side, just to loosen up the neck a little ready for our lower lifts. So stretch your legs up, press your heels together and your thighs together. See if you can zip up through the centerline of the body. Hands behind the back of the head, and let's bring the nose up towards the knees. We don't have to do a big range of movement here to get maximum effect into the abdominal.

So here we go see on as well, lower, lower, lower, and scoop to lift, and again. And scoop, we're all through this abs series. Stay with me, keep working this really to get some warmth going in the abdominals. And up last one into our crisscross bend, the knees let's reach and criss and we cross. and criss and cross, keep scooping those abs.

Try and get the armpit up towards the knee if you can. One more each side and then come up to sit for our spine stretched forward. Well done, that's the tough bit out of the way. Now, place your hands down on the mat in front of you. And I want to feel a little pressure through the hands as you're pushing down into the mat.

And at the same time, just as we started lengthening the spine up tall. Take a deep inhale. And as you exhale, push those palms out one, two, three, scooping the abs back in our position. Stack the spine up like building blocks and again, up and overreach, reach, reach, scoop, and lift. Stack tall, let's do two more.

Take the top of the head between the knees, pulling the abs back, fiercely back with the abs. Last one, big inhale, exhale up and over, and then stack up nice and tall for open leg rocker. So lift your seat towards your feet and take your hands to your ankles. We're start with a little balancing work just to look at that anchor in and center in. So take hold of the ankles and draw the legs in.

Pick the toes up just off the floor, we're balancing just off the back of our sit bones and we're straight on one leg as straight as you can get it and lift the chest. Proud chest, change that to the other leg lift tall, and change. We do one more on each side. And now let's see if we can get both legs up to balance. And if you feel inclined and you feel ready, scoop your abs, let's rock.

Oh, maybe not. (laughs loudly) All right, let's try that again. Scoop those abs, roll back, and lift to return. Lift tall, scoop to roll, lift tall to return. Now bring your legs together. Lower, gently onto your back for corkscrew, press the heels together.

Press the shoulders down into the mat. We're start with tic talks because the focus is the hip stay in anchor. This is like our single-leg circles, but with both legs together. So press the shoulders down, press the hips down. Just a couple of inches to the right and center and to the left and center.

Keeping those hips steady and down, scooping the abs deep. Press the shoulders into the mat as well. Now let's add some circles to the right down around left and center, left down around and center, and again around we go. Abs deep, around one more in each direction. Keep the control range of movement is only as big as you can go while maintaining that control.

All right, bend your knees, come up to sit for the sore. So feet a little wider than the mat. And let's flex the toes back. Reaching out the energy reaches out through the heels. Bring her arms into our peripheral.

And then take the hands link the fingers and take them behind the back of the head. So this is a great way to work on anchoring and stretching at the same time. It's a different version. Take an inhale tool and twist and take the opposite elbow towards the opposite knee. Exhale out.

Inhale tall, exhale twist in your notices challenges us to keep our seat connected and grounded. Exhale it out. Inhale up. Keep those elbows wide, no cheating. Last one on each side.

Inhale up. Exhale, all that air out the lungs, bring the lungs out. Inhale up stack toe and we're ready to go into swan. So bring your legs together. Let's turn up and over and lower onto your front.

Now swan is still the same connection to the powerhouse, but we're just challenging it in a different relationship to gravity. So draw your navel up away from the mat. Press your heels together, push your feet down. Let's push an imaginary marble with the nose. Lift the head, the chest, the shoulders, find that length and lengthen to lower.

So it's all about how long you get. Not necessarily about how high up you came. So lengthen, draw those shoulders down. Abs are in and up. My seat is on, my legs are switched on.

Lengthen up all the way down to the mat. And let's take a seat back to our heels for rest position. Scoop the abs away from the thighs. This isn't just relaxing into it was staying active during the navel away from the legs. From here, let's kneel up for a thigh stretch.

Bring your arms in front knees just under the hips and I want you to feel like you're almost falling forward. See if you can catch yourself you're immediately feel the seat switch on which means we're working. And hinge with that connection as we lengthen back, and lift tall as we return. Reaching up, scoop the abs, hinge it back and lift tall to return. One more time now.

Here we go, guys. So lengthen and up, scooping deep, everything switched on and lift the spine tall. All right, I want to our backs for shoulder bridge. Lower gently onto the mat. Take your arms by your sides.

And from here with your heels about sit bone distance apart. Let's keep our hips even as we lift the seat towards the back to the knees looking for lengthen the spine, it doesn't matter how high your hips go, is how long can you make your body here and then lower down. vertebra by vertebra. staying connected to both the seat and the abs. Let's lift the sit bones to the backs of the knees again, lengthen, reach away, and then lower down, vertebrae by vertebrae.

Working all the way to the mat. Now bring your feet together your thighs together. Let's lift the hips up again and bring the right leg up pointed up towards the ceiling or the sky. We're gonna lower that leg out three times reach out and up, out and up. Stay working through the seat.

Let's change legs. Bring that leg here. Reach the other leg up. As pointed up, keep the hips even now, no drop in the hips. Let's reach that leg out and up.

Out and reach, one more time. And then reach that leg out and lower down. Stay with me as we lower vertebra by vertebra to the mat. Stretch the legs out. Let's turn onto our side for our sideline series.

Bring your feet to the front corner of your mat and lengthen your body long, we stay connected to the powerhouse even in this sideline position for leg kick, front and back. Here we go. Kick, back back. Kick strong. Reach long, lengthening both through the spine and out through the legs, two more.

Keep the upper body as quiet as you can. And then we go to up and down proceed on to the instep and we lift up. Reach out stay long and scooping the abs in end up. Reaching out. That's three to more.

Last one. And then circle the leg around small circles. Reaching the leg away. That's reverse. Keep the upper body strong, straight, and long.

And that inner thigh lifts and circles bring the legs in line with the body and the top leg foot comes down in front of the thigh. Take hold of the ankle with your hand and stretch the leg away. Flex the foot. Here we go. We lift and we lower.

And lift reach that heel away like you're trying to close the door. Pushing the door close with the heel. Keep it that way, two more. Working both inner thigh and the back of the leg. And now let's make big circles with that leg.

Reach it up and over. Get that upper inner thigh working as well. So much more to the powerhouse than we think. One more time. Reverse and lift, two more.

All right, let's change to the other side. Bring your legs in front. And let's swing over to the other side. Reaching long. Same on the other side now so press the bottom foot into the ground.

Lengthen the upper body long for leg kick, front, and back. Kick, back Back. Kick strong. Reach long, big kick, small kick, back back. Two more.

And then up and down. Bring that heel onto the inside of the foot. Here we go. We lift up and reach the leg away. So the legs coming up as we reached the leg way lengthen the body way scoop the abs deep, two more.

Small circles around, tiny little strong circles. Working from the hip, reverse, inner thigh lifts and circles. Bring the other leg in line with the body. Flex the foot strong and we lift and lower and up what that upper inner thigh. Three more.

Last one, keep it up there now big circles, as big as you can make them. Big strong circles working that upper inner thigh, and reverse, let's go back the other way. Abs in an up, reach in the heel away. Two more, almost there. All right now, ready for teaser.

So bring one foot to the mat, the other leg reaching long. So to stay focused on our powerhouse connection. Let's take teezer with just one leg. Reach the arms out, reach the leg long and away. Scooping deep, I want you to press the thighs together, we're got that centerline, that we're gonna zip up through the entire body as we reach for the knees, reach for the toes, reach for the sky, Change legs.

And can we lower ourselves all the way back down with control. Once again, reach for the knees, reach for the toes. reach all the way up. Can you lift, lift, lift, pressing those thighs together. Change legs and we return to the mat.

Chin to chest, heel up, reach, lifts as tall as you can lifting out from the center. Change the legs lower with control, last one, all the way up. Reach for the knees and the toes in the sky. Now here's the real challenge. Bring your arms forward, bring both legs out, leave the legs where they are.

Lower the body. Reach for the knees, reach for the toes, reach for the sky and return. One more to do. And then lower everything down to the mat. Ready to roll over for swimming.

Reach your arms, reach your legs long. Once again, draw the navel away from the mat like there's ice under your belly. Lift everything up off the mat as long as we can be. Let's swim. Strong in lungs, scooping those abs in and up, a little longer.

A little stronger swim fast, and handhold and lower. Hands come by the chest for leg pool fan support. And we're push up in one hole units or pounds by the side of the body. Reach the heels away so that the thighs lift up off the mat was scooping those abs deeply. Switching on the seat and then one whole unit.

Let's push up into our plank position. Adjust onto the mat. Now you can just hold this absolutely plenty of work going on. If you're just holding it, you can come to your knees if that feels better at maintaining that quality. But if we're here and you're up on your toes, let's rock back through the heels.

So right back through the heels and forward, lift one leg same again. Lower, let's change and repeat. Right leg, left leg and let's finish with both legs as we lower to our side for side bend. So we'll begin our side bend. Once again, focusing on staying connected and moving from the center.

So come down onto your elbow and your forearm. It's gonna help us connect better with the shoulder girdle. Press the knees into one another arm reaches long. Press the knees down. Press the elbow down, lift up and reach.

Get that full length. We're still connected into that shoulder girdle. Let the hips just kiss the mat. Lift, lengthen one more time. Now you're happy to carry on like that or bring that top foot in front of the bottom foot, come up onto your hand.

Lift long and tall through the spine. Scoop those abs deep as we reach up and over. Let the hips just kiss them out. lengthen it one more. Up and reach, stretch, stretch, stretch.

And bring your seat down. Let's start on the other side. Swing to the other side. Pressing the knees pressing the elbow. Connect strong and safe in your shoulder girdle.

And again, lift up and reach. And return, two more. And then last one. Now bring that top foot to the mat, up onto your hand. Stay strong and connected here, this is important.

We've got to protect our shoulders, show them some love. Here we are length and tall, scoop the abs deep and reach and kiss the mat with the seat. lifted up lengthen away. One more time. Up and reach and then lower your seats to the mat, for a little bit of seal fun.

Let's bring our seat towards our feet. Hands come through the center and take hold of your ankles. Now I love the seal not just because it's so much fun, but also because it's a real reminder to stay center. Can you keep that center in and keep that connection all the way through the movements or scoop those abs, press your elbow into your thigh in your thigh back into your elbow. So we get this circle of energy right here.

Moving from the center, here we are. Let's clap the feet three times. Scoop deep and repeat. And again, stay connected. Seal is fun, but it can also be strong exercise to stay moving.

From your powerhouse. Keep it connected, abs in and up. Let's do one more after this. Here it is three claps and we're coming all the way to our feet to stand now. And cross my legs.

Come all the way up. Stand tall. And turn to the mat. Ready for push-up. Reach my arms up to the sky.

Abs nice and deep. We're back in that starting position really, push down through your heels. As we go up and over. Hands come flat to the mat. If you need to bend your knees do so.

Walk the hands out. One, two, three. Three push-ups, elbows into the sides. If you need to do these on your knees or up against the wall that's fine. It's quality and that is key here.

Here we go. One, abs deep. Push the floor away. Now don't lose it as we walk back. Keep control.

Keep those hips as even as you possibly can. As we return, roll up to stand keep the arms with ears. Stand nice and tall. And we're finished with some splits and lunges. Hands to the hips.

And step out with your left foot and go as wide as you can, be a strong lunge. Square the hips. Keep the hands on the hips. The back foot is pushing down the energy through my back leg out through the blade of my back foot. And let's bend the front knee three times.

Nice deep lunge and lengthen, And two, one more. And up to take the arms up to the sky. Bend your knee and frame your front foot with your hands. Let's straighten and bend the front foot as best we can the front leg as best we can. With the hands on the floor.

So we straighten and we bend and straighten and bend, one more time. Now lift the back heel placed the back knee to the mat. Hands come to the front knee. And I want you to push your torso away, we're gonna have a beautiful stretch up through the entirety of the psoas now. So lunge deeply into that position and bring your right arm forward.

Look to the fingers. Now reach them up to the ceiling or the sky and then reach behind you a little over to the side. Indulge in that stretch. And then bring the hands to frame the front foot again. Let's set the back foot to meet the front and the front foot.

Then repeat the returns to the back. Stand up nice and tall. hands-on your hips. Square the hips up. And once again, lunges.

Bend that front knee and straighten and bend and straighten one more time. And straighten arms up to the sky. Bend the knee and take the hands down to frame the front foot. We're ready to straighten this front leg as best we can. Here we go.

Get it as straight as you can. It doesn't matter if it's not going all the way straight. Everything in time. One more. Now lift the back heel and lower the knee to the mat.

The full-service stretch now so push hands into the knee. Draw the shoulders back, lunging. Bring your arm forward. Reach it up with look to those fingers reach it behind you. And a little over breathe into that stretch.

Now bring the hands to frame the foot. And let's take the front foot to the back foot this time. We're back in our familiar plank position with control. Walk your hands back towards your feet. And then with the arms by the ears roll up to stand.

Lift tall, now bring the heels together, fold the arms like a genie again, we're back at our start position. So reconnect with the powerhouse the seat, the inner thighs. Press the heels together, lengthen the head up to the sky and reach the heels down to return. Let's separate the heels. Roll the shoulders back and down.

Great work everyone. Stay strong, stay connected.