Sweaty Cardio Flow

Hello everyone, My name is Delia Buckmaster and welcome to week seven of the LevelUp Series live from my studio in Whitefish, Montana. Today is a little cardio sweaty flow or sweaty cardio flow. It's not gonna be too cardiovascular, we're not gonna be doing a lot of jumping but there are no burpees per se, but we're gonna be doing some cardio things intervals in between some of the classic exercises to just keep us warm and keep us moving. So if you can't do any of those, you prefer to stay on the mat and then just stretch yourself out, please do so and we're gonna get going. I am gonna start right here on the floor instead of starting on top of the mat.

What I would like for you to do is just to reach those arms up to the sky and give me a big stretch. Allow the shoulders to come up to the ears and maybe open up those ribs so you can get as much air into your lungs as you can. And then just bring those arms back down and we'll do that again. Inhale as you reach those arms up, and exhale as you bring them down and continue just to allow that mobility in the shoulders, we will be doing quite a bit of work in forearm plank, a regular plank on all fours so you'll be using those arms quite a bit. We'll do this one more time, you're gonna interlace those fingers and push the palms up towards the ceiling, take a little stretch to one side shortening one side of your body, lengthening the other, and then over to the other side and you get to allow that hip movement.

So just being a little bit more receptive to your feet. So see what your feet do as your body shifts from side to side. Now, go ahead and take those hands behind your back. Interlace the fingers, draw those shoulder blades together and open up the collar bone but when you do that, it'll put your shoulder blades in a retraction. So lift the chin a little bit so there's consistency in the neck and in the head when you do that, and then go ahead and just shake it off.

And then a little bit of mobility work here, side to side, I call this your own personal fan system. So you're just moving and again, the reaction of your feet. So if your feet are just standing or as in on the floor, on your mat in concrete, they need to move and I'll do a little ski reference, but it's like riding your edges of your skis. So side to side, side to side, everything moves. And then from here, just a few little squats, don't worry too much about form, as long as you don't feel any pain in the knees.

And I'll give you a little side view here as well, down and up and down and up and I use this as an, a little excuse too, to continue to mobilize the shoulders. Yeah, and then look down at your feet, see what they're doing when you're not on the reformer and you're on the mat, you don't really start that much with footwork or footwork tells you quite a bit about what's going on with the rest of your body. But if you stand here and do your squats, you could see what your feet are doing. Two more and then one more and then hold, and then I'm gonna turn towards you again. And then just do a little side to side lunge so that you can stretch the inner thighs and again, move laterally.

Most of the time when we're working out or doing anything athletic, we are going front to back and never side to side. So unless you are into sports like tennis or those types of things. So keep going a little stretch, I'm gonna stop on the other side, hold and then look down at my foot and really reach with that opposite arm, almost like half your swim stroke to stretch your lat. Come back to the middle, let's take it over to the other side and really reach and stretch looking down at your foot. And then I'm gonna go ahead and come back, keeping my legs wide, reaching my arms up and then dropping down into a few plie squats and then watching to see what the knees do here.

So I want you to look over at your knees to see if they're centered over your second and third toe. So whenever you make any changes to the position of your feet, always make sure that your knees and hips are all consistent. So the movement should have happened from your hip down. So if you don't have that rotation in your hips, your feet shouldn't be out that wide either. One more time, and then I'm gonna go ahead and fold forward here, bringing my hands to the floor and just giving myself a little stretch and always be careful, I'm just gonna shift side to side, no rules here, just warming up the body and you want to be careful in the very beginning, I have pulled a muscle in the beginning of a pilates class.

It was 20 something years ago, I learned my lesson and then we're gonna bring our feet all the way together. And then for you guys, roll yourself all the way up, and then you'll step to the back of your mat, I'm gonna step onto the top of my platform towards the back of the reformer. This time I'm gonna reach my arms up to the ceiling, just as a flow movement and roll myself down to the mat. I'm gonna walk out to a plank position and then pause here. So you could immediately drop the knees if that doesn't work for you.

Plank is a really great way to really warm up the core. Then I'm gonna take my right foot and bring it to the outside of my right hand and I'm gonna hold that lunge and stretch that hip. Again you could drop the back foot and if that works for you, you could stretch here. Then I'm gonna step that right foot back and then bring the left foot forward and drop my knee, or I can keep it up, it depends on how flexible you are right now and give yourself a little stretch. So now I'm gonna alternate, I'm gonna step back, step forward, pause.

Step back, step forward and pause. And your alternate exercise is to just get into your lunges slowly and not move with any quick pace, it's totally up to you. And I've said it many, a times in the past but Pilates or any kind of movement isn't meant to be done slow unless you lose control. So you want to maintain control. the whole time and know exactly the purpose of what you're doing here so we're just warming up.

And then I'm gonna take the other foot forward to end that series and then bring my leg back, come up to a pike position and then walk my hands back to my feet and then roll myself up. I'm gonna do it again, arms off for flow, roll down. I'm gonna walk forward. And this time I'm gonna take my right foot to the outside of my right hand, my left foot to the outside of my left hand. So now I'm really low in a squat.

Then I'm just gonna reach my arms up, maintain that Sumo squat position, take the hands back to the floor, whatever foot I led with, I lead back. So then I go back right, back left. Now I'm gonna switch left, right. And you could see why we warmed up with some plies. My stance is gonna be a little narrow here because I'm on a high mat.

So I want you to make sure that your knees still feel comfortable. Now I'm gonna go right, left and up, and then I'm gonna go right left back then left right so I'm gonna continue, you guys go at your own pace. I'm just gonna continue the movement and there'll just be a few more of these. And then we'll get back onto the mat. I actually I'm forgetting which foot I'm leading with, but make sure when you, whatever foot you lead forward, you also lead back.

So I'm gonna do one more left foot, right foot, and up, take my hands down and then to transition to the mat, I'm gonna find my plank, lift up to my pike for stretch, pedal my knees here and you should feel more, I feel warm. Considering even the temperature outside is almost a hundred degrees, but, and pedal. And then I'm gonna walk my feet forward to my hands carefully and then sit down. And these are suggested transitions. So if they don't work for you, then you get on the mat, how you feel comfortable doing so.

Lower yourself on your mat, now you're supine, legs at the tabletop, arms, overhead. My arms are in my peripheral, I'm gonna go into my up prep using one breath pattern, so I'm just gonna lift up, stretch the shoulder blades, maintaining tabletop and exhale up and lower. Use this as an excuse to stretch the shoulders, stretch the shoulder blades, warm up the neck. And now you can add a little extension of the legs and then lower and again, and lower. The arm movement needs to flow with the flexion of the upper back.

And also if you're really stiff, try not to lift higher than those upper ribs. It's very tempting to go into a rocking position, moving at this pace so be real careful that you're not rolling onto your sacrum. One more and then lower. Now we're gonna do a little bleak ab prep or a hundred prep. As you extend your legs, take your arms to the right side, one, lower down, take it to your left.

So you might have to shift your legs towards the other side, but make sure you're not twisting too much into that lower back. And then the hand, that's away from that side, so here we'll say your right arm as you're moving to the left, that should be the shoulder blade that you're stretching the most. And again, keep going, one more on the other side, bend the knees and rest. Right into the hundred, inhale breath, exhale, lift up, start to pump your arms. Inhale two four, five, exhale.

Now with every exhale, lower those legs just a bit. Inhale, 2, 3, 4, 5, lower 2, 3, 4, 5, Inhale, 2, 3, 4, 5, lower 2, 3, 4, 5, inhale, exhale, 2, 3, 4, 5, inhale. Exhale, now we're gonna go up so it's inhale. 2, 3, 4, 5, a little higher 3, 4, 5, Inhale, 2, 3, 4, 5, lower 2, 3, 4, 5, a little higher 3, 4, 5, inhale, exhale, 2, 3, 4, 5, 2 more sets. Exhale, 2, 3, 4, 5. Last set, those legs should be perpendicular and then take your knees into your chest, stay, and if you can rock up to your feet, great, otherwise just sit up and then stand up, hold it here at a fold over position, toes pointing forward, knee soft, head falls towards the mat, take your time because the blood is gonna distribute so you might get dizzy and if you're dizzy, I need you to march in place just a little bit.

From here, being a little bit more intentful with your squats. So drop it down and back up. So this will allow the blood flow to redistribute all over the body. And I want you to think about your feet, look down at them, make sure they're parallel. Make sure that your knees are tracking over the second and third toe.

As your butt goes back, the arms coming forward is a counterbalance movement. So it'll let you go down a little bit lower. And then I want you to think again, Pilates principles here, pelvic floor, without that pelvic floor, those glutes don't fire properly. And then if you can avoid the squeeze, as tempting as it may be, think more about the lift. Four more, three, two, and let's just bring the bottom down and do little pop pulses here.

Just a little pulses, press, press a little isometric work on the legs, look down at your knees for a moment without moving your feet, can you draw your knees in just a quarter inch and see what difference that makes at your inner thighs. Three, two, now hands to the floor or your mat. Step back, drop your knees, pause, okay? A little forearm plank work now. Drop your forearms to the mat, take a little pause, extend your legs back and hold.

And this might be all you'll be able to do right now so I want you to find your perfect forearm plank, breathing in through your nose and out through your mouth. Quads are strong to hold you in this position. Abdominals and back are working as a team so try to avoid that posterior tilt. See if you can lengthen the spine even in this position. Let's lower the knees for a little pause and then add some variation and so stay with me if you can.

I'm gonna take myself back to this position to plank. and I'm just gonna do a little knee drops up and down. You can rest them all the way and lift them, or you can hover them as a little tease off the mat. Like your body thinks it's coming down and it's not, inhale, exhale. I happen to find forearm plank way harder than regular plank, because I don't have that elbow extension.

And that actually helped me stay here. And then you're closer to the floor so of course, gravity's pulling you down. One more and then drop the knees and then shift back and rest, you don't have to go into a full child's pose, just enough to stretch the shoulders out of that position. I'm gonna bring my body weight forward again and I'm gonna go ahead and drop side to side with my hip. So right hip drops, left hip drops, but I want you to think about the supine spine twist happening here, or not supine spine twist, but spine twist.

You're thinking about the ribs as you drop from side to side. I'm looking at the camera, but I would prefer if you guys look down at your hands, squeezing those inner thighs together for a little bit of support, we're gonna do one more on each side and then again knees drop. And then you shift back for that little stretch. Take it back to your plank and we're gonna work on some side plank. So legs back and if your arms are in good position, you should be able to place the left palm down and slightly shift over, your hand could be on the floor, legs together, your arm can be at the ceiling and even harder yet, your hand could be on the hip, okay?

Let me take it back to my plank. And then I'm gonna go over to the other side carefully and shift. None of this should feel like it's pulling on your shoulder. So careful as you step to one side or shift to one side. I placed my arm down and I rotate instead of grinding up my shoulder joint so be really careful here.

And you could just hold your side plank if you want and then just switch after a few counts. You're going to do one more on each side, and then I'm gonna end facing you all on my left hip and pause. Now my right leg is over my left leg and I'm in this forearm position, which is actually pretty comfortable. I'm gonna get myself out of this comfortable position into an uncomfortable position. So I'm gonna lift up back to side plank, hold, from here, I'm gonna drop the hip and lower the hip.

And my hand is on the floor for little assist. This is your side plank, hip drop. Then I can take my arm up if I like can do the same thing. Up and down. You're working that interior oblique on the bottom side, two more, one more, then I'm going to shift.

My knees came down and I'm gonna go over to the other side. And then again, my hand could be on the floor and now you could see what it looks like from behind here, my arm, up to the ceiling. And then I say, you could see what it looks like, but try to avoid looking at the camera as much as possible. If you're having a hard time understanding my cues, please pause for a moment, listen, and then go back into your exercises so you can maintain that consistency with your cervical spine. And then I'm gonna take it back to the forearm, and then this time I'm gonna have you sit back into your child's pose.

But I'm gonna curl my toes under so that my feet get a little stretched too, which feels really good. Deep inhale through the nose, exhale through the mouth, This time I'm gonna lift to my down dog or what I like to call them upside down teaser, I'm gonna walk back to my hands. I'm gonna roll myself back up and I'm gonna go back into my squats, I'm gonna face you this time so you can see a different view and I'm gonna drop down and up again, letting the blood flow from the feet. Think about your joints of your body, your bones, your skeletal system, the bones of your feet, your ankles, your knees, your hips, and your spine coming down to this neutral position and then the movement of the shoulder joint. Now, if you would like, you can give me little hops and lower, little hops and lower, and they're not super dynamic, we are on bare feet so be really careful and you don't have to do these, but this'll just give you a little variation to up that heart rate just a little bit.

Two more, last one. And then I'm gonna walk to the front of my mat, I'm going to have a seat and I'm gonna do some more abdominal work, starting with a single leg stretch. So roll yourself down onto the mat again, find a comfortable supine position, take your legs to tabletop, give yourself a teeny hug, catch your breath here, if you need to, inhale and then exhale roll up into that ball position, right leg comes in towards their chest. Left toe is lined up with your right toe, you switch. I don't mind you using whatever arm variation that you would like, but the hands should be there to guide the legs so that way you stay center line with your body and just don't pull on your knee cap and then don't do anything to compromise your lumbar spine, your lower back, and just continue here with this single leg stretch, I'm not counting, It doesn't matter, you're just moving.

When you need to rest, then you rest. Now, go ahead and bring the knees in, head and shoulders down, head and shoulders back up, come into that flexion. Now take your body to the hundred position so the legs go out the arms go down. So it's half of your double leg stretch. Bring your knees in.

Now when you shoot 'em out again, lower them just a teeny bit higher and in, two more, a teeny bit higher. Last one, find that double leg stretch, circle the arms around, bring the knees in, we'll do that again. Legs, go out arms, come to the hips. Legs go out, arms go a little higher. Legs go out, arms go a bit higher.

One more then the full circle with the arms now paused. Little pulse is up for 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, Hold on your legs, lift yourself just a teeny bit higher. Grab onto your right calf, Extend your left leg out, feel that stretch, let's pulse the right leg towards you, two times one, two as switch scissor legs, switch, three variations here. One holding onto the legs. Second, hold your head.

Pulse, pulse, pulse, pulse, pulse, pulse, nice, now rotation, rotation and then you can always bend the knee or just stay with the first one. One more on each side. And now the legs to the ceiling, rock yourself up, hold, arms will come across your chest or out to the side, feet flexed spine twist so make sure you're right on top of your sits bones. And if you're super tight in your hamstrings, please bend your knees so you can sit up a little taller, three pulses to the right 1, 2, 3, maintain peripheral vision of the arms. 1, 2, 3. Let's do it as an inhale, inhale, inhale, inhale, exhale to the middle.

Can you grow taller from the ribs? A little taller back to center, and again, one and two and three. One more to the other side. It's 1, 2, 3, back to the middle, I'm gonna flip onto my knees. Yes, and then I'm gonna go to my all fours.

Now hands underneath the shoulders, knees underneath the hips, give me a little cat stretch here to move the spine. Tailbone to head, emphasis on lower back flexion and then emphasis on upper back extension so taking the spine into its opposite position. Now curl your toes under, knees lift to a hover, knees lower. So I want you and to think of this like the knee stretches on the reformer. So your hands are on the bar, the knees are on the carriage, and then you've got very little resistance between the two.

So I want you to think about maintaining that connection from your palm of your hand to your feet. Now, as you lift up to a hover around your spine, scoop the abdominals in, as you straighten your back, simultaneously lower the knees simultaneously lift the knees, find flexion, inhale, find extension lower the knees. So continue here, making sure that your wrist feel comfortable the weight should start, the resistance at the center, right at your belly button. Then once you find that, then you should distribute the weight out towards your feet and then towards your hands, straighten and lower. We're gonna get back to these later, but we're just gonna do one more.

But this time, straighten the back, lift back up to your pike. Palms are down. If you really tighten your heels, I want you to really think about pressing them down into the mat and maybe softening your knees or working on your abdominals to pull your hips towards the ceiling. Now, from here, we're gonna lower the knees down all the way to the mat. That's one, and then take it back up.

Do that twice more, two and three. Now, go ahead and come back and then just hover the knees and then lift back up and then hover and then lift and continue as you take it to your hover, you should feel the core really start to fire if it hasn't already. And we'll just do a couple more, one more and then lower knees down and everyone go ahead and go into your child's pose, stretching the arms out in front of you, relaxing your feet, nice. And then from here a little variation, you're gonna curl those toes back under, lift up into your pike and for sake of just transition, bring your right leg to the ceiling into arabesque, and then shift that leg forward. Now, from here, you're goin to extend that right leg into a little hamstring stretch.

So you're carefully moving your knee from flexion to extension. Try not to put a lot of weight onto your hands, you should be able to lift your hands off the mat. Now go ahead and stay here in your lunge, reach your arms up to the sky and then shift that back leg forward if you need to, otherwise just a little lunge here. I am dripping sweat down the center of my body, hopefully you're doing the same. Always maintain the integrity of what you know about your Pilates form your breath.

Even though we're having fun with movement today, don't try to get your cardio in and then compromise your back, your knees, your neck, and then place the hands back to the mat and then plank to pike to Arabesque again with the left leg, again, sake a transition hold, and then bring that leg forward. And then from here, you'll go hamstring stretch, extend and bend again, extend and bend. And that should feel pretty good, 3, 2, one more, find your lunge, shift that back leg for you up and down with that back knee, now the back knee is loaded. So it's under the hip, but if that bothers your knee, then you need to change the position. And if you're having a hard time balancing, then maybe your legs are too close together, almost like a slalom.

You need to bring them out a little bit wider. Two, one, hands to the floor, now you step your right foot forward. Now be facing the other direction on the mat, I'm gonna have a seat. And from here, I'm gonna lie back down. Now, bridge position, arms are long by your side.

Let's lift the hips up. Once you lift your hips up, find your bridge. It's one of my favorite things to do is to make sure that my bridge is right. Honestly, I probably need a life if I feel like finding my bridge is like my favorite thing to do, but you guys know what I mean. Arms are long, shoulders wide, from here drop your tailbone down and lift it back up and make sure that you're maintaining as much lumbopelvic neutral as you can, so stability there.

I like to visualize grabbing pencils from my glute to my hamstring, just lifting up and down. Now, hold it here at the top, shift the feet, maybe a little bit closer for balance, take your right leg up to tabletop and then just toe tap that right foot, making it so that my hip joint is the only moving joint. Careful here when you're in this position that you're not using your neck to keep your bottom up, it's not it job. Now put the foot down, take the left leg up. And these are the type of positions that if you're not quite understanding my cues, I need you to just stop the exercise and watch for a moment and then continue because it's not really good to turn your neck when you're inverted like this.

Then the foot comes down and then the bottom comes down. Then you lift the hips back up. Then the right leg comes up and then you take that right leg, you reach it to the ceiling and you flex that ankle. And then here comes your shoulder bridge while you lower your leg, flex the ankle up one, and again, add two. You can repeat the first variation if you'd like, or the second variation.

Two more, one more, right foot comes down, left leg comes up. You flex that ankle first then you point lower and lift. And the leg only lowers as much as low as you can maintain your hip level off that mat. Two more, last one, bend that knee, place that foot down, roll your spine down, take your legs up to tabletop. Now from here, heels a little higher, cross your right ankle over your left ankle and then your arms are down by your side, you're gonna give me a little reverse curls.

So again, I'm gonna give you some variations here, reverse curl. As a warning, we are doing the roll over today, okay? So here's your variation of the rollover cross the other way. You should be able to take your arms off the mat as you do the reverse curl. If you can't, then you're probably gonna struggle a little bit or use the wrong parts of your body for the rollover.

I'm actually gonna scoot down a little bit, my position is a little far back on my mat and I'm gonna bring my legs back up. Now I'm gonna go to the roll over, but I'm gonna start perpendicular right over the hip, not at a diagonal. Pressing into my palm I'm gonna curl my tailbone under and then roll over, so now my legs are parallel. I'm gonna roll myself back down and I stop the leg perpendicular. inhale, exhale, Inhale but to start to roll down, exhale, okay?

Just a couple more. Inhale, exhale. Just stay parallel, look at your knees. Scoop as you roll back down, one more. Roll it over, now pause.

This is going to transition into your rolling like a ball, knees come to chest, grab your shins and roll yourself up, hold. This is gonna go back to your rollover, you're gonna roll back, place your hands on the mat, roll over. And then bend your knees, roll up. Now if that doesn't work for you this morning or this afternoon, or whenever you're doing this class, just stick to either the rollover or stick to the rolling like a ball, you don't have to combine the two. Rollover.

Roll up. Nice, keep going, rollover, I always say this is a risky one to take when you're teaching a class because you never know if you could do the roll over. This and open leg rocker, one more, and then place your feet down. We're gonna go back to supine. So you're gonna lie all the way down onto your back, and then you can extend your legs long, reach your arms overhead.

Give yourself a little stretch here, reaching with your fingertips and your toes. And then I'm gonna turn over to my left side so I'm facing you. So if you need to make any adjustments on your mat, you can so that you can see the camera. Now, my forearm is down, my legs are out and I'm actually just going to do my legwork here, but on my forearm, my sideline legwork. So just up and down with that top leg, the bottom leg or the legs in general should be slightly forward so you could see them.

So you're a little bit more of a banana shape. Now as that leg comes up, try to maintain as much parallel as you can with that leg. You can definitely get higher, but I don't want you to work that part of your leg. I really want you to focus on the ab doctor, that outer thigh, okay? Now we're gonna stagger the legs.

Leg goes up a little bit, the bottom comes up, you lower down. Now, you're not stuck here so make any adjustments to your feet that you need to, making adjustments to your shoulders and your neck and a lot of times when the neck's source of fatigue, I'd like to put my hand at the back of my head just so I can push my head back and realign it with my shoulders and it actually seems to work, for me anyway. Now top leg is dead weight for the bottom leg, and I'm just gonna lift the bottom leg up and down, up and down. And again, if you're tight here, you can make that adjustment by just dropping your hip back slightly. I'm actually gonna scoot over just a teeny bit here.

Good, lift and lift and lift. Two more, make sure that top leg is dead weight, that inner thigh's working. Now, can you hover the legs? Can you take your free arm, bring it to your thigh, push into the supporting palm and then lean back as you lift your legs and reach your arms up? Smile, it makes it feel way better.

And then you're gonna lower yourself back down, I'm gonna maintain a hover if I can. I'm gonna do it again, but I'm gonna maintain that hover. By being on your forearm, it does make it a little bit easier to transition into this exercise versus coming directly off sideline. And since we're focusing more on moving, this was a way easier transition to be right here so that's why we started there. Now making it a little bit harder, let's level it up.

Lift your legs up lights lower up and down, one, two, three, and four hold for eight, seven, you could do it. 4, 3, 2, 1, and then bend your knees, come up, give me a little mermaid stretch. Look down at your leg, reach that arm just like you did in the beginning when we were standing reaching just that one arm for a stretch, I'm gonna swing the legs to the other side so I can continue to look at you guys. And then we're gonna do it all over again. I'm gonna get onto my forearm, my legs are long. My legs are slightly forward and then I'm just going to lift and lower that leg.

Up and down, I'm on a high mat, so I have to be really careful as to where I'm laying down. I haven't had that blooper yet where I've fallen off the back of the mat. I just like to lose props here and there so we don't have any today. So I'm gonna try to stay on this mat. Now lift that leg up slightly.

Bottom leg comes to the top, you lower them both down and you pull and you lift and you pull these, your staggered legs. Don't lift that leg up so high that you can't actually reach for it. So just teeny bits and make sure you're not turning your toes towards each other in that medial rotation. Make sure you're coming right from that inner thigh and then lift the leg and again, make those adjustments so that way, when you're lifting your leg, you're not going into your lower back. Nice, I'm gonna fix my head here, a little bit pushing into the Palm.

Oh, that feels so much better. Hand up, you ready for that side teaser? Arm lengthens down the hip. You start to drop your hip as you lift your legs, push into your right palm, lift your legs up and then lower down and you'll notice, one side's gonna be easier than the other. And then lower back down.

And again, I'm gonna keep that hover with my legs so that I challenge myself just a little bit more. Lift it up, inhale and your breath when I suggest inhale, exhale, that's me and so you can switch it just to make sure, in through your nose, out through your mouth, that's holding on the next one, legs lower up and down one, two, three and four, hold eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one, drop those knees and give me a nice stretch. Smile makes me feel good when I smile and then drop the hip back and stretch. And then back to all fours, we're gonna conquer those plodder pet exercises and make them a little bit harder than we did in the beginning. So hands underneath the shoulders, knees underneath the hips.

Give me just a couple of cat stretches here, I'm just being generous. So flex extend. And then let's go ahead and curl the toes under. Let's go back to knees up. So knees up, knees down, elbows point backwards, naval to the spine, neck nice and long.

The knees need to be under the hips. If the knees are too far back and you shift too much weight into your arms, then your shoulders are gonna be doing all of the work. It should be centered. Okay, so now knees lift, you hold. Now you go ahead and take off one foot, point that toe round your spine and tuck that knee into your chest, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, foot comes down, back straightens, knees, come down.

We're gonna do that again, you're gonna round your spine. You're gonna lift your knees up, lift the foot up and then tuck in eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one foot down, knees down and straighten out your back. Alright, we're gonna keep going, we're gonna go onto your bicycle. So knees lift, spine round, right knee into the chest. Now extend that leg behind you, lift your chest and then pull it in.

So you're going from flexion to extension. (exhales) We are gonna go for eight, I am motivated this morning. Three more, two more, last one. Foot comes down, but I'm gonna rest in between each side. Round the spine, exhale, knee, foot comes off the mat knee comes to chest you round, you extend one, two, three, keep going, halfway there, you've got it, elbows back, two more, last one.

And the foot comes down, knee comes down and you rest. I want you guys to go out and drop the forehead to the mat, relax the shoulders we are not done yet, so do whatever you can to stretch the shoulders, if you need to reach in your hands to one side. Good, and then over to the other. And then before we tack a little extension, we're gonna go ahead and curl those toes under and we're gonna level up that Jack Rabbit exercise that we were doing earlier, hands underneath the shoulders, knees underneath the hips. So drop your bottom to your heels and then shift your body weight forward to your hands.

So you're just going forward and back, okay? This is step one. Now lift up into your pike position, hold, stretch the heels. We'll do that again. Knees, come down, you shift forward and back, maintaining neutral.

Do about three repetitions, take it up, drop your head between your arms, drop your heels. Hopefully with each one, you'll get a little bit more mobility in the ankles and also in the wrist. Shift back, now, drop your knees to a hover and then sit your bottom towards your heels. So you need to find that position. We're gonna Jack knife or Jack rabbit back and forth and then you can go back to the other exercise if this is a lot on your wrist, but I want you to think about, again, this like knee stretch variation that's on the mat.

I wonder if you guys can hear my knees crunching, knees crunching, here we go. Two more, now again, for a sake of transition, go on and drop to a pike, take your right leg back up to the ceiling and then bring your right foot forward and then go right up into your lunge again, hold and pulse here again for eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, hands to the mat, back your plank, up to your pike, left leg up, shift it forward, reach it up to your lunge. Same thing for eight, seven, six, four, three, two, hands back down to the mat, now stay. I timed this with my legs, or I decided where to start so that can rotate on this one and go back to that wide stance, that wide squat stance, and just fold it over and then I'm gonna make sure my knees are over my toes as I come back to my plie and then I'm just gonna lower up and down doing some arm swings here, down and up, down and up. And then I should be able to get a little bit deeper on these, deeper than I did in the beginning because my legs are warmed up.

This is the second to last of your transition cardio work. We are gonna go down here back onto the mat and do some extension. One more time and then take your hands back to the mat, extend those legs, shift in whatever direction you would like to on the mat and then walk your feet back and then lower your knees and then we're gonna go into some extension. All right, so now we're going into your pushups or press ups I should say, hands are gonna be by your shoulders, forearms are down nose down to the mat, push the tops of your feet into the mat and then press up and just find that extension. Now, when you're doing this first part, relax your lower half of your body, I call it unpilates your body.

So just think more about putting your body in our position of where we've been working for the last 45 minutes and also where you've probably been in the evening, all night long on your back on your side, sleeping or sitting in a chair or sitting in the car, just do a few more and these are great for your triceps. So enjoy, two more, one more, nice and hold that stretch at the very top. Just breathe in through the nose, out through the mouth. And if that's enough for you, you can go ahead and lie all the way back down. Now I'm gonna bring my elbows and keep them, sorry, I'm gonna keep my elbows by my side.

And now I'm gonna bring my legs together so they're a little bit more parallel and in line with my hips. I'm gonna press my pubic bone down, press the tops of my feet down, and then lift my upper body and hover with those double U arms. Now, I'm gonna press the palms into the mat, lift my eyes, find that extension. I'm gonna maintain a connection through with my back line of my body, my posterior line. And then as I lower myself down, I'm gonna hover the arms and catch up.

I've done this a few times in the series, but I've prepped you a little bit more, but if you've been keeping up for seven classes, you should be able to follow me with these swan exercises here two more, last one and then lower back down and pause. Now take those arms way out in front of you and then float those arms legs up. So my arms are on the mat for starters, my pubic bone is pressing down, I wanna swim my legs. The swimming is gonna come from the hip, not from the knee, not from the ankle like you were in flippers, okay? So I want you to stay stable.

Now let's take the right hand off the mat, bring it all the way back to your right hip, look over that right shoulder, continue to swim. Bring that right arm back to the mat, bring the left arm back. Come into that extension with rotation. I try as much as I can to move through an entire mat class in all planes of motion and then back. So here's your extension rotation and then bring the arms back, pause for a moment.

Float the arms if you wish and swim inhale, 2, 3, 4, 5, exhale, 2, 3, 4, 5, inhale 2, 3, 4, 5, exhale, 2, 3, 4 20, we're going to 50, 3, 4, 5, exhale, 2, 3, 4 30, inhale. Exhale, 2, 3, 4, 40, inhale. Exhale, 2, 3, 4 50, pause. Curl your toes under, place your hands under your shoulders. Find your plank, hold leg, pull, right foot comes up twice.

One, two, flex that ankle, pull that foot down. Inhale, inhale, exhale, inhale, inhale, exhale. Continue lift, lift, lower lift, lift lower. We're almost there, hips are square, shoulders over the wrists, one more pause. Take your left hand now, bring it underneath your right, flip over, find your leg pull front now, leg pull back, excuse me.

Let's drop the hips down and then lift the hips back up. And we're gonna start with a little prep. Bottom down, bottom up, hinging at the hips. Inhale, exhale. Now we can add your leg.

So as you lift, lift your right leg up, lower down, alternate, inhale, exhale. Two more on each side, one more, last one, hold, walk your feet towards your hips, rock forward, place your hands back onto the floor and stand up. Now that's gonna roll up here, one vertebrae at a time, and I am now gonna find my squats again. So I'm gonna turn towards you and find those squats. So when you stay on that from being on the floor, it's nice to maybe move around a little bit so the blood flows, and so we are going to add a little squat variation here, and this will be your last set.

So I'm gonna go back to my jumps, up and down, up and down. Now I'm gonna add almost like a jumping jack, legs a little bit wider, legs close together. So it'd be like if you were on your jump board on the reformer, inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale for four, which is the magic Pilates instructor number, two, one, I'm gonna land on my legs together and I'm gonna march in place. I am gonna step off of my high platform and then finish off where I started on the floor. So just breathe and now hold steady.

I apologize for my heavy breathing. I haven't done one of these in a while and you're gonna rock or swing from side to side like you did in the beginning. And hopefully beside your heart rate being elevated, everything is moving a little bit better, it feels a little bit more fluid. Just a couple more and then we're gonna go back to those nice side easy lunges. Little stretch.

Back to the middle, a little stretch back to the middle, continue. We are trying to get our heart rate down now. So careful on your movement. It's starting to come down, other side. One more and then keep your legs wide.

And then a few of these movements here in plie, second position, two more, last one, fold forward, place your hands on the floor and then shift from side to side, whatever does not yet feel relaxed, try to relax and breathe into that. Let the neck go, let the tension go. Feel really proud of yourself right now that you completed this class, that you got a little bit of that cardio in there that maybe you're ready to settle down for the night, have a glass of wine, or maybe you're ready to tackle the day. Let's bring the feet together and then interlace the fingers behind your back so that you can really stretch the shoulders, maintain that position with your hands as your roll up and then bring the right arm out in front of you, hook with the left, give it a little stretch and then the other side and hook. And then you gonna do that one more time as you reach your arms up towards the sky, push the hips forward, open up that front body, hands together, hands to heart center, and you guys are all done today.

Thank you so much for joining me, I hope that you were able to do most of those exercises. All of my classes are set up so that you can layer and that everyone can join and then you can continue to add some of those exercises on as you get stronger, or maybe you're just having a better day. Thank you so much for joining me.