Reformer with a Twist

Hi everyone. Amy Havens here at Pilates Anytime. I am excited to be here back in the room, back in front of the window, back with crew that are amazing and teaching for you all. So Thank you for being here and joining me. Today's reformer class is reformer with a twist.

So we have some rotational components going on here. One caveat before we start, you may wanna do a little bit of pre warmup or stabilization for yourself if you know you have some sacroiliac thing, is I'll just say things. Maybe a little bit of tweak now and again, try to warm up a little bit before because we are rotating quite a bit today. Okay. So let's get started.

I'm on balanced body reformer of course. We're gonna start with one red spring and we'll start seated. And I sit a little closer to the foot bar end if you tend to be shorter. I'm about 5'3, this is where I usually sit up for this. A little taller you can scoot this way.

It has to do with leg length and arm length. Okay? So we're gonna open things up. Quite literally by opening up the hips, the sides of the hips in particular. And let's go with that.

So the bottom leg is the one that's closest to the foot bar that's crossed underneath. Top plate is right on over this way. And just settle in. And settling in can be uncomfortable, especially if you feel a little limited in mobility and flexibility in your hips. But that's what this is for.

Okay. And so as you just hold your hands around your knee, let's just settle in, take a couple of breaths. I'm a diaphragmatic breather. Hopefully most of the time these days really trying to breathe that diaphragm down, let it rebound up as naturally as it can. We all could probably continue to focus on breathing into our back low rib cage.

So keep that in mind. Inhale again, and then just exhale. So see if you're even on your sit bones. That's the goal right here. If you're not, you may want your hand on the bar to kinda help you there.

I'm gonna put that there. Let's lift this hip. I want you to lift your hip, okay. Or that half of your pelvis, and then set it back down. So right away, this is gonna challenge your central axis awareness.

And I would love for you to feel that. That what I mean is when we lift a hip we're really trying to keep in our containers, right? This cylinder of posture, head to tail. So when you lift your hip if you feel like you're already shifting off center we're gonna minimize that. We're trying to minimize that.

So twice more. If you pick up your hip without shifting your ribs that's more like it. Okay. Inhaling to lift the hip and exhale to stretch the hip down and pause right there. Okay, adding on.

We'll take this outside hand behind the head, aim your elbow in a place that feels good for your shoulder, push the carriage away, and as we push side bend toward the foot bar. Do your best to keep your hip down on the mat. Let's breathe in here. Use an exhale breath to come home. We'll do that four times total.

Inhale up the spine to bend the spine to the side. That's the inhale and exhale to return. And again, checking that diaphragmatic breathing, trying to fill up the side back of your back. Keeping that hip down the best we can. Okay.

We're gonna add on now. This is our fourth one, you're gonna stay here. Okay. I like my hand, the top hand in a different place. I'm gonna put it right around this knee.

Okay. Hip lift again. So let's breathe in lift that hip, and as you exhale set the hip down, try to really stretch the side of your waist down. Inhale and exhale. You're probably gonna feel a couple of things.

Contraction on this side, yes. Deep stretch on this side, yes. Inhale, exhale, set that hip down. Are you feeling the stretch around your hip? Yes, of course.

And then all the way down and then that's just come on in. Okay. So adding onto that, take that hand right behind your head again, breathe in, push away keeping the hip down, inhale and exhale side bend, keeping the hip down. Rotation, breathe in first. Here it is.

The first time we're rotating. I want you to think it's your rib cage turning inside the shoulder girdle frame. Right. So really turning the rib cage, and then returned to facing front. Inhale, exhale, twist.

Kinda nice press with that single arm and return. Okay. We're gonna add onto that. So you get the idea for that side, bend and twist, and then come back to the front. Now this feels really yummy.

Take the hand off the head and reach over you, take the arm behind out and behind your back. I'm gonna put my hand behind my back, feel that nice side neck stretch, and then come all the way in. Okay. So that's a long pattern we're gonna do it twice more. Inhale here, exhale up and over, hip down, exhale twist.

(sighs) Returned to face front breathe in, and reach. The arm is gonna come all the way up and behind, hand is in the small of the back. Try to open that collarbone and find your way in. And one more time and inhale, exhale, bend. Rotation, (sighs) Return to face front.

Trying to keep that hip down hand is gonna leave the head and go up and over, big port de bras, big arc of the arm, feel that nice long neck stretch and find your way all the way in. Delish, I hope feels good for you too. I have to turn around now. So I can't see you. Here we go.

Just turn yourself around. Again, it's the leg that's closest to the foot bar that's gonna be the tucked under leg. The top leg then you wrap around the front of you. And for this first moment as you're settling in, you're trying to get your evenness on the sit bumps. It's okay.

If you're not this is here to help you. You can hold on. Hands in front of the knees first. Just feeling that settling in. Remember you're trying to inhale and keep this part of your back wide not arching forward.

Okay. I did start with my hand on the bar. So I'll do that here. The hip lift staying in your central cylinder axis. So we lift our hip and we exhale, set the hip down you're stretching it.

Inhale picking it up, and exhale setting it down. So even in these first little up and down moves we're trying not to rotate the spine or the ribs, right? So we're really going up at this vertical, inhale, lift, exhale, lower, I did six, I know. Inhale. You're using your back muscles to help lift your hip, and down.

One more lift and exhale down. Okay. Now we're trying to keep it down, guys. Take your hand behind your head, but your elbow and the place that feels easiest for you to organize your shoulder and we push. And we're breathing into side bend.

And exhale to come back to center. Inhale, push, open the ribs, keep the hip down, and center. We know there's one side of our body that already feels more open. You're seeing mine. That's okay.

Last one. We're gonna stay here and add spinal rotation. Oh, we're adding hip lift. This hand is gonna go around the knee. Okay.

So lift the hip again and exhale set the hip down. Three more. Inhale, lift the hip, exhale, set the hip down. You're still pressing strongly with the arm on the bar. Inhale, stretch and get that hip down once more and exhale.

And now we've got to come back in and add on. So the hand will go behind the head again, shoulders organized. Lateral flection, here we go. Press away, inhale to the side, bend and exhale come all the way in. Inhale, exhale, over and inhale, exhale to come in.

Keeping that hip down. Oh, it feels so good. And now we'll add into the rotation here, everybody. So starting with the push away, let's take an exhale as we rotate. So it's the rib cage rotating kind of in front of the scapula.

You can really feel that keeping that hip down, return. Just do again. You got to really keep pushing with the arm on the bar, keep your scapular wide and then return. Okay. So we're about to add into that.

Let's start all over. I'll do two more cycles. And we've been to the side. Now we took that arm and we reach it up. Okay.

Keep that hip down, keep that arm strong. This hand goes behind the back, feeling that nice long neck stretch and then come all the way back in. Let's go for one more round, arm goes behind the head, inhale and exhale press. gonna rotate, inhale, exhale to the side, add that yummy reach of the arm. Circle really go through space with that arm, hand behind the back.

Adjust that collar bone a little bit. Feel how, what is when you pull it back a tiny bit, and then come all the way in. I feel like we did one more actually. Here we go, and side bend, rotation. Derotate, arm reaches, yeah.

And all the way around. Hand behind the back and all the way in. Okay. How do your hips feel now? Hopefully pretty stretched out.

I know mine do. Okay, moving on. You know me well, nothing is really ever the same. So we're taking away some spring now. No spring.

So there's no spring on. Wheel yourself back , please. Sit at the front edge of the mat about a foot length away. Okay. Arms long, sitting very tall on the sharpest points of your sit bones.

Take a breath and let's flex our spine to roll back. Trying to keep the carriage relatively still, it may move a little. I'm gonna put my hands here, take your time to roll down. Okay. So while you've rolled down, yeah, our carriage just stayed still.

What I wanted to do here and it's okay. I'm gonna just adjust my head. Rest a teeny tiny bit. I'm gonna just take it all the way flat everybody. Do what you need to do.

That feels better for my ponytail, my bun. Okay. The objective here is feel your rib cage and your back position as neutral as you can be. I don't want us to be arching here. And I know some of us have glutes that are pretty developed that might get in the way of that.

You might be the person who has to tilt your pelvis back a little bit to bias that. But also use your tummy, pull it in, try to get back down. Okay. You're also probably feeling some stretch in the hip flexors. That's the goal.

Now moving the carriage. You're moving it backward to try to extend the knees a little bit. Keeping your pelvis flat ribs down, feet down. How is that feel? And now use your hamstrings to come back toward your knees.

Only three more. Let's inhale as we push backward. Fill up your back. Move your diaphragm backward, right? Or fill it up to the back.

Exhale coming in, inhale press away. Ideally we could maybe get the knees straight with the feet flat on the floor. We'll see. Elongate, elongate, elongate, keep integrity here. Exhaling in, only one more.

Using your hamstrings. Part of that body, open the front of those hips and exhaling in. See if you can feel for about 90 degrees of knee flection. Okay. Hands by your sides.

Bring a knee to a table top. Breathe in, exhale, the other knee to a tabletop, no springs holding us at the foot bar. Inhale, chest lift now, just feel goal controlled, move with control. Of course, we're gonna do the hundred. I want you to take your legs extended out.

Maybe hovering right above the foot bar. So you have to pump with control. No too vigorous, nothing too vigorous. Okay. (exhales sharply) (inhales deeply) In, ex.

Inhale, exhale. Breathe into your diaphragm. Remember it's a 360 muscle. It's like a parachute. Use it.

(exhales sharply) 70. (exhales sharply) 80. You're just still real still, right? I hope so. And one more in two, three, four, five, and ex, two, three, four, five Hold it.

Bringing your knees and with control take your hands behind your head. You might have to narrow your elbows and put your head down. Breathe in, and here we go. Chest lift. Let's explore just a little bit of basic rotation here and rotate toward your right.

Give me a tiny, through center. Exhale towards your left and center towards your right. So you have to move with deep concentration and control. We have no springs keeping us held stable on the track. You're in control of it.

One more each side, center. Rotate that spine, and center. Okay, everybody. Arms long, let's reach those toes of the foot bar. Let's roll up.

Roll all the way up. I got it. I've got it. I've got it, I've got it. But I wanna try it one more time.

'Cause I might be able to get it a little more smoothly. We'll find out. Rolling down. So my feet are on the bar. I'm using my hamstrings also.

That's part of what that was intended for. Come on girl. I did it. When I put my hands at my shins and just hold on. Stretch, stretch, stretch.

Stay on that edge. (sighs) Good. Okay, let's roll up and add some springs. Oh boy. Well, when I practice that, I nailed it.

Usually when I'm here I don't nailed it this well. Two red springs. We're gonna move into some footwork in some legs. Okay. So everybody come on down.

To red springs. Pilates V to start, take a look, make sure you're right in the center of the bar. Ready? Your hamstrings are warm. Your abdominals are warm.

We're just gonna do eight regular extensions, nothing fancy. only two springs. I don't wanna overcook our legs. Just keep working with your center, keep working with your breath. Four more.

Sometimes the lighter springs allow us to feel like we're getting more of the lengthening. At least for me it does. Inside my body. Okay. Last one, easy breezy.

Then we're gonna just do eight with heels wide. Now there's not as lot as tension here. So you may have to really work to get yourself back in. Pelvis stay level, breathe into your sides and back and your belly. Let the diaphragm move.

Okay, four more, and we breathe in, breath out. Pull those legs up long, right up into pelvis, long through your waist, and last time. Okay. Moving back to the center of the bar, just peak up set the balls of your feet on the center with about an inter two of space between, push the carriage out. So we open up the session here in the class with a little hip stretch.

We're gonna do another one. You've seen me do this before. Take your right leg or a leg and cross your ankle above your knee on your thigh. Okay? Just in that sometimes the pelvis gets a little bit out of line.

So just take a peek. Hopefully it didn't swivel to the left. Just pick it up. And now bend your opposite knee, come toward the foot bar. The intention is to have you feel the stretch here.

Some of you will really feel it. Some of you might be like no hold up. It's okay. It's good for your hip joints. It's good for your back.

Now you'll see that I'm trying also to get this thigh flatter when I push out. But not to sacrifice pelvic neutral. Okay. Just one more time. Pushing all the way out and all the way in.

We're gonna add to that but let's push out first. Now, instead of this leg being open, I want you to cross the knees completely. You may feel like, Ooh, I just feel some nice contraction in my adductors and then bend the knees. So my knees are really hooked together. I'm taking my top leg and pressing down on the other and the bottom kinda pulling up into the wedge here.

It's really nice adduction work. Okay. And here. So I just have my hands on my pelvis so that I'm behaving, keeping myself as neutral as I can. Press.

Let's take twice more inhale as we lengthen back. So there's a little bit of twist going on in the pelvis. Not a whole lot, but tiny, tiny bit. Okay. Now I want you to press out again.

This time you'll stay. Let's allow and move this hip, now this side, and I'm gonna take my hands out of the way. Please do that. Put your hands around your shoulder, rest. So what I'm doing is gonna lift the hip and we lift the hip and we lift, now keep doing this as I chat.

It's not a rib push. Ribs shouldn't push forward, right? It's your hip, you're lifting up off the mat. Just like you lifted the first exercise. This is slightly different kind of lift.

Four more. I'm going up and over like a little rainbow arc. Okay, last two. And last one. And then take that leg right up to the ceiling, get a good flex and point and then step.

Check it out, hopefully you can stand side by side and we're gonna start that all on the other side. Okay. So ankle over knee, open that hip as much as you can, making sure you're doing your best to keep your hip centered. You're not letting your hips get scoot to the side. Okay.

Bend the knee to come in. Woo-hoo! And inhale it out. Try to let the thigh go flatter and exhaling center. Another kinda self Q you may wanna choose. You can see what I'm doing here.

I've got my hands side of pelvis, holding it like a two lines this way so I don't get naughty and push my hip to the side. Okay. One more time, fully back and forth, inhale. There she goes, exhaling in. Okay.

So layer two you push away. Now we do all the way across. Woo! You may feel those adductors. And bending, press, inhale. So again, I'm really thinking, allowing my top leg to press down on the other, on this movement.

But when I bend I'm thinking bottom leg pushes up against that. Top leg presses down, bottom knee presses up, two more. I'm on the verge of deep connection. I'll call it that rather than a cramp. Okay, we're gonna hold.

Now we lift the hip. Hands go away. Okay. You're lifting this hip up and over, and up and over. Try not to push out the tummy or the ribs.

Think of a little rainbow arch. Up and over. The standing leg on the bar is parallel. Four more now, and over. Is for intended to get your low back a little bit on the stretch.

Okay. Toe to the knee lift, flex point and stand. Okay. Come on in everybody. We have one more little footwork pattern here.

Single leg, very leggy, straight leg over the bar pointed, parallel pushing leg. We're gonna do our little passe developpe. Love these. Flex both ankles, point both. Reach and touch that bar.

Bring it up. And then in and out. Three more only, breathe big. Flex and point. Reach for the bar, lift and in.

Nice and continuous, flex and point, touch four the bar, lift, bend and stretch in last time. Reach and in. Okay. Left leg is the long leg over the bar, right leg is already to press. Level pelvis, here we go.

Bend and stretch. You have a flex of both feet, point of both, reach and touch the bar, lift a straight leg up, both knees bend and long leg over the bar. Just continually breathe in and out. My timing might not be matching yours, that is fine. Inhale.

(inhales deeply) (exhales sharply) One more pattern. Okay. And flex and point, touch the bar, lifted up. Both knees bend and in. Okay.

Just put your feet on the bar for a minute and just kind of wiggle the hips. Just loosen things up. All right. Now the next series is for some more abdominal work. So I'm still on to red springs.

Let's all pick up our straps from behind her shoulder rests, wiggled down away from the shoulder blocks here just so that you don't feel like you're jammed up. Okay. Yeah. I learned this years ago. I don't remember who, but I would like to give them credit, but I've shortcut the name as mofo.

Just so you know. It's a lot of ab work. Let's take a breath. Come up to the a hundred. Now, stay there.

Open those legs, reach your hands through, close the hundred, come back down. Ready? Again, it's an exhale. (exhales sharply) Exhale, exhale, and lower. Last two.

We don't need many reps. And the open close of the legs is parallel. Two and three. Now curl up to a hundred again. Only the arms come up and down.

As high as you can go. Three more. Try to stay with integrity of your back's position on the mat. Everybody come on down. Take your arms up out to a T position.

Come up to a hundred. Arms will come to the side of the body. Curl up. Arms will go open, close. Open, close.

Three more. (inhales deeply) (exhales sharply) Two. And then we'll take some arm circles with some of this chest lift addition to it. So everybody gets to come down. Let's bring our arms straight up.

We'll do three each direction, regular arm circle pattern, down first, chest left. Keep the arms or the legs out. Take the arms out to a T and then lower yourself down. Curl up, Keep the legs as you open the arms, bring them in as you lower your chest. last it's time and open, three the other way and open.

Pull strong. Arms to body. Open, pull strong, arms to body, last one. And open and close and come in and take your feet to the bar and rest just for a moment. Feeling good.

Okay. We're moving on. We're gonna put our feet in the straps. So this is how I like to do this. And this is really, really great because these straps are nice and sturdy.

If you have the wimpier ones, do the best that you can. I love to have us reach the straps toward the feet and put the feet in at the same time. Okay. That this way your sacrum stays even. There's more on that later.

Okay. Come on, stretch your legs. So we're gonna do some leg arcs and then into some circles. This is great for inner thigh, outer thigh, internal rotation, external rotation. Legs are a kind of a halfway point, turned out heel to heel.

Open the legs, you're gonna arch the legs up, keep the heel to heel here. Hopefully at 90 degrees to your body, open arch down heel to heel. Three more of those. Pretty easy. (exhales sharply) (inhales deeply) (exhales sharply) Not everything has to be so intense, right?

This is rotation. It's just external rotation in the hips. It's not spinal rotation. Now there's internal rotation of the femurs, puts your toes to toes. Let's stay internally rotated, arch the legs out around and touch at the top.

Open, arch down around touch at the bottom. Three more there. Work to keep internal rotation. It's tough. It's important.

Yeah, we don't always do turnout in parallel. We've got to turn in sometimes. Strengthen those, keep them balanced. One more time. And now stay at the bottom, stay internally rotated.

We're gonna vary this up a little bit. So as we open come up externally rotate, which puts heels to heels, open as we come down is back to toe to toe. Okay. Three more of those. We open around heel to heel, open down toe to toe.

Feel free to arch the legs wider if you wish. I'm being a little modest about that because they wanna stay in my muscle work and not go just to the flexibility work. That's my personal choice. Holding here, reversing it, start heel to heel. As we come up it will be towed to toe at the top.

As we come down heel to heel. Should really feeling that ball and socket in the hips. Twice more here and around, woo! Yep. Last pattern. Yes.

And then stay at the bottom. You should be an external rotation. Okay. Now everybody come to parallel legs. We all know leg circles.

I don't always do them the same way. Let's start at a 90 degree angle, legs perpendicular to you, actively work your hamstrings. We'll do leg circles, we'll do one down circle and then one out circle, alternating. So we're coming down. Here's that external rotation.

Out around. Come up to parallel pause. Go the other way. Open in parallel, externally rotate come down, parallel to come up. Down again, round and together, open, around and together.

Four more times. Just alternating the circles of the legs. (exhales sharply) Three. Hopefully this little pattern feels good in your legs. Feeling some adductor connection, and last would all the way around.

And from here you can just bend the knees into your frog position, rest for a moment. We're about to go into some up and over the shoulders, excuse me, some short spine. And a little bit of short spine work. So just double-check that your headrest is back down flat and a little bit of gap between you and the blocks. Okay.

So there's, we're gonna get into some more rotation. Or identifying some one side of our back than the other. So if you start here, parallel legs, not quite tabletop because the straps might get onto top of your shins, but they're about. Aim your knees to your right or left side. I'm gonna go to my right side which is here.

And as I aim my knees to the right, I am gonna roll up the right side of my spine to get to that right shoulder blade. Oh, that feels so good. I feel the stretch mainly on this side of my back. Okay. Roll down that side of your back.

Once you're at the bottom center your pelvis. Left side, knees go to the side, roll up the left side of your back, just pause when you get there, take a breath. My feet are cramping and roll back down. And when you're down we're gonna center. Let's do it again.

Right side, roll up. Inhale, exhale, roll down, center at the bottom, knees left, roll up left. Inhale, exhale, come down. Okay. Couple more patterns here.

So right side again first. When you're at the top, bring your knees to center, roll down the center. You see that change of pattern. So now we go to the left, roll up the left, center and come down the middle. Each side again.

We go to the right, inhale. Exhale. Just let the breath be fluid. Don't get too caught up on, you know where it is. Just use it.

It should be your support. Maybe there to help create space in you. Okay. Now the third iteration is around the world. This is great.

So you take the knees to the right, roll up to the right shoulder, at the top swivel all the way over to the left. Come down the left. At the bottom of center your hips, go to the left, roll up the left. At the top center to the right come down. We'll do each side just one more time.

Hopefully you're feeling some of the muscles that associate with spinal rotation. They're in the inner thighs. And your obliques. And center, here's the last one guys. Take it to the side or roll it up, come to the center all the way through to the right, roll yourself down, center.

And then I want you to straighten your legs forward. Just feel centered for a moment. Take two big breaths. (exhales deeply) One more time. And then we'll step out of our loops by doing both feet at the same time.

There we go. So the tension comes on the feet at the same kind of velocity and leaves the feet at the same. All right, everyone. Hope you're feeling great. Let's come on up off our back.

Now I'm gonna have us come into some long box work and I like a lighter spring for this. I like a blue. Feel free to go red if you'd like to. And we can take our foot bar down also for this sequence. Okay.

So, and then you'll get your box on. So going to this one here and then the long box. And I like the blue spring, I don't know if it's that. I just like lighter with this. I tend to have some shoulder recruitment in my upper trapezius.

So if you know, that's you too you don't have to always do the heavier red spring. You can go blue. Okay. We're challenged on the heavy one and not over recruit your traps. Okay.

Head rest can come up, doesn't need to be down. I wanna sell the lie on a box. And I like to position myself so that my underarms are right in the corners of the box. So they have quite a bit of my spine being supported by this box. We're gonna do some pulling straps and a little bit of combo with this, reach your hands way up, probably past the brackets and just start with yourself luxuriously kind of rounded over the box.

We know the first thing that happens is scapular movement. So we're going for it. But I wanna have you think of spinal extension. Spinal extension, drawing those arms back, bend your elbows through a little kickback, extend. Now from here, open your arms to a T position, close the T and then straight arms bring you all the way down.

So it's a nice little combination. Start with spinal extension. Think swan, right? That swan is allowing to drag your arms back. Stay lifted, little kickback, tricep work.

Feel the external rotation, start the upper arm. Bring your arms out to a T. Close that T, return your arms all the way down. Okay. Two more patterns.

Breathe as it makes sense to breathe for you. (inhales deeply) (exhales sharply) (inhales deeply) Keep your collarbone expanded, your chest reaching for the ropes. Open, close. Using those strong back extensors come all the way down. Everyone, one more time.

Start with an extension of the spine. The arms are kind of second. Stay there, bend, and stretch. Open to that T, close T, arms come all the way down. Okay.

We're gonna work at T again but from sitting, let's try a cute little transition. Okay? Hold on to the straps, put them here. Open those legs, bring yourself up. Hey, pretty easy.

Take yourself around and put your legs, bend your knees and put your feet down. Okay? So here you can sit using the straps. I'm gonna do that here. If you wanna hold out on the front of the bracket, that's fine as well.

I want you to think about something. If you know yourself to be a little bit protracted in your scapula naturally, let's just retract a little bit. If you're already retracted in your scapula, you're gonna need to widen your scapula. Okay? And now let's work on strong movement here.

Really beautiful posture of your back. (inhales deeply) (exhales sharply) Not thrusting the ribs. That was three. I'm gonna maybe take us about two or three more. Really good strong shoulders and back muscles.

Postural muscles, one more. Okay. We're gonna rotate that a little bit. So take yourself into a little mini roll back. Just a teeny, teeny bit.

Now I'm gonna rotate toward you. Open my arms and do that same T pool. It's quite a bit different when you're on that rotation. Face the center, go the other way. We're gonna repeat that everybody.

(exhales deeply) (inhales sharply) (exhales deeply) Just keep on going. Curl back a little more if you'd like. Yep. Feelings some sweat, one more each direction, but then we're gonna do it again, starting the other way. Because sometimes we connect differently.

When we start in our favorite side. Let's take a breath. Go at it again. So curl it back, I'm gonna go toward the window now. Pull, inhale, return.

Rotate through the thoracic spine. Trying to keep my belly in for more. Exhale, pull, and center. Pull and center. Last one.

Oh my gosh. Okay. And come all the way to the top. Now we put our straps down, Thankfully. Good.

We're getting there. We're gonna come around and lie on our tummy, on the box, still the blue spring. Now we're gonna work on the rear end a little. Okay. I want you to stack your hands, your forearms, rest your head slightly on your forearms.

Where am I in relationship to the box. Is kind of almost the base of my ribs here. I know some of your boxes are different size and height. It shouldn't feel like it's cutting you in the ribs. You can always move back or forward to make it comfortable.

Start with your legs in parallel, good shoulder connection, bend your knees. As you bend your knees, you're gonna pause right there, and flex your ankles. Okay. Press your thighs up any amount. Keep your heels together and pry your knees open.

We're gonna take the legs and extending out kind of a grasshopper variation and then bringing the legs together. Ready? Pull them in, flex the feet. Lift the thighs, pry the knees open. My heels are still together.

Extend and bring him in. Twice more. Remember breathe where you feel you need to support. Okay. (inhales deeply) (exhales sharply) (inhales deeply) And close.

Let's reverse it. So we open, bend, heel to heel, parallel, extend the legs straight. Turn out, open the legs, lift and bend, heel to heel. You've seen that already, parallel and lower. Open, lift.

Bring your heel to heel close and down. One more time. Open, lift, bring heel to heel, stay right there. Stay right there. Hover your head off of your hands, stay right there.

You could also put your hands on your platform, I'm gonna go with that. That gives me a little bit more support to use. This is sea horse, I learned this with Kara, from Irene Dowd. on the mat, but I'm putting it here. Okay.

I'm gonna use my left glute, my left hamstring set, my left back and lift that above the mat or the box in this case and center. Now this right side. Hip extension, spinal extension with rotation. It's pretty intense. Just one more each side.

Okay. Keep your thighs up, rotate, you can't go too far. I don't want you to fall off the box and center. Last one used that posterior hip and rotate and center, rest. Okay.

We're done with us. Come up off your tummy, put the box inside over position. Get your springs all set up. We're gonna do some side over. So that means a strap comes up.

I like all the springs on, so I don't move this around. And you can put this bar here. Okay. Just so it's out of your way. So I'm calling to ask us to sit on the side of hip.

Not this way. That's fine too. Let's make it harder. So I'm sitting on the side of that hip. I'm gonna hook my foot in my strap, the other knee behind or the other foot behind my knee.

And I'm just gonna lean out for a moment. Lean and trust the strap. Okay. So now a lot of us that tend to pop our ribs, we're really good at it in the side overs. Bring the package of your ribs back, lean over, take your bottom hand around you, top hand around the shoulder.

Lean, pull down, breathe in, have some fun. Come on, exhale up, and down, up. Let's do like six of these. I'm thinking about going long, not just up. Long and down.

Four more. Let's go for eight, over sudden, three more and two. Good. And our last one all the way up, other side. Okay.

Twist it around. We could have added some thoracic extension there. I decided not to or thoracic rotation. Okay guys, so hook your foot, bottom arm is wrapped around, putting it on your hip. Top hand is on the shoulder.

Getting very long, bring your rib cage into your back. Here we go. Over and yeah. Thinking of lengthening in both directions. Reaching out.

Four more and over. (exhales sharply) (inhales deeply) (exhales sharply) Last two. (exhales sharply) Last one, and then everybody come up. Great work, right? Okay.

We're gonna come into a little bit of flexibility work now, some hamstring stretches. We do not need all of the springs. Probably one red is sufficient. So drop yourself down. Maybe a green if you want but I'm gonna do one red.

Okay. Step up on your reformer. Don't worry about the bar that I see. I'm gonna put my left foot back on the platform, heel on the foot bar. Other foot here on the mat.

Just place your hands on the box. You're gonna find out where you need to put your hands. Let's just start in an beautiful lunging stretch. Okay? Knee over ankle.

Nice long extended spine, some support from your extended hip long. Okay. Now work a little bit of extending the front knee, and bend. Two more times. And extend, trying to keep a relatively flat back.

It's relative, extend. Now keep that leg straight. Here we go. Let's come into seeing what we've got with two straight legs. You'll probably have to move your elbows a little bit.

Keeping those legs straight going forward. You may surprise yourself and be able to go further than you might in other splits series. And out, and in. I want you to stay in for just a moment. Adjust your hands back here.

Hold onto this. Put your forehead really close to the mat or the box, send your sitting bones nice and high, and then let's see what we've got. We're gonna take the carriage forward again. Try to keep your elbows more on the box and just hold that. Feeling the stretch in the hamstrings may be in a different place and then come back in.

And you're upside down. How fun is that. Some of my yogi friends have probably going into a headstand right now. That is not gonna happen with just me. But you probably could if you trusted yourself.

Okay. And let's go ahead and switch everybody. Maybe I should practice that. Okay. So we've got a ball of a foot here.

We've got a heel there, we've got a nice 90 degree here. We're back into this basic form of lunge. Just take some deep breathing, long out your head, out your tail, support the back hip extension with some glute work, right? And then we're going three knee extensions. And extend and bend.

Holding there. Go a little further. Let's try to square the hips. And now two straight legs. You're gonna come in.

Your elbows will probably soften a little bit and extend. Kind of follow the box with your eyes and follow looking back to the supporting link. And then one more of each, and in. Okay? Now let's adjust the hands, get the elbows down, drop your forehead down.

Try to keep her hips square, and we're trying, and then we're gonna move that carriage as far as our muscle flexibility and length will allow. Here, right? And then carriage in. Couple more. Extend.

(sighs) Like a little nice rush of blood to the brain. Healthy, healthy stuff. Come all the way in and then bend your knees. And you guys, we're gonna finish like that. Why don't you just to sit on your box though for a minute facing forward and just sit still.

I've been trying to incorporate this in all of my practices now. Just sit still after all of the movement, let your body come back to baseline. Say Thank you to yourself. We're all doing a fantastic job. Thanks.

I had so much fun. I'll see you next time guys. Bye bye.