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Hi. I'm Lesa Logan. And today, we're doing an advanced reformer workout that is actually going to teach you some skills for an arm back connection and then challenge them and some overhead and advanced exercises. Feel free to leave anything out that you're not ready for and replace it with something that you are and get ready to move. You'll need 1 light weight for the very beginning, and you can use that again if you choose not to use the straps. Let's get started.
So we're gonna grab our long box I love to do this as a warm up anytime I'm going to connect my arms to my back and really focus on that because it really does just like Get you in right where you need to right away. So 2 to 4 springs for stability. And when I take your short box or your long box rather and put it on the edge of your carriage, And then where you can face towards the well or towards the foot bar. So I'm gonna start facing the well with my shoulders at the edge of the box. And then the weight in the hand that's to the side you're lying on.
Arm Reach Forward
This other hand is gonna go on the carriage just to keep me from zigzagging or falling and then inner thighs up. Then we're gonna reach our arm forward, pull that there, feel your shoulder come on your back, and lower it down. Do that again. Reach forward hold and lower. 3 more of these. When people tell me they struggle with going overhead, It's often not what they think.
It's often that they don't have a strong upper back to stand on. So this series is gonna help us get their last one. And then take your arm back, hold it, open your collar bones, and then lower it back down. Again, reach It's like your pull strap. It's like a chest expansion, straight wrists, and lower. And, again, reach And down. Last two. If you're like, Leslie, my arm is shaking already with this lightweight, I must be so weak. Wrong.
Arm Reach Back
It's hard. It's a really tough connection, and then the lighter the weight, the easier it is to find it. Then you're gonna take your arm out to the side. And lower. This is the one where the upper trap likes to do it. So I try to feel like my shoulder blade is pulling on to my back arm is going wide. And lower it back down.
Open Arm Side
Like, it's almost like you're doing a hug on the reformer, which we'll do in a moment. Last two. And one. And then elbow up, shoulder on your back, and down. It's very tempting for the shoulder head to round 4 when the elbow goes up. We think higher of the elbow is better, but that's not what we want.
Rows
We want. Just the elbow to go up as much as our upper back does it. Last one. And then step off, shake it out, let your hamstrings have a moment as well. And then I'm just gonna turn around and do the other side facing the foot bar. You can move your short your long box to the other side if you would prefer to look at your well instead of your springs.
Arm Reach Forward
So shoulders at the edge? And then same thing. We take the arm forward and we lower it down. And again, reach and down. And I have one side that is more connected, more coordinated than the other.
I like to say that one is more than something rather than I've got this week's side. And so when I do this on my own, I like to do the side that needs more curiosity, and then the side that's stronger, and then the other side. Let's go arm back to the back and hold. And lower it down. So this upper back getting nice and warm, nice and strong so that we have something to stand on in our overhead, something to stand on in short spine.
Arm Reach Back
And whether that's in your practice today or not, someday it can be, and we want a strong upper back to have that waiting for us last one. And then arm out to the side and lower. It's not like a true fly. If you were to go at the gym, It's it's definitely more of that hug, but my goodness it's as hard as a fly at the gym. So I like different gym, like, I did it.
Open Arm Side
One more time. And then elbow up, shoulders wide. I even when I think of my shoulders wide, even the hand that's not doing the work right now. I even pull that shoulder back because it tends to just, like, hang out. Take a break. Rest. Right? Last two. And one. Alright. Go ahead and put your long box away.
Rows
Put your footwork springs on. So I like 3 to 4 heavy. Springs through my footwork and foot bar up. We'll do 10 of each. We're gonna move through them pretty fast.
If you like to take it a little slower than me, you'll just do less reps, and that's okay. So lying on your back. Head rest can be up in the right place and arms pressing down by your side. Oh, fill it upper back. It's, like, ready for us. Go ahead and press out and in.
First Position
So when we have a nice upper back connection, it gives us more access to our upper abdominals without having to think about it. And we have something to stand on when it comes to snake and twist and other advanced exercises. So if you're struggling to get there, it's probably an arm back connection more than in something else. Right? We tend to think, I just have to practice the exercise more. Come on to your arches and add it in. And just notice if your tendency is to over rotate your shoulder so that you're trying to pinch your shoulder blades together, we wanna wide upper back instead of like like a narrow one and then heels up You know, our moms would tell us to pull our our shoulders back, and they were half correct.
Arch
We want them to be wider, not pinching together. That gives us more to stand on. So 10 on the toes, 10 on the arches, 10 on the heels, and then come all the way in onto the balls of your feet, press out. Stay out for 5, 10 and stretch. Just lower the heels under and lift them up.
Heels
You can go as low with your heels as they can stay together. Just connecting our feet to our seat, because even though we're focusing on our arms and our bep are back, we do need the feet and the seat to be working with us. Come all the way in. Take your footbar down. Grab your handles. And let's go into our hundred.
Tendon Stretch
Your most upper back connected hundred ever. Are you ready? Take a deep breath in. Press your hands into your handles and come up. Pump those arms vigorously. So how big can these pumps be with your collar bones wide?
Hundred
Can you reach into the pinky side of your hand even more? Allow your low ribs to take up space on this carriage. Your next shift feel nice and loose, and they just wanna say we're gonna do overhead in a second, and this is pretty much it. Right? So could you stand on your upper back right now if we had to? One more cycle of breathing. Lower everything down. Take your handles on one hand teaser for the site.
Jackknife
If you're not doing overhead, you can do a roll up, like, from the mat, or you can go into coordination early. Alright? We're gonna take our headrest out of the way. By all means, you can start with the legs up if you wish, but I just want you to get your hands settled into your handles. So palms will be facing away, ready to land on the mat, and collar bones are nice and wide. Ready to take your arms down.
The legs overhead then lift them up. Stand on your upper back for a moment. Lift your chin off your chest. Roll your waist away, and then stretch your fingers into the handles all the way across the ceiling. And then go right into the next one.
So if your hands are getting loose on your handles as your arms reach forward, you're letting the springs close themselves. Instead, you reach into your handles. So you have something to stand on when we're upside down, and then you stretch your arms into the handles as they come up so you control the equipment home, and you're still connected to your back last one. As you come all the way down, bend your knees in to your chest elbows into your side. 3 coordination. So press your arms and legs out open close, focusing on a chest expansion in the arms.
Coordination
So really feel like your arms could push through this carriage last time. Okay. So we're gonna do some swan I'm gonna do the bigger swan on the box. If you are someone who's not into that, there is a swan prep on the box. By all means you can do that.
You can also do Swan on your mat. It's really important that we connect our mid back, and that's what our Swan does. So Two springs are already on. You might need a sticky pad here or on your frame or on your foot bar. I like to put my feet on the frame.
Swan
You can put them on the foot bar, heels together toes apart, stand on the balls of your feet, knees can be inside the frame or outside the frame. Arm reach forward. So just take a moment. Last time we're laying on this, we reached our arms forward to connect our arms to the back. So we still know how that feels, right, go ahead and feel your shoulders on your back and notice how it lifts your arms already. Get them at the level of your ears and reach your tailbone towards your knees.
Then with your arms connected to your back, lift your chest, scrape your fingertips along the ceiling, big backbend here, lower into a straight line, and then lengthen out. Stay out here. Lift your arms up and that will lift your back up. Hold it. Take a deep breath in, and then exhale. Bend over your box. So if you normally do your swan with your lower back, you'll feel it there.
So go ahead and lift up, reach those arms back. This is a big backbend. I'm standing my legs, but my upper back is connected. Lower into a long line straighten your legs. Lift the arms because they're connected to the back.
You get another backbend here, and then you come down. 2 more. Up. And lengthen. Fill your shoulders wide on your back, lift those arms. That second backbend is gonna be a little To me, sometimes it feels lackluster because I want it to be bigger, but the legs are straight.
And the upper back is so connected. We get another backbend there, and then you come all the way in. Alright. You can step off to the side or stand on the foot bar, squat down, take a spring off, and then come lie on your stomach, shoulders, shoulders at the edge of the box. Go ahead and walk your hands up your straps for pulling straps where to do 3. In her size up, pubic bone long, pull the arms back, open the chest and lower.
Pulling Straps
It's okay if your chest doesn't lift. I don't want you to lift it from your lower back. I want your chest to lift because your arms pull your back up and then lower. Slide the hands down for your t pull pull the arms up and back. Whoo. So if the arms go up to go back, your chest will pull up if they're connected. If it's not, your chest will just kinda hang out, and you'll have to muscle it. It should feel like it's all happening together.
T-Pull
Let's do one more. Alright. So for fun, which means It's kinda mean. For fun, we're gonna do back stroke and a teaser, which means one spring. If you are not doing teaser today, just do back stroke, put it on two springs. So stay in on one spring for this combo.
Backstroke/Teaser Combo
Take your handles and your hand behind your back, and then you don't wanna be on the very edge for back stroke. But not as far back as t's or either. So it's somewhere in the middle, and you bend everything in. Then your arms and legs will up you open your circle, get to that hundred position, flip the palms, push into the pinky side of the hand, and lift up into a teaser. Lower the arms and lift. So we're challenging that arm back connection.
Can your arms go behind you without it disrupting what's happening in your upper body? Hold it up here, roll down, bend in, up, open circle, flip the palms come up, 3 circles in each direction or do the up and down again. It's okay to repeat something so that you can get the connections You don't have to go into the circles if you're not there yet. Right? Yet is the important word. We have a whole lifetimes to get to these circles.
Hold it, roll it down, bend it in, and then up, open circle, flip the palms, come up, and just find that upper back connection, hold it you should smile a little bit because we're gonna do leg circles. So now can we keep the arm back connection while we circle legs up down and around and together three times each direction without changing anything in the upper body because you're so connected to your arms and your back. And then roll it down. Amazing. Okay.
Breaststroke
Brad stroke. If it's not in your practice hamstring curls is a great substitute for right now. You'll want 2 springs or maybe one. Right? It's up to your practice. You don't have to do the backbend. You can just do the arms part. So follow along if you're doing to do that.
You take your handles and they're hooked with your thumbs, like, in rowing 3. You're gonna take your hands to the edge of the box, and we're gonna come on to our stomach and we're going forward till our knees are here on the box. Okay? Then you'll take your arms by your side. You'll kick three times. That's your hamstring curl.
And then you reach your arms forward and hold. You'll lift the arms up. Remember, they're connected to the back from the swan. They circle y to the side, and they go around and we kick three times and we reach and we lift up and around So the height of your chest only happens if your arms are connected to your back, and it's also not a big deal. It's not important. You just need to connect your answer back.
3th kicks. Go wide to the side. Reach forward. We find that swan. And then we come all the way down. And again, kick 3 times.
Arms go wide. You reach, reach, reach, reach, reach, reach, and in. Last one and reach wide to the site. Go forward. Okay.
Now for those of you who like a combo, here we go. Kick 3 times, reach it forward, find your swan, find your arms pulling on that arm back connection, then open the arms wide, go back forward and lower it down. Awesome. Hands on the front of the box. Step to the side. Close your spring.
If you wanna shake it out, you can just put your hands on the frame, bend your knees around your back. Awesome. Okay. So go ahead and put your long box away. We get to go into our long stretch series, which is partially a challenge for arm back connection more than teaching anything, but there's some things we can do to set ourselves up. So Two springs on, foot bar on, head rest up with your sticky pad, and then try this with me.
Plank
Walk on the wild side. Put your hands. So far on top of the footbar your wrist or straight, and then pull that footbar apart to stand in your plank. And if you're new to being here with your wrist, just hold it. Otherwise, push the legs out and pull the carriage in. And again, push the legs out and in one more time. And then without changing your hands, lower both knees, So something I like to think about with the down stretch is this. It's not that my arms are pushing down.
Down Stretch
It's almost like they could pull the footbar forward and up just like they did in that swan. So when your hands are on the front, feel like you could pull the footbar forward and up and then push your legs back. So the legs are why the carriage moves, but this arms reaching forward and up in our mind's eye helps us with that extension and lengthens our spine. Go ahead, head in, heels down, up stretch. I do wanna do the combo today. If it's not in your practice, you'll repeat the up stretch.
Up Stretch Variation
So angles toward each other, ribs up. You have half the weight in your legs, half in your arms. Push just the legs back. And then pull the shape in. So you look like an upside down 100 with a really strong upper back. Right? Do one more like this if you're gonna move on to the combo. If you're not doing the combo, repeat what we did or go into elephant.
Lifting the ribs up. We're gonna push legs back so much. I can pull my chest through my arms and that down stretch connection then push out with the legs head in. Lift the ribs. Push the legs out.
Pull the heart through the arms. Push the legs back. Head comes in one more time. Third times the charm. Okay.
Then heels down. Ribs up. So half your body weight is still in your arms. Push the pull this foot bar apart. Get your wrist as straight as possible and just push the legs back. 3 more.
Elephant
The legs can go out as far as the ribs can remain pulling up, and the arms are reaching the foot bar wide. And then step off. Okay. Biggest challenge to your arm back connection is your long back stretch. So the hands come on this side of the hibar straight wrists. You wanna use your legs more than you think gloves.
Long Back Stretch
So here we are. Open the collar bones. You bend the elbows and you lower the hips, you push with the legs. You lift the hips up and you come in. And again, bend and reach and in. Ben those elbows, reach, and lift, reverse, push out. My arms are connected to my back, letting me stay out there as I long as I need you to lower my hips and then pull in.
And again, reach collar bones nice and wide. You don't have to get all the way to the carriage yet. If that if getting to the carriage means you disconnect your arms, then just go as low as you can go. Right? Step off and let's go to your short box. So I want you to have a pole as long a pole as you can.
Lean Back
Ideally, like, 3 feet, a full yard. Right? If your pole is really short, grab your broomstick. Right? So you can just try this for a moment. So we have this nice long pole. I like to put a sticky pad on my short box. This keeps me on there and then seat into your straps.
So with your strap around your feet, so you're secured, you're locked, and you feel really good. Grab this pull and hold it with straight wrist. So look up. You actually have to do that and double check that you're not bent because that happens a lot. Straight wrist pull your shoulders out wide. Pull on this bar. I like to think that I'm kinda bending it. So if my arms are straight, I'm trying to bend it in my upper back that keeps the pinky side of my hand on the bar.
Then you look straight ahead and you lean back. And you lift up. So you can even look at the tip of your nose because sometimes I see people look at the sky, look straight ahead, pull this bar apart as you go up and back. This exercise right here is one of the best ways to reconnect your arms to your back. 1, because it just is. And 2, you can see what your are trying to do when your arms are straight.
And you have this pole that's wide enough to get your shoulders wide on your back. Stay up. When you would twist and reach. So we'll twist to the right, pull the spar part, lean out, lift up, and come to center, twist, lean, and come up. What I'm doing to keep my arm back connection as part of this is I pull this bar apart and I lean out and I pull the bar part to come up. It keeps me from sagging to my side and allows me to really feel like I'm getting longer as I lean as I reach. Awesome.
Twist and Reach
So stow your bar. We're gonna do some tree. The tree is really just a challenger on back connection. So if you're like, oh, Leslie, I'm not ready for that. Do elephant single leg.
Tree
I skipped it for you. Grab the thigh, hold it here, lift up tall, and feel your shoulders on your back right here. Just holding your leg. Then as you straighten and bend your leg, notice what your shoulders wanna do. Do they wanna hike up? Do they wanna round forward? Take your legs straight out.
Walk up to your ankle. Pull your head to your knees and feel your upper back connection get wider and stronger. Lean back. And as you walk down your leg, Feel your arms connecting to your back the whole time, maybe you back then. When you come up, if you feel your biceps, we lost your back. Feel your upper back doing a row.
Here, head to your knee. And again, walk down the leg, back benefits in your practice, head in and walk up, feeling your upper back gets stronger with each step last time. And up. Lucky you, you have another side. You get to try it again if you're like, I wasn't finding it.
Here you go. You have another opportunity. So open the collarbone sit up tall. Straighten and bend. And it's not that the shoulder blades pinched together to get on your back.
I kinda think of my shoulder blade tips like drawing towards each other. Walk up, head to your knee, shoulders on your back. It's so tempting. I just did it. I just pulled my shoulders on my pull your shoulders away from your ears and then climb down your leg. And then climb up.
If you are doing the backbend, the head is the last thing to drop out. It's the first thing to come up. And if you're going, oh my gosh, my leg is going to the side or it's going rogue, Well, we're not really harping on ourselves about our legs today. This is about that arm back connection. So take notes for next time.
Here we go. Hop off short spine. So if you want to skip short spine, It's not in your practice to overhead right now. Rolling like a ball on the mat is really great. We also skip stomach massage round and reach up. That would be an awesome substitute. So you want your head rest down.
Short Spine Varation
You wanna have your short loops on 2 heavy springs. And we're testing, right, overhead is this dynamic exercise at the very beginning. Kinda lets us know Are we able to stand on our back yet? Are we not? And then we just had 20 minutes of challenging that our back connection. So it's like a second chance at seeing what's going on in our bodies.
We get to celebrate something, I bet. So lie on your back, bring your knees into your chest, put your short loops on, and then feet into those loops. Bring your heels together, arms down by your side, press those legs out. And then instead of pulling your feet to your face, lift your hips first, push your arms through the carriage like you're doing a chest expansion, and then go upside down. Bend your knees, and then roll the shape down. If you wanna do the hamstring stretch, that's fine. I just wanna focus on, can you stand on this upper back? Are your arms pressing down into the carriage, shoulders wide? When you bend your knees, do you feel like you're still standing on a foundation?
Or did you lose it because all of your foundation was hanging in the springs? You should feel strong enough in that upper back just to do a couple more. And whether you're like, oh, I could go higher. I could go longer. I could do whatever. Just notice what your upper back is doing and celebrate that.
Woo. That felt so good. I'm a pat myself on the back. So go ahead and get the straps off your feet. Hook them up. Now we're gonna come up and get ready for our chest expansion.
Awesome. So two springs on is enough. If you want to hook your feet, that is a hard version, I personally don't. I can make it harder by bringing my legs together. So that's an option for us, right? Otherwise, knees are a hips distance apart, walk your hands up your straps, and then shoulders over the hips. So This is where if you're tighter in your hip flexors, you can push your lower back forward and disconnect your upper back. So instead, worry more about reaching those knees down, open the front of the hips, pull your center in, and then grab the straps, You can do fingertips as a challenge where you just hold the straps with your fingertips or you can hold the whole fist.
Chest Expansion Variation
Pull those arms back Hold it here with straight wrists, long elbows, look right, and left, look center, and then pull forward. As you look, this is fun. As you look to the left, your right shoulder's gonna wanna creep forward. So pull it back. As you look to the right, your left shoulder wanna creep forward. Look forward. Arms forward.
Again, pull it back. Close your eyes to picture your wrist and notice 5th or straight, and then look. If you look down to see that, I promise you took yourself out of your connection, so we try to do it, like, just by, like, zeroing in on it. Where is our mind body connection? Can we feel it? Whoo. I'm shaking. So it's there.
So we're gonna do a third spring for our thigh stretch. If you wanna do the backbend here, it's a great place to practice that because you have to have such a great arm back connection to do it. So Walk your hands up your straps, knees hug towards each other. You lean back, and this could be you, just doing the stretch, collar bones wide, and come up, especially if you're not back bending right now, it's totally fine. You lean back, you stay on the legs, and you lift. If you're ready for the backbend, we go back. We have such a strong-arm back connection that we can backbend, and then we come up into a straight line before we come all the way up. Again, you lean back. You have that arm back connection to backbend around and then all the way up.
Thigh Stretch Variation
Okay. Arm circles. So one spring, one heavy spring, please, and come kneeling facing the foot bar, feet are back, get those toes stretched under, and you can sit back first just so you get the handles in front of your hips. I'm gonna do, arm circles, shave, and hug. If you are like, ah, just do serve a platter.
Arm Circle
We'll do serve a platter to come into it. So you lift and reach the arms forward. That would be serving a platter. Otherwise, 3 arm circles each direction, pinky side the hand up the whole time, and maybe call them arm ovals, right, reverse. That's what I have to call them to keep my arms from going behind my back so I can stay in control. After 3 of those, flip the palms so if you index finger and thumb and reach forward and forward. So that's our shave.
Shaving
And I'm not going from behind my head because that's not where my practice is. So you can go in front like I did. Open the arms and 3 hugs. Whoo. Well, that challenge is things, doesn't it? Okay.
Hug
Staying on 1 spring. Snake and twist. If up stretch, up stretch combo is not in your practice yet, go back to elephant and repeat that. That's gonna get you ready for snake and twist, or you can just hold the star position with four springs on. Otherwise, we'll do one spring, hand on the shoulder rest, hand on the carriage, foot turned out on the footbar, let your head drop down, and lift your other leg. Let your head hang hang hang.
Snake
Fill your arms connected to your back and then push with the leg and then pull your chest through your arm back connection. Head in to pull it in and, again, reach. So our arm back connection is not pushing the carriage front to back. Our arm back connection is actually allowing our spine to round and extend through it last one. Woo.
No twist today. I feel like, Leslie, I really love it. You you do. You Go for it. Otherwise, other side, foot on hand hand. Let the head hang. Here we go.
So sometimes pulling My arms apart on the carriage lets me get a straighter wrist and soft elbows. Sometimes that doesn't work. So you'll play with that as you do four snakes. Whoo. Close the spring step off. Alright.
Knee Stretch Variation
Let's go to our knee stretches, two springs. So we're gonna do all three, but just five of each. If you want to omit 1, just do more of your favorite. Right? So hand, hand, foot, foot, round your spine, pull your footbar part straight wrist, and push out and in. It is less important to me how much you move the carriage away and more important that you close the spring.
And that your shoulders are out of your ears for at least today's theme. Right? So you flip your spine after five round. You do five flat. And then you round your spine, lift your knees, and we do 5 with the knees off. If you moved your hands to the front of the foot bar, and bench your wrist.
Knee Stretches Knees Off
You've lost your own back connection, my love. After 5, step down. Alright. Add a spring. So I love to do running in pelvic lift to check-in. It's like my favorite way to see have I gotten what I need.
Running
So head rest up. Arms down by your side. Before you press out with your feet parallel, balls the feet on, just take a moment to notice where your ribs are and your shoulders are. Then push out one heel under, one heel up, letting those collar bones be wide. Your low ribs. It should feel really nice just to be here. It should feel like a full body connection and then come all the way in.
Arch is wide lift or hips. Right here, pelvic lift is our first time. Like, one of the first exercise we learn where we stand on that strong upper back So, hopefully, it feels wide and something you can stand on today. 3, how to n Awesome. Okay. So control push ups. You'll want to if your carriage allows to gear out, and you'll need your peg.
Pelvic Lift
And then 1 to 2 heavy springs is good. If your care is not, like, gear out, do a lighter spring and start with one heavy on that. And then maybe one medium, and maybe you can build up because it's gonna get heavier. The more the carriage goes out. Then your feet are gonna be on that foot bar. So hands on the headrest at the very back edge, feet on, and then you pike up, and then you're here. Right? If you're like, oh, are you kidding? Long stretch is a great exercise for you to do instead.
Control Push Up Front
So always just replace and build that endurance. So here we are straight wrist, push the carriage out and pull it in, That's one place to start. If you're ready for more, you're on back connections ready to be challenged, lift a leg. Set it down. As you lift a leg, you move the carrot. And then hold. If you want a little bit more, challenge it up or back connection more, bend your elbows, and press up.
Leg Lift
After 3, you lift your waist to close the spring, step all the way to the floor, and we're gonna do the reverse. So you place your hands on the front if this is like, no. Not doing that today. Long back arms is a great place to go. Right? It's a great place to build that endurance. Feet on the foot bar, hands on the shoulder rest come into your start position here, and you can just push the arms back and forth. Okay. This is good enough, especially if when you push the arms, the hips drop down.
Push Up
Or your shoulders come in yours, stay here. If you can do more, lift a leg. And when I say lift a leg, it's a strong word. You're gonna reach the leg across the room. But feel your upper back, move your arms behind you. It's an important skill set to have strength with our arms behind our backs. Stay in, find your wide collar bones, bend your elbows three times, and then close the spring, step to the floor, Check your arm back connection out.
Control Push Up Back
Your collarbone's full wider. I feel proud. Right? It feels like I have a really proud chest. I love it. I hope you enjoyed this work out too. If you have questions about your arm back connection, I'm happy to answer them.
Leg Lift
I love talking about how this can work. We obviously only did a few of the exercises available to us on the reformer. So see if that arm back connection is something you can carry to other exercises you struggle with. Maybe that's why you're having a hard time. And thank you so much for letting me work you out.
Dips
Have a great day.