Overhead Mat Workout

Hi, Melissa Logan, and welcome to building your overhead. In this quick class, we're gonna find out how all the exercises in the mat actually build us to stay on our shoulders and taking on some of those exercise that feel a little out of our league. And if they still are, feel free to omit them and replace them with something you can do. I believe that is very brave and courageous. So let's get started.

So if you can, you'll stay at the top of your map. Cross 1 leg over the other, 1 arm over the other, and then lie on back. If you need to, just get down on the ground. However you want, that's fine too. We're gonna take our knees into our chest for our 100 today. It's gonna feel a little weird, but I promise you it'll make sense by the end.

So you'll bring your knees in, curl your head and chest up, hug those heels tight together and pump your arms for your 100 here inhale for 5 and exhale for 5. Now you're gonna stay here but on every exhale, you're gonna try to pull your knees into you more. Inhale here, and then exhale pull those knees into you more. And you might start to lift your tailbone a little bit. Maybe. But we're just trying to get our hips to think about levitating up.

And if you need to put your feet down at any time or your head down, that's totally fine. We're just using our stomach muscles to pull those knees in a little bit more. 1 more cycle of breathing here. And then go ahead and place those legs down. Stretch those legs out.

Flex your ankles. Take your arms up overhead. And then lift your head and chest up and exhale up and over your legs. The first one's always a little shocking, and then we roll back down. Squeeze those legs tight together.

And I promise you, if on the exhale, you squeeze your legs more, it actually does help. So I also like to excel on the hardest part. Somehow that makes it more possible. Bonus, if you can keep your arms exactly where they are by your ears, on the up and the over and on the down because it will help you with future overhead exercises. Last 1 Alright. We're gonna do single leg circles.

If you've got any reason to not twist, then you'll leave your hip down. But we're gonna take this leg up. My right leg is up pointed. Left foot is flex on the mat. Try to lift your right hip off the mat to take the leg across the body, circle it down the hip lands.

Lay goes out to the side and you do it again. So we're just practicing lifting our hips by lifting 1 hip at a time, 3 circles across the body, and then you'll reverse. So leg goes out of the side. The hips down when the leg comes across, the hip lifts to take it further. And then it lands back down to take the leg out to the side. So a little twist of the lower body, a little half cork screw, and a little practice of our overhead scissor switch your legs if you can't.

And we go across the body first, lift the hips, circle it around, and again lift. And if this is, like, a little much for you to organize, you can leave the hip down. I promise you'll still build the overhead. And then you'll reverse it. So leg out as the leg comes down, lift the hip and take it across. Sometimes it takes a few tries to figure out how do you get that hip to take the leg across.

Alright. Bring your knees into your chest rock and roll up to sitting. We're gonna do a fun rolling like a ball. Meaning it's rolling like a ball, but we're gonna balance. So grab your ankles if you can. Squeeze your heel.

See other push your shin's into your hands rock back try to hold on your shoulders 12 and come back up. So the sign that you can do overhead exercises is if you can balance on your shoulders, without going past them. So 11, 002, 001, 000, come back up without those feet touching. And again, rock back 11, 002, So if you're struggling to stay up there, it's just a sign we gotta get your hips up, and we have to think about those hips, so which means more hamstring, more glutes. 1 more time. Awesome. Bring 1 knee into your chest.

1 leg. Let's go into our ab series. Pulling this leg 2 times and switch. We'll do 3 times on each leg, and we'll go right into our double leg stretch. If you need a break, you take it. Pull those legs in, reach the arms and legs away from each other, circle around pull pull reach, and pull pull reach, circle around, come in, single straight leg stretch, grab 1 leg as high as you can.

And pull on it 2 times. Push that leg into your hands. The more you can pull with your upper back, the stronger it will be to stand on it. Sweep the hands behind your head, double straight leg stretch, lower the legs, and lift 3 of these. If you're wanting to break, you can take it. I do too, but I'm gonna keep going for you, we're gonna go into our crisscross 1 knee and 1 leg out opposite armpit to knee 3 times each side. Try to curl up a little higher.

The lower you get the harder it is going to be to overhead and sit up. Spine's rich forward. You made it. Welcome to the warm up is over. Round forward and pulse 1, 2, 3, inhale and lift. That's what I tell myself.

Every time I get a spines rich forward, the warm up is over. Now you're in it. And then again, which means, like, if you got through the warm up, you can finish anything. Right? 2 more. Pulls 3 times, pull that tailbone down, and lift up. Last 1. Alright. We're gonna open leg We are gonna balance if you can. If rolling a cabal was hard, repeat that. So take your legs, either bend them into your chest and grab the ankles or lift them to your hands.

Your knees can be any version of bench you want, but the elbows are straight. Rock back, balance 12, and come up. Now if you go too far back and you land, like, past your shoulders, that's not what we want. Right? We wanna go controlled and then show we can control at 12. And up. And, again, rock back. And, last time, rock back, 11, 002, Come up hold, squeeze the legs together, push them apart, squeeze them together, push them apart, squeeze together, push them apart, hold, let go of your legs, flex ankles, lower legs to the mat, and saw. Open those arms. Why the side twist to the opposite foot pulse 3 times.

Roll up in the twist unwind and twist to the other side. Now we do not want the hips lifting here. So whatever you learn in the single leg circles, you leave there. We're on saw. We need those hips to stay exactly where they are. So we can get a nice stretch through our lower back. To make overhead exercises more possible.

Last time, even yourself off, Awesome. Come around onto your stomach. Single a kick. I love a single a kick. So prop yourself up on your forearms. Let your shoulders sink into your ears and then pull them wide and away from your ears.

Push your tailbone towards your heels and then kick kick switch. So we talked about in rolling like a ball. How do you get your hips up? It's because you have strong hamstrings and glutes. So welcome to you're answering in glute exercise. If you hate this 1 or you find yourself sachet, you are cheating yourself out of a great single a kick, but also overhead exercises. So stick with this or double 8 kit cans behind your back. Let those elbows fall down.

And thigh stretch 3 times. So it's 3 hamstring curls, feet, down, arms up, big stretch across the chest. Now I am someone who tends to hang off my shoulder. So I have to really think about my arms going up and the heart going forward. Kick 3 times and reach So I might not go up as much because I'm trying to keep my arms connected to my back.

So I have something to stand on, take those hands down, sit back, Give yourself a rest pose. So a child's pose or Joe's pose head towards your knees, waist up, grab your feet. Alright. Rolling up thy stretch. You know, it's a favorite. Arms up. Knees hug towards each other. Plant those feet.

Lower those arms and lean back. Now if you need to take your arms wider than your shoulders here, so you feel your arms connected to your back, do that. If you have a pole, that's super fun. You can use the pole. We want to use a side stretch to strengthen our upper back, but also stretch the front of our thighs so that our hip flexors do not get in the way of our overhead exercises, jackknife, control balance, things like that are not fun if your hip flexors are the ones doing it.

Last 1. Come all the way up and then flip on over, lie onto your back a little shoulder bridge. So shoulder bridge is an awesome exercise for practicing the stand on your shoulders. So take your arms down by your side, open your collar bones, feet and knees are hip distance apart. Roll your hips up and pause.

If you drop your chin to your chest, roll down, start again. We tend to drop our chin down when we do overhead exercises, which makes it harder because you just lost your tripod. The top at the back of your head is part of the exercise. So see if you can lift your hips up and down without looking at your body. So just pick a spot on the ceiling, up and down.

And then if you want, you can take the sides of your mat. Pull them apart that will help you broaden your shoulders. Hold it up on the next 1. Stay here. You can hold on your mat still or you can press drums down by your side. Lift 1 foot 1 inch. Set the foot down.

Lift the other foot another inch. And you start to do a little marching. And I always stay an inch, and I see people do a foot. So I promise you, I mean, like, tiny, teeny tiny, just a little bit. So you can practice keeping your hips up, standing on your shoulders for 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, roll it down.

Your glutes should be on a little bit on fire. Roll up to sitting. You're welcome. Take your legs tight together. Flex your ankles, arms, wide to the side. Spine twist. Pull to the right.

Stay here. Lift a little taller, twist a little bit more, a little more unwind, twist a little left. So, again, as we twist our upper body, our legs are anchor. They're staying down and nice and strong. And, again, 1 more time to the right. Twist a little deeper a little deeper.

And since it's think of this as like a little rinse. Getting ready for our big overhead finale. It's not yet. Not yet. Okay. So lie on your back. You can be enrolling like a ball and a teaser will you'll see what I mean in a second, but let's just try to do a full teaser together.

So squeeze the legs tight to either point the feet. If you wanna go into your roll up, you can. Like those arms overhead, take a deep breath in, exhale up to your teaser. Smile. It's better. Lift the arms up. Roll the upper body only down 1. Maybe you can get your head and chest and arms down.

That's extra credit. Just getting somewhere down is the goal. And then stay up and lower those legs and lift those legs and lower and lift. You're doing amazing. I know it. Lower everything down.

Lift everything up and lower everything down and lift everything up. Sometimes I just tell myself that to kinda get through this last teaser 3, hold it up for 3, 2, 1, lower it all the way down, flip 1 to your stomach, swim it So hands who underneath the forehead if you need to. Otherwise, arms long in front of you, legs behind you, and just breathe in and out. Use the inner thighs and the hamstrings to stretch the front end of the thighs if they got in excited about your teaser. Last 1. Alright. Sit back.

Take a nice child's pose, head towards your knees, waist to the ceiling. Alright. Pull your waist in. See if you can get more a little bit more weight on towards your head so you can open up your chest a little bit more. We're going to flip over in just a second, and we're gonna do a little cardio party. So take another deep breath in.

XL and flip on over. So We've done rolling like a ball, and we've done teaser. There's 1 part of this party we haven't done, which is a bit of a jackknife. Okay? So we'll do a a couple jack knives so we know where we're going and then we're gonna add this party in. So lie onto your back. Take your legs overhead if you can.

Parallel and then legs go up. And then you're gonna roll it down. Alright. If you wanna hold the sides of your mat, you can do that. You also don't have to go straight up to the sky. It's gonna depend on your body's practice today. Right? So and you can also just, like, lift those knees in towards your chest 1 more time.

Legs go over. They're gonna go up. Now notice where your up is, that's where we're gonna go in this party. We're just gonna go to the up. So come up to rolling like a ball.

Here it is. You're gonna roll like a ball. Just do a couple of roll like a ball. We'll call this Simon says, we're gonna roll like a ball until I say teaser, and then you're gonna reach out to your teaser, and you're gonna roll like a ball and roll like a ball. And then I might say jackknife, arms go down, legs go overhead, and then you're gonna roll like a ball. So you're ready? You got the rules, roll like a ball, roll like a ball teaser, roll like a ball, Jack knife.

Role like a ball. Cheezer, by the way, when you like a ball, Jack knife, arms going down. It's much easier. And then arms down legs up. Okay. So here we go. It's gonna just roll like a ball, have some fun, roll like a ball, roll like a ball, jackknife, roll like a ball, roll like a ball, teaser, roll like a ball, jackknife, roll like a ball, teaser, roll like a ball, Simon and say Jackknife, did you do it? Role like a ball? Taser? Role like a ball? Jackknife.

Role like a ball teaser? Roll like a ball teaser, roll like a ball, jackknife, roll like a ball, roll like a ball. Is, the overhead a little easier, especially when you're playing Jack knife. Role like a ball. Taser. Role like a ball.

Last 1. What's it gonna be your favorite teaser or Jack knife? Tada. Why onto your back? Alright. So the heart rate got sped up. Let's go into control balance, which is 1 that most people don't love. You can replace this with any other overhead exercise that you want. Otherwise, Press your arms down to the mat, take those legs overhead, and then circle the arms around, grab 1 ankle, lift the other leg up.

And then just switch. And you're just standing on your roll like about shoulders, and you're just doing your single straight leg stretch. So It's kinda fun to see that everything just kinda comes together. Now to get out of this, we're gonna roll up to standing. That doesn't mean you have to.

You could actually just roll down and stand up on your own. Otherwise, bring those legs together in that jackknife position and then press the feet down. Stand up. Here we go. You'll see other toes apart. Arms up. We're gonna celebrate going overhead by doing some push ups. I know it's exactly what you asked for.

It really isn't, but here we go. Elbows back 1 time. Walk your hands back. Try not to wave those hips side to side as you walk back and come up arms by those ears. So when you practice this, walk out and 4 counts.

Try not to go side to side. It's preparing you for tomorrow's strong upper back. Bend the elbows 2 times. Take the head and walk those hands back. Arms by the ears.

Really important to be able to keep them there. It makes your core work a little harder. Walk it out. Try it. If your arms drop down versus stay up, you'll notice a big difference. 3 elbow bands, strengthening that upper back and center for tomorrow's overhead, head in, walk those hands back.

I was by the ears. Roll it all the way up. You did it. You are amazing. Overhead exercise can be so scary, and sometimes it's a tilt of the chin.

Or just some rhythm or getting your glutes in the air. So I hope you figured out what was what you needed to get upside down. Let me know and enjoy this class. Compare yourself to yourself every time you take it. Have an amazing day.