Full-Body Flow

Hey. It's Andrea, and welcome to your full body flow workout. Today, we'll be working through 30 minutes intermediate level, and we'll warm it all up, and then we'll work top to bottom. These are some of my all time favorite strengthening exercises, so I hope you enjoy it. The props you'll need today are a ball and make sure your box is nearby as well. Alright. Let's go through the setup for your reformer.

I want your foot bar in that middle upright position All of those springs are on. We're starting with footwork. So if you wanna start a little bit lighter for your body stay, just take the yellow spring off. You're good to go. I'm working with my handle attachment.

If you have double loops, that's totally fine. You'll use the shorter of the 2. Or a single loop is obviously fine as well. Alright. That's it. Let's get started. Grab your ball.

Bring the ball with you and lie down on your back. Once you're down on your back, take the ball. Put it in your upper inner thighs. Arms down by your sides, heels together toes apart, lengthen out as far as you can with that ball, bend your knees, come back in, and just start to flow that out, end in, and reach. As we start to move here for the first time today, I want you to scan through your body. Heals are actively, evenly pressing together.

All ten fingers pressing down into the mat so you feel your shoulders spiraling back abdominal scooping in and up. I love doing footwork with the ball here because it gets the inner thighs, the adductors to just connect and help the lower abdominals scoop in and up. Let's do ten more seconds. Which is big natural breaths for me. 5 more seconds.

On your next one, halfway in little pulses up and down, press and reach. On these pulses, you're not going all the way out, and you're not coming all the way in. You're working in that mid range zone here, building endurance, 10 more seconds, feeling that heat through the top of your legs, your your quads, 5 more seconds, Hold it out halfway. Stay there Andrea wrap in on that ball. Tiny little pulses in, in, in. As you do these little squeezes, watch that you don't push your tailbone down here.

Keep the natural, beautiful curves of your spine. You've got 10 seconds. In in 5 more seconds. Hold that there. Push out as far as you can.

Come back in. Walk up onto your arch's hip distance Andrea parallel. Press all the way out and bend your knees come back in, let's start to flow that reach and in. Shoo. Now that our heels are separated, you can get all the way out to those straight legs Andrea try to get all the way in. You don't wanna crash that carriage, but You do want that full range. So maybe just test it.

Make sure you're doing that all the way in, all the way out. 10 seconds. Shlengthening from the top of your head. 5 more seconds. On your next one, halfway in, little pulses up and down, press and reach, and your knee should line up right over the second toe. So you have that gentle hug in on the ball throughout.

5 more seconds. Let's hold it out halfway. Tiny squeezes in on that ball. Wrap, wrap, wrap. This is a moment to build the endurance in the quads Shoot. Get those adductors inner thighs working with your body. 5 more seconds.

Shoot. Hold it there. Length Andrea all the way out come all the way back in. Walk up to your heels, hip distance, Andrea parallel flex your feet, lengthen out, and come back in, and here we go. Flowing through this reach and in. I always think I'm pushing the foot bar out from under me, and that helps me to keep those natural curves of the spine and not kind of push down with my back. So test it out, see if that helps you as well.

Pinky toes drawn back towards your face. It's as if that footbar travels all the way up to the toes. Wheeling that heat. On the next one, go all the way out, bring it halfway in. The little pulses up an inch.

Up an inch, think about that accent being up and up. Shoot. 10 seconds. Shoulders are down relaxing your neck and jaw 5 more seconds. Hold it out halfway, squeeze that ball in, in, in, in tiny little wraps. Give me 10 strong seconds.

5 seconds. Hold it there, lengthen all the way out, bend your knees come all the way in. Take the ball out, rock and roll your body up, come seated, and let's go down to one red spring. This is for some seated core work. So everything comes off except one red, take the ball, put it about mid back, round yourself back into it, and then walk your feet up.

Let's go about an inch or 2 apart with the toes heels together, lengthen out to straight legs, arms reach forward. Shoulders are back and down. I want you to start by really leaning back into that ball and then flexing up from the sternum. Hold that, bend your knees in and lengthen back out. Flow at your own pace.

You do not have to match me on this. What I want you to focus on is just that form, chest open, abdominal scooping in and up. Pivot feels better to put your hands behind your head, or down on the mat, listen to your body. Do it. Couple more moments here.

Essentially, what we're doing here is a reverse crunch, deepening into the low abs. On the next one, hold your legs out straight, lower down an inch, little flexing crunch up, down, up, and down. As you lift, it's not the shoulders. Right? It's from the core. Zipper up. Put a zipper right below your navel. And deepen in. Give me 5 more seconds.

On your next one, hold it halfway down. Bend journeys bring the carriage in. Walk your toes together. Extend one leg out to hover over the footbar fingers from that same side go down on the mat, opposite hand goes behind your head. Push out as you pull that knee into your chest and extend that leg over the foot bar.

Give me a couple like this. In and out. So you're still holding that big capital c curve of the spine, scooping in and up as that knee comes in. Now if this feels good, you could stick with this or add a twist as that knee comes in, untwist extend the leg over. So we're wrapping it into this movement. There's no crunching up on this, right? So keep the connection to the ball and just ring it out.

Get those obliques working, the waist. The deepest part of the core, the transverse abs, 5 more seconds. Oh, my abs are on fire. On your next one, come all the way in. Put that foot down, and let's switch. Extend the other leg out.

Switch the hands for me. Here we go. Push out, pull the knee in, and extend over. Push pull in. So even if you added that twist, let's start with no twist, just scooping in as that knee comes in towards your body. Do a check of the shoulders.

Draw them down. Okay. Here we go adding that twist. Push out twist toward that knee, untwist, bring it home. Bring it out Andrea bring it back. Oh, 10 seconds.

Keeping your elbow out wide, twist from the torso. After your next one, bring it back. Put both toes down. Reach out. You thought it was done, but it's not. Reach your arms forward back to those little crunches. Up and down, up and down.

Shoo. 10 seconds. Shake out your neck. Relax your jaw. Give me 5 more seconds. Shoo.

Bend your knees come back in. Bring your feet down, round yourself forward. Grab that ball. Let's set the ball down out of the way for now. We're going back down for some supine arm work.

So give me a red and a blue Speir. If you wanna go a little heavier, 2 reds, otherwise, a red and a blue, lie down on your back. Your abs should be warped up, but let's just double check. Reach back, grab on to your handles. Reach your arms up to the ceiling.

Now one at a time, lift your legs up into a tabletop position. Shoulders down your back, lengthen your arms to your sides, and then resist the springs back up. Just shy of the shoulder Andrea that again. Reach down and lengthen back up. Give me a couple like this.

As you do this, I want you to think about your shoulders drawing so far down your back. Maybe they don't even touch the shoulder blocks. Every time you reach down, your abs scoop in and up. Now, you could either stick with this if this feels good, or add a curl, arms lower, curl it up, lower your head, lift your arms, big act of crunch up, and lengthen back down. You could stick with this, or as you curl up, extend one leg out over the foot bar, draw the knee back in, and alternate legs.

So we're challenging the cord just a bit by adding this distal movement, this movement away from the core. You could stick with this if you want to advance that one leg goes up, one leg goes down, make it l shape, 10 seconds with whatever you chose. Shoot. 5 more seconds. Give me one more with each side to be even. When you're even bringing it back home. Bring your hands into a diamond shape, thumb, and first finger together, legs up to the ceiling, heels together knees slightly apart, and press your hands about 2 inches forward of your sternum.

Shoulders down. Your legs start to lower together, and they lift right back up. Inhale to lower Andrea exhale. Shoo lift of backup. Flow at your own pace here. So as we flow through this lower lift, the range is also up to you, right, the range and the pace. If you feel like your back starts to arch a little bit, that's probably too low for your body today.

Keep it in the core. You've got 10 seconds here. 5 more seconds. Shoot. On your next one, keep your legs up toward the ceiling.

Little bend in wider with the knees, separate the hands, curl up, one hand goes through the legs, one hand goes outside, lower all the way down arms up, and then switch other side. And down, here we go. Go for this oblique v. Curl up frame that thigh, that hand that's going through the legs. I want you to really focus on that Andrea you work the twist over and through.

10 seconds. As you lower, keep the abs engaged, so it's all from the core, not from the neck, one more each side to be even. And when you're there, bending, Whoo. Put those handles back on the pegs. Rock and roll your body up. Just roll it out.

Shake it out for a moment. Alright. So I hope your abs are feeling good, a biter on fire. Let's move on to the upper body. So I'm going on 1 red spring for this. If you wanna go a little bit lighter, do this on a blue instead.

Alright. Hop up onto your knees. The setup for this today, I want your entire foot on top of the carriage but your toes should be pretty close to the back edge. So give it a look. Make sure you're good. Holding onto your shoulder blocks, pull your hips halfway back toward your seats.

Reach down, grab one of your Andrea, open off to the side, and then reach that arm straight back and resist it forward. Length and back Andrea resist forward. This is one of my all time favorite movements. We're targeting the back of the arm here, the tricep, Things that you're watching for, shoulders are squared off and even. You have a nice natural neutral Speir, so no rounding, no big arch. Right? Find that perfect middle zone of that by pulling your abs in and up.

On the next one, reach your arm back. Hold it back there. Bend at the elbow and lengthen back. We go for this tricep kickback. Building a little bit more of that endurance stamina building out that muscle.

If you've done this movement before or you're just feeling really good today with your balance, you could take that free hand and put it behind the small of your back. Use that hand sort of like your private pilates instructor and breathe your ribs back into it. After your next one, lower your arm down. You're not done with this. Flip your grip.

Straight strong arm, straight arm back, straight arm forward. Here we go. If you did bring your hand back Andrea we switched up the variation here, you wanna bring it down. Do it. Having your hand down does not make it easier or more challenging. It's working with whatever is gonna help your body and your practice today.

Give me 5 more seconds. Oh, it's getting real. Bend and straight, and we do the same thing. Give me a little bowling here. Bend in kick it back.

Bend in. Reach it back. 10 seconds. Shoo. Nice long line of the neck, gazing out toward the end of your carriage frame. After your next one, you are there. Bring it all the way down.

Keep holding on to that same Andrea. Now lifting up sitting nice and tall, arm parallel to the floor. Let's take the free hand, use it like a little table under the tricep, bend into a bicep curl and extend back out. Big curl in and out. Now if this doesn't feel good on your knees, lower that headdress, bend your knees, and put your feet on top of the headdress. Right? So you're sitting, and then there's no extreme flexion of the knees.

So you always have options with your practice. Speaking of options, let's give you one here. So you could either stick with this. This is a great exercise, or take that free hand, put your fingertips behind you on the mat. Maybe watch me once.

We're adding extension, bend in, lift your hips reach overhead, bend back and tracing over your face extend forward. So you curl hips up, reach back toward the foot bar, bend and lower your hips reach. Okay. Let's flow. Just a couple of these if this is what you chose. This is a really nice way to get so much great extension into the front of the body stretch out the quads, the hip flexors, the whole anterior front of the body.

Give me one more. Oh, good. Set the handle down. Sue the other side. Lift your hips up, reset, Make sure your feet are still in that good Speir, totally flat, pull halfway back, handle off to the side, and here we go.

Reach straight back and forward. Reach back and forward. Give yourself a little scan here as we start the second side. Make sure the hips aren't too high. They're not too low. They're pulled back.

The reason for that is I want you in your abdominal scooping in big time. Shoulders are squared off. Andrea, yes, you should be feeling the front of your legs on this because they're actively involved. On the next one, keep your arm back. Bend at the elbow and straighten.

Bend in Reach back. Maybe you took that free hand behind your low back. Maybe you didn't, but you wanna try it. Go for it. 10 seconds. Whoo. And this elbow's hugging in towards your body.

5 more seconds. Your arm goes back. Hold. From here, lower it all the way down. Flip your grip. Alright. 2nd set. Straight arm back.

Straight arm forward. Your palm is facing forward. Toward the risers, the back of the carriage. You got 10 seconds. 5 more seconds. The sweat is starting.

Whoo. On the next one, keep that arm back there. Bend at the elbow. And kick it back, bend in, reach back, Andrea squaring those shoulders off. I said that because I noticed mine was dipping down, so keeping it back and down.

After your next one, bring it all the way down with control. Have a seat. Give yourself that moment. Square off. Arm lifts up. We go into the bicep curl. So give yourself that little cue tripod underneath Andrea then bend and straighten. Here we go.

In and out. As you're sitting here, watch you don't kinda drop down into it. Lift up from the core. Lifting up even from the pelvic floor. Now if you wanna add that option, this is your moment here. Take your fingers behind you, bend Andrea, trace back, extend forward, have a seat.

Bend Andrea over. And bend it back in. Let's do 10 seconds. Flow at your own pace. Faster is not better on this.

It should feel really good. Give me one more. Oh, I love that one. Set it down. Roll it out. Alright. Before I get you out of this, let's get one more movement in for your lats and traps.

Take your Andrea. Could either hold them in front of you, palms in. If you wanna add some resistance, cross the ropes, Andrea facing, you're still seated back there. Shoulders back, fly open, bring it back in. Inhale. Andrea exhale.

Just a couple of these. I'm not gonna add anything onto this. No fancy choreography. This is all functional movement. You're thinking about cracking that walnut between your shoulder blades here lots and traps hugging together, abs are scooping in and up.

Give me just a couple more. Prowed open chest. One more time. And everything comes home. Uncross those handles if they were crossed and set them back and down. Alright. Let's get off the carriage for a moment.

So take a sip of water. Whatever you need to do here, we'll do a quick change up of the reformer. We're lowering your foot bar down one setting. So taking that kickstand, lowering it down, lock it into place, go on to one blue spring for me. That's gonna feel really good.

Just one blue Speir. This is for standing lunging. So let's grab your box, bring your box around to the side of your reformer, and set it down on the floor. So I want you to line it up. So the box is basically an extension of the front of that carriage.

Grab your ball, bring the ball with you, and bring yourself up to stand. Let's face forward toward the foot bar. One foot goes forward. One foot goes back against the shoulder block. Hold that ball at your chest Andrea just slowly start to dive down, find a good lunge, and bring it right back up.

Okay. Let's do a couple like that. That ball, you could do whatever you want. You could keep it at your chest. Bring it out a little bit if you'd like to see your knee alignment. As we start here, that's what I'm focused most on is knee over heal and balance.

If you're like, got it. I'm good. You wanna add a little something here. As you go down, thread the ball under your leg, bring it up, and alternate the direction each time. So we're just doing a couple like this. You may hinge your body slightly forward as you do this, and that would be okay.

Nothing extreme or dramatic. The focus is that foot on the box is almost pulling the box in towards you to keep your hip back and down. Give me one more thread each direction if that's the variation you chose. Shoot. Meet me down on the next one.

Hold it down there. Reach your arms up toward the ceiling hinge slightly forward. Now lower your arms as you draw the carriage in. Lift your arms up as you push the carriage away. Everything comes in, and everything lengthens away.

I'm doing a little bit more of a dramatic hinge forward on this one so I can challenge the back of my leg a little bit more. 10 seconds in and dive down. 5 more seconds. Meet me down on the next one. Stay there. Now bend your elbows and your knee into the center and send them away.

Pull it in and out. This is such a good series to return to. And no matter how many times you do it, it is hard. I don't know if you can see this, but I am shaking right now. 5 more seconds. Shoot.

On your next one, extended out hold. Pull the ball into your chest. Stay low. Now press the carriage back a few inches. Drag it forward. Press it back.

Drag it forward. I'm moving from this front bent leg. Move from your glute. Move from your hamstring. 10 seconds. Could you get a little bit lower on this now? 5 more seconds.

After your next one, I want you to stay in that hold. Little pulses down to the floor. Down and down and down. 10 strong seconds. Shoo. 5 more seconds. Whoo.

And then bring everything back home. Whoo. Step carefully onto the box. Step off to the side. Let's lose the ball for the next exercise. So put it down maybe in front of your carriage so it's not gonna roll towards you.

Now take the box. This may be different for you depending on height. I'm gonna say about 2 to 3 inches past that edge of your actual frame. Once you're there, you can see if you're taller, you may wanna go a little further out, but let's set it up first. I think I'm taller than I am.

I'm gonna pull it back a bit. So once you're down there, take your inside foot Put it back onto your foot bar. It should be still about hip distance. Inside hand pushes the carriage away. So square it off, make sure you feel good, then bend Andrea straighten that arm. In and out.

That back leg is a support system here, so you want a little bit of pressure back with those toes. Your elbows not going out to the side as you bend here. It's not coming all the way in. I want you to find that nice mid range zone of this. If this feels good, stick with it.

If you wanna add a challenge to this, hold the carriage out. Abs in, hover that free leg. Keep going in and out. This is full body, abs, arms, legs. You could either stick with this, or as you bend your elbow in, twist cross that knee.

Tap your elbow, untwist, send it out. Ben twist. Send it out. Here we go. 15 seconds with whatever you chose. Shoot. 10 more seconds. 5 more seconds.

Now to come out of it, knee down first. Bend your elbow back second. Make sure the carriage is home and come off. Whew. Alright. Let's do the other side. So coming up to stand, let's bring the box around.

And set yourself up. We start with lunges. So you set it down. It's lined up with the front edge of your carriage. Grab the ball and bring yourself up.

Let's do this. So you're all the way up. Outside foot comes forward. Inside foot props up against that shoulder block. Hold the ball. Here we go. Whew.

Down and up. Lower and lift. So again, if you wanna hold the ball out for balance, do it. Shoot. Make sure the hips are squared off and even. The ball here is a nice prop to squeeze into just gently to get the shoulders down.

If you wanna add that threading, here we go. Threat it under the leg, bring it up, and we alternate direction down Andrea, and we're alternating direction, not just for our minds, right, to keep our minds healthy, but also to make sure we don't tend to kind of lean one direction every time. Keep it super balanced. Shoo. Give me one where make sure you're even Andrea bring yourself all the way down, hold, reach the ball up, incline your body forward. Draw the carriage in as you lower your arms come up to sand, everything dives away, start to flow in and away. Inertheyes are not touching, but I want you to think about that active energy hugging in toward that midline.

10 seconds of this, focusing in on that hip on the box I drawing back. Shoulders staying down. Meet me down on your next one. All the way down. Stay there. Bend your elbows and knee in.

Glide them away. Everything in. Everything out. Flow at your own pace. Second Andrea last side here, maybe see if you could get a little lower in this.

Give me 5 more seconds. Make sure you're breathing. Shoot. On your next one, everything goes out. Hold. Pull the ball to your chest.

Now glide back 2 inches forward 2 inches. Press and then here's 10 seconds. Whoo. Shoulders down. Abs are in.

Shoo. On your next one, meet me back. Hold that lunge. Little pulses down and down to the floor. Keep the care just still as you can. 10 seconds.

5 seconds. And then you bring it all the way home. Step onto the box. Step off to the side. Let's set that ball again out of the way.

Okay. We're gliding that box back again. So back to the same position you found worked for your body height, 2 or 3 inches further than the carriage edge. Come down. Again, I think I'm taller than I am. Come down onto your hands and knees. Inside foot goes back. Get those toes on.

Square off, hold on to your shoulder block, push it out before you start to move. Does that feel good? Make sure you're in a good spot, then bend, and straighten. Here we go. Press, end in. We're different side to side. So take this moment to really make sure you're driving muscularly, not from your wrist or a joint.

Shoo. On your next one, hold it out there. Abs in. Let's lift that free leg up if you did before. Bend and straighten. Press, bend. Reach. Bend 10 seconds.

5 more seconds. Hold it out. Add the twist. Bend and twist. Untwist. Bend in and out 15 seconds.

If you didn't try this today, that's totally fine. At some point, give it a shot. I was surprised the first time I did this. How much support and stability you actually do have? One more time.

Whoo. Need down. Bend your elbow. Bring it home. Okay. Bring yourself up. Roll it out. You are so close to being done here.

Step off your box. Take your box up. Let's put it the short direction on top right in front of your shoulder blocks. I'm gonna add a yellow spring here. So blue and yellow.

If you don't wanna add extra weight, after what I just did to you, stick with one blue, grab your ball Now to come on, hold on to your footbar and the box, step onto the frame first, come all the way up to sand. Take the ball, you'll put it between your leg and the box get a little bit of squish there. Start nice and tall. Hands wherever you want. Push out. Bend that leg that's on the carriage.

Bring everything back up. That's all I want you to do. Drop it down Andrea bring it back up. Bring it down, and bring it back up. Flow through this.

If you wanna do arms the same as me, this helps me to flow. Hands come together in the lunge. They press back as you come to stand. 10 seconds. Bringing it down, bringing it up.

You've got 5 more seconds here. On your next one, hold it down low. Now, bend that straight leg in press it out. It's a version of a speed skater, keeping that gentle connection into the ball, opening your chest, abs are engaged, hips are pulling back, 5 more seconds. After your next one, bring it all the way back in. Reach down. Take the ball. Have a seat, and then turn yourself around from here.

Let's go straight into that second side. Bring yourself up, take the ball, connect it in here. Alright. Here we go. So start nice and tall. Bend that leg that's on the carriage, dive down lateral lunge, and bring it back up.

Bring it down. Bring it back up. Again, second side might feel different than the first side. Start small. Get that form locked in. If you're like, yes.

Got it. Go bigger. This is your last movement of the day. Down and up. On your next one, meet me down low. Stay there. Bend your leg in and out. That foot that's on that platform. I want you to keep all five toes down and drive out from that corner of the seat, the medias.

5 more seconds. 3 more seconds. After your next one, bring it all the way up. Reach down. Take the ball out. Hold on to the box and the foot bar and carefully step off. Okay. I'm not gonna leave you without a quick stretch. So set your ball out of the way take off your blue Speir.

You're on just one yellow. Give it a little push out. Make some room. Take a gentle step into your carriage well. Turn, put both hands on the foot bar.

Your knee goes back. Against the box toes point up, little hop forward, opening your chest, dive down, and just hold this. Nothing else here. No fancy choreography. Opening your chest, tiny tuck under.

Keep the abs engaged so you don't, you know, crunch up into the back. We want this to really be a nice functional stretch. Round your body, bring everything in. Let the carriage touch your shin. Take a step in, and then the other leg comes back.

Little hop forward of that standing leg, and you dive everything away. Tailbone slightly tucking Andrea. Chest is open. Undoing all that lunging we did in the hip flexor opening up the quad. Shoo. Gentle rounding of the back.

The carriage comes in touch the calf muscle there. Now step out Hold on to the box. Step your foot carefully out. Close the carriage. And just standing tall.

Reach your arms up. Open your arms around. Stand tall. Stand proud. And my friend, you are all done with me today. I'll see you for the next workout.