Efficient, Balanced Tower

Hi, everybody. I'm Tom McCook. It's a great pleasure to be back at Pilates anytime. I'm here with Aaron who I love teaching with. And, the class today will be a tower class, a balanced flow where we'll work on strength and mobility. And a little more emphasis on upper back strength and tying it to your legs. So we're gonna start with a little tapping just to wake up the body and wake up our nervous system.

So we're gonna start with tapping your torso. So we'll start with the chest. Heart and lungs, big pumps up here, also your chest muscles, and then we'll go on to the belly wall, digestive area, your core. And then with your fist, soft fist, tap at the rim of your ribs, go around from the front to the back. This is the level of your diaphragm.

Do that a couple Tom. Your most important breathing muscle. And then from there, we're gonna go down the front of the legs. Up the back of your legs and hips, down the outside, up the inseams. Give your butt a little punch.

And then with your lower back, just tap your lower back with your legs bent with soft fist and do a little arch curl of your lower back as you do it. That's it. And then from there, come right up and bring one arm out in front of you and tap the arm. All sides. So you're just waking up your mind map, brain to body, so you can move better more efficiently, let go of tension, up around your neck, underarm, And then go right onto your deltoid, your shoulder muscle, and just sponge your way down the arm, bicep, tricep.

And when you get to your forearm, rotate the tissue and rotate the bone counter. So you just get that all those muscles to glide around the bone a little bit better, working your way down to your wrists. And then when you get to your palm, just work your thumb into your Tom, and then give each finger a pull. Oh, feels kinda good. Now from your neck Tom your fingers, brush down all sides of the arm, just sluffing off anything that no longer serves you.

And then just take a moment just to notice just from that. You might notice that arm's a little more dropped. So you've already let go of tensions. We're making the body a little more functional. We'll go right into side two. We'll tap. All sides underarm, up around your neck.

There we go. And then move on to your deltoid, your shoulder muscle and just sponge your way down. Bicep tricep. When you get to the forearm at a rotation of the tissue and a rotation of the bone countering each other, down to the wrists. And then work your thumb into your palm. Give each finger a pull.

And then brush down for your neck. All sides sluffing it off. And then just tap your neck, the back of your neck, let your knees unlock. Light fingertips. Tap your head. Given us that awareness of knowing where we are in space a little better.

Give each ear a little pull. And then just shake out your limbs. Now we're gonna go right into spread eagle on the on the equipment. So she's Erin's gonna come up to standing on the tower and put her feet either in the corners towards the bar or the toes up. The toes don't have to be up if that's uncomfortable for anybody. They could just be in the corners.

Hanger its shoulder height. Now she's gonna let her arms lengthen. Now starting from the top down from her head, picture the heads like a wheel, roll the head forward, roll through the spine, then slowly let the spine straight and head tail. And just hold that for a moment. Feel that traction.

Take a breath. Now bend the knees and curl from the pelvic wheel, start to straighten the legs as you open the front of the hips, retract the shoulders, and then extend through the crown of the head. Then come back to straight spine again, then start from the top down again, the head wheel, thoracic wheel, pelvic wheel, Tom straight line, feel that moment of traction, take a breath, bend, curl, Through the spine, take your time nice and smooth, retract the shoulders and extend out the crown of the head. And we're just gonna do three more. She'll come back to straight, curl down from the Tom. Reach back feel that head tail line, bend, curl, open the hips, retract, and open the top of the chest, and back to straight and beautiful.

Curl down from the top nice and smooth. Straight line, small bend, curl, sequencing through the spine in nice fluid way, retract and extend. And just one more. And I'm just giving her a little bit of feedback along the spine just for for awareness. And she can bend from the bottom and curl from the bottom.

And retract and extend. Beautiful. Now from there, we're gonna go into she's gonna come onto her back facing the bar with a head away from the bar and put the roll down bar behind her knees for bridging. Now you guys at home set it up so the spring tension is not too much. So it's not uncomfortable in your knees, but you wanna feel like a little bit of traction.

So if you need to, you can slide back a little bit. So just gonna start and just take a few breaths just to arrive in this position. And on the exhale phase, just deflate into gravity. Let the shoulders relax. Let's chest melt and just sense the feedback of the mat.

There you go. Then take a nice fluid breath. Now initiating from the tailbone, curl the tail towards the knees and slowly peel into an articulated bridge. Take a breath at the Tom. Now use the top of the abdomen on the down to lengthen out your back and let the tail be the last thing that you release. And so we're gonna do a few more like that.

Nice and smooth with peel up, go for evenness along the lower back. This time, while on the bridge, inhale reach your arms overhead into a high v, thumbs towards the floor. You can go all the way back. There you go. Now start from the top of the abdomen to sequence down so you get a little more stretch in your side body now. And as you drop the tail, float the arms to your side again.

And we'll do three more, just like that. Curling, reach without arching, Feel the abdomen, fill the side body lengthening on the down, and then float the arms down. Beautiful. Two more. There we go. And then reach, feel your foot points on the floor, the ball behind the big toe, behind the little toe in the heel like a tripod. You're on both tripods.

And we'll do one more. And then add the reach and traction down nice and smooth. Now when you get to the bottom, reach the arm straight up to the ceiling, we're gonna go into hundred prep. So on the exhale roll the head wheel off the floor, curl up reaching arms parallel to the mat and stay curled up and really slow, inhale reach the arms back by the ears, lower the torso, lower the arms. And again, inhale reach up to the ceiling, exhale into the curl, inhale reach to the back, hold the curl, exhale down through the torso, and we'll do that two more Tom, inhale reach up, exhale head wheel, inhale reach up and back, exhale lower the torso one more time, inhale up, exhale curl, inhale reach up again, exhale lengthen down. Now interlace the fingers behind your head.

We're gonna go into just an oblique turn. Now picture you're gonna turn from your rib to your opposite hip. So take a breath, and I'll do that same head wheel curl and hold it. Now turn from the waistline. And inhale to center.

Just do four each side at your own pace and get heavy in the hip you're turning away from. Wake up all those muscles. That's it. Nice and fluid. Exhale into the turn, like you're wringing out a towel, inhale to the middle, exhale the turn just one more each side nice and smooth. Beautiful. Last one.

And back to center, lengthen down. Now, carefully help yourself out of that setup with the bar, and we're gonna go into a roll down so you just help yourself up to a seated position. And we'll just have you put your legs right up against the uprights. Now at home, if you need to bend your legs a little bit, get up tall, that's fine. Otherwise, keep your legs long. Sitting up nice and tall, just press the arms down slightly and grow taller. Now from the pelvic wheel start to roll back. That's it reaching through the legs, all the way down onto your back.

Now at the bottom, shrug your shoulders north as you breathe in. Let the shoulders slide down. Let the head wheel follow and peel up and over your center nice and smooth. Grow tall at the top as you press down slightly and peel away from the legs as you reach through the legs. At the bottom again shrug.

Let the shoulders slide down. Let the head follow. Curle up and over your middle. Grow tall at the top. This next time we're on the bottom, we're gonna add. So press down to grow tall.

Peel down from the pelvis again. Now this time at the bottom, just bend your knees slightly and press your heels down so you can feel how you can keep your lower back nice and long. Now keeping your shoulders low and the exhale, bend the elbows wide, pull in the bar to like the bottom of your breast bone. Do that for six reps inhale to straighten, exhale to pull. Feel the back of the shoulders, the back of your legs, and that nice line through your spine you're maintaining.

Just three more. Looks really good. That's it. Two more. Be mindful to keep your wrist nice and straight one more. Inhale to straighten on the exhale let the head follow and peel right back up to sitting.

We're gonna do one more set of that exact same thing, grow tall at the top. Press down, peel back through the pelvis. At the bottom, just have a small bend of the leg so you can feel that easier to maintain the lower back position. Now pull wide, broad across your clavicles, six pulls. There we go. That's it. Just three more. Yep. Very nice.

And one more. And then peel up and over the center. Nice work. Now from there, we're gonna go right into water skiers. Across your right foot over your left, And then hold the middle of the bar with an underhand grip with your left hand. That should now grow nice and tall. Now picture when you roll down, you wanna see if you can avoid side bending.

That makes it a little harder. So you'll reach the free arm under the bar. Take a breath now from the pelvis, start to roll back. So your length in the lower spine, now reach up, like, reach out like your water's getting towards me, and then sweep it back low and come right back up. We're gonna do three three more on this one side.

I'm gonna give you a little bit of a correction as you go into this time. I'm gonna pull you over towards me. Here we go. And then curl right back up. Picture that you're gonna stay long on the side that's holding the bar that makes it a little tougher, but you you get more core integrity.

There you go. That's it. Just two more. That's it. Nice and fluid. And then peel it right up. So you're staying in that straight line, but you're like a cork screw when you add their rotation.

That's it. Now we'll go right over on to side two. Grow tall at the Tom, initiate from the pelvis and see if you can keep that awareness of staying long on the side that's holding the bar. Good work. And then sweep it low and come right back up Just three more on that side. Nice and fluid.

That's it. And I'm just watching that she's staying long on both sides. She's doing a great job. Two more. That's it. Excellent. And one more now. Nice and smooth.

There we go. Awesome. Now from there, we're gonna we're gonna come up to standing. We're gonna use the long box. So this one will be, a series of arm work where you'll you'll be standing up holding these guys facing. We're just gonna step back and feel what attention feels like for you. So I might need to move this back a little bit.

So take your feet about shoulder width apart and just just practice when you when you start to squat, let the elbows bend outside of your body. And just just see what that feels like if that tension level feels like for you. Is that giving you a little bit of support? Is it pretty light? Let me slide this back just a little further and then step back a little further. Here you go. So you just gotta test to see how the spring tension feels. Now same thing, but this one, you go down, stay as vertical as you can.

So you might bend a little less, and then straighten. That's it. That feel a little better? That's it. Now let's do four of those before we add to that. Feel that connection across your back, your abdomen, and your legs. Nice and fluid.

That's it. Now the next one, You're gonna pull, and you're slowly gonna descend all the way onto the box. Now, right as your hips hit the box, let your arms straighten, now slowly roll back onto the box, and let yourself extend off the back of the box as you press the arms down. Inhale nod your chin forward, exhale curl right back up, and then come right back up to standing as you bend the arms. And we're gonna do that two more sets like that. Who knew?

And again, bend and squat four Tom, and then right back up. Just do your four reps, add your breath, inhale as you bend, exhale up. Good. Excellent. On this next one, you'll just send all the way onto the box. Let the arm slowly lengthen. Length and back, press down and add that upper back extension, nod the chin first, curl back up.

As you start to bend, come back to standing, we're gonna do one more set of four. That's it. Tom again, bend in squat and straighten good. Three more. That's it. Really good. Two more.

And one, This time, go all the way to the box with control. And the next one, there you go. All good. Now let the arms lengthen and then slowly peel back. And now press down, fill that upper back engagement.

Nod the chin, peel up. Now, this time, stay seated and let your legs lengthen out a little closer together. And we're gonna go into a, oblique pull. We'll start in a neutral spine, then we'll add a little flexion. So just bend one elbow and turn towards it. And then control the return. It really feel how you're pulling from the shoulder blade and waistline.

Both sit bones are heavy. So the rotation is really from the waistline up. That's it. One more each side before we add to it. There we go. Now slide further back on the box. You'll have more support.

Now the next time as you extend as you pull back with your left arm, reach through your left leg and straighten it. And then slowly lower as you come back to center, just do three each side like that. Fill that extension through the leg. That's how you feel that adds more activation. Pull and turn. Good. Nice.

One more each side. Good work. There we go. Last side. And rest. Great work. Now from there, we're gonna come on up.

We'll take the box away. And we're gonna put on one at home, you can put on either one blue or one red on your push through bar. We'll get this out of your way. Exactly. And this is a teaser progression.

So for this one, Aaron's gonna come on to her back with her head at the bar end, and then take hold of the bar and start with us when you're at home. Start with your shoulders just slightly behind the bar. And she's just gonna start in this position again just to arrive, take a couple breaths just to feel position, and just do a couple of telescoping where you reach the shoulders towards the ceiling, then imprint them into the mat. And think of when they're going towards the ceiling. You also want to pull them further away from your ears.

So they don't go up and forward. They go slightly down and forward. So it's smaller. That's it. Now next time you set the shoulders, float up one knee at a Tom, and bring your legs into a small v. So your knees open about six inches heels together.

Now inhale to prepare on the exhale Tom down flex and feel your head wheel. Now as you roll up slowly reach your legs out to a 45 and zip up the legs. Take a breath at the top. Now from the pelvic wheel, start to roll back and start to bend the legs back into that starting place. And we're just gonna do three more like that before we add. So on the exhale, curl, Feel that zipped up feeling in the inseams.

Peel down from the pelvis. Feel the bottom of your shoulders. Two more. That's it. Nice and fluid. And peel down. Excellent.

This next time up, we're gonna hold, and we're gonna do single leg lower and lift through each side. Now hold that length in the lower back, toned legs, lower and lift one. Alternate. There you go. Nice work. Good catch. Three side.

That's it. One more each side. Great work. And then peel back down. Excellent. Now from there, we're gonna go into what's called advanced sit ups. So from here, Erin's gonna slide back where her head's gonna be even a little further off the back end. Like, there. Now let the legs straighten, and just get a sense of tone in the bottom of your glutes, your inseam, so the back is long, the the legs are toned, set the shoulders low.

Now as you breathe in, float the head, And nice exhale, peel up and reach into the bar all the way up to full setup. Now at the top, extend your upper back and look up into the bar. And then from the pelvis, roll down, flex the spine all the way down with control. And at that bottom, have that little bit of extension, take a breath, nod the chin, curl all the way up. Reach up into it open, and then from the pelvis lengthen all the way down.

We're just gonna do one more. One last one. Nice and smooth, exhale peel it up, reach up into it, and then lengthen back down. Nice work. Now from there, you're still gonna stay behind the bar, but we're gonna add just one more oblique variations. So slide a little bit forward so your head's like more on the edge, but you're still behind the bar. Now bring your knees in and then up in the air with your knees together.

This is an oblique variation. So on the exhale, you're gonna curl up into the teaser. Now as you roll back halfway, pull your knees into one armpit and touch the lower back to the mat, and then go right back up into it. And just take your Tom, do three side That's it. One more on that side. Fill how it's waistline rotation.

And now to side two, shoulders stay low in that moment of going Tom. There you go. Just two more. That's it. Excellent. One more now. Last one. And from the top of the movement, take a breath.

And then roll right down, let your legs bend and rest. Good work. Now we're gonna turn around for parakeet. So she'll come on up and now when you turn around, you're gonna put your feet on the bar with the legs long. Have your feet and think of when you guys at home, instead of holding with your toes, put it across the top of your arch right behind the ball of your feet. So you can actually be on the bar, but you can relax your toes a little bit more.

Now she'll come on to her back with her legs long. And first, just feel a relative neutral in the lower back, and pelvis, legs or tone, and then sense your body line. Now as you breathe in, just bend your legs halfway towards you. Then slide them back down as you follow the belly wall in. So you feel that connection between the back of your legs, your core, and your postural muscles. Do that a couple times.

That's it. And one more. So you're just working on alignment and a balance of tone. Now the next time is your inhale let the legs bend towards you and with control, let them go up to the ceiling. Once they're straight, let your tail chase your feet into a bridge.

Now in the bridge, stay strong in your legs and inhale reach one arm towards, or one head, leg towards your head, then back to the bar. You knew what I mean? I meant. There you go. The other arm. There you go. One more each side. Strong arms, relaxed neck.

Back to the bar, take a breath. Now sequence down nice and slow with long legs. As you drop the tail, pull the bar down and press it back through. That's it. And again, with control, let the leg with the bar come towards you. Let the legs go up.

Let your tail chase the feet. Inhale into the reach, back to the bar to each side. That's a strong body line. One more. This time as you come back to the bar, hold.

Now just do a small bridge, bend both legs small and reach back up three times. Hold that connection. Two more. And one. Tom the top, take a breath. Now again, sequence down through the spine.

At the bottom, pull the bar through. Now this time with the bar all the way through reach your arm straight up to the ceiling, Now keep the back of the waistline close to the mask. We maintain that tone and really slow reach back. Now exhale the arms forward. Let the head follow into a roll up.

In the roll up, hold that forward flexion. Take a breath. Now roll back down. We're gonna do one more rep like that with control nice and slow. Reach the arms to the back. Arms forward head follows.

Peel off the mat. This time, take hold of the bar outside of your feet, let your legs bend as much as you need to to make it comfortable. Now with your legs a little bit bent, tuck your chin in, and as you hollow the belly, let your legs straighten a little bit Tom, and inhale to bend. And it's okay if the legs don't straight and just bend and stretch a few Tom. Where you feel the connection of your abdomen as you stretch.

Two more. That's it. One more. Now next time you come into the stretch phase, hold it. Now just breathe into your waistline, your sides. And on the exit, just follow it in and relax your neck, but you feel the tone in the middle of your body to support your back. One more breath. Now nice and slow as you start to bend your legs, still holding the bar with your hands, just carefully take one foot off the bar, then the other foot and let the bar come up. Good job.

And there we are. Now from there, we're gonna go into standing facing away arm work. We're working. So this is we have the long yellow springs. Aaron's gonna stand up facing away up on the mat. And she'll start with her feet in a small v, and she just wants to feel like where's the appropriate tension for her.

So just push the arms out and just feel what that feels like. So you wanna feel like it's there's a little bit of tension, but it's not too much. So she's gonna start in what's called upper arms with her upper arms bent at right angles with her elbows, hands, shoulder width apart, and then feel the tone of the legs, the inseams, and her postural awareness. Now exhale, just straight and keeping the elbows at the same level and bend for four. And feel that connection, belly wall, bottom of the shoulders, strong connection to her feet and legs. On the next one, she's gonna press and hold, then nice and slow, reach the arms overhead, keeping all four sides of the waist long, pull back down and bend again.

We'll do three more like that. Press and then add the reach. Pull and bend. Really nice. Two more. She did a great job maintaining her body line, strong, connected movement.

One more. That's it. And reach. Pull and bend. Very nice. Now from there, bring your arms down at, like, shoulder level or or mid chest level. Now reach out to mid chest level, and then do a small bend of the elbows for hug a tree.

Inhale to open. Exale wrap from the back to the front. That's it. Inhale on the opening phase, exhale as you close. Beautiful four more. Feel the ribcage expanding laterally as you breathe in.

You feel that back to front connection as you close. Two more. That's it. And one more. Now from there, we're gonna go right into step and punch. So step back a little closer to the back of where the springs attach and start with your feet in parallel and your palms facing each other. Now step your right foot forward and press your left arm to the middle.

Then come right back to your start and just alternate like that. That's it. And let me give you a little cue that'll help you. So when you when you press, picture that your waistline goes back. And the back glute is active.

The tendency can be to extend the spine. Like, pull back through your waistline as you press. Get a feel for that. Like, right there. There you go. And let it come a little bit across the midline Tom.

So you feel like, now you're ready to hit somebody. There we go. Now opposite arm and leg. There you go. There you go. That's it.

And even punch a little lower and let the palm turn down. There you go. Now we're talking. That's it. Feel how that connection from the back leg to the punching arm. There you go now go into it and hold it just for a second.

This would be good for everybody to feel. Think of your pelvis is slightly turning towards your back leg and your spine's turning slightly towards your front leg. That just turns everything on. Try that as you bring that into it as you do a few more. Pellevis slightly to back leg, spine to front leg.

That's it. Nice. Couple more each side like that. That's basically walking. That's it. With a punch.

That's it. Just two more each side. There you go. Feel how that lights up the hips a little bit more. Good. One more each side now. That's it. Beautiful.

A last movement we'll hit we'll do here after you finish this rep is salute. So you bring your arms up in front of your forehead back with the heels slightly together or together and turned out. Now as you slide the shoulders down your back, press up into a high 45. And then bend. And feel that connection lower traps, low belly, bottom of your hips and in seams.

Just three more. There we go. And two, and one more. Great work. Awesome. Now from there, we're gonna step off carefully, and we're gonna go right into swan on the long box.

So for this, again, at home, you can put on either one blue or one red. Get this out of our way. So Aaron's gonna come onto her belly facing the bar and hold the bar as wide as you can. Chester just slightly off the box. Now first thing, just get a sense of your alignment that you can reach back through the legs to add tone and feel that you got that nice line through the crown of the head.

Now it really slowly telescope the shoulders towards the hands, then glide them towards the hips. Just do that four times. And feel how it's really not an arm exercise it's more of a shoulder blade to spine exercise Tom connect to your back muscles and have good good mechanics when you start to extend the spine. Now, one more. Now next time you slide the shoulders down, Keeping in your neck the same. Just lift your head slightly up, and now start to turn the head wheel to look forward, now extend through the spine.

And then lead with the spine back down. And then allow the shoulders to release up again. Slide them down, feel that small head lift, head wheel, thoracic extension. Nice and smooth. So that nice frequency through the spine, just do two more before we add.

That's it. And then lengthen down one vertebra at a time. And one more, set the shoulders first, head wheel, thoracic extension. Now next time, come up like halfway and hold it. Now connecting to the muscles across your mid back, slowly bend the elbows wide, letting the bar come towards you, and then slowly lengthen the arms will stay up with the torso. Do that for five reps.

Ben feel it across the mid back. And straighten. Energy through the legs. The legs are toned. Great mid back work.

Two more. That's it. And one more. This time when you lengthen down, let the torso come down, nod your chin. I'll let your head drop and tuck your tail a little bit and just take a couple breaths so you can lengthen your lower back. I'm just gonna give her a little stretch.

You can imagine I'm giving you a stretch at home. There we go. Then I will take the bar for her at home. Be careful coming up. Very nice. From there, we'll take the bar down, and we're gonna go into rolling in and rolling out in chest expansion.

There we go. So the first one will be chest expansion with the bar. So Aaron's gonna come to a kneeling position facing the bar. And again, spring tension, you just need to make sure that it's set up for you that you can actually pull the bar down without it being too much. First thing, just get a sense of tall kneeling, relative neutral head back, shoulders back, And on the exhale, just pull the bar towards the thighs, initiating from the back of the shoulders, the side body, mid back, inhale to straighten.

And just three more. Feel that pull That's it. Just two more. This time when you pull hold, now turn your head to one side, center turn, center, and release one more. That's it. And then add your head rotation. Center, turn, center, release. Now, when we do the thigh stretch, slide back just a little further with your body, now leaving your arms out in front of you, tuck your chin a little bit.

Now imagine you're just gonna flex at your waistline. Pull the waistline back a little bit so you're opening the hips. Now hold that shape And on the exhale, leaving the arms out in front of you, lean back from your knees. And then inhale back up. Do that for four.

So the way she's doing it is to keep her lower back long, which is gonna target the the thigh's more into a stretch without substituting in the lower back. One more. That's it. Now we're going to take that directly into rolling in and rolling out. So from here, On the next exhale, from the top down, she's gonna curl down and reach the bar to the floor about a foot in front of her body. Now pull the bar towards your thighs lean back into thigh stretch and bend the elbows and pull the bar up.

Open the top of your chest at the Tom. Now press it back down the front of your body. Let it go out in front of you about a foot. And from the pelvis core, roll back up to your start. Now we'll just do three more like that.

Nice and fluid, curl down. Pull the bar to you, pull up, open the front of the hips, opening the chest, press back down the front. As it goes out in front with control, return to tall kneeling. Just two more. Exale into the flexion, draw it towards you, slide it up, bend the elbows wide, open chest, beautiful back down the front, roll it back up, and one more last one.

Curl down, draw it to you, slide it up and open, press back down the front, restack the spine. Beautiful work. How we're talking. How's it working? Great work. Now we're gonna come on to our side and do a side leg series with the long purple springs enough.

Long purple feels too heavy for anybody. You can go to long yellow. So she'll come onto her side and take that top the strap that's in front of her on her top foot. And then press both legs along, and you might wanna even just support your head with that bottom arm so you can just leave your head in neutral. Now with the bottom leg, let it be about six inches in front of you.

And now the top leg, you wanna have a nice straight line, ankle, hip, shoulder, ear. Now all she's gonna do here is flex her foot, reach through the leg, and picture the hinge is at her pubic bone level. She's gonna lift the leg up in parallel, and then squeeze it back down. Just abduction, adduction. And think of that think of reaching through the sit bone So you really get the movement in the hip joint, but not the lower back.

There we go. Just two more. It's getting that nice clear hinge in the hip joint. One more. Now next time from the starting position, point the foot, now stir a circle a little bigger than a dinner plate, pretty small circle. Same awareness of that pelvic stability, as you reach into the strap.

Two more in that direction, and then reverse. There we go. Wakes up all your hip muscles. If you're feeling it about right now. There we go. Two more. Now reverse again, make it a little bigger.

That's it. Keep reaching into it. Keep breathing. That's it. Just two more. And one, and now reversed last time. Keep reaching to that strap, especially as you go to the back.

Two more. And one. Now hold the starting position and bend your bottom leg like you're sitting in a chair. And we're gonna go right into side kicks as you inhale, flex the foot and kick to the front. Now point and press to the back and resist the down knee towards your chest like you're striding up a hill. Inhale kick to the front, press and reach back.

That's it. Just three more. Picture that sit bone is following the foot. And the tail is doing the opposite. So when your foot is going forward, think your tail is gently going back. As your foot goes forward, your tail goes as your foot goes back, your foot, your tail goes slightly forward.

That was not super clear, but it was I think you got it. One more. Last one. Now next time she takes the leg to the back, I wanted to hold it there. Now as you hold it back there, keep pressing into the strap and going into bicycle slowly bend the knee. And I'll I'll pull it back again. Now see if you can leave the knee back as you start to bend the knee.

That's it. Now let the knee come forward, then reach the leg long. And again, reach it back. Keep the knee back as you bend. That's it. One more.

Now as it comes forward, pause, and now reverse, bend, and now reach back. There you go. And then sweep it forward with control. Bend, reach back, and sweep it forward. Just two more. Bend and reach back.

And last one. There we go. Now let's go ahead and straighten out your bottom knee and put your top knee on the mat, let it bend for a moment. Let this knee bend and just take a moment and tap out your hip for a moment. There we go. That's a lot of work.

So Aaron's gonna carefully help herself out of that setup. We're gonna turn around for side two. Otherwise, we walk in circles. So her body is roughly in the middle of the mat. Bottom leg a little bit in front of her body, about six inches in front. And then I'm just gonna give her that cue of having her her hip, ankle, shoulder, ear, all in one straight line, and then flex the foot in parallel.

Now feel like the hinge is at the hip joint. Now hinge to lift the leg up in parallel and then back down. Now I'm just giving her that feedback of the waistline stays long and the hinge is right. The level of the pubic bone. That's it.

There we go. Just two more. Feel both sides of the waistline helping you maintain position. One more. Next time you lower hold and point the foot, press into the strap. Small circle now.

Little bigger than a dinner plate. That's it. Wake up all those support muscles in the hip. One more in that direction and now reverse. That's it. Fluid quality to the movement, two more. Now reverse and make it a little bigger.

That's it. And two more. And one, and then reverse again. That's it. Nice and strong and fluid all the way through. This one looks easier on this side. It takes the wind.

One more. Now as you ride back in the center, bend the bottom leg like you're sitting at a chair for a version of side kicks. So, there you go. Now with a flex foot, inhale kick that leg to the front. Now point and press the leg to the back. As the tail goes to the back as the leg goes forward, tail goes to the front as the leg goes back. It's very small, but just picture it.

It's like an opposition, sit bone forward, tail back, sit bone back, tail forward. That's the dynamic with the pelvic halves. And the sacrum. There you go. Ice and fluid. There you go. Just two more.

And one, next time your leg goes to the back, we're gonna go into bicycle. So press back. Now leave the thigh back as you slowly start to bend the knee. Now knee to the front, leg long to the front. Sweep it to the back, bend at the knee, knee forward, leg long. Two more in that direction. Feel each stage of the exercise.

There you go. One more. Reach. Now as the knee comes forward, reverse, bend, reach back, sweep the long leg forward. Nice and fluid. Just three more. That's where you're getting all the leg muscles working through these dynamics, two more. And one. As you finish, let your bottom leg straighten out on the mat. Now bend that knee and put the top knee on the mat for a second, and just tap out your hip for a second.

Say thank you, hip, for taking care of me through that series. Now from there, we're gonna help out from there. Now we're gonna go into a push up variation. We just have two more exercises. And for this one, Erin's gonna come into where she first starts by putting her hands on the box in a kneeling push up position to do a couple scapula glides.

And think of when you do a scapula glider, a lot of times when we do push ups, we let it be passive when we're dropping, but I want her to actively pull her shoulder blades in then actively widen them and lower them. Do that two more times. Actively pull them in, actively widen and lower them. One more. Tom that's gonna be part of the push up.

Now that the wrinkle on this one, the version she's gonna do, she's gonna put her feet on the push through bar. And if that's too difficult for anybody, they can just do it with their feet on the floor, but we're gonna play with that just adds a little bit of dynamic in stability to it. Now when she goes down, before she goes down, she's gonna let her body translate a little bit forward and let the shoulder blades actively pull in. Now wide and press yourself back. Go a little bit forward towards the front as you go down, that's it.

And then up and back. And just two more. Forward and down. Up and back. Excellent. One more. Up and back beautiful and place one foot down at a time.

Nice work. Looking good. Now we have a kneeling mermaid to finish. So, Anne will face you guys to start. She's gonna be in a kneeling position. Now when she takes her left arm up up on a high 45, Pictureure, I want her to get heavy in that outer hip and take her spine towards her hand as she starts to bend. Now shift the weight onto the inside leg so she can extend the outside leg.

Now just from the rib cage up, turn towards the bar really slow. Back to side and now let the arm lower and turn open really slow. Back to side, now nice and slow shift back up to kneeling. And we're just gonna do that two more times. Press down, shift on to the outside knee.

Now on to the inside knee and extend. Spiral from the torso towards the bar. Back to side, lower the arm a little bit, rotate open nice and slow, back to center, back up to tall kneeling. And just one more. Push down, shift to the outside, shift to the inside, extend, spiral forward with control, back to side, lower the arm a little bit, rotate open, Back to side. Now hold.

Now let's last one, just go into a little more of a side bin, let that top arm come over the Tom, take a big breath, and then lengthen all the way up to tall kneeling. And we'll take side two. Good work. And again, just as you take your right arm up on that high diagonal, think of going towards it. Now shift onto the inside knee so you can extend that outside leg.

From the rib cage up spiral forward, back to side, lower the arm a little bit, now open to the back, back to center with control back to tall kneeling. And again, press down, reach up on that high diagonal onto the inside knee, reach, spiral forward with control. Back to center, lower the arm a little bit and open, back to center, lengthen back up to tall kneeling. And last one, press down side, inside knee, extend. Spiral forward, back to center, lower the arm, spiral open.

This Tom, when you go back to center, go a little more into that side bend over the top, hold for an extra breath. And then lengthen right up to tall kneeling, and then we'll finish standing on the mat or on the floor. And we'll finish with a standing roll down. So just start with your feet, run under your sit bones and lift your 10 toes so you can feel your key weight bearing points and do a small leg bend, and now starting from your head wheel, roll down through the spine, rib cage, let the pelvis roll over the top of your legs. And at the bottom, just take a moment to nod your head.

Yes a few times. Rotated no. Now anchor into your feet and initiating from the pelvic wheel slowly restack the spine and arrive in a line posture. Let the breathing drop, unlock the knees. And acknowledge yourself your great work today.

Nice job. Thank you, everybody. Thank you for joining. Hope you enjoyed, and look forward to seeing you again on Pilates anytime.