Strengthening Reformer

Hi. I'm Delia. And today, we'll be doing a strength flow on the reformer. We'll go over a couple of things before we get started. I have the Allego 2 reformer here, and I have it set up to the foot bar at foot bar footwork position. So positions say number 2 here on the a 2. And we'll be using the platform here in just a bit.

I do not have an extended platform to put on here, but if you do have one at home or at your studio, place one on if you'd like a little bit wider platform because we will be standing on the reformer here in just a little bit. I'm gonna walk to the front, and I have one red spring on, and we'll do a little warm up standing facing the bar. Hands on the bar, Take your bottom back and just fold over for a nice little stretch, dropping your head between your arms, and allowing your knees to bend and soften. Extend through the upper body, Stend the legs and then stand all the way back up. We'll do that again.

Hands onto the bar, knees, bend, feet parallel, head drops. This feels good, inhale breath, and exhale to roll up. I'm looking at an excuse here to put a little bit of pressure onto my shoulders for a little stretch because we will be doing a lot of arms today just a little heads up, bend, and stretch, and fold forward. And roll up. Now taking your hands back to the bar, dropping your bottom back, softening your elbows, and you can do a little stretch with those hips just side to side, allowing that lower back to stretch. I feel this quite a bit at the lumbar spine towards the hip, which I tend to get a little bit tighter, just a few more of these, little pedal of the knees, and then center yourself over the bar into a modified plank position. My body is upright above my feet, so this should be doable for most of you out there.

Feet behind, dropping your hips towards the bar, little up stretch, allowing your lower back to extend eyes towards the ceiling or sky, and then drop the heels down, soften the elbows. We'll do that again. Lift up, roll through the spine, drop the hips, extend, open up through the chest, and then drop those heels down. We'll do that one more time. Inhale breath.

And hips drop. Chest opens. And then lower those heels. Standing nice and tall, we're gonna place the foot on the bar. You could either place it on the bar or on the platform. So if the bar is too high and you don't feel balanced, just put your foot on the floor.

This is just the beginning. Just a little stretch. Hands on the bar, and I'm just going to extend my forward leg that's on the bar and then bend it so I can open up through the hamstring. And I'm really conservative here in the beginning as to how much I extend in the hamstring before I get moving. One more time.

Let's keep the left hand on the bar, right hand on the shin, and just open up the front body. And that extra little hip flexor stretch, I can feel the hamstring word attaches to the glute here for a stretch. And repeat on the other side. So left foot goes onto the bar or on the platform, whatever you felt comfortable doing. And you're just going to hold the stretch and then extend and then bend, inhale, and exhale.

Two more. And one more. Hold that stretch. Nice little lunge. Left hand on the shin, right hand on the bar. Pause here. A couple of breaths here.

1 and exhale and 2 and exhale. Foot to the floor. 1 more roll down. Reach the arms up to the ceiling fold forward. Watch your head. Don't hit it on that bar.

And then roll yourself all the way back up. I'm gonna go side on the reformer. So, again, one red spring, I have the foot bar up. You can get it out of your way, but for sake of flow into the next exercises, I'm going to keep the bar up. It's also really great.

You can hold on to it as you step up. I'm gonna move the safety strap out of the way. And if you have that wider platform, awesome. If you don't, just be real careful as you step. So I'm gonna take my foot onto the platform that doesn't move, and I'm gonna stand all the way back up and place my foot on the carriage that does move. So be really careful that I'm gonna step that foot down.

That foot's gonna stay on the platform. So I'll step up and then I'll step down. So you can see why we did a little bit of a stretch on those hips because we're starting on our feet. I do love to start classes sometimes, doing the standing splits because people walk in and they expect to lie down right away. Uh-uh. We're gonna stand up and move.

So lift it up and then lower yourself back down. Be careful on the placement of your foot. This isn't meant to do really quickly. It's more of a strength class. I want you to think about that supporting leg.

And then make sure that you soften the landing as you bring your foot down to the floor as part of the workout. On the next round, take that foot up, hold it on the carriage, feet parallel, and then press the legs out and back. So this is the side split. People love the side split most people do because it works out outside of the thigh, so make sure that you are in the right fire pattern for these. If you fire right at the side of your hip, that'll get the most fire.

Keeping that pelvis in neutral will help you fire that muscle. Secondly, is that thigh. So a little bit lower. You should feel that fire second. And then lastly, your lower back should should get less fire, more stability.

But the pelvic position here is the most important because if you play around with pelvic position, posterior, and anterior anterior tilt, then it'll change what you feel on those legs. One more time, press it out and then return. We're gonna alternate those 2. So you'll step back with your right foot, that's off the carriage, step up, push out. The closer the carriage leg is to the other leg, the platform leg, The harder you'll work because it'll tighten the spring load. So you put that foot where you comfortably feel that it works for you, for the amount of resistance that you want.

Your arms can do whatever you'd like. You can reach them up You can open them up if you wanna add a little arm coordination and movement and step down. Let's do 4 more. The goal was 10 repetitions. I don't know how many we've done. 3 more inhale.

Reach. 2 more, lower lift, and up. And then one more we're gonna stay up on the next one. So you'll lift, stay up, pause, open the legs. The legs are as far open as you want resistance.

I feel the burn right here on the outside of the hip. If you're feeling it anywhere else, adjust your pelvis. Soften both knees, pull the abs in, and just skate that carriage leg out. What you do with your hands doesn't matter. Here, here, here, even a skating arm move. I've trained some hockey players see.

4 more, 3, 2, hold that leg out there, pause, go ahead and bend that carriage or that platform, like, just a little bit deeper and then pull yourself all the way back up just to add that little bit more endurance on that muscle. Step down off the back carefully. I have the pad to the side for a little bit more of a softer surface for my hand because we're gonna go into a plank series now. So if you don't have a pad, but you've got a little safety strap or towel, it's totally fine. It's more of a comfort So I'm gonna place the pad right on top of the platform.

Hands go on the carriage and the platform. The further out your hand goes just like you did with your legs, the more resistance you'll have. I'm gonna start with my arms slightly out and a little bit wider than my shoulders. From here, a little moving plank. Leg goes out with the arms evenly if you can, and then return.

We're only gonna do 5 of these. So inhale, exhale. 3 more, 3. And 2. Last one reach the carriage out, bring the foot with you, return, and then step all the way up to give yourself a little break.

There are 2 more to this series. Hands back on to the carriage and the platform, set your legs center between the arms. We're gonna add a little push up. So press the arm and leg out, little baby push up, and then bring the carriage and feet back together. What you don't wanna do is take that foot too far out.

You wanna keep it pretty conservative as you move out with that leg. And that way that spine stays nice and steady and straight. You have 2 more. Inhale, bend extend, last one, and then return the carriage, and then step up. This is gonna be more of a moving one, so you're gonna be bending those elbows as you're moving. Place your hands back onto the carriage, feet, go back, feet in between. So bend your elbows first. And when you push out, you extend the arms and bring the carriage back in.

Bend and press away. If the red spring is too heavy, you're more than welcome to change that spring. Just for flow sake, we're just gonna keep that red spring on. One more time, Ben, reach away. And then return.

You could also do those on the reverse. So now I'm gonna step up. So I'll take the pad off, and this is my transition exercise. So I'll place the feet onto the platform hands onto the bar And the foot that was just on the carriage will then be back onto the carriage in the lunge position. So with your foot secure on the platform hands onto the bar, the foot doesn't go all the way back.

It goes to a comfortable place about halfway you're gonna press the carriage back behind you and then return. I'm gonna move that foot a little bit further forward and press and return. So front knee bends or the platform leg bends, to get that nice little stretch and then hamstring. Shoulders are supported here, but you don't have all the weight on your shoulders. Let's go ahead and press back in that lunge and pause. I'm gonna let go of the bar come up and put that weight on that forward leg.

And then just bend and extend the carriage leg. All the weight and strength on this side, mobility on this side, eyes focused forward, knee can travel right over that second and third toe, could even rest right onto the bar conveniently. Last one and hands onto the bar. And now both feet go on. I'm gonna walk my feet back a little further and find plank.

I'm just gonna hold plank for a moment, make sure my quads feel like they're recruited, they're strong, my abs, my back, pause here, and then just push slightly back with the arms into long stretch, but you don't have to go into full long stretch. And with my feet together instead of apart on those blocks, my inner thighs are supporting my hips. So I actually like this a lot better. I feel a lot stronger than with my legs apart. 2 more inhale.

Last one, press back, return, and then we step off to the other side. And we do that series all over again. K? I will use the pad here in a little bit for the hands, but for right now, no pad and just a forward step up, I'll try to count this time. So foot onto the platform, step up to the carriage, step down, and then keep that leg on the whole time. And again, and lift. That was 3 and lower and 4 strong through that right leg.

Let's try and soften that landing a bit halfway there. Lift lower. 4 more. That landing is actually important because then I know that you're firing that platform leg, the quads, and the glutes for control. Just two more.

On the next one, we're just gonna stay up. So stay up and pause, and then look down. Make sure the feet are even and press out. So a different viewpoint, make sure that pelvis is nice and neutral. So the front hip bone and the back hip bone should feel level.

And that's how you know. It doesn't have to be perfect But if you are working 1 for the front body over the back body more or vice versa and not really firing through here, then you know that your pelvis is probably out of neutral. I lost count. 3 more. 2 more. Last one, and then bring it all in for those inner thighs working.

Now we're gonna alternate. Step down. Step up. Push out. Return.

Again, this is not about speed, but more about intent, and the muscles and joints that you're using for this exercise lower and lift and step up. I also think exercises like these are really important. We lose depth perception as we get older. The more we can step up and down safely, the better, and lift, and out, and back. Let's just say halfway there.

Inhale, exhale. One breath pattern will speed it up for you. 2 breath patterns will slow it down and give you more control. So you decide which breath pattern you want for these and lift. And out. Let's do 2 more.

Drop the leg. Lift the leg. Push it out. And on the last one, we're gonna hold it. So lower, lift, hold. You wanna hold where you really feel the muscles working on both sides because you try to stay even here.

Bend your knees and skate that leg out. Skate. Press. Press. Make sure you feel the whole part of the foot on the carriage. Abs pulled in. Abs and back working strong together, posture nice and tall for 4, 3, two and one now.

Hold. Stay. My foot's slipping just a bit. 3, 2, 1, and return. Step off the back.

I'm adding the pad again for my hand just for comfort and then place your hands on to the carriage and platform. First part, arm stay long, feet in the center of the hands right between the thumbs. You're gonna press out and return for 5. Inhale. Exhale. Keep that head aligned.

Don't let the head drop. Don't go so far out that you've lost form. Two more, last one, and return. Step up. Stand up.

Another set. Hands go back. You're gonna go into your push up. Legs behind you. You take it out, you bend, you extend, you return. It's a wide push up. So be careful as you're coming down that you don't lose shoulder stability.

One more and then return step forward, stand up, and then the elbow flow, we'll call it. So hands on the pad and the carriage feedback you bend, you push your way, you extend your return. Inhale, exhale. 2 more, strong shoulders, strong back, strong quads, last one, and then all the way back. And then you can remove the pad so we can go into the lunges. So hands onto the bar for safety, right foot up, The foot that was on the carriage before is on the carriage again.

You're gonna go into your lunge and then extend. Follow your body will follow your eyes. So look up and then look down so that your neck comes with you. 2 more. Last one hold.

And then you're gonna lift yourself up, get that body weight either over that thigh or upright, and then pedal that back knee. Nice and tall. I guess hands can do anything. Hands can pray. Hands can go here. Hands can go out for 4, 3. A lot of weight on this leg.

A lot of work on the left hip flexor last one and then hands to the bar back into your plank, both feet back. Hold it here. Shoulders are back. A second set of that long stretch. You don't have to go all the way back.

But just enough to complete that front body work that we started on the floor and reach it forward, inhale breath, and exhale breath. 2 more. Last one and return and then rest. Lower all the way down for just a moment so that we can change some spring. This is the only time I believe that I'm gonna change the spring, but I'm gonna add for my shoulders a little extra.

So I'm gonna go to a red and a blue So that could make it more of a strength exercise for the next few for the next few, next in the series. Excuse me. So hands on to the bar. Fee come up. Let's bring the feedback so we just finished the long stretch. So I'm gonna go from the long stretch into an up stretch. So the heels are gonna come back to the blocks, and then I'm gonna get my butt over my ankles.

Now the more resistance that you put on the carriage you can hold this through. This is actually work, so stay here and listen. But the more resistance that you put on, the more it becomes about the upper body. The less becomes about the abs, hip flexors, and those sorts of things, and lower back stability. So you choose. From here out of this pike position, flat back, you're gonna press the carriage back and look up towards your hands.

Maintain a long line and bring the shoulders right over the wrist. And if you can bring the carriage all the way in to the stopper, so that end range. Lift your butt up. Try not to move the carriage off the stopper. Press back and repeat. Bringing the shoulders over the wrists.

Find the stopper. Lift your bottom up. Inhale. And forward, exhale, and lift 1 more, and then lift back up to your start. Let's reverse. So bring the shoulders over the wrist.

Find your plank. Push back, hold, lift up, feel the stretch, get the butt over the ankles, find the stopper, shift forward, do it again. Inhale. Exhale. 2 more. Reach back. And lift.

Last one. Press back. Feel the abs. Pull everything in in in in in in don't move. Press the carats slightly back and pull for 8. And 7 emphasis on the in motion. It should take you as long to bring the carriage in as it took to press out. 2 more, 2.

1 more, And then it's not over. So you're gonna take those knees to a hover, look up, and let's push those legs back as the knee stretches. 2, 3. For the lower of the knees, the more the work, but you stay where you feel comfortable. 4 more, 3 more, 2 more. It's like a bobsled, bring it all the way in, drop the knees, and then rest. So, hopefully, you got through all of that.

I'm gonna take the blue spring off so we can go back to the red spring. I told you in the beginning there was a lot of upper body, which I don't normally do this is great. K. So I'm gonna sit on the bar on the bar this time facing backwards. The nice thing about a foot bar is that your sits bones actually sit in such a great place that you almost can't help sit up nice and tall, so that's good. I call this the control, back series for me because I break this down.

So feet are gonna come forward, and the first part of the series is let's just try tricep dips. Fingertips forward buck comes up. Okay? If this isn't comfortable for you so many reasons, it could be your wrists. Okay. It could be your shoulders. You could do it by standing on the floor and just sitting on the carriage. Okay? So let's get those shoulders out of the ears And then from here, a few tricep dips, let's just stick to 6, 2. If I don't give myself a goal, I'll just keep going.

So you got 3, more, 3, 2, and 1. And then back. And if you can see, these are these are an antagonist of the last exercises. So we're opening up the chest. So this is really nice to combine with the long stretch and the up stretch and those exercises.

So now I'm gonna reach my legs forward. I'm too sure to reach the box, but that's okay. Two things you can do. Just wing it, or you can put 2 yoga blocks in front if you wanna get your feet on there before your butt comes up. Because once your butt comes up, most likely you can get the balls of your feet on there. Shoulders are under the shoulders are in line with your wrists.

To move the carriage, the arms stay steady. You tilt your pelvis back posterior tilt and the carriage moves forward. Now my arms are in an extended position, Then it'll go back to neutral and the carriage moves in. Just four shhh and return. And 3, tuck those abs in.

2 more. Bring that tailbone right between the legs. Last one. Return. And then have a seat. Now we're gonna combine the tricep dip with the pelvic movement.

Feed are gonna go towards the blocks. Your hands are on the bar. It is important that your thumbs are in the same position because if you can see what my shoulder does, if I wrap my thumbs versus if my thumbs face forward, feet are gonna be on the blocks. You'll start with a tricep dip. You bend, you push with your pelvis, you extend your arms, And then you find that first or that last exercise, you bend.

Exhale. Shush. You return. 2 more. Shush and back. Last one but without resting, I'm gonna reverse these. Okay? So I'm gonna go first with the pelvis, bend the elbows, and return. Now if you recall, the plank series that we did from the floor has the same elbow movement, So we're consistent in this workout one more time, exhale, then return, and then you're done with those.

So time to sit on the reformer. Thank god. Okay. So we're sitting. We're gonna stay on that one red spring. Likes come forward. Traditional back rowing 1 and 2 the way I like to do it. Feet go through the center of the blocks.

If they don't fit, you cross. If you cross, you cross uncross so that you're not in the same position the whole time. Hands with the way from the back, and I'm gonna try to get them to fit there. I'm gonna grab the straps. Okay? Alright. First one, you break down.

Then we move. Palms face up. Alright. From here, tilt the pelvis back, bring the fist together. You pause. Okay? Elbow to elbow, really strong. Think about pulling a super heavy weighted blanket towards you. So you had to work at that. K? Keep the humerus, the shoulder to the elbows steady and bring the arms out to the side to make, like, a little a. So you can repeat that a couple of times, make sure you got it.

Now dive your nose into your knees as you push the arms behind you. Once they're behind you, if you have this available to you, bend your elbows to bring your fingers together. Push away, extend the arms. Circle the arms up out and around, and as soon as you can see your hands, just sit up. Okay? One more slow.

Exhale. Inhale. Exhale dive. Bend, press. Arms come all the way around.

Inhale sit up. That leaves you, and we're gonna keep going. Exhale. Sh back. Arms to an a. Dive forward, circle, bring the lands together, excuse me, circle the arms around, sit up tall. 2 more. Shush. Arms out. You see them at those shoulders rise.

Last one, dive forward, hands together, hands apart. And if you can't do that, eliminate it altogether, and then back up. One thing to remember back rowing, is to promote shoulder mobility. Let the arms go. Let it all go. Make sure that the shoulder blades are nice and mobile on your back.

2nd one. Slow it down. Bicep curl. So we're gonna hinge this time instead of rolling. So it's like somebody took that recliner, push the button, and you just reclined. Okay?

Montana reference. So big old cowboy hat on your head. Grab the rim of it. Take the hat off your head. Lift up to your sits bones, die forward.

So now this part is looks like this first part of the or it looks like the last exercise, fingers together out, and then sit up tall. Inhale to hinge. Exhale hat off the head. Drop the head into the well of the reformer or the hat and bring the hands behind you. Thumbs, fingers touch.

Arms out, circle around, sit up, 2 more. You hand you the bicep curl, you press up, you dive forward, hands to the outside of the frame, scoop the arms back like you just scoop your hands in water. Reach the arms up and around. And one more time. Inhale. Press up.

Exhale. Inhale. Wherever that breath feels like it's moving you fluidly. Breathe. Take it all the way around. And then sit up tall.

A little pro tip, if it's hard to figure out what the straps, drop the straps, do all of the motions without any resistance, grab the straps, do what you can. K. Alright. We're gonna place the straps on the hooks for just a moment so that we can straddle. I know from experience some people can't do the straddle. If you can't do the straddle, just sit legs to the outside of the blocks so you can keep moving and then bring your feet down, though, if you can do the full exercise. So from here, incorporating some lower body now with the upper body, reach forward, grab onto the shorter loops.

And when you grab onto them, the carrot is gonna move. You want your butt almost at the very edge, then you're going to lift. Okay? Let's try a few rows. You want enough mobility that your carriage doesn't slam into the stopper as you roll back.

Inter thighs are on fire here. You should have that the shoulders over the ribs and ribs right over the hips, abs nice and tight. Last one. Now pull row, drop your bottom, dip it down, lift it up, extend your arms. So now you slow it down. It's 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, and 2, and 3, and 4.

Keep going here. Legs are strong. Make sure that the toes and knees are comfortable where they are. One more. And then last one here, pull and little pulse is for 87, 65 strong arms, strong legs, strong will, one more arms reach out, bottom comes down, and those are done. Okay? So next in the exercises facing the same way.

So we're facing back where it's next series. Straps are gonna go over the legs, over the thighs. K? This can be done with more resistance, but for sake of flow, we're gonna keep it at 1. We're gonna lie all the way down, and the way to get there is once you have the straps on, get your bum as close to the blocks as you can, place your hands on the blocks, make sure your bottom is as close as it could be. Biggest concern for people is your ponytail here, but don't worry about the ponytail. Just fold your head and drop back, and you should be just fine. Okay?

Now legs come up to tabletop. If you have anything going on with your lumbar spine, herniated disc, or whatever condition. Careful with these. Make sure you're moving from here. And not moving from the lower back.

This loads the lower back. Interlaced the fingers behind your head, knees perpendicular to the hips. You can rest a tray on those shins. Let's left let's take the head and shoulders back for a few ab Curls. Drop back, chin to chest.

2 more. One more. Hold it up. Don't move. From here, the knees start and end at the hip. So you pull to the chest, Stop at the hip, exhale.

Shush. Elbows wide. Hands are definitely assisting my head up, and I'm trying to bring that chin to chest and ribs to hips. Now let's rest, put the feet down rest of the head back. And then move into the next exercises. You have 2 more.

Head and shoulders up. Legs up to tabletop. Let's try the obliques now. Chin or knees to chest, rotate, and then rotate to the other side. And exhale.

It's the safest, even though you're working the hardest to not let the knees go way out so that you can maintain some slight imprint of the lumbar spine. So it's all pretty much focused on the front part of the body. One more and then rest the feet and rest ahead. Last of the series, head and shoulders up. Legs back up. Let's tuck the knees as close as you can and just pulse up the upper body for 8, 7, 6, and 4, 3, 2, 1 feet down and then head back.

There is no graceful way out of this exercise. I've tried, and it it doesn't look graceful. So just try to get yourself out of the straps. But we are gonna stay down on your back. I will have you rest your head in here a second.

So can you take your arm inside the longer loop, please, and then bring your hands behind your head and then rest back? Alright. So here's your little reprieve. Here. Just pause. Head and shoulders up. Let's incorporate a little bit of mat work, legs up to tabletop and pause here.

What's nice about the straps is that it's helping me lift my upper body up, which is awesome. So from here, we're gonna go into a modified double leg stretch. Now, unlike before, can you pull your elbows forward? As you extend your legs out, can you open your elbows out and bend? And inhale and exhale.

We're just going to 6. So you have 3 more. Watch that lower back as you load it with that heavy lever of your legs. One more. Feet down, head down, and you rest.

That burns. We're gonna do one more. This is the double leg lower lift. This is important that you were careful with how much how low you get those legs. Legs towards you hold. Legs's extent.

I'm going to keep my elbow steady and just move from my legs for 61. And this is only as far as I could do. I could I can touch the shoulder block, it looks like. So you've got 3 more, 3 and 2 and 1 knees in feet down. And you rest. Okay. So use the weight of the straps to try to get you up.

And you are done with that series. Alright. We're gonna do some extension next. So I'll place the straps over here, and then we're gonna get the bar. I'm gonna put the bar down. 1, I'm somebody that likes that. Because then I will have a point of reference for me.

Whoop. There it goes. So that my feet don't get lazy. So with the box on, We're gonna do in this exercise, not so much creative, but the some of the original extension exercise that I learned that are completely effective. Okay? So one red spring on.

K. Boops over the top, and I'm flexing forward hands on the frame. So with the chest over the top of the box, make sure that you feel comfortable here. You're gonna grab onto the straps. Grabbing onto the knots are a great place to grab. You can also grab a little bit lower if you need a little bit less resistance on the fly.

So as I flexed over the box, I'm gonna press my pubic bone down into the box to float my legs up. That was probably one of the best cues I was ever taught to put my body in this extended position. So you can't squeeze the glutes like this, which is good. You want to be able to fire the glute without a really tight squeeze, and it should line those legs up with your hips. From here, let's pull the straps back leading with the pinky finger to the hips and find a really long line. Okay?

Once you find your long line, hold your long line and just move with your arms. So you are fired through the back the whole time. Lead with your shoulder blades. So anytime you move with your arms, you want your shoulder blades to come with you. They are synonymous with our movement. Otherwise, you're gonna overuse that shoulder and make sure that your pinky finger leads so that you can open up through that front body, the chest one more time, exhale.

And then rest everything down and rest the feet and rest the hips. K? I'm gonna reset hips, press into the box, legs, float up, navel to the spine. Now I'm gonna find that long line and pause. This time, I'm gonna move my upper body. So as the arms come down, I drop into flexion, allow the arms to come forward into flexion, then I'll pass through neutral into extension, but into a long line, and then down. So try not to come up too high into your extension, maybe gaze right before the back of the reformer and lift. You've got 2 more.

2. One more. And back and then rest. Now what I consider to be the hardest is going from a flat back to an extended back because you have to maintain control and also feel those muscles the whole time. So you're gonna lie and flex over the box, press the pubic bone down, and then lift through the legs in that float position. K? We'll take the hair out of the way here for a second.

Bring the hands back to the hips, but from here, Find extension. So can you see that? So I lifted my eyes up and the rest of me followed. Now I'll just look down to the floor, maintain a flat back, and then look up, and bring that chest with me. Two more, one more, and then rest back down. And be careful here that you don't put that much pressure onto the lower back. Do as many reps as you think are comfortable for you.

So one more thing here. We're gonna go from flexion all the way up to extension and with a bonus exercise. So head and shoulders come down. Press that pube bone down, float the legs. Pass through neutral, all the way up to extension, and then all the way down to flexion, all the way up inhale, exhale.

4 more, 4, 3, 2. Here's your bonus. Hold triceps. 6 of them. Tricep kickbacks. Keep those elbows in line with your shoulders.

If you get them above your shoulders and you're gonna round those shoulders forward, defeating the purpose of opening that chest, you've got 2 more, 2, one more, and rest all the way down. K. We're not done with extension, but we're done with the straps. At this moment. You're gonna pop on to all fours on the box. Do a quick little cat cow, even though we're not done with extension, just round and extend and flex and extend maybe give your butt a little wiggle.

K? We're gonna do a modified swimming and a modified swimming, but it's gonna really challenge all sides of the body, side, front, and back. K? So hands under the shoulders, knees under the hips, and my knees are a little closer than my hip distance apart. So from here, I'm gonna extend my right arm out in front of me and my left leg behind me. Try to square those hips off to the floor and the box.

I want you to imagine that you have a flex band at your left toe to your right fingertip, and you're expanding that flex band at the front body while it retracts at the back body and then bring it all down. And then alternate making half of that x, the letter x as big as you can. So reach, inhale, exhale, and reach inhale. Exhale. This feels really good. Again, side body, front body, back body, all firing, one more time, and reach, and then return. Now take that right arm back out left leg back out, pause. Let's add a little challenge.

Funny enough being on this box feels more unstable if it was on the floor, and I think it's just because you're off the ground, but you'll bring the right elbow to the left knee round the back like your goal is to stretch your back and then reach it all away, and your goal is to stretch the front of the body. So your exhale inhale and exhale and inhale. 2 more. Last one, hold it out, pulse the arm and leg for 87 654321 and return. These are hard, especially after we just did all that arm work and extension. Okay? Let's try the other side. So right leg goes back.

Left arm goes out. You're ready? Elbow to knee round the back and then open up. Stretch your back. Stretch the front.

Exhale. Inhale. 2 more. Last one. Hold and pulse.

87. Make sure to come out of that right shoulder nice and strong. You're almost done. 2 1 and lower down. I'm gonna step off of the box for one quick cool down. Hopefully, you're as sweaty as I am right now. I'm gonna step to the front of the box. And place my hands on the box here and just press away.

Nice little stretch and then return. This doesn't have to be anything fancy just a little cat cow, maybe bring the hands to the side, stretch the side, and the other side, and reach and reach and then release. Now you're back where you started in the beginning of this class. So let's place the hands onto the bar, take the bottom back, drop yourself down, maybe even drop the forearms down, forehead, on the forearms. A little petal here. This bar is 1 notch lower than it was in the beginning of class, so the forearms feel good on the bar. Last one, hands to the floor.

Watch your head on the bar, roll yourself all the way back up, big reach for the sky, and give yourself a hand. That was a really hard class for me. I hope it was challenging for you. So thanks for joining me today.