Challenging Athletic Flow

Hi. I'm Delia, and today we'll be doing a challenging reformer class. I have the reformer set up with the foot bar up, and I have one full spring and 1 quarter spring. You can do these with less spring. So just one red spring would be fine, but the yellow spring is a little bit more challenging and also a little bit more supporting of my hip when we go into some other exercises. I'm going to start with some lunges.

So left foot goes up against the block. I'm on the right side of the reformer. Right foot goes near the foot bar. So you're nice in alignment here. Left hand is on the bar, and the left hand is lined up with my left shoulder.

And my hand is just placed nicely next to it. So I'm just gonna press back into some lunges. The reason that I have that left hand lined up with my shoulder, which is an important cue to set yourself up for lunges, is so that I don't have a tendency to twist to the side. I wanna keep my body as square as possible. Let's just do two more nice little active stretch. One more and then stand up keeping the feet and the knees in place.

Step the right foot back so that the right knee lines up with the left knee. The left knee is still down. K? So stand up, nice and tall. We're gonna go into scooter, or I like to call them knee knee stretch prep, because it kinda gives you that same feeling with both knees on the carriage, but you've got one foot on the floor. So it's easy to find that pelvic position. So let's just press back with that left leg that's on the carriage. Good cue is thumb on the rib cage, fingers on the hips, and try to keep this space the same. That way you're moving from your hips.

You're stabilizing your lower back, and you can really feel that left glute working. If the red and the yellow is too challenging because it pulls that knee back too quickly, then just take off that yellow spring, and then you can do more repetition and build some endurance on that leg. Now from here, we're gonna go into hip hinge. You'll look a little bit like a bird picking up pecking for seed or like a woodpecker. But from here, you'll hinge at the hips, push the weight back with your carriage leg.

And now my leg that's on the floor is slightly bent. You wanna maintain a long line from the tailbone to the head and then come up. What you'll notice is that the work now, the muscle emphasis has gone now to the leg that's on the floor. So that glute I love this exercise, especially for me because I love hiking and going uphill or propelling uphill. This is a great exercise to build those muscles. One more and press back and hold.

And then little presses with that back leg press. Both legs now are on fire just so you know for 4, 3, 2, 1, and then return the carriage. Let's place the right foot forward press that left leg back, big old stretch. Now with the left leg off the carriage, go into a nice little Eve's lunge so you can tuck and move through the spine, tailbone to head. My right leg starts to ex extend as I round my back, and then my right leg bends. Almost like that leg initiates the movement of this exercise. Make sure to keep the arms nice and long and focus on the spine.

One more Exhale. And then one final little stretch. Believe it or not, this is your warm up. So extend that forward leg, hold that stretch, and then return. Transition exercise on the carriage.

Both knees on feedback to the blocks. Modified long stretch, if you will. So you're gonna shift your body weight forward, knee to head nice, long line, and press back with the arms gently. Now this is really the reason why I have the yellow spring on. I didn't wanna get so deep into my abs right here in the beginning. It was more about mobility and warming up all the joints.

So the more resistance you have, there is a sweet spot. If you have too much resistance, it'll be in your arms. If you don't have enough resistance, it'll be all in your abs and your back. And this feels nice. I'll do 2 more inhale breaths.

Load the abs and back. One more and return the carriage. Step off to the other side. Let's do that whole series of lunges again. So back to your normal lunge, right foot up against the block, left foot forward, towards the foot bar, and then nice gentle stretch.

Remember to line that right hand up with your shoulder, and then the left hand just sits right next to it. And you do as many of these as you'd like. These feel really good, but I'm gonna do two more. Last one, return the carriage. Make sure to take that floor foot back to meet the other knee. So now they're lined up, but when you come up, Now you can see that the right knee here is forward of the left knee.

Pelvis in neutral and then just press back with that leg. And if you don't feel like you're in the right spot, I'm actually gonna pop that left foot forward. Go ahead and move. You're not stuck in that position. But really focus on the right hip opening up and the right glute firing.

And, again, if you can't maintain that movement and you're taking it into your back, you need a little bit less resistance to complete this exercise effectively. So now into the pecking bird or woodpecker, some on the ribs, fingers on the hips, I'm gonna hinge at the hip peck for seed and come all the way up. Inhale and exhale. Left glute is working. And I could tell you that this side is easier for me.

I am dominant on that left side for balance. So where I was sort of struggling on this side with a red and a yellow, this is way easier on this side for me. And feel like you're propelling forward propelling forward one more time, hold a little pulses with that back leg as many as you could take. I'm gonna do 3 more, 2 more, 1 more, bring it all in. And then step that foot forward, Eve's lunge, as you extend your right leg back, you're opening up that whole chain on that right side. Look up and then round and tuck in.

Inhale. Left knee bends. Left knee straightens. So if you start with that part of the body, everything else will follow. Just remember not to fall into your shoulders and bend your elbows.

You wanna keep them long because you're trying to stretch between those shoulder blades. And with the arms long, you'll get that stretch. One more and then hold here, if you'd like, maybe even add a little extra stretch of that hamstring and then return the carriage. I'm gonna step up onto the carriage, and we're gonna go into a little building of exercises with the long stretch. So we started on our knees, feet are back.

From here, and now I'm gonna lift the knees. So the first step is can you hold this? And if you can hold this, great. If it's not challenging enough for you, you can add to it. Press back very slightly and return. So if you go too far, then you're gonna get a lot in your lower back and abs, but that just depends on what you're looking for with this exercise.

Keep your head in line with your shoulders, and make sure that your heels have contact with the shoulder block. Almost as though your heels are pressing back with the arms. And when you're pulling, you're maintaining that energy heal to head. 2 more inhale. Exhale. One more, and I'm gonna add a little bonus exercise hold the long stretch or the plank position and just do a few push ups. 5, exhale, 4, 3, 2, last one.

And then lower the knees all the way down. I am gonna take off the yellow spring now and go just to a red. Okay? Let's do some reverse abs on your knees. So you'll get on your knees face backwards and then place your hands onto the frame.

From here, hands need to be on the shoulder or under the shoulders, knees under the hips. You can add a few more cat cows if you'd like, stretch out your back, But find a flat back. Think of your back as a ceiling and your abs as a foundation, and your arms and legs are the sticks holding it all together. Okay? So tall with the spine, elbows point back. Let's just pull the carriage forward with the lower half of the body. Inhale or exhale, whatever breath pattern feels good to you. Again, if you change where you're inhale and where you exhale, it might change what you feel.

So play around with the breath. 2 more. One more. Let the carriage slide back to the stopper, reset, make sure you're nice and stable with the upper part of your back. Don't let that sternum drop.

Now I'm gonna pull the carriage forward and round the back at the same time. So as the carriage comes forward, I'll tuck my tailbone under and then come back to that flat back. Exhale. And then inhale. If you cannot get that tension out of your shoulders, you might have too much resistance on. You should feel armpit to hips.

2 more exhale. One more. Now hold that round back little tucks for 5, 4. Look at your knees. 3, 2, 1. Let the carriage slide back and then drop into a child's pose. You can drop your head to the carriage with your arms back. Let the shoulders rest.

Take 2 breaths. Inhale. One more deep inhale breath and exhale breath. So now we'll do these exercises. The next one's on our knees, still with the one red spring. Bring your feet back so the feet fall in the well because you can then you can always dorcey flex or flex the ankle to hook yourself to the back of this carriage so you don't fall forward.

Now this is one where if you get a little bit cocky or you stop paying attention, you will fall forward. Okay? So grab on to the shorter loops, if that works for you, and then drop your bottom down towards your heels. We're gonna do some lifts with at the knees. So let's just lift up at the knees and then lower back down. So pelvis or hip extension, because you're lifting, hopefully, from your glute, you will feel your quad. Once you got that dialed in and you have the right amount of resistance, lift and pull with the arms behind the hips, and then lower your bottom down and repeat and inhale and exhale.

As you're pulling the arms back, don't forget because you'll get a little excited here with some momentum. At least I do. So I wanna make sure that my shoulder blades are moving the arms. So as I lift the shoulder blades connect with the back body and lift. Let's add a few things to this. So lift up hold.

You're pulling your arms back, chest expansion, look to the right, look to the middle, Look to the left, look to the middle, have a seat. Repeat, but start on the opposite side. So you lift to the left, to the right, forward. Repeat. Exhale.

Inhale. Exhale. One more. Inhale. Right. Left center and then lower. Adding on, you're gonna add some pulses.

We'll do 3 pulses at the top, and then you'll sit. So lift up and pulse 1, pulse 2, pulse 3, and have a seat. It requires balance. So pull up through those inner thighs 1, and 2, and 3, and lower. Let's do 3 more sets, pulse 1. Pulse 2.

And 3, last set, and lift 1, lift 2, lift 3, and have a seat. Okay? Bottom comes up for this next one. Pull those elbows back and see if you can stay balanced here and just a little extra for the back of the arms, 3, 4, these weird tricep kickbacks, and 5. And then have a seat. Okay? So straps could be wherever you'd like.

I'm actually gonna put them on the little l hooks back here, and I'm gonna go into some glute work. So hands on the blocks to lift your upper body up. Legs are together. Now for sake of resistance, this isn't a lot. This is something you really need to feel and focus on what's working.

So let's take your left foot back since it's closest to you. I'm putting my left foot back. Extend that leg from the bar. So now you're nice and strong and long from the foot to the chest. K? If the arms went forward and the knee went forward of the hip, then you used arms.

So I need you to stabilize. So the upper body's gonna work just to stabilize, I'm gonna press back and forth. In order to feel this, because the red isn't as much as you could probably take. You have to think about closing that little gap between the bottom and the thigh. Okay? So you got, like, I don't know.

I call it the Bethigh area. I think Leslie Logan calls it the FAS, but you know what I'm talking about. So but to hamstring, and I can feel it. Now if I put too much resistance on for this exercise, I'm gonna feel too much quad as the carriage returns. One more. And as I press away, I'll just push the carriage forward, drop the hip, feel a big old stretch, and then come all the way back.

Let's switch sides. Left knee on right foot back. Onto the bar and press away and return and press, and this actually feels really good just to make that hip extensor work without overloading it so I can get a little baby squeeze to it, press it out, elbows point backwards, 4 more, 3 more. 2 more. Last one. And then just press forward.

Let that hip open. Yes. And then return the carriage. Alright? Next is reverse long stretch. We did it with the hand on the bar.

We're gonna do it backwards. Why is this any different? Because I was pushing from my feet back here. And this time, I'm turned around, so I'm gonna be pushing from my arms. So feet go onto the platform in this long stretch position. Push the arms forward and back.

Hands come forward to the shoulders, hands come under the shoulders. My ankles are stable. I'm just doing 4 of these. I thought it was about 4 or 5, and I'm gonna drop my knees. I'm gonna add on.

We're gonna be using some tricep and elbows. So lengthen back up to that long stretch position or plank. Bend your elbow slightly. Push the carriage forward. Length in the arms, bring the arms right underneath your shoulders. Bend.

Press away and pull. So you have to bend push hold and pull back one more, and I'm not going to rest. I'm actually just reversing this. So arms forward inhale. Bend your elbows.

Draw the elbows into the ribs. Almost like a little yogi push up. You've got 3 more. 2 more. Quad stay strong.

Don't lose it. One more. And then the knees come down. And finally into something that might feel kinda nice. Red Springs still on. I don't know if you guys remember Cleopatra, if anybody's done, Cleopatra, but I'm gonna do this because it's gonna feel so good.

So feet are gonna be on the back. I'm facing you. My feet are gonna be on the back block. So One hand is going to be on the bar. That's the closest hand. This hand is going to be on the carriage. So I'm actually holding the side of the carriage as closest to the springs.

I understand if this is hard, you could place it anywhere if you'd like, but just maintain the same shape I'm about to maintain. So let's push the carriage away, and you'll see that my hips came up. And I'm gonna look over my right shoulder. Pull in with the left arm to really stretch that bar side of your torso, and then return. So cue the Cleopatra music, inhale, and then exhale.

And, again, 2 more big stretch. Last one, pull it in, press it away, and then just return the carriage. Grab onto the closest shoulder block. So you can give yourself a nice counter stretch here, and let's just switch. So I'm gonna turn around.

Just turn towards the back, and now you could see the backside of this. Feet go on. The blocks hand goes on the bar, and this free hand grabs onto the carriage. Look towards your left shoulder. Press the carriage out. Make sure that right arm is slightly forward to the shoulder, and then you're going to pull.

So you push and you pull. Let's do 2 more inhale breaths, or you can switch the breath and inhale secures. Comes in, and you should feel a really big stretch there. One more. And back and then just return the carriage and stretch in this direction.

Alright. So I'm gonna step off and pull the foot bar down. We're not going to need the foot bar for the next few exercises, so it'll just be out of the way. So bring it all the way down. To the bottom.

There it goes. Sorry. It's a bit loud. I'm gonna grab the box, place the box on long ways. Alright? So extension. I'm dropping down to one yellow spring.

Yellow may not be very hard for some of you, but it's gonna allow me to get through these exercises a little bit more smoothly. I do recommend a blue if you want a little bit more umph. Okay? So lying on my belly with my chest forward, we're gonna utilize the uprights. So this is the fun part of this. You get to pulling and catch. See? I'll do that again for you. Ready?

I get a little wind in my hair. Ah, k. So you're floating here elbows are back. We're gonna do some, I'd say, lap pulls. You'll work your bicep as well.

Drop your head between your arms. Set your lower half of your body to where it feels comfortable. Press that pubic bone down and fire those back muscles. Lift the chest, pull, and then extend. This is step 1. Let's do 6 repetitions.

This is 2. And exhale. And 3. You've got 3 more. 2. Last one.

And then don't let go of the bar unless you wanna, get the wind in your hair again, but drop your head right between the arms. Now start to swim the lower half of the body. And make it rhythmic 1, 2, 3, 4. Okay? Now we'll pull as you swim and then extend. And because you're controlling with a little rhythm and keeping a stone, you'll get a nice little burn on that rear end.

A nice opening of the chest, really focus on stretching. If you're doing this correctly, you can almost feel that skin stretch. Yes. And then back. And one more and then back. Okay? Now from here, we'll incorporate a little extension or what looks like a swan with the grasshopper.

So from here, we're gonna cross the ankles. Gonna lift the hips. You're gonna cross, uncross, cross on cross, cross on cross arms long, pull yourself up. Ready? 1 and 2 and 3 and extend.

And if you're coordinated enough, you can cross in uncross at the opposite start with your ankles, 1 and 2 and 3 and inhale. Last one, 1, 2, 3 reach extend and then slide yourself all the way back. So let's come off the box and remove the box as to the last of the extension exercises. I'm gonna bring the box to the back and we still, need to switch springs for this next one. So we have yellow spring on for the extension, and I'm gonna go to one red spring for the standing work on the reformer.

So we are gonna utilize the platform. So at this moment, if you have an extended platform and you want to use it because you feel safe for doing so, place it on right now. I'm gonna place the left foot onto the non moving platform and then my foot onto the moving platform. How far your leg is on the carriage out, how far out the leg will go is depending on how much resistance you want. So the closer the more resistance, the further out, the less resistance.

Let's go ahead and just go into side splits. Okay? If you've done these before, these are one of my go to exercises always. I like being on my feet, especially if I don't have a lot of time to work out, so these are great. As you press out, make sure that you feel the side of your glute working. So that means that you are in a neutral position with your pelvis. Your hands could do whatever you want them to do.

The next exercise builds on skating. So bend your knees for me and pause. Make sure that you feel secure in this position with your feet on both platforms. Hands, let's just place them on the hips for now. Take your platform leg, extend that platform leg out and hold. So you're at your end range.

You're gonna shift the weight to your platform leg. Okay? Do you see that little shift? Then return the carriage leg long. Do that again. Press out and return. Let's add some fun little hockey arms. Okay? So you're just gonna go out and back.

Just two more and press. And last one and press and return. I call him hockey arms because I do train a hockey player, and he loves that exercise. Next is called picking flowers. So toes pointing forward, hands by your side, push the carriage out. K? Now my arms are at a tee. Soften your knees, fold the body forward and reach your hands towards the well.

Soft knees will protect that lumbar spine. Let's keep the arms in line with the ears and roll yourself all the way up so that your arms reach now really feeling my outer thighs working for me, my glutes, Return the carriage palms face up at shoulder height at a little baby extension. Look up at the ceiling twice more. Inhale. Die forward. Bring the hands down towards the floor.

Roll yourself up. Arms come up. Return the carriage to that t position, and then a little extension. Keep those arms at the t and just press out and fold forward Let it all go. Let those shoulders go to the ears. So as you roll up and stack your spine tucking that tailbone under, you'll feel your shoulder blades then go wide into your back pockets.

And you are done with that side. We're gonna go to the other side. You can step around if you've got a larger platform, but for safety, I'm gonna come off off of the reformer and back on. Right foot on. Left foot on. K?

From here neutral position with the spine, and then you've got your just your little side splits. You could do whatever you'd like with your arms. And if you're somebody that likes to incorporate weights, maybe, this is a good place to do that. Just make sure that they're not too heavy taking into consideration that last exercise that we just did. Okay? One more time, press it away and return. Now that variation of skating, knees are bent, okay, Spine is nice and neutral.

It's the platform leg that pushes away. Then you shift the weight and pull it in. You can even actually hook your little toe on the side of the platform. You press out. And that gives you a little bit more of a secure feeling on this platform and press and return.

Here's your little hockey arms for 2 more. The last one and return. And last but not least, those picking flowers. Let's press the carriage app, bring those arms to a tee position, soften the knees, hinge, and you reach for the floor. And then you roll yourself all the way up, reach your arms up to the sky as you straighten those legs, bring the arms to a tee, open up the chest, and again, inhale, dive forward. It's important that you bend those knees and hinge at the hips. So you get a little bit different feeling.

Instead of rolling through your spine down, you can roll up, tucking the tailbone under, making it challenging to hold that carriage steady, bring your arms to a tee, and open up the chest. You all have one more inhale as soften and flex and reach. Feel so good. Roll yourself all the way up. Arms up to the sky. Bring the carriage back in.

Extend and look up and then carefully step off of the back. I'm facing you for just one more roll down. So just tuck the chin into the chest, roll down, reach your hands down towards the floor, Take a deep inhale breath at the bottom. Let's lift through the arches, inner thighs, tuck that tailbone under, lower back, middle back, upper back, shoulders, reach, and you guys are all done today. I hope you found that class challenging, and you enjoyed it.

Thank you so much.