Reformer Basic Variations

Hi, I'm Zayna. Today we're going to be doing a total body workout. Just sticking to reformer, one basic choreography. And we're gonna throw in some really great bootcamp variations to get results and tone, buttocks and thighs, upper body, and of course the inner most core muscles. We'll be starting with about three minutes of release work. It'll look just like footwork, but this isn't your normal footwork.

Let's go ahead and put on one spring. So you know like a red spring. Well lie down, lie down in your back. I like the head piece up all the way with a sponge underneath. And this helps your back settle down onto the carriage heels right onto the foot bar. Let's roll our back into the mat. Stay there and just feel your back widening.

Releasing now roll the other way. So this is rolling into an arch in your back. Your lower back may come up. Give me a great big hot breath as you release the lower back down. And then inhale and Habra. Ah, well find what we call our safe neutral by minimizing this rocking little by little until we find a place where our back feels very comfortable and heavy on the carriage. Breathe in on a hot breath.

Press the carriage back. Release the back into the carriage and come back in. Exhale. Now an interesting thing happens with this lightweight. Our hips and the front of our thighs and back are able to completely relax. I call this releasing into alignment, that feeling of releasing any compression in the pelvic area so that our body can find the proper form. Stay in for a moment.

Hands behind your head. Curl up your head and shoulders. We'll do the same thing. Press back now on the way in. Release your rips into the front of your body. Find a greater curve. Press the way big exhale curving up. We'll do this four more times. Exhale, sink the rips and scoop the abdominals away from your tee shirt.

Okay, one last time. Pull up with your pelvic floor, zipping it all up. Now roll up and we'll switch to whatever your spring is for foot work. I'm going to put mine on three red springs or three. You can go a little lighter or heavier if that's your preference. Let's roll down now that our back is all nice and comfortable.

Adjust your head back on the head piece. We'll start with heels. Anchor your feet so that your feet stay absolutely still. Breathe in on the exhale, press back and in back and in five more hugging your bottom. Every time you press the way, and as you come in, feel the front of your hips releasing. It's like that leg bone is simply releasing down into the hip socket for two and one [inaudible].

Move your toes to the foot bar. Lift your heels into a nice high heel. Exhale, hug your bottom away. Bring it in HUD. Bring it in. There's so much that we can do here to tone the lower body, hugging the buttocks. Every time we press away, press the back of the legs right into the floor. Press them. This wakes up the hamstring area and really activates the glute fold where the hamstrings come up into the buttocks for three two we have one last time and one change your foot position.

Wrapping your toes over the top of the foot bar, anchoring your heels down, press back and in if you'd like. Put your hands on the back of your upper thigh. Dig Your fingertips in and hug those muscles. Hello, that's our hamstrings calling out for us. Press the back of the size right down into the floor for three are your inner thighs all connected through your midline one and in come to your [inaudible] B. Press away and in.

Now we're using our external rotators here to keep that Nice v pressing your legs together and down. Okay. Together and down. Thinking about the back of the inner thigh, connecting back of the inner thigh. Four more. Four. Three. Hug those heels. Two and one.

Now push the foot bar away to lengthen through our torso. Come in just halfway. Press your hands on your external rotators with resistance from your hands. Press out. Two, three, four, five, six, seven. Set to feeling those thighs dropping right into the hip sockets.

The more you press your heels together, the more you'll feel those external rotators really firing up. We've got eight, seven, six, four, three, two, one four full range to stretch that out to one comeback and halfway place your hands on your adductors, your inner thigh. Use Resistance. Same thing in two, three, four [inaudible] leg bones dropping into the hip socket. The nice thing here is we can feel the inner thigh muscles working. Notice how much that helps you connect with your pelvic floor.

[inaudible] lift your pelvic floor up out of your hip sockets. Feel that heat. That's your inner core working. And Eight, seven, six five four three two one four to stretch out, three to press back and together. Last time and second position we'll do a little differently today. Toes on the foot bar. Turn in this release are as I join in the lower back. Press out and in and here.

We'll just think about the lower back area, right where your sacrum is. That's between the waist and the tail. Think about that widening on the mat. Why did it go on the mat? See if you can pull your lowest dabs away from your t-shirt, keeping the lower back, the sacrum wide and three and two and one and in 10 and stretch toes on the foot bar, heels high. Press out all the way.

Place your hands on your lowest abs. Lower your heels. Pass the foot bar. Now dig deep with those lowest dabs. Breathe in on the exhale. Use the abs to lift the heels and lower. Exhale.

Yeah, so the ABS are pulling the weight of your heels up. One more time. Oh, hold your heels high and bend in running. Press back and little short run. We'll go on a little run on the beach here and just relaxing everything. If you pay attention to where your foot weight is centered between the big toe and the little toe, this running is a nice place just to have an awareness of your foot alignment.

Do you place more weight on the big toe or the little toe? It's just a nice thing to know and we'll pick that back up later in our workout when we're working our thigh muscles. We'll do four, three, two, one, lift both heels. Then dive in, put your feet on the standing platform, roll up head and shoulders, look towards your ribs. Breathe in now, reach for the far wall and roll up for hundreds. We'll take off one of our springs for a total of two. Breathe in on the exhale, her widening your back and we'll pick up the straps for hundredths. Place your hands in this straps and push against the straps slightly so the hands are right up over the chest.

Just for today, we'll do a modified table top position. Notice how my feet are hanging down towards the sits bones. This will allow our back to widen our front hip to release. Breathe in on the exhale. Curve up to your hundreds position and help. Two, three, four, five. Yep.

[inaudible] continue. All I want you to think about is reaching into those straps and just when you think you've reached enough, you can reach another inch. So no matter how far you reach, there's always a little more, get your fingers under that foot bar. You can do it. Keep reaching, sliding your ribs towards the navel hold. Bring your arms up, halfway widen.

Collarbones now reach further. Inhale for five. Exhale, keep reaching. It's as though you're trying not to move the carriage, even though of course it will be moving, but the more you reach your fingers into the straps, the deeper your inner core hold that there, widen your lower back. And if you can keep it wide, lengthen your legs into three, four, five. Inhale. Okay, last that [inaudible] and bring your knees in. Feed and straps.

Place the straps in one of your hands. And if you're just starting your reformer practice, this is an easy way to get into feed and straps. Put your left leg right in the strap. Push against the strap so you have a very stable carriage. Now simply bring the other leg here.

Bring your legs up toward the sky. Breathe in on the exhale. Press away as you pull the lower abs up. Now as you bring the legs up, sync the front of your hips, release them. [inaudible].

Release the front of your hips, [inaudible] and release that release of the front hips as you bring your legs up, helps you to develop a deeper connection with your inner core. Because as our pelvic joints release, the muscles have to do the work hold. Bring your legs hip width apart and bend your knees one inch. Maintain that leg position and press away. Press away. Put your hands right where the deepest connection is, right in the back of your hamstrings.

Really hug those glutes as you press the way and every time you bring the legs back up, release the front of your hip for more. Three, two, one more time. Big Breath heels together, toes apart. Four frogs. Press away. Sink the front of your hips. Press away, sink. Now we'll do eight more. The deepest hug of your heels possible. We'll wake up the back of the thigh, the glute fold where the back of the buttocks and the upper upper hamstrings meet, and that's where all of us want to get so much strength and tone.

That's such a power center for our body. Give me a little bit more hugging, a little bit more intensity. Four, four. Use your breath. Three, two, and one. Bring your knees in. Put your hands into the straps for supine arm. Work with your arms pressed into the straps. Slide your shoulders away from the shoulder rest and notice my modified table position again. Press down and up.

Now Watch open, not moving the carriage and keep your wide repeat down, up, wide, up, down, up. Why? As you're doing this, focus on the shoulder blades away from those shoulder rests the top of the shoulder away from the shoulder rest. So it's all about sliding the shoulder blades into the waistline. [inaudible] one more time and open. Now push into the straps as your elbows come down. Slide the shoulders past your hips. Very functional.

Let's make this a little faster. Eight, seven, triceps. Hug the armpits like you have a little rolled up towel right underneath your armpits. I want you to hug it. This is going to wake up those triceps. Hug those armpits. Two more and one. Turn the palms towards you. Reach the legs up. Open arms and legs. Lift through the pelvic floor. Open lift.

Keep the shoulders away from the shoulder rests. [inaudible] remember that rolled up towel that you're hugging and hugging? Three more to one. Bring your arms up. Bring your legs hip with bend your knees as the arms come down. Legs come down.

Stay there a moments sacred widens and come up. Exhale, lower, back wide. So this is all abs. One more time and come on up. Bring the straps into your left hand. Curve up your head and shoulders. Slide your ribs. Let's roll up.

And here we'll take off a red spring to be left with one red. Put down your head rest and we'll do beginner style back rowing roll downs here. I like to use this sponge right at the edge of the reformer. It gives you a better app connection because it fills in a little space there so you can use a rolled up towel as well. Let's sit up really tall to come into our c curve.

Sink onto the sponge and just stay there. We'll establish our seeker first to begin. Breathe in on a hot breath. Slide your ribs towards your waistline. Bring your chest just a bit forward right away.

You'll feel those apps kicking in from this position. Breathe in on the exhale. Slide the ribs again, come a little bit forward, horizontal, row and forward. Reach your chest through the frame of your arms. [inaudible] reach such Hess through the frame of the arms and let's add something. Pull the abs away from your t-shirt as you reach your chest forward.

Two more. One more. Tuck your tail as you roll up. Turn your palms up, come right back down to your seeker and this time press your knees apart. They'll be caught up on the shoulder rest. So use the shoulder rest to press away a bit. Arms at shoulder height.

Plug those arms back into the socket. Bicep curl. Now as you straighten your arms. Exhale, scoop abs in and up. Chest, reaching towards the thighs. [inaudible] especially during the Bicep curl component. If you reach your chest forward and then keep it there, you'll feel an immediate jump in intensity.

One more time and come on up. Just one more exercise. Let's do single arm. Sit Up. Very, very tall, round back on the sponge. For a c curve. Now pull your right arm back from here. Both hips are equally weighted. Maintain that, uh, their arm. If you focus on the hips releasing the lower back sting wide and an equal weight of buttocks on the carriage, you'll get the very deepest core connection.

One more and hold now chest forward just a bit. Tuck tail. Maintain that as you roll up. And we can hook our straps right there on the pegs and we'll come off and grab our short box where a long box to start with. We'll take our long box and place it right in front of these shoulders. Shoulder breasts.

Put your hands on the front corners of the box. Your abs are already in and up and lay down on the long box with your chest, either on or slightly off here. You can lower the foot bar to a height that's comfortable on your back. Some people, if the foot bars too high, their back, we'll tweak a little bit and some people to those so you can experiment with that. For overhead press, we'll add a half of the spring or a blue spring. So I now have on one red and one blue or one and a half springs.

Put your hands wide on the foot bar wide on your chest. Press back now. Push the foot bar away. As you come forward. Press back, push the football away. Hold. Bring the hands in a bit. Press back and now lower the elbows for your triceps.

Press back and in, back and in halfway in. Let your chest release and little pulses. Slide your shoulders away from your ears. Four, three, two, one and all the way in. Put your hands together in a diamond shape. Look straight down at the ground.

Hug Your hands together as you come out, releases you. Come in, hug the hands. Release, hug, release. This is working your chest and the very top of your upper arms. Four more. Four, three. Really hug those hands. Two and one take off the blue spring. So we're left with one spring and here I'm going to put the sponge right underneath my naval.

For people who have scoliosis or rotations in their spine, the sponge can be really helpful here as we go into Swan. Slide your ribs towards your pubic bone to feel a little more lengthening in your spine. Now press back until your arms are straight, pubic bone presses abs in and up. Lift up your head, your chest. Reach your chest through the frame of your arms as you come down. Inhale up and exhale down. Inhale and exhale. One more time and excellent come off the long box and we'll do a little bit of holing straps now. So lower your foot bar all the way. We'll be using one red, and again, you can use this sponge right under you if you find that's helpful in a prone position. So for polling straps, we'll start choking up quite a bit for our tricep.

So let's really get a little tricep blast here. To begin, bring your elbows back along the waistline and sink your ribs into the box. Hug your armpit press. I'd like for you to focus on resisting as you bend your arms. [inaudible] send your mind's eye to the back of your upper arm. Activate from those triceps every single time. Now, all the way back, bend, press, then press preps.

And four, three, two, one and we always want to end with full range for four, three, two last time. One for t shape arms. Bring your hands down to the hardware, slide your shoulders into your back from your armpit. Hug the upper arm bone toward the torso, and then resist. Hug and resist.

Hug your shoulder blades into the spine. You'll immediately feel that all those little muscles that we want to tone in our lower back, widen the collar bones. Hug the shoulder blades. Let's go for four to end for three upper arm bones two and one. Put this strap into your well. Come on up and we'll switch to us to the short box. So we'll put the short box right in front of the shoulder rest.

And here we want to load up the spring resistance just for our safety and find your strap, your safety strap where you'll put your feet. Sit on the short box. And here again, I love to use my sponge right here at the edge of the short box. We'll start with round back and the sponge really does help place your hands on your abdomen round back onto the sponge. Before we go further, try turning your legs out slightly.

For many people this helps release the hips. Breathe in on the exhale round forward, chest forward and tip the pubic bone ups so you get a deep deep core reaction curve curve. And the secret here is how do we have the inner core working just like crazy while we release the lower back and let's not forget about our front hip release through the front of our hips. Release through the front of our hips as we curve up hold, bring your arms forward, reach for that far wall. We're going to float up and press float up in press releasing the front of your hips one more and come up tall.

Plays to sponge on the front of your box and we'll do straight back here again, I'd like to zone in on the front hips just because we don't usually in this position. Remember we can have turned out legs. Tuck your tail. Notice if you look at my back, it doesn't look tucked or tilted. That's because we only talk our tail enough to feel those low abs firing up. Release the front of your hips, hinge back just an inch. Release your hips and crease for inhale, grow tall. Relax your front hip.

Grote all or on the way in. You're looking here for that shaky feeling. You can almost hear my voice shaking a little bit. That's where I want you to go. To your very own shaky place here.

Two more. Released the hips. Lift your abs or lifting out of the hip socket. Lift, lift, lift. One more time. And we're done with our short box. Let's put the short box subway. And here we put our foot bar back up to the same position that we used for our foot work for elephants.

Make sure that you are on foot bars really locked in tight. This will be our, our standing exercise on the reformer. Put both hands on the foot bar. Pull your abs in right away and then step up. Um, the, the reformer round your back. And before you even start, Tuck your tail, lift the ribs up to the spine.

And here you want to take off spring. So let's, let's do this with a red spring and a loose spring. We can kind of, if you're advanced, you can go lighter than that. But if you're just starting with reformer, let's do a red and a blue. Tuck your tail, release your front ribs towards your back ribs. Press back. Now pull your abs up to drag the carriage. Let me hear that breath. And with each breath, take a belt and tighten up your hipbones. Tighten up your rib cage, plugging your arm bones right into the sockets.

We'll try for more. Release your hips. Three more, two and one. Keep the carriage forward and control your knees down for knee stretch. Move your heels back so that they're pressing against the shoulder rest and sit back almost like you feel like you're sticking your bottom out from the sits bones. Hug, press in, in, and again, releasing the front hip here. We'll give you a really nice, almost unexpected inner core workout. Release the front hips, and then pull in hollow. Those lower abs.

Imagine you're trying to get your hipbones to stick out. That's how much you're pulling in the lowest abs. One more and tuck under same exact exercise. Press those heels, plug the arms into the socket, hug the bottom, release the hips release. Every time you bring the kerogen released, the front of the hip.

And again, this really makes you work in your muscles because your joints aren't doing the work for you. So when, when situation that as we let our joints loose, compression and open up, our muscles have to take over. So we get what we want. Nice, relaxed back, but very sculpted legs. We'll go into an exercise called scooter now, which really steps up the toning in this area. It's like a one legged knee stretch. I'll take off a blue. So we have just a red. You can also use a red and a blue here.

Let's sit back as though we're on a bike. Has Spin, bike, hug your bottom. Press that now up. Reach your heel right into that shoulder rest. Put Your weight on your left hand, releasing the front of your hip. Two more. One more and bring it in. Now we'll do something that wraps it up even more.

Put your hands on your abdominals. Bend both knees slightly, push back if you keep one hand on the front of your body and the other hand right here in the glute fault isn't this exactly where you want to find the greatest strength, the greatest isolation, and make sure you're using every single muscle fiber in the glutes. Can you stand up even taller and eight seven go deeper here. Four more. Four, three, two, one and n I think that deserves a few little repetitions of a reward. We'll go right into our lunch stretch just for a few reps and this is a feel good. So the only rule here is make it feel good.

Come on up and we'll walk around to the other side of our reformer. We'll start with our single leg scooter. Remember sitting back into a spin bike type of position. The weight now is in our right hand. Press back now, reach the heel into the shoulder. Rest, isolate the glute fold area, that place at the top part of our thigh. And that is what we're hugging. That's what we're reaching with.

Visualize outer, middle and inner hamstrings. We're doing about 10 more of these when we are doing the footwork. We talked about the weight between the big and little toe. You want to use that type of thinking right now to make sure you're getting a balance across your entire hamstring for four, three, two, one more [inaudible] and now we're ready to challenge even further. Let's stand up tall. We'll put one hand in front, one hand in back, right where you want to strengthen the most and press.

Get all those muscle fibers from the glute fold all the way up. Really working. Yeah. Stand up a little bit taller. [inaudible] eight, seven, six pushing right from that glued and back thigh.

Four, three, two, one. And here's our reward time. Press back and up. And again, the only rule here is feeling great. [inaudible] one more. Come on up and we'll do one final exercise. Um, to complete our total body workout.

We'll be doing some high bridging. And I like to use three reds here. Uh, you can also use two reds in a blue or even two reds. So for this it's important that you keep your head rest down, all the wet lay down, and we'll have our legs hip with the part I'd like for you to go up into a very bridge here, unless that bothers your back. And then you can use our usual low bridge. Fire up your glutes. And we're using our spinal extensors. These are our back muscles.

Press the way pushing from the back thigh and in press, reach your knees over the foot bar press. So this works the entire back of our body to more with this Highbridge [inaudible] and one more [inaudible]. And in place your lower back down. Release your hips and we'll change to [inaudible] v feeds. Same thing. Press up again into your high bridge.

Press away and release the hips. Press away, release the hips. Okay, we'll try two more and one more. [inaudible]. And in this time, let's take the time to roll down Vertebra by Vertebra.

Okay. Place your heels back and we'll end by bridging up. And bridging down two times. Curve up your bottom. Reach your fingertips, and now just press up inch by inch, reaching your knees forward, relax your back wide as you rolled down. [inaudible] just feel that nice energy in your back.

All of that nice activation creates such a nice feeling of energy. By the time we finish our workout, [inaudible] place your feet on the standing clap form. Hug your legs together. Let your arms float up, lift your head and chest. Reach your fingers to the opposite wall and now look within your abdomen, hollow your abdomen. Use those muscles to roll. Uh, thank you for joining me today.

I hope you enjoyed the workout as much as I did and thanks for watching. Palladia anytime. We'll talk to you soon.