Kind Cadillac

Hi, everyone. I'm Benjamin Dagan Hart. I'm reunited with Meredith Rogers. I'm so excited. You're here. As you can see, we're on a Cadillac on a balanced body Cadillac, and, Meredith had a little request for the class to be kind one. So that's the theme I'm rolling within my head, a kind Cadillac.

Meaning, we're going to look for opportunities to really let springs do a lot of work for us in terms of finding length and ease in our joints and our body overall and stiffen a bit and just really let the work inform us and let it feel good. So there's going to be a lot of stretching. I hope that's, I hope that sounds like a good plan. And we're gonna start with some rollbacks. So Go ahead and have a seat on your Cadillac feet against the poles, hands on the ends of your rollback bar.

Just giving yourself a good amount of space. I always like to start this with the knee somewhat bent already, but feet flat and firm against the poles. And with almost a little bit of a hinge action, we're starting to lean back until the springs and arms line up. And at that point, as you develop spring tension, you round your spine. You push through the heels. You straighten the legs to roll yourself all the way down. So your head is heavy.

There's always a tendency I find to hold the shoulders away from the ears. But right now, I actually want you to let the springs pull your arms a little bit, find ease there, And then standing solidly on those feet, you roll yourself back up chin over chest till it's time to soften those knees to sit back up nice and tall. So that was a slow rollback. We're gonna do a couple more little quaker hinging back to start. Once you feel that spring tension develop round the spine from ears to hips, push through the heels, unroll your spine, let the springs pull your arms off and a little bit of that tension that we tend to have around the neck and shoulders, chin over chest, driving forward through the heels, rolling back up, soft knees to sit up tall one more time, hinging back to develop spring tension, push to the heels, roll yourself down, feel like you're getting a little taller each time releasing the head, nice and open in the chest, loose in the neck, and shin over chest. You roll back up, driving forward through the heels, soft knees to lift back up into a side stretch.

So left hand to the center of the bar, right hand just put it on your right hip for now, come down the center line hinging to start, finding that same motion with one arm supporting you, rolling the spine down pushing through both legs, and then that right arm's just gonna sweep up and overhead. Your side bending your torso left If you can grab a hold of your mat or the poll or anything around there to give you a little bit of traction, let it happen, your right leg, move it towards against or beyond your left leg, if that's available to you. You just see what works best. And then with a strong grip, let the springs pull your left shoulder. So letting go of a little bit of that tension you might find behind and then breathe into right ribs? Yes.

That was a beautiful sigh. I just heard. That's what it should feel like. And then you sort of plan your way back out by squaring off the feet right foot finds the pole, right arm comes back around to your right hip so that you find center, and then you let the springs pull you back up Finding a tall seat at the tops of knees, we switch sides, right hand in the center of the bar, left hand to left hip, hinge to begin building tension on the springs, roll the spine down, pushing through both legs. And again, take your time building this up and really feeling where does the spring pull me, how can I use that to my advantage? Left arm sweeps up and over into a side bend to the right If you have something to hook your fingers into, to open up the left side rib cage more, do it. It's good stuff. Your left leg moves towards against possibly beyond.

If you choose, see what's available to you, and with a strong right hand grip, allow that right shoulder to be hold by the springs, letting go of tension somewhere where it doesn't serve you right now, breathing into the left side rib cage, And then, sadly, we have to come back out. I know. I don't want to either. Looks so yummy and left foot against the whole left arm comes back to start position, chin over chest, you lift yourself back up, and we separate the hands on the back part again to go into a variation of rolling in and out. So this is part of a sequence. We'll explore later and kneeling again.

My goal for this is to just get the circulation going. Alright? Starts with a spine stretch forward. So you round over your legs. You press the bar down towards your shin bones, building tension on the springs, and then you roll yourself onto your shoulder blade tips simultaneously rowing the bar towards the chest. From there, lift yourself back up, stretch the arms up and forward, and start again. So we'll just do that piece first.

It's a fine stretch forward. Press down against the bar. Use it to puff out your back more and then roll yourself back, bending the arms, pulling the bar towards the chest to widen those collar bones and then keeping the tension on the springs, you can start lifting yourself back up, stretching the arms up, and forward from there. So that's one more rounding forward, spine stretch, pressing the bar down, roll yourself back, really driving the energy through the heels simultaneously rowing the bar towards the chest, adding on your chest now live you look up maybe back into a little backbend, let that lift you back up. Arms unfold. At the end, you're sitting upright. Nice.

Let's do that again. This is harder to do slow, right? But we'll do one more to really outline the path. So pressing down from here, you roll yourself back, you bring the bar towards you, establishing more tension on the spring. So you have something to backbend from lifting the chest. Now let those heavy springs pull you back up and we go a little quicker rounding forward, pressing down, rowing back, finding that lift of the chestlet that propel you up and forward to unfold the arms twice more rounding forward, pressing down, rowing back, finding that extension through the spine, beautiful, and you lift yourself up, arms come forward one more time, spine stretch, press down, roll back, roll back, lift the chest, arms up, arms forward.

We're gonna reverse it three times a little quick. We're rolling back into a backbend with a row. So bend the arms lean back. So crown of your head might just touch the mat, then you'd bring your chin over your chest. You press the butt down towards the legs, towards your ankles, Ending in your spine stretch and rolling back up. And again, speed as your friend flow right through twice more, leaning back, changing the spine, pressing the bar down, really feel all that undulation in the spine. Last one, arms bent, chest lifts, lean back, reverse the shape of the spine, pressing the bar down, and forward lift yourself up, and let the bar go.

So that's part 1. Does that feel kind on your body so far? Good. We're gonna continue with that theme on the knees facing the rollback bar, some chest expansion, and thighs stretch. For the first one, she's positioned perfectly about an arm length away from the pulse. Knees can be hip distance apart I like to have my feet together for this one, but you can choose parallel or slightly turned out.

What you're looking for is a wide base of support. That your hips can lean forward. Your chest can remain open and you have good control over your shoulders as your hands pull the bar down. Towards the thighs against the thighs. Try to break the bar around your thighs to really stretch the chest while taking a deep breath in keeping it in the lungs for a second and exhale. Release the arms up with control to go again, pulling the bar down against the legs. If they touch legs and bar, try to break the bar around the legs.

Would he press it into you, widen your chest, and then with supreme control on the exhale at the arms float back up. Beautiful. Adding the turn of the neck. Inhale to pull, hold the breath with the bar against your thighs. Turn your head one way and the other straight ahead and then exhale lift the bar back up. There was one set.

We'll do 3 more changing lead size time. Pull the arms down. Turn your head left and right. Straight ahead. XL lifting back up.

One more set starting to the right. As you keep the attention on the spring, really use it as an opportunity to lift your ribs off the hips one more time pulling the bar in, opening the chest, turn your head one way, and the other straight ahead with control lift up and then take one generous step back with your niece. You're sort of in the middle of the Cadillac. That way you get a lot more tension from the springs sooner into your thighs, right? You don't have to go back as far. Bring your chin slightly down.

And lengthen your tailbone down as well. You wanna pull the front of your thighs almost up a little bit, again, to minimize the amount of range you need in order to get that stretch. Once you feel like you have that set up, start your recline leaning back. And instead of going deep, I wanna keep you in your thighs, which for a full breath in and out. So we stay a little bit longer, really honing in on that piece of pressing the feet and shins down and using that effort to lift you back up at the end. We'll just do that twice more.

Take it back. All of this leads us back into another opportunity to work on our rolling in and out. Press up to come forward. Take one more. Let's rehearse the rowing with the thigh stretch. So as you go back into your thigh stretch, also pull the bar towards your chest just to familiarize your body with that. We're gonna visit this position in a second. And then you lift back up to go into a rolling in and out begins with a spine stretch forward up on the knee. So chin over chest, you press the bar towards the mat.

Hovering over the mat, you pull the bar towards your thighs, begin rowing the bars, you lean back into your thighs rich row, where we just were, and then you'll stretch the arms forward to lift yourself back up. And once you have the choreography down, you can go and flow right through it rounding down. Pull the bar towards you puff your back, roll the bar to the chest, tilt your and your thighs stretch, and then straighten out as you lift back up one more time. Rounding down. Pull the barge towards heel key pushing those hips forward as long as you can. Then bend the elbows to row the barge to your chest.

Stretch the arms to come forward, even quicker 3 more times adding a backspin rounding down, same direction. Pull in, rowing back as you arrive in your thybridge, lift your chest, find your extension, then let the arms come forward. Let that pull you back up flow right through twice more before we reverse. Pulling back, rowing in, really relying on those springs, setting up the tension. So we have something to lean back from arm stretch, lift up one more time.

They'll luxuriate in that amount of tension the springs give you letting your chest hang up and back away from the bar Now you reverse that. You pull a bar towards your chest. You lean your head back to arrive in your back and thigh stretch. Then you round over your bar pressing it down towards the knee sling. It come away from you and lifting back up, finding your flow, just twice more. Pull, row, backbend, thigh stretch round over, press the bow down and forward, and roll yourself back up.

Final one pull back, lean back, shin over chest, rolling over that bar, finding you a spine stretch on the knees, to roll yourself all the way back up, and you can let the bar go. Lovely. So with the circulation stimulator, from this motion. We're going into a rolling stomach massage, which continues that theme of undulating the spine. It just feels good. It'll liven see you gonna lie down on our back with our head towards the rollback bar.

At this point, if you have the option to change the attachment of your bar a little bit further down. I recommend you do it. Depending on the size of your rollback bar, you wanna have your legs preferably inside the springs, but you can use your hands on the outside of this particular bar to then hold it. Bring your niece in, try to get your feet over that bar, bring the bar against the backs of your knees, and your hands back to the pulse behind you. If it's available for your shoulders, come to a position where you're outstretched through the arms and you have something to push against also creates a bit more tension on the springs.

Now, one more thing, if this is uncomfortable on the backs of your knees, one maneuver that might help might be to cross your feet a little bit. Another one is to place a pad between your knees and the bar. How are you doing here? You're good? Alright. So we're gonna set this up by changing the push of the arms for the setup into a slight pole. Alright? So you can call on the power of your arms to bring your knees in towards your chest to let your hips curl up with the support of the springs.

And once you're on your shoulders stand, right, the tripod of your head and your shoulders, you start to push the knees up and away from you leaving the hips where they are. And then once you're in an airborne shoulder bridge, you start rolling the spine down. Down. Down till your hips land, you can now change back to a push before you change again to a pull of the arms to bring the knees back in lifting the knees up in a way. This is where you can start changing to push into the arms to manage those springs. Let the spine roll down freely and go. Again, knees come in, hips lift up, knees go up and away from the body, pushing into the hands, roll the spine down, To then pull with the arms to bring him in one more time, lifting up, pushing the knees up and away from you.

It's almost like an airborne thigh stretch, you roll back down and you reverse pushing the knees forward, try to lift the hips up, fold the knees in towards your chest, and then push into the pulse to roll your spine back down with the goal to set you seat down a little farther away on the mat each time. Couple more times. Lift the hips up. Fold the knees in towards you. Press into the hands to distance your hips away from your hands.

We'll take one more lifting up Massaging the back as the knees fold in pressing into the hands to roll the spine down. Down, down, nice. And then you can grab a hold of the bar with your hands, find your way out so the feet have to come up and over and then you can let the rollback bar. And we're done here. You can go ahead and grab your knees, hug them into your chest, We're gonna set up for a push through bar next. So that's typically on the opposite side of your Cadillac.

So let's come to this end. I'm gonna set it up with one spring from above for just a regular push through. Alright? Feet against the pole's hands against the bar, arms lift, up. And my first goal for you here is to just really find a massive stretch through your back so your knees can actually bend your body leans forward And your objective is to get the bar up as high as you possibly can. If your shoulders lift up by your ears, for right now, that's totally fine.

As long as you feel like you're really stretching out of your hip creases, first objective of push through, finding this stretch. 2nd one round bag. Like, you're rolling down till you get stuck, pause there for a second. Pull on the bar with both arms. Push into the pulse with both legs and use it to round your spine as deeply as you can, then try to push the bar down another inch or so without a change. That's your second objective to find this energy.

Then you lift back up into your stretch. Let the knee soften lean forward and stretch up and out of the waist. Nice. And finding that second position again, you push through the feet, you pull with the arms, you find that horseback spine. You press the bar down and you round over now. So you press the bar into your full push through.

To complete the motion. And again, we're going super slow so we can really look to create in those moments of finding that support from the spring, letting it open us up. Now find that same control on the way back. You roll yourself back till it feels like the bar is about to fling up in front of you. You control it. You lift it.

You lift out of your waist. You soften the knees. You find that first stretch. You've outlined the path. Let's go a little quicker now.

Rolling back. Press down. Push through. Beautiful. Roll the tail under to come back. And the second you can, lift the bar up, soften the knees, lean into your stretch.

Two more times, a rounding back. Press down push through. Your arm's still pushing forward so your back really has something to round out and puff out against, roll yourself back, controlled about all the way up. Nice. And one more. Round yourself back.

Press the bar down. Push through. Continue to push through the feed as you return, rolling yourself back. Beautiful work. Bend your knees, lift the butt up, and come into one more stretch here at the end. Alright. Let's go into a little bit of a twisty stretch here.

I want you to bring your left hand to the center of that bar. Your right arm lifts up and away from the bar stretches back behind you and you start to lean back. Like, you're trying to reach the opposite corner of the Cadillac, Still standing on both feet, finding an even twist through your entire spine. And then from there, push the bar up bring your right arm across and over to the top of your left foot. And then we're gonna stay here. If you can hold on to the pole, I encourage you to do that.

So we can really use the framework of the Cadillac. So staying here for a few breaths, take a nice deep breath in, try to get that bar up a little higher, as you exhale, pull a little bit more with that right arm to find that twist. Inhale again. Keep working in those two directions up through the left arm, twist with the right arm. And then on your next breath, add a little push to both feet to get deeper into the lower piece of that twist. So not a lot of movement occurs on the outside, but I hope internally you feel some changes.

I'm getting a see a grade. And then when you're ready, just let all of that go. Return to hanging off that bar and stretching up and stretching back. Still standing solidly on both feet, meaning there's weight on both of those feet against the bar. And then you come back to lifting the bar, returning to that first position of our push through to change sides, right?

So your right arm is now supporting you. Your left arm lifts away from the bar. You stretch up you stretch back. Good. So even here, right, rather than forcing the shoulder to go anywhere, it doesn't wanna go right now, just kind of surrender to where that shoulder wants to be, let it hang off the bar. You've built the control already.

Now you can indulge in it. Lift the bar up Slice your left arm across to the top of your right foot. Hold on to that pole. And then again, settle in for a lovely little stretch. We're using each breath to find more ease in the position that you're in, but also using each breath as an opportunity to go deeper by lifting that right arm up.

By pulling just enough with that left arm so you find a new spot to stretch into by pushing into both feeds to get just a little bit more traction on the lower end of that twist, always using your exhales to kind of just soften into the position. Nice. And, again, we're gonna go into the hang. So holding on with the right hand left arm goes to the top corner of your Cadillac. Both feet still pushing.

Just untwisting you for a second. And then come back. Both hands on the push through bar lifting up. We'll do one push through to just kind of center you out. So leaning up and forward, this is the final one. You choose the speed.

You round yourself back. You press the bar down. You push it through. Nice. And all the way back up. We're going into our shoulder roll down neck You can leave the bar where it is lie down on your back.

Sort of in the center of the table with your head on this end, feet towards the bar. Our feet will have to grab this bar, but I'm here to assist. So get your feet up here. You might have to scoot a little bit closer. Do you have a decent grip?

I always like to have my arches against the bar because it just gives you a bit more wiggle room as the bar travels underneath your feet as you go in and out of different positions, but our toes don't have to get super, super crampy. Alright? First movement is to bend the knees to press the bar down and then gently extending the legs without that feeling of the legs falling into the bar. You kinda wanna hold back and guide them into full extension. Nice. And then let them soften to come back in. The spring will lead the way. And then you unfold your legs without obviously losing control over the bar without it slipping off your feet. So again, a sticky pad might be helpful if your bar does not have this kind of grippy surface. You bend the knees again to pull down. You push through.

As you do that, since your feet are held, right? It's very easy for the knees to kind of just drop to the mat. You wanna hold back against that. But also leave the upper body nice and tension free. That's it. Bend your knees back in. Like, stretch up.

We'll take one more of these, just a little push through through the legs. You bend the knees. You find length and our position, making sure the legs don't fall into that position, you bend your knees back in. Stretch the legs up And like a straight leg shoulder bridge, start to push your feet and legs into the bar to lift your hips, rolling up onto your shoulder stand position, head and shoulder blades, arms pressing back, just checking in with how that feels, finding length in the front of the body, even making sure that your neck gets a little tracked, so you can actively push your head gently into the mat, front of the throat open, and then you melt back down, rolling sequentially upper back, middle back, lower back, release the tuck of the pelvis, bend your knees, push through. That's the full range of motion.

We're gonna go through that twice more. You can flow a little faster if that feels agreeable. Bending to stretch, pushing to lift. No fancy kicks today. We're just enjoying the ride up and the right down, working that sequential control, bend your knees push through.

We'll take 1 more. Knees bend in. Leg stretch up, pressing up against the bar to find that lift. Beautiful. And, again, take your time on the roll down. This is the yummy portion of it all.

You bend the knees when you're done. You push the bar through one final time, and we're just gonna finish this with a pull up so your arms can just stretch back over your head. Just really feel that resistance that's coming up against you feet. See if you can release your feet into that somewhat. So no need to grab the bar anymore.

It's coming for you. You don't have to hold it. And then take a roll up here. Arms up chin follows. You roll up and over your legs.

You can grab a hold of that bar to release it. So you take one foot off at a time. Make sure you keep pushing that bar away with your arms because it's coming for your teeth. You slowly roll yourself back, and you let that bar come up. Just sort of where we started our push through, and we'll take one final stretch. Nicely done.

Beautiful. And then you let that go. Okay. From here, we're going into our half swan. So Head towards the push through bar. You're gonna lie down on your stomach. I'll take this bar down in front of you because it's a little awkward to do on your own, but it's totally doable.

Just again, remember that bar is coming towards you. So you wanna make sure that you have a good solid grip on it. Take your hands out as far as you can on your push through bar. And then make sure that your legs and hips are in a comfortable yet active position. What I mean with that is in a perfect world, we would press our legs into each other, have them close together, But if that feels tight on your body, you can absolutely keep them somewhat apart if that feels better for you. Just make sure that your legs are active and your hips are sort of pressing down into the magento to keep some lower body support.

A focus, however, will be on the upper body. Now we often say in Pilates, you never shrug your shoulders up by your ears. Right now, I actually want you to do that. So with straight arms. I want you to push that bar slightly away from you. And because of where the spring pulls the bar, you can use it to actively un shrug your shoulders so that your shoulder blades settle down to where they usually stay in Pilates. Right? So you push the bar away again.

Letting your shoulder blades glide up and slightly out. And then sort of coming back to a more neutral position there, following the tension of the spring. Do that one more time. Shrug up, which is also a lovely stretch for the musculature underneath your shoulder blades. Andunchrug.

We're gonna add one thing. If you can, you can rest your forehead down on the mat so that you don't have to hold the weight of your head up. Alright? Now, you're gonna bend your elbows out to the side and bring the bar behind the head. You let your elbows ring out to side, as far as that's available to you and you're going to meet some resistance at some point, and I want you to stay where you meet that resistance, taking a deep breath into the front of chest and shoulders with the exhale possibly finding some ease in those areas. And then you press the ball forward again, going into that full shrug, unshrug to bend, and using it as an opportunity really angle out those elbows open wide through the chest and pictorial area. A nice passive stretch courtesy off the push through bar. And then you stretch the arms forward one more time, going into the shrug, the shrug, elbows bend, And then of course we have to do a little bit of work here too, right? So you stretch your arms forward again. As your arms stretch forward, this time lift yourself into a half, swan.

So your eyes lift up. Your chest lifts up. Your legs are still as active as they were this entire time, so you have a place of support. You find a stretch through the front of your body supported by the bar, and then you press it back down to start this whole thing again. Once you're down, you shrug the shoulders.

You unshrug the shoulders to bend the arms, to bring the bar behind the head, getting some good steam coming off her shoulders, here. That's good. You stretch the arms forward to find you half swan lifting the chest, active legs. So gorgeous. One more time. Come on down, shrug your shoulders up by your ears, un shrug to bend, elbows nice and wide. You see that the range of motion increases a little bit each time.

That's what we're going for. Nice. And then you press the bar forward one more time for your final half Swan. Beautiful. Look at that. And then you press the bar away from you. If you're on your own that you always keep one hand on it as you plan your escape, but you have the luxury of me so you can just sit back over your heels into a child's post, and I'll take care of the bar.

Alright. And then we get ready for our monkey. So a little bit of change on the equipment. You can stay in that position if you enjoy it. This is a kind Cadillac after all. I'm going to lower barred down and I'm gonna set up the safety feature on your Cadillac, which is typically either a chain or a rope like belt like this one here.

And we wanna change a height that accommodates the spring that we're gonna use from below for a monkey and our tower. So I want the spring to not be intention as I set it up so that you have a chance to really fully release it on each repetition. We're gonna begin with the monkey, which means that we have to come slightly off the side of the Cadillac here. So turn yourself onto your back and let your shoulder blade tip sort of slide right against the edge here. Alright? Always making sure that you have a good grip over where you are on the apparatus. That's it. You can go even a little further back. And, yeah, change your arms to be around the spring rather than stuck in it.

And you wanna set yourself up here. This this belt, obviously, make sure that the bar doesn't come any closer to you. You wanna push it away from you with your hands and set your feet in between your hands. Good. If you have the strap here, just kind of like cradle it, that your toes be open enough so that you have space for that. You pull with the hands and you push with the feet and that sort of stays throughout this exercise. There's no expectation at all to get the legs to straight Right? But you wanna use the power of this setup, of the push through bar traveling in this half circle shape, the power of your arms and legs, to find the deepest stretch available to you right now.

So when you're ready, pull with the arms, push with the feet and find where that is for you today. At the highest point, point your feet ever so slightly up, maybe flex the feet after you've done that. And after you find maximal length through the back of your legs, pull with the arms to lift your chest up a little higher. With other words, explore a little bit how you can relate to the stretch. Make sure you breathe.

As you do all of that, it's easy to forget. And then at the top, point your toes up one more time, bend your knees up and into your chest to create a deeper fold thighs to center and then you roll yourself back into start position. We're gonna do that twice more. Pressing up. So it's a great way to create some extra space and really trust your stretch before we go into the tower. You lift through the toes.

You full next to the feet. You pull with the arms. You can change your relationship to the stretch, go into exploratory mode, and then you fold your knees up and into you to start coming back down. We'll take one more of these. Lifting up. Pressing into the feet, pulling with the arms and playing around with that traction as you point and flex to point again and bend the knees.

Just start rolling yourself back down. Nice. And after opening up the backside like that, you can take your hands off the bar. Feet come down if you wanna reposition yourself, which I highly suggest. So you take your hands against the poles. You push yourself up to an arm length away from the polls, hand around the spring, and then you set yourself up with your feet against the bar, again, from this position.

So now the angle has changed, obviously. You can separate your feet a little farther apart and leave your heels apart as well. So in a parallel position, If this is not agreeable for you, she happens to have a good amount of stretch here today, even though she told me she might not. Surprise, surprise. You can bend your arms a bit and slide back if that makes, it more comfortable for you if that accommodates your body better. So we start kind of where our monkey ends with the knees bent in.

The thighs folded in towards the rib cage. The arms pushing back so that the hips can still have a chance to glide down towards the floor. And then we start by pushing the arms back, the feet up into the bar. And when you can't go any farther, so you start rolling your hips away from the floor. So similar to our rolling stomach massage earlier.

At the highest point, make sure you don't go past your tripod of shoulder blades and head. Front of your throat should be open. You flex your feet so your heels are the highest point of all this. And as you roll down, your arms are pushing back just a little bit harder. So you have the goal to set your hips down all the way on the opposite end of the Cadillac.

And then once you release the hips to the mat, you can soften your knees to start the whole thing again. Always feel free to change your mind as to where you are in the Cadillac. If you need to go closer, you definitely can. Push the arms back, hips down, legs out to straight, Lifting to the top. Beautiful. Then flex through the heels, push them up there, the highest point of your body, heels up, hands back, spine rolls down.

Sequentially, again, upper, middle, lower back releasing the hips at the end, soften the knees up and in against the chest. And one more time, make sure you straighten your legs first before you lift the hips up. So press up. And with the legs as straight as you can get them roll yourself up for one final tower, lifting to the top. Again, making sure the front of your throat remains open, flex your feet, roll yourself halfway down. Just to give yourself a little bit more space for the front of your throat. On that halfway position, we're gonna add the knee bend like knees stretches on the reform, you bend your knees down, you keep the spine around, your arms are still pushing back, and then you push the legs to straight.

We'll do that a little quicker a few more times, bending down. Pressing up. Let the increase of way that's coming down through your feet, through that push through bar. Really settle into a deeper stretch of your back. Your arms are still pushing back so that you have good control over this one more time down and up to flex the feet one more time and a final roll down here. The arms press back. You become enormously longer on the way down.

You fold your knees in. It's time to get rid of that bar so you can hold it with your hands, let your feet come out. Continue to close the spring until you know it's no longer moving, and then you can wiggle yourself away from it. Because we'll be facing the other direction next for some leg spring work. Alright? So thank you for the help. We're gonna take the spring off.

And get this pushed about out of the way. We're really using all sides of the Cadillac today. So you can lie down on your back with your head towards the leg springs. Now depending on what kind of Cadillac you work with, you have some wiggle room as to where those springs come from. We're gonna work with one leg at a time.

And even with that, different cadillacs, we'll have different attachment points. So I want to set my springs up at about hip distance or a little narrower because we're gonna do some unilateral one-sided work to start. So go ahead and grab your right leg spring from behind you. Put it around your right foot. And again, our theme is to be kind to ourselves and to find length in the body and to use those springs to help us. Unlock some additional mobility in the body.

So that's the goal for this exercise as well. Your hands go onto the polls, both of them. Again, if available to you, you wanna stretch them out as far as possible. So you have something to push against. Your left leg is long on the mat, so it feels like you're really lifting that Cadillac up with both of your arms. You're standing on a strong solid foot with your left leg.

And the right leg is going to move through the spring. You press the leg forward and down, and the biggest radius possible bringing it down to almost make it try and make it longer than the left leg, still pushing back into both hands evenly and then again, biggest radius possible the leg travels up to go again, press the leg forward and down. Stretching into the spring and then resisting it on the way up to really clear the range, pressing the leg forward and down one more time, keeping the rib the back of your ribs is close to the mat as that is comfortable opening up the front and lifting the leg up. One more time. Press the leg down. Both arms push back.

You might start to notice one eye wants to push harder than the other. That's your way to stay centered. Lift your leg back up. And then we go into circles. First, we're gonna take this leg across the middle, very small range of motion so that we can really keep the circle pain with no movement of the hips and no twist on the back. I like those circles too, but for right now, we really wanna use the spring to get some clear articulation inside the hip joint.

As you go through the circles about 3 more times, make sure your arms continue to push back, again, monitoring if your spine is centered checking in with that left standing leg to one more circle this way, then you go the opposite way. Open down across and lift. Open down. Across and lift. Same rules apply. Both arms pushing, left leg reaching, left heel pressing away from the center.

3 more. Oh, bend down across and lift and 2. One more time. And then we change, not the springs, and not the circles. We're just gonna do them with the other leg, but this leg stays in the spring. You wanna press it down and forward one more time.

Flex your foot once you're down there. Now this becomes your standing leg. This is gonna feel a little strange, but you wanna lift your left leg up to the ceiling. We're gonna do circles with this leg now across the body to start down around and up. Same idea. You might find that that leg feels surprisingly heavy because the right leg is now supported by spring, but that you also have immense freedom in that left hip right now.

And that's what we're going for to around and up one more across around and up reverse the direction open down across and lift 5 more. Now all the while trying to stretch that bring out more with that right foot with both your arms pushing back. So again, indulging in extra length in no body one more time around and up. Bring that leg down, bring the right leg up, to fold that knee in, and to take the strap of your foot. And then we'll do the second side, of course. Good thing. There's only 2.

Left leg comes in. Both hands back on the pulse. Leg goes up to start. So first, a lower and lift with that left leg. Make sure that your arms are ready for the task at hand constantly pushing back your right heel flexed left leg moving in the biggest radius possible.

Whenever you get to the bottom, try to make that left leg longer than the right Also check-in with how that right leg feels. It just worked pretty hard, lengthened to lift a couple more pressing out. Stretch to lift. Nice. One more time. Down. Reach into it, lifted up with control, circle across.

To the right down, around, and up, cross down, around, and up. I always like to think less about the circle my foot is making in space and more about the circle that's happening inside my hip joint. Right? It's a very small circle in there, but try to make that smoother rather than worrying about where your foot is in space. Now reverse it. Same leg, open, down across and lift. And you might find that as you get more comfortable with making a really smooth circle inside the hip joint, you can increase your range of motion as well without disturbing the stability of the rest of your body. 3 across an up and 2 across an up one more time.

And then we go back into changing legs. So your left leg comes down with the spring still attached. Your foot flexed once you're down. The right leg now lifts up. And we'll take 6 circles each way across the body first, down around and up, and 5, down around and up. I'm still pushing, but we're almost there around and up. And 3, turn around it up and 2, and 1, reverse it for 6, pushing the left teal away from both those hands pushing the opposite direction.

3. And 2. And one and done. Lower that leg down. Bring your left knee in. Take the strap off. Next up, we're going to set up a push through bar again.

So I'm gonna need your head on this side and your feet the opposite way. We're also setting up the trip piece. So you have a moment of rest if you need to stretch out in any way you would like. So we're setting up the trip piece opposite of the push to bar for what I call a trapeze teaser, which is a very kind variation on teaser because your feet are supported by the peas, the push through are is helping you up. Obviously, we're still going to do a good amount of work.

But it just feels like one of those moments where, again, you use the Cadillac to give you that feeling of elongation and just weightlessness which I quite like. So the trapeze is in place. You rest your feet up in the sling of the trapeze. And we're gonna take the push to bar into our hands. Again, I always recommend to bring the arms as wide apart on that push to bar as possible.

The head is resting. And I personally always like to do this. When I have my feet in the sling of the trapeze, I push my legs over to one side, and I let them sort of pendulum swing themselves to a moment standstill, which is quite lovely. There's a passive torque and twist that happens in the lower back. You just find that moment of stillness And once you're there, this is what we're gonna do.

I want you to start pressing your feet into the scrap to roll your hips up yet again, like our shoulder roll down earlier, until you feel like you're in one long line from the tripod of your head and shoulder blades up into your feet. And then you roll your hips back down. Again, this is something we've done all class long in the tower, in our shoulder roll down, in our rolling stomach massage, one more time lifting up. So just another variation on the theme, another opportunity to get longer as we roll down. That is one of the pieces we're gonna need. Now we leave the hips down and we work on the upper body. You bend your arms out to the side as wide as possible thinking of that half swan stretch we took earlier, and then you press the bar back over your head.

So that's the trajectory of the push through bar. You bend your arms back in and let your arms come back up as simple as that. Now we'll put those 2 together. You bend the arms. As you push your arms overhead, your hips start to lift up.

So you're in that enormous, like, a good morning yawning stretch. Your feet reaching one way. Your arms the opposite way. And then you synchronize the rolling down the bending of the arms and the stretching up of the arms. We'll do that one more time.

Just that. And bend your arms wide to the side, open chest, as you press the arms back, your hips lift up. Always think of stretching your feet forward and away from your hands stretching your body in opposite directions. And again, you roll yourself down. You let the arms come through, and you synchronize those 2 things. Any way you see fit.

By the time your arms are straight, we can now add our teaser into this. So you follow the bar now lifting your head and neck and shoulders up the bar pulls up. And at some point, it starts pulling back. So you're in that lifted position. You can really lift your chest up nicely.

Your feet still supported. Then with control, you roll back down, sending your feet away from you, melting onto the mat, bending the arms to go again. As the arms push back, the hips up. Nice. Take your time rolling back down, bending the arms through.

And once you roll down from top to bottom, you roll up from top to bottom, lifting your spine, finding your teaser. We're gonna add a bend of the arms here to open the chest yet again, stretch the arms up with straight arms, roll yourself back down. We'll do one more set. Bend the arms, push the bar back, lift the hips up. And roll yourself back down.

Arms come through. Find your teaser at the top. Bend and stretch the arms three times, down, up And 2, down, up. Beautiful. One more time. Down up. Hold it at the top. Reach one of them.

The other forward letting go of the bar. Lift one leg than the other out of the strap and then find your way onto your back yet again. Roll yourself down. And again, I'm gonna change the Cadillac around. You can take a stretch from here. Beautiful.

We're gonna move the trapeze over to the opposite end. We're gonna need it there going into our breathing push through bar will have to come down. Let's get it through. And you can change yet again the position of your head. Alright. Coming towards the end, and there's a very special trade waiting for you.

Hands on the rollback bar yet again. Again, grabbing as wide as possible feet in the sling here. And this is our breathing. Think chest expansion combining yet again our chest expansion with that lift of the hips that we've worked on all class. Another opportunity for undulation, inhaled press the bar forward and down, lift your hips towards the bar, like chest expansion, try to break that bar around the legs if you get them to touch And then with control, exhale roll the spine down, lift the arms up. So now we're gonna change the pace for this to be a little bit more invigorating, deep breath in, lift yourself up. Press the bar down.

Hold the breath for a moment. Exhale and control the return. 3 more times. Inher poll. Press the hips up. Press the bar down.

Think of your thigh stretch. X arrow down. Like, you're in your shoulder row down trying to get the hips far away from your head as possible. One more time. Press the bar down hips lift up, deep breath in. Hold the breath. And exhale. Release.

Beautiful. There's one more thing for us, which is our spread eagle. So leave the trapeze behind. Let go of your rollback bar. And then just sit up and spin around. We're gonna stay seated for the setup.

You place your feet. Sort of turned out against the pulse. You bend your knees enough so that you can get a high grip on the vertical pulse. You can bend your knees even more skewed forward a bit more, grab up a little bit higher. That's a good place to start.

So already here, you're hanging into that framework, finding some stretch underneath your shoulder blades. Like we did earlier, an openness of the hips induced by the start position. You wanna, again, pull with both arms and push with both feet to find your start position. So straight legs. If at this point you feel like you need to adjust your hands up and down, trust your instincts there, but we're starting this hanging rounded position. So from ears to hips, you're in that c curve. Beautiful.

And then the feet continue to push. Your arms continue to pull They stay long and you ripple through your spine, rounding to a straight spine, finding extension at the top, lifting the chest, letting your head release back, and then reversing that shape, keeping arms long legs long until you're hanging back into your c curve. And you just, for a final undulation moment in this session, roll through the spine into a nice open chest, letting your head release back into gravity, and then you reverse it hanging back and away from the vertical pulse. One more time ripple through. I always like to feel as though I'm pulling my arms down against the pole so I can lift my chest up even higher.

Now from here, just come to a flat spine looking straight ahead. You can pull yourself ever so gently forward so you can step your feet back and all that length you just created, you sort of take with you for the rest of the day. You can come down and have a seat. You are done with your workout. Actually, I wanna high 5 and a hug. You did great I hope that was a kind Cadillac, and I hope you enjoyed it at home as well.

Thank you so much for joining us. See you next class.