Class #1096

Deepen your Practice

55 min - Class
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In this Mat Workout, Niedra adds a few tricks to help you get deeper into the exercises and get more control over the details. She shows great breakdowns of Double Leg Stretch, Swan Dive, and others to prepare you for the full exercise. Niedra ends the class with great stretches which will really open your back and shoulders.
What You'll Need: Mat, Towel

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So, uh, good evening. We're going to, um, we will be doing a math class today with my favorite math people and we're going to add a few little decorative tricks to help get deeper into the exercises. We'll start with the wall today. I would like you with your feet slightly away, just a little bit away from the wall so you can feel we usually end with each. I want you to feel the back and the waist against the wall. The stomach is up. And first of all, bring the arms out in front of you. Now once they are out, pull the shoulders slightly back, but keep the ribs into the wall so you have a beautiful lift and little circles with the arms without losing the position of the spy. Reverses circles. Two, three. Now as the arms come down, think of yourself getting taller and longer without losing contact with that wall. Now bring the arms up in, reach them higher, but keep the shoulders down in three circles against circle.

So the arms are reaching to the fingers, but the shoulders are reaching to the wall. We verses two and three. And then as the arms come down, think of the back, get in March much, much longer and taller. Now from here, drop your head and just roll right to the tips of the shoulder blade. So you roll down just a little bit, but lift your stomach, let the hands Hain and then roll back up to an upright position and feel as though you're unraveling the spine. Now drop your head and roll a little bit further so you just roll down til the base of the ribcage is touchy or just about to get off. The arms are long and the stomach is pulling way, way, way in, and squeeze your hips and you roll back up to an upright position.

Nice and tall and long through the crown of the head. Now drop your head again that the shoulders come a little bit forward and then roll a little bit further down, a little bit further down until the base of the hips is pressing into the wall and the arms dangled him. The arms along yes, and then roll back up. Roll back up. Pull the stomach amend. Literally feel yourself stacking up your spine into the wall. Now drop your head and roll them down til the base of the hips the way you did before. Soften your knees lightly and keep rolling down further. As you roll down, your head is relaxed and your knees are relaxed, but your stomach is pulled in ahead. Hangs ahead, hangs here now roll back up, roll back up.

Think if you can get the even pressure in the spine on either side on the way back up. Very good. And then one more time. Drop your head again. Round your spine and roll down at the arms. Belong in dangly and soften the knees on the way down so you can go further. See, you can go all the way down towards the floor. Drop your head Tim, all the way and then roll back up. Roll back up, roll back up. Roll back up to a nice stacked up position. Um, I think Tim, you will need for the next one, the knees a little bit further forward. The feet.

Everybody else looks fine from here. Just lift your heels very slightly. Keep your bottom and your ribs into the wall and see, I don't have a wall behind me, but see if you can slide down halfway so that your back is long against the wall. Squeeze your heels together and slide back up to your back as long and flat on the wall. The heels are slightly lifted. Roll down again. Bend the knee. See slide on. Feel your spine get long and tall on the way down. Pull the stomach in and slide back up. And again, roll down this way, nice and long in the back and roll back at nice from hips.

Now as you go down, you lift your arm, so you go down in the arms, come up, reaching up above your head and slide back up, bringing the hands down, keeping your back long. Two more times like this, the head stays long and easy and natural and come back up and last time pull the stomach into. Feel this. It's not how low you get. It's how long bottom against the wall, Tim. Yes, and then come back up. Come back up, come back up. Very, very good. Now let's have you all lawn on your backs with your bottom is close to wall as you can with your feet up on the ledge. So an easy way to do this is to sit sideways against the wall and then roll onto your back and put your feet up against the wall.

Great way to stretch and release the spine. If your hamstrings are too tight, you don't get your bottom to the wall. You just want to start with your back flat. Your feet have to be hip with the part and make sure they're more or less straight. So you want your feet a little bit flexed. So Megan, I think for you more flexed for you, right? And this is too wide for you. So knees and feet about the same distance.

Now Roll your bottom up in the air so you roll up toward your shoulders and push your feet into the wall to get your hips up high. That's it. Now take your hands and put them against your thighs. Push your heels strongly into the wall and they truly think of pushing into your head with your feet. You tried to slide yourself away with energy as you roll down. Also use your hands to push your knees up and see if you can unravel your spine.

So you stretch your whole final column out on the way down. Sometimes this could give you a huge stretch in your shoulders as well. Keep your arms long. So roll up again. Roll up, roll up, roll up, roll up. Reach your hands up and push them into your side. Push your feet into the wall and roll down and push your knees up and push with your legs into your head to stretch your back out. All the way down, all the way down, all the way def and again, roll up. Roll, roll, roll, roll, roll. Roll Up. Use your legs to push your hips forward and then start rolling down a push with your feet. Drop your chest, drop your ribs, drop your waist, drop your bottom. Very, very nice.

And one last time, like this. Rolling up, rolling up, rolling up, rolling up. Hands on your thighs. Push your thighs away and roll down. Roll down, roll down, roll down, roll down. All okay. Very, very good. Now just for the fun of it, bring the soles of the feet together a little bit lower down. The knees would be out a little bit lower if you can. And with your hands, push your knees out, but keep your back flat. So you press and now gently squeeze the knees together and then push the knees out and then press your knees together.

Now add something interesting to this. Squeeze your knees towards each other with the strength of your inner thighs. And as you push the legs out and resist with your inner thigh. So you still get the knees to open, but you're working to tonify. Yes, the inner thigh muscles a little bit. That's it. Now push the knees out, put your hands on the outside, push your knees into your hands and then bring the knees together against resistance. So you work the outer size a little bit. Good, Megan? Yes.

All the way to flat. And then press your knees out with resistance. Push, push, push, push, push and squeeze those knees back together with resistance. So the outer thighs, the resist in your hands, your hands win. But you start to wake up all these muscles, and one more time, press out, presale, pre-sell, pre-sell, presale, presale out. Excellent. And then squeeze those knees together. Very, very good. Pull the knees into your chest, just rock side to side, right to left a little bit, just to massage your back.

Excellent. And then roll to one side and come on up and we'll move our mat back into the middle of the room for our normal mat work. Now that you've been warmed up. Okay. So before we get down, now that we're set with our mats, come in and stand in the middle of your mat or towards the front of your mat just to stretch out the side body in [inaudible] stance. That's all. All of us. Take our right hand and turn it out. So lifting the powerhouse, narrowing in the hips, ship the way towards the balls of the feet so you can lift the heels up. Just feel that lightness in the heels and then the heels are down, the arches are lifted. So press into the outer foot slightly.

Bring this arm up by your ear. Turn the little finger. Slide the inwards. Yes. Now pulling the stomach in. How high can you stretch this arm up? And then start stretching to your left and pressing the arm over into the ear so you have a stretch on the right side. Wrap the hand round your head. Stretch a little bit more. Stretch to the arm out and come back up.

Same thing on the other side. Lift the powerhouse. Lift the spine, two in the left, hand out. Bring it right up, stretch way up with it. Keep the stomach up and start sliding over without the hips moving. So you're lengthening both sides of the waist. Wrap the hand round your head. Stretch the arm out a little bit further and come back up. And again, right hand comes up big. Reach up, stretch far over. Keep the hips from rapid.

Round your head. Stretch it out and come back up and other side. Reach the left arm. Way Up. Nice lifted powerhouse over to the right, rapid round your head. Stretch it out and come back up.

And very good. Now coming to the front of your maths, Cross your feet. Bring one hand on top of the other and press that one hand down, one hand up. So you have resistance. Use it to lift your powerhouse up and start bending your knees. If you can sit all the way down this way, fine. If not, take one foot behind you and come down onto the floor on cross your feet. Stretch your arms out and squeeze your hips.

Drop the shoulders, roll down an inch and pull your stomach muscles in. Press your shoulders down, roll down another inch. Pull your stomach in, press your shoulders down, roll down another end, and then roll all the way down onto your backs. And just for a little warm up, keep the legs where they are. They're not sandy. Bend your knees in a little more, so not too close to your bottom. See if you can feel the length of your whole spine pressing towards the floor and without anything moving, bring your right knee into your chest and bring it back down again.

Nothing moves left like benzene and come back in. So if you notice, because the knees keep doing this movement because the feet are further out to the angle of the knee is a bit more open. Don't bet it in, keep it kind of more of a bigger shape because it has a different quality of weight into the pelvis and into the hip socket and you're all so much stronger and so much more advanced. You want to just take advantage of this two more times in and back. And one more time in and back. Now, knees and feet together, keeping the stomach and bring both knees in deeply to the chest. Just let the legs come in. Heavy feet close to your bottom.

Bring the legs to tabletop. Lower the feet to the mat. Bring the knees into your chest. Bring the legs, the table Top, pressing your waist into the mat. Lower the legs down without any change in the waist. Bring the knees to your chest. Take the legs to tabletop. Now, right here, press your head into the mat. Press up through the skull and as the legs go down, try not to rock towards your legs.

Keep the head extending in the opposite direction. One more time. Needs to chest legs to table top. Make sure the spine is even longer and lengthen the leg down without losing that length. Bring the arms to the ceiling and reach the arms back by your ears without the back shifting. Bring the arms up your head and chest and reached towards your ankle so you just scroll up just a little bit lower back down, arms back by your ears. Bring the arms up, lift your head and chest and stretch towards your ankles and down.

Bring the arms back and up. Lift your head and chest and stretch and lower down. Take the arms back and up. Lift your head and chest. Now its whole this position. One, he comes up, the other knee comes up. Curl up a little deeper and start your hundreds. Breathing into three, four, five. Exhale. Four, five, two, two, three, four, five. Exhale.

Three, four, five. Keep the finger stretching. Long. Exhale by four, two, three, four, five. Exhale. Three, four, five, five, two, four, five. Exhale. Three, four, five, six, two, four, five. Exhale. Three, four, five, seven, two, four, five. Exhale, three, four, five, eight, two, four, five. Exhale, three, four, five, nine, two, four, five. Exhale, three, four, five, last seconds, four, five. Exhale. Three, four, five. Bend your knees into your chest, lower your head to the floor, lower your feet to the floor and I'll take your arms out, your legs out, and just give yourselves a good stretch. Let the back arch reach the arms towards the floor.

Even the shoulders come up to try to stretch your elbows and just pull. How long can you make? Point your feet. Stretch. Now relax in this position and stretch again. Pull, pull, pull, pull, pull and relax. One more time. Now Hook your thumbs together the way Wendy's doing. You're stealing my ideas as steward Uber Pool.

Relax. One more time. Flip the thumbs the other way. Stretch. Pull. Pull your belly up. Popo, Popo, purple and relax. Very good. Come up to a sitting position. If you can roll up, roll up will come up any other way you want to. Let's have the feet together. Holding beyond behind the open. The knees likely lift you back way up and lift your elbows.

So knife lifted waist long spine. Imagine something a await on your head and you're pushing your head up against this weight that's pressing you down. Now lean back a little bit and lengthen up through the crown of the head. Tuck the tail role further back and lengthen back till the arms are straight and the rib cage is slightly closed and roll back up and sit up nice and tall. Lift that spine and roll back.

Rounding through the spine till the arms are long and look down into your naval and roll back and sit up nice and tall and rule back pulling your stomach in and take your arms away and roll back up. Sit Up nice and tall and roll back without arms reaching and roll back up and sit up nice and tall and I roll all the way to the mat. Roll, roll, roll to the Mat. Stretch your arms over your head, bring the arms up and if you want to roll up or grab your knee, bring yourself up. Either way. Works and roll down again. Roll. Roll, roll, roll, roll, all that. Way down. Stretch arms over your head.

Bring the arms up and use your knee if you need to to roll up or without almost there, Tim. And one more time. Rolling down. Rolling down, rolling down, rolling down. Stretch your arms over your head, Tim. Stretch your legs out and roll back up. Rounding all the way back up. Very, very good. Single leg circles. Roll down onto your backs. Check with your hips. Feel really nice and even lift your right leg up and make sure the food is just above the hip, not closer.

And then take your left leg down to the map and slightly to the left. Very slightly out so that it's easier to anchor both hips and start your circles. Circle one and up. Pause. Circle two and up. Pause. Circle three and up. Pause. Circle four and up. Pause. Circle Five. Very good. And pause. Reverse it. Circle the opposite way. Keep your hips quiet.

Circle and quiet. Circle and quiet. Circle and quiet. Circle and quiet. Now bend the right knee slightly and hold the hamstring with both hands. Just hold it where it's nice and easy, and then lengthen your right hip away from your stretch, your right leg up to the ceiling stretcher like later. You straighten the leg, bend the knee a little bit and straighten the leg. Ben The lead a little bit, and straighten the leg. Bend the knee a little bit and straight up. Put your hands on the mat and lower the leg down. Straight down, straight down, straight down, straight down, straight down. Very good.

Bring your heels together, bend your left knee and lift the leg up to the ceiling. So now the other leg, the hips are nice and square. Take your right leg, move it slightly out. It allows more stability in the pelvis. Cross your leg over to the right, down, around, and up. Pause. Circle the leg up. Pause. Circle the leg up. Pause. Circle the leg up. Pause. Circle the leg up. Reverse and circle the leg and up. Circle the leg and up. Circle the leg and up.

Circle the leg and up. Circle the leg and up. Now bend the knee and hold the leg, the hamstring, and then stretch the leg up and bend the knee as you straighten the leg. Lengthen the left hip down and Ben and like left hip to right heel and bend and left hip, the right heel and bend. Left hip to right heel, hands on the mat and lower the leg all the way down, all the way down, all the way down and lower the legs down. Very, very nice. Now we started working in what eventually we'll be rolling over in the different ways that we lift our hips up in the air. So just to remind you what we'll be doing, we'll be doing the bottoms up one where you'll be your legs down, you bring your legs to table Top, lift your hips, stretch your knees and roll down.

So from here when your legs aren't tabletop, you have to squeeze your hips, pull your stomach and see if you can get your bottom to lift. Part of what's going to happen is if you push down with your end to get your bottom up and roll back down again, lift your bottom up and roll back down. So let's bring the knees into your chest. First of all, just to have them in. Now bring the legs, no hands. So bring the legs, the table top. Now Roll your bottom up, lift your bottom straight to your legs and roll your bottom down and bring your legs, the tabletop. And again, bottom comes up. Lift the leg, straighten them and roll down. Bend your knees, roll your bottom up. Lift your legs, roll down, bend your knees, lift your hips, straighten your legs rolled down. Bend your knees. Very good.

Bend your knees in. I'm rolling like a ball. Grabbed behind the knees and just start rolling back and forth and roll. Rolling like a ball. So you're going to go up and down. That's it Megan. So bottom comes up, chest comes up, bottom comes up, chest comes up, bottom comes up, chess and and back and rock. And that's all everybody come up to the sitting position.

Hole behind the knees. Round back just a little bit and see if you can lift up now from this position just a little bit back and up again. Roll a little bit further and up. Now see if you can roll. That's it. See if you can just find this place where you start small and then it less momentum. More control. Good. Tim. Yes, yes, yes, yes. So you starting work in the muscle structure rather than from momentum.

So Megan tried to keep your knees from coming to your chest. Keep them that distance better. Yes. So you re Wendy. Very good. That's it. Yes. So you start to be able to sustain the shape with muscle tone, not just momentum, which becomes a more sophisticated way to control the shape of your own body. So much better Wendy. That really, really good. Excellent work.

Okay, let's have let's all of us roll down on our back for single leg stretches. Nice long spine. Bring both knees into the chest, curl your head and chest. Stop and hold your ankles. Now elbows wide, wide, wide. Get your bottom down on the mat. Yes. So you're wasting. If hips are down now, left hand to right knee, left leg long and try to reach the person on the other side without your backs changing shape switch and other leg goes way out and slightly further down. Switch. Stretch that leg out. Switch.

Stretch that leg out and double time and switch and switch and switch and switch and switch. Switch, switch. Switch both knees in. Drop your head down, keep your legs and just roll your head side to side to relax your neck for a minute. Double like stretches. We will do this a slow version again. We've started working on this for more detail. To curl your head and chest up, press your hands strongly into the mat. Stretch your legs away from you. Take your arms to the ceiling, lift arms by your ears, arms to the side.

Bend your knees and give them a squeeze. Drop your head down, curl your head up, hands to the mat. As the legs go out, arms the ceiling, arms behind you, arms to the side. Squeeze the legs in. Drop your head down, curl your head up, press your hands to the mat and stretch your legs out. Long arms to the ceiling, arms to the ears, out to the side. Bend your knees in and squeeze his slow motion. Circle. Head down to relax. And last time, crawl your head up into a tiny little ball. Press your hands to the mat. Stretch your legs out, arms up, arms back, arms out, curling and squeeze. Tight, tight, tight.

Head down and restaurant your head side to side. Just to relax your head. Harder to do because you really controlling the detail and scissors are next. Curl yourself up and lift the leg straight up to the ceiling. Now grab your thighs, curl up a little bit more. Elbows wide, stomach in tight, right like towards your left leg out. Paul, Paul scissor, Paul Poe, scissor, Popo, scissor. Pull and pull.

Call Paul, Paul, Paul, Paul, Paul, Paul, Paul well both legs, Zap hands behind your head. Rest your neck in your hands and float the legs away. Bring them up, float them away. Sandy higher with your chest and up. Half the distance down, but stay up in that chest and lift two more times and lower and lift and lower and lift. Bend your knees in, drop your head down and take a rest. Very, very good. Now take the hands behind your head. Keep the legs where they are. Feel the how, why your elbows are keeping the elbows wide. Curl your head and chest up twists to the right. Try to get that right elbow way, way, way back.

Bring your left elbow or way forward so you're stretching to the right side of your mat. Come back to the middle, twist to the other side, all over to the left side of the mat from above the waist, back to the center. Twist to the right side of the mat, back to the center. Twist to the left side of the Mat. Back to the center. Twist to the right side, left waist down and center. Last one other side and center and lower back down.

Legs out, arms out. Grab your thumbs and stretch and pull those thumbs apart. Just give you some of the good stretch. Feel the traction all the way from the shoulders. Now release the hand, switch your thumb class and stretch again. Try to pull the thumbs apart so you tractions into your armpits. Very good.

Relax. And now bring the arms to the ceiling and roll up to a sitting position. Either bend your knee to roll up. Come all the way up and open the legs for spine. Stretch forward. So nice starting with the hands down. See if you can press your knees down.

Literally put your fingertips on the floor perhaps, and lift way, way, way up. And then relax. And again, pull the stomach and lift a little bit further. Tim, this is relax. Now as you do this, press down with the knees and reach with the toes, pointing your feet and relax. Good and pressor these onto your quads are working and relax. Good. Last one. Press tight-knit quads. Lift your back up. Now pull your stomach in and crawl your fingers forward.

Rounding up the spine. Press your knees down and roll up. Roll up, roll up. Press your knees down. Long strong legs. And again, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward. Roll up, roll up, roll up, roll up, roll up, roll up, roll up. Last one with the arms straight in front. Press your knees down, reach through the fingers, reach through the crown of the head and drop your head and dive down between your arms, pulling your stomach in, stretching, keeping the hands parallel to the floor of you, Kat. And up, up, up, up, up, up, up, up. Lift and relax. Down. Okay. Bend your knees. Open leg. Draka holding behind the knees. Elbows slightly out.

Extend the right leg and down and the left leg and down and the right leg and down and the left leg. Now both legs at the same time. Lift and hold. Hold, hold. Bring them down. Stretch them up. Try to tighten the size and pull back with the waist and down. Now we're adding Nice, fun choreography. Open the legs.

Bring the legs together. Take them out, bend them down and again out. Bring them together. Open them out and down. Okay. Now make sure you have room on the back of your mat for rolling back. We're going to start the rolling part. So holding behind the knees again, lift your legs up and pull your stomach and say, find your balance. Roll back towards your shoulders and roll up again and balance.

Good. Roll back again. Head stays forward. Come up in balance and roll back again. Come up and balance that. Bring your legs together and out. Roll back and come up. Bend your knees and out.

Roll back and up. Legs together and out. Last one, roll back and up. Bend your knees and out. Legs together. Not only have you improved a lot, you also super smart because you weren't infecting this back on your backs for corkscrew. So hands pressing into the mat. Your bottom is down the legs along really push with the arms to get a nice anchor in the powerhouse and small circle right down, left and up. Reverse it left down, around and up.

Right down, around and up. Left down, around and up. Right down around and up and left down around and take your hands and place them under your bottom. Just like that so that you anchor and then float your legs. All the way to the mat, all the way down with that cushion to support your lower spine. Okay, very, very good. Roll onto your stomach for preparation for swan dive.

So just roll over with on your stomach. You want to place your hands on the floor, the wood part outside your own mat, about the same height as your ears. So you're weird. Now the legs are going to belong in electric cramping. I liked the toes long. Tighten your hips slightly. Lift your head in Chasse, look up and just start pressing up. Very long body. Lifting up nice and long and then bend your elbows to lower down again and press up again. Lifting the stomach, lifting the stern up.

Nice and long, long spine, shoulders down and back down. And one more time like this. Lengthening up. Nice and long, long, long and lifted. Very, very good and lower back down. Now you remember the full Swan we've started working on where you, when you, you will catch yourself in this high position. Uh, just to very quickly show you in case you're not sure you're going to be lifted up, your legs are long. You Rock and press, Rock and press so you have the legs have to be active before you start your fall forward. So press up into your beautiful arch. Nice, lifted broad shoulders away from your ears. Here we go. Bend the elbows, legs go up and fall. Push up and lift and fall. Push up and lift and fall. Push up and lift and fall. Push up and lift and lower your chest down and just sit into child's pose for a minute. That was very, very good. Stretch back, bottom back, head down. Nice long spine.

Come forward onto your stomach again for single leg kick. So from lying out it's just stretch your arms out in front of you. Turn your hands into a karate chop position, lift your head and look at your hands and then you may not be able, I'm not sure if you can slide them in. Let's see if it bring them into the elbows at just about under your shoulders. Yes, you may have to crawl him in. Make fists with your hands.

See if you can bring the knuckles depressant towards each other and you can move the elbows away from each other about an inch. Check that your knees are together and your feet together. Pull your stomach in and see if you can lift it away from the front. Really use the arm stick. Stand up and look forward. Don't look down. You want the back of your neck nice and long. Now in this position, pull the elbows and shoulders down towards your waist to get more length in the trunk. Yes. Now right like start. Bend the right knee, kick, kick.

Put the leg down, squeeze your hips, left leg kick, kick and down. Kick. Kick and down. He kick and down. Kick, kick and down. Kick, kick. Very good. And our whole position pulls down with the arms tight. Hips. Bend your right knee slowly and bring the foot in towards your bottom.

Do not move your bottom as it comes in just the right foot, Tim. Just no change in the hips. You have to really observe. Squeeze it as tight as you can and stretch the leg out. Nice from hips check. Your hipbones are steady, the stomach is strong. Bend the other leg in without your bottom. Moving at all.

Very attentive to the pelvis and lower back down. Very, very good. Lower down, right cheek on the mat. Both hands behind your back for AA kicks. Excellent. Excellent work both hands behind your back, right cheek. It's good. Make sure your hands are by your waist, not your bottom. If you can. If you're flexible, your hands go higher up. That's it, Megan. Yes. Do not.

[inaudible] yes, that Sandy. One Hand holds the other very good. Now knees and feet together. Knees together. If you can press the hips into the mat. Bend your knees, kick three times. Kick Q three pull back and stretch those shoulders back to lift. Lower other side three and pull your hands back towards your knees. And for side again, kick to three and pull back and ou lift like a flower and other side.

Kick two, three and pull back and watch. Very good. First side, tick two, three and pull back and schoolies those shoulders together. And last one, tick two, three and pull back. And [inaudible]. Sharon can come down, sit back into your heels and stretch your back out again. That was lovely. Really beautiful work. Everybody.

Nice long spine. Walk your hands to the right so you stretched the whole left side of your ribs out. Walk your hands to the laugh. Very good. Come back, I just around so you're sitting facing front with your legs. Let's do neck pull. So the legs along your feet will be hip with the part and flax hands up behind your head.

Let's have the hands just not classed together, but slightly apart and lift up really, really nice and tall. It's as though you're grabbing your head and trying to lift it off your spine. Drop Your Chin and start curling in, trying to get your head come down towards your knees. So pretty rounded shape. Opening up every vertebrae in your back. Come back up to an upright position. Big, big, big lift and he need back a little bit long, long, long spine. Come back up and can curl your head in. Round your back, round your spine. Pull your stomach way, way in. Roll back up again.

Lifting up nice tall, long neck and lean back. Keep the back of the neck long and come back up. One more time. Lift. Pull the stomach in. Open up the back ribs. Try to take your nose to your belly button. That's how tight you want to get. Come back up, lift, lift, lift up those ribs.

Lean back like a long flat, strong back and come back up. Very nice. Very, very good. Roll down on your back for the bridge pose. So your feet are under your knees, your hands are by your side. Your stomach is from check that the feet and the knees are going in the same direction. Hip with the park. Now from here, Tuck your tail and lift your pelvis off the mat. Just your bottom. Your waist should still be down.

Roll ups and now you're just at the base of the ribs base of the shoulder blades and then in a long plank from your armpits to your knees and then roll the shoulder blades down the ribs down the waist, down the sacred and the tailbone. And again, tailbone rolls up. Sacred Rolls Up. Waist rolls up, roll through the ribs, shoulder blades to the armpits. Pause here and push their hands down. Stretch from your armpits to your knees. Pull the stomach in long back, and then roll down. Roll down, roll down, roll down. Very, very good.

Again, roll up, roll up, roll up. Make sure the feet are pressing down to activate your hamstrings and your buttocks. And then roll down. Roll down, roll down. Very good. Bring your knees in your feet together and move your feet and other injure too. Out Away from your bottom. So there you kind of a water-base Tim, try to get them even further out. Yes. Now harder to do more work in the legs, more work in the hamstrings, in the in the glutes. So start rolling up. Same exercises.

Squeeze legs together and get very firm in the hips. So see if you can roll up any way you have to work very strongly in the feet. Press up and then slowly articulate down through the spine, trying to be very even and very methodical in the roll. Check that your inner sides are working towards each other. Roll up again, rolling up, rolling up, rolling up and press down into those heels to get the hips to lift. And then roll down, roll down, roll down, roll down. One more time from hips, stomach and push down in the heels to lift up.

Try to get those knees together if you can. Excellent Tim. Good work. And then roll down. Long neck, soft sternum all the way down. Melting down like butter. Very, very good. Bend the knees into the chest. I just rock side to side, right and left just to massage the lower back a little bit. Massage the waist and then stretch your legs out. And let's have you all, um, let's have you all facing this way for sidekicks. Some of you you, you will be the left and you will be the right legs. So, and I'll be the side that doesn't have my Mike. All these things we have to think about. So starting in, you know what?

Let's start with a straight line. The arm is down. See if you can get as long a position with this underneath arm. Try to get your armpit on the floor and your ribs and literally lift your head for a minute and pull your ribs away from your hip. So you're trying to stretch the underneath side of your body as much as you can, right? Right now in this position, just lift the legs and imagine your bottom leg, lifting your top leg and lower down and keep that length in your body and lift and down bottom like pushes top, like off and down. Now Flex your feet, take your top leg and push it away from UC. Tried to touch the person and the other side of the room little higher than your hips are very long.

Now you may feel if you really push the leg out that your waist is coming off the floor right now we go this hand out again, see if you can bend up. You may or may not be able. So eventually this whole armpit and upper rib area should be on the floor, gets very tight cause the lots and the whole rib cage gets short. But you're looking to have that much so which means your bottom is shoe is longer than the top. Now lift both legs up, bring them forward, lower them down. We do the pendulum one, lifting the leg hip, high point foot is slight external rotation and swing to the front. Front, front, long to the back. Front, front, long to the back. Front, front, long to the back. Front, front, long to the back. Front, front, long to the back. Bring your legs together just for the fun of it.

Bring this hand up. Now it's not supposed to go forward or back. You have to keep your body very quiet. Front, front, back, back, so lots of control back, back, front, front, back, back, front, front, back, back. Very good. You can bring the hand down again. You both grow. You all graduated during the leg out. That was really good. Swing your leg up, flex it down. Swing it up, flex it down, swing it up, flex it down, swing it up and flex it down and it'll circles. Two, three, four, five, six, seven, reverse it in back. Two, three, four, five, six, seven, and eight. Take the leg in front. You can hold the foot, flex your inside leg and lifted way. Where can you get it any higher?

Can you get it higher? Can you get it higher and lower down? So if you notice, as you get it higher, it's almost like the weight goes towards your ribs. You're actually pushing up towards your skull and down and lift and down. Now last one, lift point and little circles up here. High two, three, four, five, six, seven. Reverse it. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Lower the legs down. And if both legs up and down and up and down and up and down and up and down.

Very good. Let's swing around to the other side. So we'll still face the same way. I'll just shift over. So you tell him you're gonna swing your legs the other way. We're doing it different today. So start out with this very long position of the arms.

You're trying to get your arm pit. Often people's armpits are tight, the shoulder joint is tight to Thomas. It's hard to get this full stretch. Very good. Eventually for the next, so very, very long. In fact, if you can take this hand that stretch out and we go with your fingers, literally try to pull more Thea, stretching the ribs even better. Right now. The other hands on the floor, your legs are in a straight line and not on a diagonal yet. Feel your bottom leg and use it to lift your top leg up to push the top leg up and down and lift too. Literally as you're doing this, notice what's happening in the pelvis and in your waist area because the muscles are contracting in order to hold this and you just want to be aware of what's happening. Both knees straight, Tim, flex your feet both knees straight. Now the top leg lifts and lowers, so as you lifted, see if you can make it longer than the bottom leg in order to lengthen it, your bottom waist will shorten slightly. Very good.

Now both makes it down. Can you just bend that arm? You may have to shorten, but your goal eventually is to, can be completely open here. Lift both legs, bring them forward and lower them down. Lift your top leg for the forward and back swing. Swing to the front, back, back. Now as you do it, try not to move in your trunk at all. So the size of the swing is relative to your body being completely controlled. One more time. Forward, forward, back, back. Bring the leg together.

Other hand comes up. Lift your leg. See if you can do the same thing without any movement. No movement in the elbow that's in the air. My teacher used to say, why are you waving goodbye at me? Not going anywhere. Back, back. One more time. Forward, forward, back, back. Very good. Bring the leg back. Bring your hand back. And now the high, high kick. So up and down and up and down and up and down and up and down and up and down.

One more time and up and down and little circles. Circle one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Reverse it in. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven and eight. Ben, your top leg in and flex your inside leg and lifted how high c you can get it higher. If you bring it a little bit more forward, you may be able to get it higher, lower down. So think a little bit more frontal and it may go a little bit further. And lift. Yes, Megan and down. Lift and point the foot. And now your circles. One, how high can you get it to you? Make that inner thigh. Wake up. Five, six, seven. Reverse it in one, two, three, four, five, six, seven and lower the leg down. Lift both legs up and up and up. And very, very good. Now roll onto your stomach and just sit back into your heels for a minute.

Just stretch yourselves out. Again, I stretch into your lower back and roll up slowly to a sitting position. So you use your powerhouse to sit up onto your heel and I just wanted to show you something. We're going to do a little stretch into the shoulders. You'll be clasping your hands behind your back. I'm just going to demonstrate, you will take the top part of your head and lay it on the map and then stretch your arms out. Now what I'm doing is I'm actually shifting my weight onto my home. In order to get a stretch, Tim, you have a towel next to you and I'd rather you hold a towel.

It's just an angle that often can allow for the shoulders to release a bit. So put your head in your Ho. Hold the tower like that, but behind your back. Yeah. So put your head on the floor, get your weight onto your head, your watch, your forehead quite close to your knees, especially Megan. And then stretch the hands away from you. So you take the hands out and when do you to let go?

Hold and hold a little bit wider. And there's your stretch. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. So you have a nice, there you go, Tim. Excellent, excellent. Excellent. Sandy called the hands normal. Yes, you could use a towel, but look how much you're opening and you're a gumby girl.

Okay, come back down. It actually is a nice place. How did that feel with the towel? Yeah, it really opened. It actually releases a joint. One other stretch I'll show you and then you'll have a go. You'll be holding your heels.

You drop your head on the mattress the way we did a minute ago. So you have a good grip on the heels. And then from here you lift your bottom up, you lift the show and actually pulling on my heels in order to stretch my spine, stretch between my shoulder blades, stretch in the lower back. So again, it's a wonderful way to get into separating all the vertebrates so your head goes down the way you did it before your bottom is up. You actually grab your heels with your hands.

Your forehead is close to your knees, so your top of your head is on the mat, not the forehead, but the crown. So Tim that now once you have that, see if you can lift your bottom up in the air and a rock forward and call with your hands on your feet to stretch between the shoulder blades. Pull the stomach up and lengthen and open the spine. And then come back up to an upright position. So it's a way to stretch and the back quite a bit. So come on to your hands and knees now and just a few cat cows.

Make sure the shoulders are right above the wrists and the knees under the hips and lift your head and push away from the floor and arch your back so you have a big opening in the spine. Then reverse some movement pressing between the shoulder blades and pulling the tail under. And again, lift your chest, pull the sternum forward, looking to get as much lift in the chest, away from the floor. And then reverse. And one more time. Lifting and arching the spine. Push the heel of the hand into the floor to get even more lift and curl way. Cross your feet, sit back into your heels and just a few, um, teaser. Would you sitting with your right leg up?

Hold onto your leg. The left knee is bent, the knees, the knees should be together. Yes, needs should be so doesn't matter if you can't hold here, you can hold here if you, you can. You just row. I'm just taking the mic out. Roll down to the floor and then roll back up if you need to. Grab your size. Do so and roll down and row up. Whoops. And one more time and roll down.

Roll Up. Good. Same sides. Yes. Change sides. So other legs up and again, roll down and roll up and roll down and roll up one more time and roll down and roll up. What happened? Cramp. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. All right. So to finish with the floor work, let's have you do seal and just come to the front of your maps.

Hands in prayer underneath your ankles. Feet low down today. No other way. Team inside. Good shoulders a damn. Clap your feet. Three times clap, clap, clap. Roll back to your shoulders and come right back up. Roll back and come up and balance here and again. Clap, clap, clap.

Tried to have the same feeling like you ate. Enrolling like about like a little China doll. Lots of control. Come back up. Trap, clap, clap. Last one, roll back and come back up. Balance, clap, clap, clap. And let's come up to a standing position. Yes. Heels together, arms above the head.

Shoulders are down. Bend the knees a minute. Narrow the hips, and then as you straighten the legs, feel the inner thighs work and roll down to the floor. Rounding the spine. Three little circles, one and two and three. Reverse it. One and two and three. Roll back up. Roll back up. Stretch the arms up, lifting reach or the fingertips.

Float the arms out nice and long. Take a deep breath in. Feel the lift up through the crown of the head and breathing out. And you all did a wonderful thank you. That was good.

Comments

That was a great workout thank you. My upper back was tense it has cracked and feels better already.
The back stretch at the beginning of this workout is absolutely amazing!! I will be doing that often as I have a really tight back.
Niedra Gabriel
So glad you both feel better from the back stretch. Awesome.
This was great, nice and gentle as I come back from shoulder injury..not to mention the humidity and heat of this summer heat wave keep me from going full out. Love your cues Niedra.
super class, great attention to connection from the start :) loved the swan dive
Niedra Gabriel
Thank you Brian and Sunni. Brian, I just looked at your bio page and saw that you are in Dublin, I am going to be teaching some Pilates workshops in Belfast August 3 - 4th. I will post the details in the forum here just in case you would like to come, I always enjoy meeting PA members LIVE.
Thank you for posting the details, workshops look great :) but I'll be @ TPC boulder when your in Ireland. But I'll be in Cali before Boulder so hopefully will get to take class with you :)
1 person likes this.
All the instructors are terrific, but Niedra does it for me. Having Niedra is worth the cost of the whole subscription, in my opinion, I'd still subscribe if all we had access to was her classes. Best workout (but I love the variety and I try them all)! Thank you!
Niedra Gabriel
WOW- JC, thank you for this incredible compliment.
I am honored to be put on such a HIGH pedestal, but what you don't know is that I have really weak ankles, so will probably stumble and fall off right away ( I see you have a zany sense of humor).
Thank you.
I agree with the man who commented that Niedra's instructions are worth the cost of the subscription! Mat Workout #1392 is my life changer. I had been doing light weight Jazzercise tapes at home for many years. At 68 years old and not having built my muscle tissue or strength very much, I was in hysterics laughing and also expressing negative frustration when I first tried the "on your side/leg work". I was rolling back and forth from side to side and my body couldn't begin to settle in a straight line.
I have been doing the same workout for close to 2 years now and cannot begin to express how it has changed the form of my body and the strength to function well in whatever I choose to do - for example rugged gardening and taking hikes up steep hills. I pray that you don't ever remove this from the queue! Thank you from the bottom of my heart Niedra!
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