Class #1996

Spinal and Hip Mobility

50 min - Class
213 likes
Loading...

Description

We welcome Julie Driver, winner of the 2014 Next Pilates Anytime Instructor Competition, with her first class here on Pilates Anytime! Julie places emphasis on spinal mobility, hip mobility, and stabilizing the pelvis. You'll work through preparatory exercises, Rowing Series, Rollover, Series of 5, Teaser, and more. Welcome, Julie!
What You'll Need: Mat

About This Video

Transcript

Read Full Transcript

Hi, I'm Judy driver. And today we're going to do in my class. So ladies, can I ask you to actually stay exactly where you are? We're going to start with some roll downs. So you're going to stand with your feet with the pot. We'll just go through some alignment cues before we start because the only thing you've got in touch with the floor is your feet or your feet. So I want you to look down and think of a triangle into the base of your foot.

So I've got the middle of the heel, the base of the big toe and the little toe. So if you take enough squat and you bend your knees, you should actually be, as you look down, be able to see your big toe on a portion of your second toe that tells you that your knee and hip alignment is correct. And straighten the legs. Place the heel of your hand on your left and right hip, your fingertips pointing down towards your pubic bone, which going to do a little rock backwards and forwards. So what I want you to fail is that as you press your pelvis forward, the arch in your back increases. And as you press your pelvis backwards, you lose your, your curve, your spine flattens. So what you're looking for is a point in between where you're left.

It's level with your right hip and both are level down towards your pubic bone. Okay? Then rest your hands down by your side. We have your ribs over your hips and your head over your ribs. We're going to take an in breath to prepare. As you nod your head, you're gonna Start Your roll down. So think of each bone Rowling sequentially off the one beneath it, all the way down when there's no more movement in the spine.

Allow the hips to flex on top of your thigh bone. Breathing in at the bottom, and then breathing out to roll the spine back up if you need to bend your knees. Ooh, that was my ankle cracking. We're all back up. [inaudible] good. And again, we're going to inhale to prepare. As you exhale, a head nods off the end of the spine. Think of each bone going up before it goes forwards. Breathing in at the bottom, and then as you breathe out, restock your pelvis on top of your thigh bones and then roll the rest of the spine up bottom to top.

Last thing is the head on top of the spot. We're gonna do one more like this. I'm going to make it slightly more challenging. So head nods, rolling down. [inaudible] breathing in at the Boston, Brianne, widen foot into the back of your rib cage. And as you breathe out, restate the spine. So the head is the last thing.

And this time what we're gonna do is as you breathe out, we're going to bring the arms up and allow your spine to go into extension as you reach up to the ceiling. So you end up looking up at the ceiling. We're going to breathe and bring the spine back to neutral and start to nod the head and let the arms move with the spine. So as you roll down the arms are going to move the spine and then think crown of the head to the float. The arms go up behind you. So now you're extending shoulders. The arms are going to get behind. You. Think of the crown of the head, going to the floor, fingertips to the ceiling, breathe in, and as you exhale, roll back up.

So the arms are going to move because they're attached to shoulder blade, which is attached to the rib, which is attached to the spine. So as you come back up again at the arms, reach up, breastbone to the ceiling. Take it all standing side. Sorry. Standing extension back to neutral, not the head and roll down. So take the arms behind you and really feel that sense that the more the arms can reach up to the ceiling, the more you can at the crown of the head. Go down towards the floor, roll the swine back up.

I'm going to do it in one more like this. Good. Okay. Arms reach to the ceiling. Breastbone to the ceiling as you extend and not the head and roll down. So when you come up from this one, we're just going to come back to that neutral vertical spine. I said, let the arms go behind, feel that opposition and then roll back up.

As you come back up this time, just let the arms come to your sides. And the head is the last thing to lift. We're going to take a side step to the right, so you might just need to shuffle your feet so you don't go off the edge of your mat. I'm going to take a side reach, so we're going to start with the right arm. As you inhale, you're gonna lift the right arm up and as you exhale, side bending to your left, breathing into your right rip. And as you breathe out, come back up, right arm down, left arm up.

And again, we're going to exhale, reach to the side. So no rotation, it's just a pure side bend and back up to neutral. Good switching arms. So I'm just taking a slightly wider stance for this one just because we're going to the side so you don't topple over. Last one. That's why we're going to come back up from this one. We're gonna do the same exercise, but we're going to make it a little bit more challenging. Again, we're going to add in a second spinal movement. So the arm's going to come up.

Same as before. Go into your side bend. So now your breastbone is pointing at the wall in front of you. I want you to do a quarter turn. So your breastbone is gonna turn towards your little toe. Now allow that to go into a roll down to the size you're gonna roll down to your side. As you pass through the center, your arms are going to change.

Now your left arm will come over your head into a side bend to your right and roll up the other direction. So you come back up, you float that arm down, breathe in, and again, we're going to flow that same arm back up. So you take your side bend first of all, take a quarter turn to start with. So you're looking down towards your little toe and then allow that to happen. As you go round, you change the arms in the middle of the body and you side bend to the other direction and you come up. That's it. That's it.

Oh, sorry. Let's do one more each way like that. Best for that to happen. And again, we're going to go to the side. Hey, whichever side you want, as long as you're even good. That's it. Lovely. Haley and backup. Good. Is that even? Yeah. Okay, so from here, sorry. Okay, last one kid said, we just mixing up our spinal pairings.

We did some flection extension. Now we're doing some side bending and some rotation. So what I would like to do is come stand at the end of your mats, fold your arms, smile at each other. We're going to cross one leg in front of the other. You're going to bend your knees, sit down without falling over onto your mat or headbutting each other. Good.

Yeah. Okay, so now we're going to sit and I want you to have your legs extended. We're just going to do some hip and ankle mobilization so you can take your hands behind you so that you can really lift up into a neutral spine, which is on a slight diagonal. So we're going to part the legs to hip with. What I want you to do is just point and flex your feet. So today's class, we're going to really work from the tips of your toes from the crown of your head. So we're mobilizing the ankle joint, and then we're going to just do some of the line calls. Circles in each direction. Good clicking good. And then reverse [inaudible]. I know you're going to bend your knees, bring your heels in line with your sitting bones.

Keep the hands behind you so your feet are still part of. So we're going to do an exercise called Zigzag legs. This is to really mobilize your hip joint. So from here, staying turned out. As you breathe out, we're going to straighten the legs and you're gonna turn the legs. And so you stay turned in and you draw the legs back in and you turn out and you strike. You're going to turn in and draw the legs back in.

Good. And keep going. So stay lifted off the hands. So as you're drawing the leg back in towards you, be careful not to let the pelvis go into a posterior tilt. So she pulled the like in. You almost want to think of sending your fiber forward as it you like bands. Last one. Good.

So you're going to pull in this time and you're turn in and we're going to reverse. So you gonna stay turned in a straight and turned in. Turn out and pull back in your feet. Stick into the mat. Good. So a little bit, Duh, Duh, Duh, Duh, Duh. Few more. Last Straw. Okay.

So from here, bring your boss a little bit closer to your feet. Again, we're going to check that alignment. So think of where your second toe is. There should be a line from the second time, middle of the knee to the middle of a hip, and then you're going to roll down onto your back into your semi supine position. So we're gonna do the same that we did standing up. Place the heel of her hand on the hip bone, fingertips pointing down towards your pubic bone.

We're just going to do some alignment awareness before we start moving. So if you think of your belly button is north, south, your pubic bone, we're going to do a little pelvic tilts or tilt your pelvis to north. So again, you're going to flatten the bat. You're going to lose that curve of the spines, posterior tilt of the pelvis, and then you're going to go towards south. If you've got a delicate back, just be careful of going south so you'll feel your back arch. So again, we're just playing around with this position. We're going to go north, you feel the spine flex and as you exhale we're going to go the other direction and feel the spine extend. So this time as you go towards south, I want you to stop where you feel your pubic bone is level with your hipbones. So now we're going to go east, west, or left and right.

So just start to tip the pelvis one way and feel how when you tip, it's going to move the spine. So just doing a little rotation so you're just becoming aware of where your body is in relationship to the might. You've got all this feedback coming from the mat. We're going to really utilize it. Good. And again, you're going to rest where you feel your left hip level with your right hip and both the level with you pubic. Fine. Good. Okay. So what are we going to do is we're going to bring your feet together so the hips and knees are together. You can rest your hands by your sides, but I want you to work really to make sure that you're staying in this neutral pelvis. We're going to do an exercise called the knee drop. So what I want you to do is as you exhale, you're gonna open your left leg out to the side as far as you can, but without your pelvis moving.

Okay? Then you're going to breathe in and as you exhale, you bring the leg back. So the challenge is how far can you open your leg out to the side without your pelvis moving. And box was a stability exercise if you need to. If you need a little bit more feedback to give you more awareness, what you can do is put the heel of your hand back on your hip bones. So really prioritize your spine.

The most important thing is is my pelvis moving, especially as we're gonna do some more advanced exercises later on. We need to make sure that you're aware of what is actually going on in your body. Good. Last one. So bring the legs back together. Take the hands out to the side, palms facing down. We want your hands about in line with the last rep of your rib couch.

So now we're going to allow that rotational that your, your body just wanted to do, but we weren't allowed to happen. We're going to allow it to happen. So we're going to do a rotation. So as you exhale, let your legs turn towards the window, you know, breathe in and as you exhale, bring the body back to the mat. Good. Breathe in. And as you exhale, we're going to go to the other side. Good. So really focus on the opposition in the spine here.

So you're breathing in and as you exhale, you're rotating the spine, but keep lengthening out through the crown of the head. You're gonna lift the chin, breathing in when you're there, and as you exhale, come back. So what I want you to think of as you are tight is keep the legs together. So it's a pure movement of the spine and the pelvis and the legs aren't dragging you across. So breathe in to come back. Make the rib cage the first thing that most of the rib goes back on the mat, then the middle of the spine, then the lower spine, pelvis, and then legs. Good.

And again, last one all the time. Thinking about the opposition out through the crown of the head. You're gonna lift your Chin a little Alicia. Beautiful. Here we go. Good. So now we're going to come back. Bring your hands to your sides. So we're going to do a little bit of upper body stability. So this time, as you breathe and you're gonna lift your arms up, as you exhale, I want you to take your arms behind you, but be aware of not moving the spine. So the minute you feel your lower ribs want to peel away from the Mat, you've gone too far. Breathe in to bring the arms back forward.

As they pass vertical, you're going to breathe out and put them back on the mat. Good. So as you breathe in the arms lift and as you breathe out, the arms move backwards. So your focus is what's happening in the spine. Breathe in, bring the arms back. And as I pass that vertical port, you breathe out that. Go back onto the floor. Good again. So you can link this later. We'll do our double leg stretch, all those movements where you're moving the arms and focusing on the spine as well. Good.

So last one, are we going to make it a bit more challenging this time? So this time as you bring your arms forward, so we're gonna bring the arms forward on the in breath. As I passed that vertical point, and you breathe out, you're going to nod your head and you're going to curl up, breathe and put the spine back down. Take the arms behind you, and as you exhale, you're gonna bring the arms forward, not the head curl up. Good. Stay neutral in your lower spine. Barina and the ants come up, read out the spine goes down. Good.

And again, good. Let's make it harder because it's just not quite hard enough yet. So this time we're going to breathe out. We're going to bring the arms back forward. I went to lift your heels and as you curl up, we're going to lift both legs into the air, good into a double knee fold.

Circle your hands round to behind your head to support your head. We're going to stay in this curl up as you exhale, lower the left leg to touch the floor. As you inhale, you lift, exhale to lower your right leg to touch the floor. Inhale to lift. And I would like you to keep alternating. Good. That's it. Yeah.

So make sure that the angle of the knee stays the same. It's really easy. As you lower the like to stop fishing for the floor and that knee joint angle changes. Keep the angle up the knee the same as you lower. Good. Bring the legs together. Now let's make it harder. So we're going to add some load to do this. Exercise Sucks. Squeeze the legs together and as you exhale, lower both legs. Same exercise.

We've increased the loading. Inhale to lift. Good. Kick the angle at the knee joint the same so it's not extending or bending. Good, right? Make sure you've killed it from below the ribs. Press the head back into the hands. Last one cause you all look like you would actually like to kill me right now.

Yeah. Good. So now keep the legs in the air. Rest your head down. We're going to circle the hands around, back to beside you because we're going to go for the 100 we're gonna Inhale, prepare as you exhale, curl up exactly the same as you would just wear and extend the legs. I'm gonna allow you to choose where you feel is safe for you. 100 and we're going to breathe into and go for it. Good, good. So I want your focus to be the height of your curl up.

So what tends to happen is as we get involved in our 100 the body gets lower and lower, lower. And we wonder why our necks hurt. So Marsha culpa, little bit more. Good. If you need to bend the knees in, I would rather you wait with a bent knee and a good upper body. Good. That's it. Cut up a little higher. Little higher. Yeah. Good. This is your last one. Hooray. Breathe in. Good. Still the arms. Bend your knees in. Rest your head down.

Place your feet on the floor. Straighten your legs. So think back to the moment we just did that arm exercise. We're going to with straight legs. Inhale, lift the arms. Exhale. Take the arms back. Inhale to bring the arms forward. As I pass that vertical to you're going to exhale and you're going to roll up.

Stretch out over the legs. Good. Stay in that c curve. And as you exhale, roll back. So as we're rolling back, we're extending the hips. Get the sacrum flat to the Mat, and then roll the rest of the spine down. As you breathe out the arms, go back, breathe in, bring the arms forward again. As they pass that vertical point, we not the head and we roll up. Think back of the head to the ceiling. Stay long in the spine. Breathe in. Exhale, roll back. Good. One more. So this time as you come up, this is going to be your last one because we're going to make it a little bit more interesting because it's just not challenging enough.

So we're going to bring your fingertips together as if you're hugging a big ball. He needs to bend your knees at this point. Please do. So what we're going to do, in the same way, we took a quarter rotation at the beginning when we were standing, I think of your breastbone. Take a quarter rotation. So your breastbone is just beyond your little toe. And from here, you're going to roll down, rolled across the back of your pelvis, and now you're a quarter turn to the other foot and you're gonna roll back up that side of the body and come back to neutral. If you need to bend the knees, please do so. Now we go the other direction. Quarter turn, roll down the spine, roll across the back of the pelvis and roll up the other side of the spine. Good. And again the other direction. Rolling down.

Use the opposition of the legs if you need to compart the legs as well. Good. Last time. The other way we pleased to know. Good. So hit the sacrum roll towards me and come back up that angle of the spine. Good. Okay, so now we're going to take this into rowing from the reformer work.

So now we're going to make cost. Second knuckles touch again. If you need to bend the knees to get the spine up right, please do so. So from here we're going to see curve the spine. You're going to roll back again just onto the sacrum. From here. Take your arms out wide.

Take the spine forward over the legs and reach backwards with the arms forwards with the head. And think of that moment moments ago we were standing up in the same position. Breathe out, circling around and around over your legs and roll back up to your start position. And again, we're going to row back. Second knuckles touching onto the sacrum. Take the arms out as the spine goes forward with diving the spine over the legs.

Reach your hands back. Find that opposition head to the feet, arms to the wall behind. Stay there. Do not let the spine move as you circle your arms around. Good. And it got beautiful. Roll back up. Find by virtue of just bend your knees slightly, Alicia, that set neutral. Beautiful. And again, roll back. Hit the sacrum.

Take the arms out, press back with the arms forwards with the spine. You could add arm weights to this if you wanted to add a little bit more challenge as well. Circle the arms around the spine, doesn't move, and you're going to roll back up your legs. Good. So from here, we're now going to take your left leg. We're going to do a little bit of climatory. So take your left leg is going to stretch out the back of the leg.

Bend your knee in towards you, and we're going to bend and straighten the leg three times. Now think of climate tree on the reformer. For those of you who aren't familiar, what are we going to do? Is we're going to do another roll back, but as we roll back, we're going to walk your hands down your legs. So the hands come to the back of the calf. Uh, sorry, the back of the side. We want your leg vertical to the ceiling. We're going to breathe in and as you breathe out, you're gonna nod the head, walk back up, bend the knee straight in the knee again and walk back down.

So it was, we're rolling down. We're extending the right hip, keeping the left, left hip flexed. Just the tip of the shoulders. Roll back up. Bend the knee. One more on the slag. I love that you will smiling at well, some of you smile, smiles, smile, climb a tree and buck up. Climb your tree. Keep the like vertical come on yet that you go and going forward. Beautiful. Bend the knee and then change legs. So again, on this flag when I do three just bendy straighten just to open up the back of the leg. Two, three and then roll down.

It's extending the left hip. Now keeping the right hip. Flex good, not the head. Walk back up. Keep that like vertical. If you can climb your tree and then forward bend the knee. And again, two more on this lack. Beautiful. So it's sometimes what tends to happen as we go back, we start to rotate and twist the spine. Think of rolling the spine back down a central line.

Good, lovely. And last time, bend the knee in between. Great. Lower you like we're going to go for some rollovers now. So hopefully the legs are nicely stretched and open. So we're going to inhale, bring the arms up. As you exhale, roll back onto the mat, lone the arms. As you go, bend the knees, make sure you've got the mat behind you. Some mater just slide forward a little bit. Good.

So we're going to bring the legs into the air and bring them to that vertical position. So really press the upper arm into the mat. As you exhale, we're going to take the legs over you, part the feet and roll back down. Almost think of rolling down from the back of your throat so you're not missing out any bones. The legs come together and you roll over again. Imagine you want to wipe your nose with your knees, so you want you to really bring the legs towards, usually rolled down legs together, rolling over. So again, we're looking at the opposition. Your feet are lengthening to the wall behind you. Every time you roll a bone down, you keep that sense of lengthening the feet and the spine away from each other.

We're going to keep the legs part or the narrow level with the legs pastored. If you want to, you can Dorsey flex the feet if that's too big enough. Stretch. Just keep the feet plan so pointed. Roll down, keep your left leg in the air. Lower your right leg to the floor. Good. So from here, we're going to bend the knee, slide you like down.

We're going to breathe in as you lift the arms up. And again, exhale as the arms go behind you for a roll up. Breathe and bring the arms forward, not your head and roll up to come sitting. Okay. Take hold of your ankles for running. Likable. So we're going to start holding me on calls. Make yourself into as tight of ball as you can, but think of the back of the head being pulled up to the ceiling so that you really maintain the length of the spine. So I want you to hold it here.

Look at your belly button. Keep the back of the length of the neck length at the back of the neck. I meant to say, so tuck your tailbone underneath you. What I want you to try and do is role, not just because you're throwing your weight back, but really posteriorly. Tilt your pelvis, keep posteriorly tilting the pelvis, keep going, posteriorly, tilt, keep going. And eventually you will simply roll backwards and forwards. Good. And again, roll back, um, forwards. Good.

So it shouldn't just be a weight shift, it shouldn't just be momentum. There is an actual shift of the pelvis we want you to create around the spine. You're increasing that posterior tilt. Last one. Good. And come back to assessing. So from here we've got a feet in the air.

I'd like you to take your left foot. We're going to clasp under your left ankle. We're preparing for our series of five left, right hand over your left knee. Straighten your right leg. Now reach your right foot away. As you start to roll back, we're going to go onto the sacrum through the middle of the back to the tips of the shoulder blades. Breathe in an ab readout and change likes for single leg. Stretch one and two and three and four and five and six and six.

Five look at your belly button, not the ceiling. Three, two, want legs together. Double leg stretch as we breathe in. Extend arms and legs away. Exhale, draw it all in. And I mean as we flex the shoulders, then we extend the shoulders. Good. I don't want to get told off. Last one. Good. So from here, bring the hands behind your head and we're going to straighten the legs up into the air. So as you exhale, lower your left leg to the floor for single leg lowers and switch.

So if you think back to where we were a moment ago with that climate tree when almost exact position. So all that work for climate tree is now paying off and your single leg lowers. Good. Lovely. Last ones. Bring the legs together. We missing out double leg allows cause I've got a treat for you coming up.

We're going to bend the knees and we're going to go into Chris Cross. So as you exhale we're going to do towards me first. We are going to rotate Chris Cross. Good. And then switch. Good. So really feel that you're not just pulling on your neck.

The rotation is coming from the rib cage. Moving around the spinal column. Good. Last one. Come to center. Bring your legs together, straighten your legs. So what we're gonna do now is we're going to do Chris Cross, but with a w we're going to increase the leverage. So you're going to rotate away from me and you're going to lower your right leg to the floor and then you're going to switch. And switch is crisscross, but whipping increased leverage and a little bit of footsie. That's it. One more. Each side, you just can't have it. Can you just want to, okay. Life together.

Bend the knees, rest your head down. Good. Slide your legs out along the floor. Again, we're going to take the arms behind the head for a roll up to come to sitting. Good, right? Let's take some spine stretch forward. So we're going to bend the knees if your hamstrings are getting a little, because I want you to really make sure you are in a seated good, neutral. So your spinal column is neutral and vertical. We're going to bring the arms up, not your head.

Tip the head off the end of the spine and roll forward keeping the pelvis still. Okay. And then Maria, then to roll back up. Good. So again, we're linking this back to that standing exercise. We started with the head nods off the end of the spine. You roll forward as you exhale, as you breathe in. And we're going to roll the spine. Rebuilt the Vertebra.

Head comes up last. Good Hon again. So we're gonna change it. We're gonna make it a little bit more interesting. So from here we're going to lift the arms up. If you want to, you can flex the feet. This time what we're going to do is we're going to rotate towards me.

I'm stem, and we're just going to twist the spine a little bit more. Look at your back hand as you start to rotate back to the center. Lift your arms up, rotate in the other direction. Press the arms down, look at your back hand. Inhale the arms come up, and exhale. Press down. Inhale, rotate back to the sense of the arms lift. I'm as UX. How are we going to press down?

Think of the spine going up in the middle of the arms. Breathe in the arms left. Exhale, rotate. Good. And again, and this time you're gonna rotate towards me and then he going to go away from me and I'll be your last one. Good. Come back to the center, reach the arms forward, bend the knees, take hold of the ankles for open leg rocker, which I'm not going to do because I don't want to fall. So really reached forward through the feet. Find that opposition between your hands and your foot. So from here, find a fixed point in front of you, not the other person, cause they're gonna move too. So you're going to breathe out.

We're going to roll backwards just onto the shoulder blades and then inhale up. Good. And again, so if your hamstrings are not forgiving in this exercise to exactly what Alicia has done, and bend your knees and just hold the back of the knee and start. It's absolutely fine. Good. That's it. So as you come back up, think of lifting the head of the rib cage and the rib cage off your waist and your waist of your pelvis. Last one. Good catch, Mary. I'm back up. So hold it here. Bring the legs together, open the legs, bring the legs together last time. Open them, bring the legs together, bend the knees, and you're gonna roll straight over onto your fronts. Onto your tummies.

So we're not primed as a first time we'd been prone in this lesson. So I want you to just familiarize yourself with where your body is on the mat. Your fingertips are together on the mat in front of you. Okay? So can you bring your fingertips together for me? Can you bring your fingertips together? That's it. Okay.

So this is our first extension. So what we're about to do, you're going to bring the spine up into a small extension. Then as you breathe out, lift your left hand towards your forehead. And then Lois, we're making a tiny salute motion. As you exhale. Then bring the right hand towards your forehead back down, and then burring the body back down into pro. Okay? So as you exhale, we're gonna lift into a small extension.

The lower rib cage is going to stay on the mat. We breathe in. As you exhale, lift your left hand to touch the forehead. Inhale to lower. As you exhale. Then you lift your right hand to touch the forehead and lower than the rest of the head down in between. So you get a bit of a breather. So the challenge with this exercise, I'd like to do it again, so left up until the rib cage, is that as you remove a hand, you're looking to make sure that your rib cage doesn't rotate. This is a really good, strong anti-rotation exercise.

So we're using the obliques not to rotate. We've done lots of rotation. Now we're doing anti rotation. Last set. Lovely. So rest your head down. So now you're going to take your hands from this position.

Reach them out and circle them down to your sides. So your palms are touching your trouser leg. We're going to do an exercise called dots. I want you to imagine your adult being fired out of a bow and arrow. So from here you're going to inhale to prepare. As you exhale, you're gonna lift that same amount of extension you just had reaching your hands to your feet, fought crown of the heads of the wall in front of you.

Inhale into lower. Good. And again, so you see out breath, the head lifts onto the under the spine. Then we have sequential extension from the spine downwards to the lower ribs. Just touching the mat and down.

Good. And again, so this time we're going to add in a second spinal movement. So as you exhale, come up into the same range of movement. Breathe in. Now as you exhale, reach your left hand down towards your left foot. So you can take a side bend. Inhale to come back to the center. And as you exhale, now reach your right hand down towards your right foot to side bend that way. Come to the center and head down. So we're going to go down in between. Just give yourself a breather. So what's happening in this exercise, we did the exercise with a salute to work on anti-rotation. So now here as you come up into this exercise, we're going to lift the spine again, really work on it being pure lateral flection.

Reach the left hand down so you're not getting side and creeping in. Sorry. Rotation creeping in. We want slight bend thing. That's what we're doing. And come back to the center and down. Good. Last set. Good.

So try not to rotate. So reach your hands. So turn this ripper forward as you are rich. Not quite so much. Ah, there you go. Can you feel the difference? Do you want more the other way yet brilliant and down. Okay. Bring your hands under your shoulders, part your feet a little bit wider. And let's go for a nice big Cobra.

So now allow more extension to cre pen so you can lift the head sequentially, extend the spine and allow the hip joint to open to bring you up into a nice big full cobra. Don't force it. Just allow the movement to happen and then come back down to the spine. Good. And again, so allow the elbows to rest. The head lifts onto the end of the spine and then it's sequential extension, shining the breastbone forward.

Try not to roll onto one hip and then allow the hips to extend. Good and back down again. If you think about the opposition in this movement, so the, as Alicia is coming up, she's sending her head forward and shining her breastbone forward and reaching the legs behind her. Good. Just look down a little over overworking on that beautiful and down. So often in extension we think about bringing the back of her head to the bum, to the bottom. Think about the forehead going away from your pubic bone.

So you're actually thinking about the lengthening rather than the shortening ACIC on left your breastbone away from your hips. There you go. Beautiful. And just watch the neck again, right? Last one. Press yourself back up into rest position and enjoy a little flection. After all that extension in this position, keep your bottom on your legs, but start to walk your hands on your upper body round towards the right. So with creating length between the rib and the hip and then just breathe into that room.

So again, we've got a mixing of spinal peds. We got a bit of flection and a bit of side bending and then pass around through the center. I really think of creating space between the last rib and the hip and bereave. Good. And then come back to the center.

Slowly roll the spine back up, rebuilding bottom to top. And we're going to come out onto all fours now. So four point kneeling. Make sure you have your knee under your hip and the hands under the shoulder, and that your spine is neutral even though it's on a diagonal because your arms are longer than your legs. So what we're going to do is we're going to do a little exercise. Cool.

Threading the needle. So we're going to rotate the spine. So I'm going to put the back of my right hand on the mat. I start to slide my hand to the back of my left wrist. I look where my arm is going and I allow my left elbow to bend. I think of sticking my bottom in the air as I rotate.

Okay, I'm come back out. We're going to reach your right arm up to the ceiling. So now again, we're in a rotation. You're reaching up to the ceiling and then put that hand back on the floor and we do the other sides. Put the back of your left hand on the Mat, slide your left hand behind your right wrist on. Rotate the spine. So we're getting rotation of the spine with flection of the hip breathing while you're there, and as you exhale, come out of the movement, reach that arm up into the air. And again, we've got a spine twist happening. Reach away from your hand that's on them.

I really use the opposition and put this hand back on the mat and the other side and come back it up. Reach the arms of the ceiling, press off the hand that's on the mat. Try not to lean into it. And last time in the other direction. Good backup. Lovely. So from here we're going to just turn the light back down.

It's time for some teaser. So we're going to put all of that rolling up work that we did into our teaser. So what I would like you to do is we're going to take the arms over the head exactly how we did in our roll back earlier. You're going to bring the arms forward when they pass vertical. Lift your head, look at your feet now. See your feet and allow the feet to lift at the same time as your body.

Look at your feet now as you roll down, keep your feet in line with your eyes. So the last thing is the feet and the head. Take the behind you again. You're in a Berea and as the arms come forward, as you exhale, you're not the head. You see your feet, the feet in the upper body. Lift together. Good. And then allow a donkey, your feet and your eyes working together, your feet and your eyes working together.

Hey, you all did it as I was to write songs. Last one. We're going to finish it. A teaser. Good. Yeah. Beautiful. Good. And a good. Lower the legs. Take the arms behind you and now this time you are going to roll up. So bring the arms forward and you kind of come up into a roll up.

Bring your feet back to hip width again. Check all those alignment points. Second Toe, middle of the name, mill of the hip. Bring your bottom towards your feet. And we're going to roll down. I'm going to do some bridging just to work through the spine. So make sure you've come back in as you've laid down in [inaudible] that again, your spine is neutral. If you need to place the heel of the hand on the hips.

Again, fingertips pointing to the pubic, so you are aligned from your hips to the pubic bone and the hands are resting by your sides. We're going to inhale to prepare. As you exhale, we're going to do a posterior tilt to the pelvis and then lift the spine away from the mat, bone by bone, breathing in. And then as you exhale, you're going to roll down from the back of the throat, bone by bone until you hit neutral. And again, so it's posterity. Tilt with the [inaudible]. Really work on extending the hip. So it's like the spine is moving like links of a chain. We're going to inhale and as you exhale, roll sequentially down through the spine, all the way back to neutral. So what I really want you to think about with this exercise is you do your posterior tilt, then think of the hip extension.

So it's almost at the hip joint is lifting the spine away from the Mat. Stop. Use it. Lifting your ribs from your hips there. There we go. And then roll back down. So if I was to place a necklace on the floor and lift one end of it, each link would lift as the one above it was moved. So you shouldn't see that your spine moves before the links below it have moved.

So posterior tilt. So as she starts to lift and hip extension, you're extending the hip. Send the thighs forward, keep lifting from your bum. Open those hips in. Yeah, that's better. And um, good. So you're not come back down to neutral. We're going to bring your feet slightly closer to your bottom. Good. And the same as before, but post area tilt.

So don't let the ribs lift just yet. So it's links of a chain. These ones are gonna lift, keep lifting, keep lifting, keep lifting, keep lifting that good. I'm down. So what you can try with this exercise, if you have a tendon neck, maybe not try this. When you do what we call a spine co or bridge, when you have lifted to that position, there should be no weight in the neck. If there's weights in the neck, then you are lifting a little bit too high or your movement is not quite sequential.

So when you're here you should actually be able to just lift the head away from the mat and down. That's it. If you can't, it means that the movement has not been sequential or that you're lifting too high and the weight is going into the cervical spine. The weight should be distributed between your two feet and the back of your shoulder blades. Last one. It's better that we go lifting your hips more. So do a slightly more posterior tilt. Yeah. Good. There we go on down. Last one.

Great. Okay. So finish the one you're doing and we're going to do a final roll up. Straighten the legs cause we breathe in. You're gonna take your arms behind you. Exhale. Bring the arms forward and come up to sitting. Good.

I feel like I want to join in and stand up. We're going to finish exactly how we started something. I suggest you move to the back of your mat. Otherwise you probably will bag heads. So we're going to finish with roll so we can compare and contrast how they were when we started. So come back to your standing alignment. Feet hip width apart.

So again, when you bend the knees, look down, you should be able to see the big toe and a little bit of your second toe. Second Toe, middle of the knee joint in the middle of your hip. Your hip bones are level east to west, and your pubic bone is level with your hips giving you that neutral pelvis. Ribs over hips, head over ribs. So we're going to inhale to prepare as you nod your head, we're going to roll down.

If you need to, let the knees bend Lao, the knees to bend rather than at the bottom. And as you exhale, roll back up. Good. [inaudible] not the head rolled down. So rolling the spine back up from the bottom to the top. And this next one is going to be our last one. So let's make it sensational. I'm going to breathe in and as you breathe out, you need to note your head and roll down.

Take a nice big wide breath into the back of the ribs, and as you exhale, roll back up. Take a little knee bend when you're there. Oh, good. I love it when cliques happen. Good. How you feeling? Thank you very much.

Comments

3 people like this.
Congratulations Julie - what a great class, just completed it and will be adding this to my list of favourites. Hope this class is the first of many!
Julie Driver
Thanks Annie, I'm delighted you enjoyed it!
3 people like this.
As my 2nd class with pilates anytime ,I enjoyed and love your humor and great explanation of the exercise
Julie Driver
I'm so glad you enjoyed it Birgit, thank you for the feedback!
1 person likes this.
Lovely teaching Julie. fellow Body Control teacher here who had the pleasure of meeting Kristi at the studio there a couple of summers ago. Will look out for you at next DWE! Hope you're enjoying California!
Louise T
2 people like this.
just amazing the way you explain so clearly, lovely class.
2 people like this.
Enjoyed your thoughtful and precise teaching....fab!
Julie Driver
Thank you for your feedback Jo Davenport, I look forward to seeing you at the DWE in September!
Thank you also Louise Taylor and Angela Wagner for watching the class and taking the time to post. Feedback on our teaching is so valuable.
1 person likes this.
Thx Julie Lovely class shall be using some of your moves later!
Julie Driver
Thanks Marla!
1-10 of 86

You need to be a subscriber to post a comment.

Please Log In or Create an Account to start your free trial.

Footer Pilates Anytime Logo

Move With Us

Experience Pilates. Experience life.

Let's Begin