Class #532

Oppositional Mat

30 min - Class
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Description

The concept of opposition and the use of the cue of "in and up" of the powerhouse is explored throughout this class. A short intermediate workout that addresses everything to leave you feeling worked and stretched out and ready for the day.
What You'll Need: Mat

About This Video

Oct 14, 2011
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Transcript

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Oh, good morning. So excited to get a workout in today. So, um, I have always come from athletic background, no Litho Ballerina, but I feel like it after I do platas so that's great. So, um, recently Cynthia has given me a cue and I not sure if it was directly from her or I've just gotten it, but really helped. My workout lately is always been told, you know, pull your powerhouse in and up and always lengthen the legs and the opposite direction. Um, and then trying to lift your legs from the back of your legs instead of gripping in the quads and you know, and all of that business. But um, lately I've just been really concentrating on creating the most space from like this hipbone [inaudible] to like the top of my thigh. Yeah. So really kind of stretching out your hip flexors. So everything, I'm really, really pulling using my stomach to pull in and up that bone away and then really stretching your thigh away from that point. So anytime we come forward instead of collapsing or anytime you lift your leg up, really shrinking in that area. Still keeping that in, in that link to pull up the legs.

So this is going to be thinking about that and I'll use that Q a lot today. Perfect. All right, so same thing here. I'm gonna just roll up my pants and look super fancy here. All right, so we're going to start off with our Polaski sit a nice Palati stance and right here, lengthen those thighs away and pull up in that powerhouse and keep that space in length as you lower yourself down. So one foot in front of the other and pulling in and up and lowering yourself down. Great. Put your hands behind you. Lift yourself to the middle of the mat and roll out.

And then just stretch to start. We're both feeling pretty stiff today, so we'll work on a lot on stretching so it reaching, and then inhale, bring your arms up to the ceiling and exhale, bring your arms down and then just take a few breaths. Trying to relax the rib cage rib cage in with the air and emptying the lungs. Inhaling. Okay. And exhaling. Same thing, just instead of going into a pelvic tilt to get your lower back down, really trying to reach those legs long in the opposite direction and you just using your stomach to do the in and up and then let's go ahead and just bend your right knee into your chest and give it a nice hug and extending that leg up to the ceiling, putting your hands behind the leg and just giving it a stretch.

If you can get more stretch by going higher on the leg. And really thinking about that space I was talking about, are we crunching into that space or can we keep it really long through there as we're still pulling that leg towards us and then hugging the knee in and then just put the foot down so it's a bent knee and bringing the left knee so your back's like super flat and extending that leg up and just give it a nice stretch. Crawl up higher if you can. Again, I've already forgotten about crunching in there. So really keeping it nice and long as we're stretching. And then bring that knee in and keep that knee in and use your stomach to pull in and up to bring that other leg in and then lengthen your arms on the mat and feel your shoulder blades slide down away from your neck, engaging your stomach to lift your head up.

So slide and then looking at your belly length and those legs away from your powerhouse that's in and up. And let's go for the a hundred and exhale, trying to get the back of your shoulder blades down on the mat. Nice and exhale, lengthen, lengthen, lengthen those legs. Really feel the stomach pulling under your sternum because you're reaching those legs so long in the opposite direction. And now [inaudible] little quicker on the pumps. [inaudible] one more and hug your knees into your chest. And then let's sit up with bent knees and we're going to start with the roll back. We'll be bet feet together and you want to stabilize with your hips, butt length in those thigh bones away from you as you pull your navel back.

And let's see if we can get just our waistband on the mat without moving our hands. So it's a really big stretch. Take a breath and then pulling away from those thighs again, curl forward. Doing that one more time. Really allowing your lower back to open up [inaudible] we spend [inaudible] let's even get our shoulder blades, so go through the waistband [inaudible] and then with the air and exhale my back. So stiff today again. [inaudible] and now go all the way down.

[inaudible] inhale, head up the exhale, curling. Reach those legs straight. Keep those ties away and scoop in and up as we stretch and rolling back. So now we're going to do five more. Always inhaling to start excelling to finish and [inaudible] have a hard time talking while I workout. So inhale, starting, roll through each bone, emptying the lux in with the year. Really pooling long away from those thoughts. Pull away with your belly.

Yeah. One more time and we'll go into the rollover. Okay. And so press your arms down into the mat, squeeze those legs together. And think of reaching those thigh bones so long away from your stomach to go over [inaudible].

Press the balls of your feet down. Open and roll down. Really pull those thighs close. Go as low as you can. Squeeze in over. Press Open, press and rule. Keep pulling your belly away from those thighs. Sweep down last one and then we'll reverse open. Rolling down.

Alright gonna Click the heels together, but open and go over. Squeeze. Now really squeeze the light between your thighs here and down. So use your belly to pull those legs close to you. Stretch, stretch, stretch. One more. Squeeze.

Leave your right leg, stretch it towards you. And here is really hard to keep that space. That right hip always loves to come up. It's really going to even it out. So those hips are square, cross length in your shoulder blades away from you and use a stomach instead of that quad to pull the leg up to nose and quickly, five times cross around. Really reached down for that other foot up as high as you can.

Reach to summit, pulls that leg up, reversing it, stretch. Good. Three more. Lengthen that hip flexor. Don't crunch in it. Try to keep the bottom leg really long as well. And bend the knee and for stretch, lower that leg long and bend the left knee. Make sure the bottom leg is also down the middle of your body.

Make sure this hip hasn't really come up. Yeah. And arms reached by your side, pulling up with your stomach and cross around him. Really get that right shoulder with your stomach. Not with the quad to last one. Don't hide your inner thigh. Reversing. Always be able to see it.

Stomach man and up. Oh wait from that nice reaching by last one and bending it. Lengthen both legs on the Mat and who heard an exhale? Cruel it up. And we're going to lift your bottom forward and we're going to really keep this pulling back feeling. So sometimes I end hang back on my hands so that I really see that I don't have, I'm not supporting myself with my lower back.

So I feel my weight is easily here and then my legs can easily come up. And then I keep my weight back there as I scooped forward and then I watch my navel until it pulls in so much. That makes me fall back. No, I wanted you to do that. And again, let's do five more. Inhaling, always empty your lungs on the way up, but really empty your lungs. I love it. Inhale [inaudible] one more and rest your feet. Place your hands behind you. Lift your bottom back. And now the transition to the series of five is like a teaser. Okay, so a teaser, you know here and then you're rolling, pulling down away from your legs.

So one leg is going to be bent into your chest and the other one's going to be reaching away and you're still rolling down with that control. So we're going to stop when the shoulder blades hit and we'll begin our first series. The whole time we're thinking thighs, reaching out to those hip joints. Stomach in and up. Okay, so right knee and right hand on ankle, left hand on knee length in the left leg forward and have energy and then use your belly to pull away [inaudible] and here we go. Left. Right. Good. Long, right leg, long left leg. The seat's working. Doesn't lengthen your stomach's pulling in the leg all the way to your ear without crunching into that hip flexor.

Too much elbows are lifted. Try to get your shoulder blades down just a little more. Yep. So your boxes square on the Mat. We'll ask set double leg. Inhale, hold the length really low, really low and pull it all together. And with the really exhale [inaudible] hold it a count longer. Good. Last time. Bottom squeezing.

Right leg to the ceiling. Left leg forward and switched. Left I really quick here. We reach those thighs long to the ceiling. Long, long stomach in and up. Okay, last set. Both lights up, hands behind your head and re hello to [inaudible]. Okay, no, keep that. Reach in the legs and twist [inaudible] and switch. Reach longer in that right leg. Pull that left elbow back.

Switch retreats, reach pool in. In it. Make that knee come in more. One more set. Work on your stomach, pulling in and up that knee. Last one, hugging your knees. But al he up. Legs long flexed in here, in with the air. And exhale. This is really important that you do not cover up in those hips and lift up in them. Yeah, let's take another breath and exhale [inaudible] and heal the whole way up. Exhale the hallway down.

Push those heels away. Push those sides away. Rolling up shoulder blades down. Head Up. One more. Exhale Hill. Okay, and now we're going to create a, sorry to put my hands down. Um, you're going to create a lot of distance here to pull those thighs right up to your hands for the open like rocker. So we just finished and we're tall, tall, tall, and we're going to pull back and those legs will float up. Good. And here we go.

Okay. I now keep using your belly to lift taller, almost onto those sit bones and again [inaudible] and feel those legs reach a long away from you scooping in and up. And again, three more. [inaudible] nice job too. One side of my back is definitely different than the other today. And now squeeze your legs together and it's like a teaser.

You're going to roll away from your legs, legs right up to the ceiling. Reach them far from your belly to the right. Drop around, pulled to your left and center. Drop to your left, pull away. You want to massage that lower back into the mat and left. And now on this last set, we're going to lift up your seat and left and now rule up. Open those arms and lift twists. You're right and eyes on your belly. Pull it away from your thighs. You reach.

Inhale, pull up first from the belly twisting and exhale. Inhaling up twist breech. As you roll up, we'll let through the spine. Drop your shoulder blade so they're not tense. That's beautiful. When was that? Inhale, twist. Exhale.

Pinky is up to the ceiling. TRICEP is engaged. Truest. Extend forward. Pass that baby toe. Inhaling up and rest. Good. We're going to flip onto your belly, so legs together and turn onto your stomach. Place your hands underneath your shoulder blades.

And really feel that length in the front of your body and on the back. So Belize in and up long thighs. Reaching the spine is has an inch in between each vertebra and keep that space as we roll up, pulling all the way up as high as you can and to your right shoulder. Circle the head down, left and forward. Look left around. If you can go to straight arms, go for it and I'll come down. Okay, some days I can today my back's totally tight, scooping in so you don't want to go where you're going to hurt your back.

You got to work that belly left around. It's definitely shoulder blades down, trying to work, stretching your neck and are really lengthening as you come down. Come up onto your elbows. Pop on up. Still Belize in and up. Now let's really work those hamstrings in the seat. So reach those sides long and with them long.

Lift them up straight. Keep one leg the left leg reaching and pull the right one to your bottom. Squeeze twice, one, two length than the right leg. Keep it up off the mat and squeeze the left. One in twice. One, two, one more. Set like that. Lifting long, reaching away from that tight stomach.

Squeeze one to and reaching long with the right doesn't hit the mat. Reaches squeeze two now to tempo, one to one to reach, reach, reach, reach, last set and right cheek on the mat. Nice cleanse together behind your back and down. Same thing here, no Wagley bottom. We're going to lengthen you look good and we're going to three kicks going in.

One, two, three legs down, lift, lift, lift and switch. And it's lifting. Kick two, three and pulling up and switching in. Kick knees as close together as you can. And lift, lift, lift and last time it's kick, kick, kick and stretch up, up. And now we're going to pull back with our powerhouse. Round your back and sit on your heels. So a lot of times when we stretch right here, we really let that belly hang on your thighs and the tailbones to ups or really pull your tailbone back and lift the stomach away. You can still be right there, but the idea is to reach your arms away from that tight, lower back.

All right, let's go ahead and flip over for neck pull, turning on long legs and let's flex the feet. You really want to stabilize in reach long with those legs. And we're going to start with our hands by our sides. Kind of like the rollout. So we'll inch our way up. So we're going to inhale this. Always start. Exhale to finish coming up.

Lengthen those legs away, stretch forward and he'll sit up tall and now squeezing up off the seat. Go back belly and tall, long thighs and roll the rest down. One more light. Done. Hmm. [inaudible] inhale up and exhale hands behind the head. Your elbows can come close again. Come on, inhaling up. That's why I can't talk during this one. Go back tall and right up and inhale up [inaudible] and back. Try to keep your elbows wide for the last two [inaudible].

Need some kitchen and exhale. Well let's do a little jack so your arms are gonna be down by your side. Legs come up at a 90 degree angle. Okay, there. Straight up to the ceiling. Now we're going to try to lift your bottom up at a diagonal and then lengthen your legs to ceiling and come down control. So hips up, up at a diagonal, then squeeze up and come down.

Yeah, three more. Yeah, right on that. Squeeze up. Come and do. Still reaching legs away from the tight stomach. Last one. [inaudible].

Very good. Why on your left side, four or, yeah, but facing this way. Let's do sidekicks. So line yourself up completely on the back edge of your mat and your legs are long and try to pull your belly in and away from the mat so you're not letting gravity just pull down your bottom, your stomach at me and squeeze those legs up and move them forward. Great. Let's put our hands behind our head and challenge our stomach here. Excellent. Keep that elbow straight up to the ceiling. So we're going to pull your belly in and up away from that sigh, right Lanka and that is the most important thing today.

Don't hide the inner thigh and don't crunch into this hip flexor area. Here we go. Forward, pants, goop and squeeze. It's nice to feel my stomach squeeze and stretch and rich and for long fly and reach, you're reaching for all the ends of the walls. All the walls. One more. Yeah, and legs together. Really trying to keep your box square here, not letting that hip come up.

We're going to reach that leg long and push it up as high as you can and then squeeze really reaching and up and up and all right, one more. Okay, reach. Keep it working. Keep it long and five little circles. One, two or three fun. If I'm picturing my inner thigh again, so tone right now and rest that leg down, we're going to do bicycle. Lift the leg up a little bit, reach it long and take it all the way forward. Then pull that into your chest. Then keep your heel on your bottom and take the knee back to the other knee. Then keep your heel on your bottom and goes far back as you can without manipulating your box and extend again.

Forward knee, hip, right over hip as you stretch, stretched back and lengthen really long. One more pulling it up. Reach that side away from your stomach instead of crunching and extend and legs together for the reverse back. Pull that heel to your seat, pool that knee all the way forward up to your chest and extend there and reach long. Really working on keeping the space. Pull it here as you come forward. Keep your belly pulling and keep reaching that leg away and extend. One more.

Thanks. And extend and legs together. Okay, we're going to squeeze both legs up and we're going to roll onto our belly. Making a small pillow for your forehead with your hands linked in those legs away. Open the width of the mat and squeeze your inner thighs all the way together, all the way, all the way, all the way. One more like that. Open the width and squeeze from the inner thighs, your legs together.

Now double time. That temple for 21 two three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10 warranty, three high and long and belly supporting that back and great lower down. Actually we're going to lift up again, but I'm going to sneak this over here. So we're going to lift up and we're going to go the other side actually aren't we? So pull up, flip over here. Alright again, long line, elbow defeat. Good. And we're going to lift both legs up with our stomach, bring those legs forward. Great hand behind hand and pooling in and up.

Reach that leg long and we're going to kick it forward and take it back and reach and stretch should be my easier leg since it's my left or not. And if it doesn't want to obey, I'm pulling up, but should be more flexible. Pull it up and reach. I felt like I was crunching as I brought that leg up there. So really keeping the length. Let's do two more sweating now. How about you all right.

Legs together and push it up and squeeze down Belize in and up. Reach that thigh. Allow blood to get into that hip by really keeping that area reaching long and opening and two more and squeeze. Last one again, imagining that inner thigh really getting nice and tone in five little circles. One, two, three, four, reverse three, four, 5:00 AM bicycle forward knee pulls in.

Take that knee back to the other knee and back and back and back and extent and forward. Try not to hide your inner thigh as you go forward with that leg. So really reach no hiding it. Need a knee and then back and legs together for the reverse. Squeeze it back. Don't move that hip so much. Pull that heel to your seat.

Need a knee, and now when you extend, try to not hide the inner thigh and back so that you really lengthen that area. Open up the hip right here. Open it up. One more hamstrings. Obviously seat pulls your heel to your bottom. Pulls all the way forward and extends great legs together.

All right, lie onto your back. Bend the knees into your chest and we're going to shake out our legs and throw a little tantrums, hugging in the knees and ran out. Just shake them up. Great teaser time. So we're going to do teaser one, two and three. Sometimes when my back's really tight, I'll bend my knees. I roll down. But you can do it however you want. So I'll give that cue in just a second.

So like that again, really reaching the length arms are gonna reach the opposite way. We're going to lower the legs to a 45 and we're gonna come up and reach for your toes and to come down. You can slightly bend the knees, make sure you're rolling through your lumbar as you go down and up. Yeah. Or we can just keep reaching and roll, but sometimes I would just correct too much and up.

[inaudible] and rolling away. We're going to do teaser too, so hold here. Legs down and up. [inaudible] one more. And arms lift and roll away both. Sorry.

Arms and legs and everything up. [inaudible] ideally your arms and your hands and feet should touch at the same time. Should lift at the same time. One more after this. [inaudible] but stay here. Pull your knees towards you, keeping this space.

I love transitioning like this. It's not traditional and we're going to clap three times. One, two, three, roll back. We're going to do five more. Cross her legs. Stand up and we'll do some pushups. Inhale. Really exhale. You want to clap back here?

Holding that space. We're going to one more after this. I don't know what number we're on and I'm back. Let go all the way up to a standing position. UNCROSS those legs. Turn this around and we're going to turn around and face that way. All right, arms up to the ceiling. Nice. Palabra stance. Reach those arms up.

Reach those slides away from your stomach and we'll often imaginary wall and everybody watch Kristy's. Awesome pushups. Yes, I'm going to do mine on fists for my wrists and we're going to do five. Okay, great. Scraping the elbows by your side. One more and back. You're not my friend right now hauling up, not you, Christie. My mic. Stay there. All right.

Arms reaching up again. Really create that link for our last one. And with yours, you go down. [inaudible] try to resist. Swing your hips side to side as you go out. Lowering yourself into a nice straight line. I'll join you now. Okay, too. [inaudible] one more and walk back lifting always in that powerhouse.

Keep your weight on the balls of your feet as you roll up all the way up to the ceiling. Exhale with your arms up. Really exhale here. Turn the palms out. Good. And then inhale as they press down and lift in the body. I don't know. I feel better already. Nice job.

Comments

You're a great instructor!
Dear Monica,

I love your workouts so much, they move right along and still have so good instruction.
This one is a great one too, get's everything moved, thanks,
Eva
CJ
you are a wonderful instructor, and today you have a great teacher-student as well. How lucky we are to have both of you in the class. I enjoyed these 30 mins. with you. thank you very much. blanche
Great quick workout..really loved that extension in the front of the hip flexors. Felt great..thanks
Yes, Monica, you are an excellent teacher! Thank you! I really appreciate the leg lengthening with the in and up cue for the abdominals. I will come back to the class for a quick and complete workout.
This was a great quick work out! Thanks
Thank you!
My Thanksgiving, not too long, but really really good, class!
Nice combination of exercises, a good and varied workout. I teach Gyrotonic, and usually find Pilates mat classes to be stale and a bit boring. I felt you really kept this class moving, while keeping it short and sweet. Thank you!
1 person likes this.
great class. what do you mean by "don't hide your inner thighs" as a cue? I think you're cueing turnout, but I'm just not sure. Thanks.
Monica Wilson
Thanks Erin, The cue is meant to trigger the muscles needed to work in a turnout.
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