Amy, this was so very helpful. Really good explanations of the how and why. It makes so much sense. This will really help me and my clients find that sense of being lifted in the wind. Love that image.

Amy, This was a great long box refresher!! Thank you as always!!

Very nice and well worth watching. I learned something today!

Very, very good tutorial! I use Balanced Body Equipment and was educated through their program. The strap length is essential to feeling connected to the springs but was overlooked in my cert training. That goes for ladder barrel length as well. I learned from a classical taught instructor to measure the strap length with the handles or hand loops over the shoulder blocks. This is still shorter than the straps in this video. Will the longer measured straps seen here work with facing back rows and rolldowns? Do you need to choke up on the straps as in pulling straps? I hope a BB teacher reads this and gives me the definitive strap measuring technique. My coworker, who is also BB certified,was taught to measure the straps with the foot loops at the shoulder blocks. We can not agree on which is correct. Thanks for sharing.

Thank you Amy. Excellent tutorial. We need to understand why to be able to access how to make our equipment work for anyone. This makes so much sense. And i love your description of being lifted by the wind or water. Key for me was to meet the resistance, not fight against or take too one to find it. The takes using the apparatus to another level.

Hi Kathy. The basic strap length is usually set at the front of the shoulder blocks - that's where the leather loop would reach - then the handle extends from there. So the leather loop for short spine is at the front of the block, and that handles are about 8" longer than that. In the old films though, sometimes the straps seem much shorter. Part of that is that fact that the frame is now sometimes nearly 2' longer than the original, making the strap 3-4'longer from carriage to pulley to handle and the engineering gets off. Hope this helps.

Oops. I forgot to answer your other question. I actually don't know what rolldowns on the Ref. are, so you'll have to ask a BB teacher. All the classical rowings (front and back) are done with the handles just as seen on this clip though.

This is an amazing tutorial Amy...Thank you from Chicago :)

Absolutely LOVE this tutorial! So enlightening and helpful! Your clear and detailed explanations and demonstrations make so obvious the impact of working with the apparatus properly. I love how the more we understand the equipment and what it is meant to do and how it is meant to support us, we can actually work with it so much better to have success in and get more out of the exercises! It can ease so much frustration when we realize that sometimes we're struggling not because our body is not capable, but because we are not setting ourselves up for success from the beginning. Thank you!!

Enlightening indeed! Thanks from Estonia!