Class #1268

Fletcher-Inspired Mat

50 min - Class
58 likes

Description

Risa Sheppard teaches a Mat workout that she used to do at Ron Fletcher's studio in the 70s. She uses percussive breathing to create a pulse in the body and to help facilitate the movements. This class will make you feel like you are dancing.

Click here to read Risa's Memories of my Early Days with Ron Fletcher.
What You'll Need: Mat

About This Video

Oct 30, 2013
(Log In to track)

Transcript

Read Full Transcript

Hello, I'm Risa shepherd and I'm here today with Candace and with Rebecca. And together we're going to do to the best of my memory of when I did a mat work back with Ron Fletcher back in the 70s in Beverly Hills, California. We had a very specific mat work and it will combine some of the stuff that Ron did and some of the stuff that we did, but basically the mat work that I personally performed as well as had been any of the other teachers as well as Ron in the in the 70s and I put it together as best I can, but it's still a wonderful workout in is one in which I do all the time. So enjoy. Okay. Um, Candice and Rebecca sit down on the mat and what you're going to do is you're going to put the soles of the feet together in what we call a diamond position. And you want to be able to, if you take your hand up like so and turn, the elbow will be in the middle of the body and the finger and the fingers just about to the ankles. It doesn't have to be exact, but you don't want to have the feet too close in or too far out.

You want a nice diamond position. Okay? From here, you look forward, you take your, you put your hands around the ankles, and I want you to think again, imagine as if the spine is going out beyond the top of the head. So the spine does not stop here at the neck, but it actually goes out beyond the top of the head. And we're going to do what we call percussive breathing, which are, is strong in Hills and strong exhales. Just follow along with me as best as you can. Don't worry about the breathing as long as you do breathe, but let the breathing facilitate the movements. And as you pulse the body, it's not a balance. It's sort of like an inward pulse from the inside out.

So what you're going to do is you're gonna place your hands here and you as you're going to air elbows are going to be pressing down gently against the knees and you're going to breathe. Inhale, two, three with little pulses, and exhale, two, three, four. Good. Inhale. That can just be very slight four. And again, you just imagine as if the spine is going out beyond the top of the head in two, three and each time you go over just a little bit more, six, seven, eight and breathe. You guys two, four an exhale. Sure, sure. Okay, now let's stop there. Focus the bar on the very bottom. Vertebraes if it's a string of pearls, slowly pressing down and start to lift it up. One vertebrae at a time. So the head is the last to come up. And here you lift the heels, a fraction of a Nan, she put your fingers by the knees, you can track the lower abdominals and you roll down to the small of the back.

And then use them, the abdominals. Lift up. Good. And exhale down. And inhale, lift. Let the heels be a little bit higher than the toes. And exhale down and inhale, lift. And when you lift the spine, going to get out, be on the top of the head, and exhale down. And inhale, lift up and exhale down. And inhale, lift up. And exhale, come all the way down to the floor. Bring the knees in, let the head down.

Bring the knees in together and these into the chest. Okay? Yeah, just, just bend the knees and of the chest and gently lift the knee. If you have somebody around the could come over and gently press this down and sort of pretend like you're on a cloud and you're just floating down the cloud. All right? So we're not pressing the knees against the anything or the back against anything, but we're literally just post focusing down on the cloud. Okay.

Extend both legs straight up in the air. And if they can't go straight up in the air. Again, do the tabletop, but flex the feedback towards your face and point. Inhale, flex X point, blacks, point, flex point, flex 0.1 more. Flex. Now open up the legs, grab the inside of the knees, hold the inside of the knees. I should say, open up the legs a little bit as much as you can. And now flex the feet Ammon. Point. Inhaled flex point.

Yeah. Yeah. And good. Now job the heels into the center of the body. Reach up if you can't reach up underneath the feet, reach at the ankles and just open the legs as wide as you can and close and the whole time keeping the stomach to the floor and inhale open and exhale back. And inhale. Open. Good.

Exhale back one more time. Inhale, open and exhale it. Okay. Place your hands underneath the thighs and just gently roll yourself up so you're in a set up position. Alright, knees. Together. We're going to do what we call the tendon stretch. If you can't hold onto your finger, to your fingers, to your toes, I get the fingers and the toes mixed up. So then the Fe, the toes, you can place your hands at the ankles, but what you want to do is extend the right leg, take it down as far as the shoulders alignment with the hand, bring the leg back into the face and then release. I know it's a little bit hard, isn't it? Try it with the ankles. Okay.

And so extend and down cause this is literally the sh the tendon stretch. Take it back in and that's when the tendon is stretched. Okay, let's try it again. Inhale and exhale. Down and back and in and right leg. Extend and down and up. Try not to move the [inaudible] torso at all. Okay, so just moving one and down and lift and release and left and down.

Am lift and release. One more time. Right and down and lift again. This is the stress, bringing that lay back into the chest and back and left and count's good on the old hamstrings, up and down. Okay. Let's take the right leg. Place it down. Take the left leg, place it over with it. If you can touch the toes, fine. If not, that's fine.

Inhale and exhale. Now as you exhale, I want you to press the knees down, pull the heels up and the shoulders back and release. Okay. Goddess, you feel like stretch behind the legs and inhale, lift the heels up. She'll toes back towards the face. Think of LinkedIn now beyond the toes. And then release. Yeah. And one more. And lift.

Press the bottoms of the DCE to the floor. Good and release. Point. The toes. Yeah. Yeah. And start to come up one vertebrae at a time. How does the last come up? Coming into the diamond position again, come all the way down to the small of the back.

Free the feet in a little bit more towards the middle. Keep the hands by the feet. Lift the feet up to eye-level. Extend the leg in and down. So just lift the feet. Extend and, and down. Lift the feet. Extend and, and down.

With the feet. Extend. And now we're going to add something with the feet. Extend open the legs. Close. Bend and down. Lift the legs. Extend open. Close. Bend and down. Lift. Extend. Open. Close.

Band lasts one and up. Extend open. Close Ben and down. Okay. Hands under the thighs and sit up. Okay. Arms up and reach out again. And lengthen. Two, three, and stretch. Think the GAM. The spine goes out beyond the top of the head and in little pulses.

So each time you stretch further, over six, seven presses smaller back down, lift up, take the arms up, turn, place it behind you. Tilt the pelvis and the lift the buttocks up as high as you can. Drop the head. Don't drop it to the shoulders. Drop the buttocks back to the hands. And really so you really open up the chest and release. Okay, fun, huh. Okay, let's try it again. Now remember to tilt the pelvis, lift it up, lift up the buttocks. Up aside, you can chest high facing the ceiling.

And now drop the buttocks back to the hands and release. So when you drop that buttocks back in the hands, you're opening up that chest so you can make it as much of an extension in the back as you can. All right, so then again, you tilt the pelvis and lifted up and rock the buttocks back to the hands and release. Circle the arms up and reach over at yen length. Any beyond, each time you do little pulses, you come forward a little bit more. Six and eight. Press a small the back down. Lift up, take the hands on the side.

Okay, now let's turn and face the front of the room. Turn. Take the elbow to the center of the body, the fingers to the heels and lift up and turn and inhale. Exhale, lift and turn. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Inhale down, up, sh and back. Lit and turn.

Lift in turn, lift and turn. Lift. Okay good. And come on down again all the way down. And this time what I want you to do is take the right knee into the chest. All right, if you want to bend the opposite leg, you can, but anything, so you keep those two hips nice and stable and place your hand underneath the thigh and from the buttocks.

Because remember the lengthening doesn't come from the knee. It comes from the center and under the buttocks. Extend the leg and think of the energy of the foot going out beyond the ceiling and back down and inhale, extend and release and inhale, extend and release and inhale, extend and release. And inhale, keep it there. Flex the foot. Point, flex point, flex and point. And here we always like to do maybe a little circle with the foot. One, two, three, four. And I just want to circle the ankle. Rebecca, two, three and four. No, that's okay. It's just that you wouldn't be surprised that you will be surprised how stiff the ankles can get. Okay, so now we really sufficiently stretch this a little bit. It's again, keep the opposite leg slightly bent or full depending on if you can keep the back down and this hip square. And we're going to do one leg circles.

You know them where you cross, they get licensed. Strong. We inhale, but then we exhale with the leg comes straight up. So let's inhale round and inhale and three. Good. Inhale and hold. Inhale and for whole inhale and make sure you hold and breathe. Inhale and one more open and hold.

Alright, let's reverse and open all the way around and hold open round two, open round three, open round four, open round five, open round and six. Now slowly lower the leg down and extend out from the buttocks. I want that leg to really longer than the opposite. Okay, let's take the left leg when the knee into the chest first and now from, put your hand under the thigh, Rebecca, and extend the leg from under the buttocks. Point the toe beyond the ceiling and down. And inhale, extend and exhale down. And inhale, extend and exhale down and inhale, extend and back. And to more extend and back. Keep the spine along the floor.

Keep it there. Flex the foot and point. Flex point, flex point, breathe. Inhale. Now circle the foot. One, two, three, four. Reverse it. One, two, three, four. Place the hands down. We're going to do one leg circles, cross the body round and then a whole make it nice and sharp too. And hole three and hold for and hold five and hold six. You're, you're doing fun. I just want sharp six. I'm an hold.

Okay, let's reverse open and one open and two. Oh and three and breathe. It's just helpful and it looks a lot for open and five open and six. Good. And lower the legs straight down. Okay, great. Bring the knees and again, take the knees to the side, the head to the left as you needs to go to the right and feel a nice stretch between the rib cage and the pelvis. It's not so important that you get the knees down, but that you really stretch and make that there.

And now slowly bring the knees in and switch to the other side. Good. Your head will go to the right and your knees will go to the left. And if you don't have anybody to give you the stress, literally think that there's a couple of hands separating. You know, I use very scientific terms and one of them is de clumping. Cause as we get older we tend to clump into ourselves. So I talk about the needs to D clump all the time to keep, again, as much space between the rib cage and the pelvis as possible to make us look as thinner as possible and tall. Even if we're not okay, bring the knees in and place the feet down to the arms. Straight up.

Inhale and exhale. Come up. Place the hands on the thighs. Now what I want you to do is inhale and exhale. Lift the hands up to the top of the knees and then back to the shoulders and two and back and three back for like your irony and your thighs. Five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10 last to 11 one more and 12 keep the hands there. Extend the right leg, take it straight down. Lift and bring it in.

Let's lift the heels. Extend, drop, lift and en. Extend. Use the air is resistance. Lift in and left down. Lift and both leg. Right leg, I should say down again and press extend. Drop. Okay, let's try to extend both legs. One a straight out and in.

I'm sorry. I mean extend this way and down. Extend two and am and three and down am 4:00 AM down and five and down and six and down and sit all the way back. Circle the arms. One, two, feel the top of the shoulders along the floor and reverse. One, two, three, and four please. The hands behind the head. Cradle, the thought, the deck. Open up the feet. Now what you're going to do is you're going to feel the small, the bath on the floor. You're going to keep it there as you just simply lift the chest up a hold it and then come back down. So you want to just keep a nice openness on the chest.

So inhale and exhale. Lift up, hold and then back down and to hold and back down. And three, hold and back. Down and four, hold and back down and five hold down and six hold down and seven hole down. Eight hold down. Nine, hold down. 10 hold two more. And 11 hold and 12 hold two. Thinks she end up a little bit more. Elbows open. Six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12 and release back down. All right, hands down by the side.

We're going to do a pelvic depress. Tilt the pelvis, lifted up one vertebrae at a time and slowly roll down one vertebrae at a time. Make sure you don't put it into the shoulders and tilted up. Inhale and exhale. Roll down and inhale, uh, and exhale. Roll down a. Bring the heels a little bit closer into the butt. Both of you and what I'd like you to do is tilt the pelvis, lifts up and keeping the buttocks where it is. Lift the heels, drop the heels without dropping the butt, okay, and lift.

Also with that raise into your toes there and lift down for five. Make sure you lift up between the big toe and the second toe. So don't go into the outset five, six, seven, eight T and puts it. Put it down this slowly. Roll it down, one vertebrae at a time. Okay, let's bring the right man left me in extending the Lake up in the tabletop. Arms forward. We inhale. We'll start with the just the beginning of the nominals inhale, and as you lower the arms, imagine that as the stomach, this lowering the arms and where the, extend those arms as far out as you can and then use the air's resistance as you lift up and reach out and lift up.

You don't raise your head quite yet and down. Miss makes sure that you're using the air as resistance. This is a good way to S if you're a beginner, to start as a beginner, to really understand that the work is all coming from the center. Now lift the upper body, reach right and back down and two and back down and three and back down on the fifth one. We're going to begin the abdominals four and back down, and now extend the legs if you can or keep them where they are and go. One, two, three, four shots in two, three, four. Make sure the stomach is flat, is not out.

If it is, make sure that the toes are facing the ceiling because I'd rather you have nice, flat abs and poofy abs. No poofy abs and plots in two, three, four. Yeah. Two, three, four. Yeah. Two, three, four.

[inaudible]. Two, three, four. Yeah. Two, three, four. Good. And release and head down. Okay.

Now let's turn around and be on our knees and pray for the Vietnamese. Okay. What I want you to do is stand up, place the hands behind the head, elbows open, and I want you to sit back down again. [inaudible] who's a to sit on your right hip over. Keep the elbows over and then lift straight up. So what you're gonna do. Yeah. Maybe your feet could be out a little bit more. There you go.

And then just go over straight up. So be on your hip. Yes. Over up. Keep the elbows open over, straight up, over, up, over up. Use that waist. Inhale. Exhale. It's a bit like the mermaid. Just a little bit different. Up. Inhale. Inhale. Was it bothering your knees too much? I'm just cramping. You haven't moved. Okay. This, yeah, just do the best you can.

Just do the best you can. I know. See what happens. You got to move it or lose it. Right? Okay. All right, so you're over. Now I want you to come down and go over to the other side. In other words, drop your head down and just move over to the other side and to keep yourself open and over and straight up. It's okay. Two, three. Does the universe telling you you work out more? Five, six, seven. Up. Eight. Two more. Nine. One more.

10 or reach out with the arms to keep the arms by the ears come up and start to go over, sit on the other hip. But you don't, you lift up and reach up, reach up, stay looking forward, reach up so you stay forward. You're just gonna like sit on the side, but you decide not to turn up. Now as you go over to the one side, I want you to lift your right knee a little bit. So when you come up you just use one knee to lift up. So it just works that opposite leg a little bit more. Uh Oh over and over and start to sit on, turn towards the knee, extend and drop. One, two, three. Now bring it back in. Turn and lift.

I know it's a little fancy. I couldn't help myself. I mean there was, what we used to do is look at, I tell you, and over and turn, extend and drop. One, two, three and in and up. Can you do it again and turn extend from the leg and drop one, two, three and bring it back in and lift up and turn the other way over. Extend into it and drop one, two, three and turn and lift. Come on up and circle. One, two, three, four. Reverse it. One, two.

Now what we used to do for arms, I haven't seen this too much lately and I also haven't done it lately, but I think I'm going to get back to it again, is extending those fingers out as far as you can. So the sort of thing Ron couldn't stand and I can't stand either. There's the see these fishy hands, dead fish hands, the library. Okay. But you know the dead ones are just no, but anyway, so, so really extend, almost like you're trying to reach something right beyond. Alright. And we're going to do a little arms circles. We're going to come one, two, three for sure. We're going to deal with the breathing. I'll make it a little bit bigger. Two, three, four, five, a little bigger. Two, three, four, five and yeah, reverse one, two, three, four, five. And [inaudible] a little smaller to keep going the same way.

Sure. And even little small book. Really small, right? Okay. And Dan, let's take the right arm behind you and reach two, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10. Okay. Now keep the elbow, but as far back as you can, drop the hand. Feel a stretch in the tricep, the hip, knee, Highland arm. Extend one drop to try to keep the elbow facing up. Three. In other words, don't let the arm go out your bad shoulder. Okay, that's all right. Don't force it.

Just go from where you are and just make sure you extend from the tricep. Eight keep shoulder down nine and you just don't want a wobbly arm. All right. Put it one place and then keep it there. Let's do the other side and drop them. Sorry. First we do this one right? Or did we already do this? Three no. Five, six, seven, eight and one, two, three, four and [inaudible]. Shh, shh. Shh.

Okay. Keep the elbow there. Drop the hand down and extend one. If you wanna take the opposite hand and place it right here to two and three and use the air as resistance. Pretend like you're wearing a hat. We're using a hundred pound weight, but I want you to use the resistance within your own body to more nine one more and town. Okay? And Ooh, all right, so we're on our knees and our, we're going to go into what we call a fourth physician, I think is a fourth visit. Uh, if you want, do you want to mere me? Why don't you do the other side? [inaudible] all right. Try to keep this foot in a direct line, but with the middle of your body and lift the heel up a little bit higher.

One hand. It's almost like there's an arc here. Okay, so you don't want to be laying back or forward. Can you open up your knee a little bit more out to the side? If not, yeah. Okay. Can you raise your heel a little bit more? Can you take this arm up and we're going to link the knower to four and stretch six, seven and eight. Now you're ready. You're going to turn into it.

You're going to swoop the Le arm around. You're gonna lift this arm up. Look at the Palm of the hand. Lift the hip flexor and the up, and then take it down and front and turn and lift and front and open and three and lift and front and open and for and Lyft and front and open and five and lift and front and [inaudible]. Open. One more. Six and lift and front and open. Good. All right, come on down on the knee.

Place the hand under the foot. I mean not going under the thigh. I'll get the names of the butter at again from under the buttocks. And don't slump yourself. Keep it up. Extend the leg. One, two, three, four. Okay, so keep the knee also as close. I don't, don't extend the knee like here and here. Wherever you place the knee, keep the knee there and make sure it stays there. When you extend it, take the hand up to touch the foot and you're going to cross his leg over and lift straight up. Cross to cross, three cross four, five, six. Now cross it overs, extend the leg back behind you. Then when it gets behind you, bend the knee, take the hand as if you want to touch the hand and the foot. Say, I love you. I need you. Oh dear. A six, seven and eight. Okay. We should feel a nice stretch in the waist as well.

All right, let's do it again. Let's do it and under extend and let's reach up and hold. We're going to extend and we're going to do it on four. One, two, straight up, three, four and down. Swing around and reach. One, two, three, four. Okay, come on back again. Hand under and extend and reach up on two and cross one, two and down and around. And one, two. Okay. Last one.

And on one and cross up, down, around reach and up. Come on. Up and over the other way. Stretch. Stay open. Ah, [inaudible] and lift out of the waist, but the arms up. Turn into the foot and reach out.

Reach out and touch someone. Keep the knee pressed in the knee, facing up and against like you're trying to link on the top of the head beyond the toes. Again, a energy. We're all six feet five. Okay. And lift up front. All right, let's take the leg around. Do a little hip stretch. One, two. So as you hold the knee into the chest, the hip comes up, but you keep holding that into your chest as you drop the hip down lift. Cause if you just lower and lift the hip, it doesn't do anything. You'd want to lift the hip, drop, lift, drop, lift, drop, lift, oof, drop.

And then come forward and stretch forward again. They in the spine going way out beyond the top of the head. Six, seven and eight. Oh okay. And now here [inaudible] turn. Now we have to do the other.

I know it is a lot to remember and I will tell you I, I remember words of wisdom from Ron. One of the things I'll never forget. He said, when you do a mat, be careful to not get too carried away on one side because you are going to have to remember what you did on the other side. These are the pearls of wisdom that's still come to me. Okay, so, but luckily I can still remember some things. Okay, let's, so we're facing forward. The heel is a little bit higher than the Cho that just keeps the leg also in more active motions that have just plop in. Their arms are out, shoulders down, stretch over to the side note, have it in front of the body, behind his reach and lengthen each time you're trying to link than from the waist as far as you can turn and down around and then lift. Think of looking at the Palm and turn and front and turn and up and turn and front and turn and up and turn and front and turn and up and turn and front one more and turn up and turn on front with the arm up. Place it down hand here.

No get a number not to slump into the shoulder, but keep the chest, I mean the, the rib cage is high as you can without flaring out. Pull it in hand under and extend. Let's just stretch it a couple times. Two and three. Flex. Okay. Reach the hand up. Extend the finger up towards the foot and cross lift cross too.

Don't sickle the foot. Keep the, keep it like as an extension from the leg for two more. Five. One more six. Now swing the leg written. Oh sweet. Like press it back and touch. One, two, three, four. Keep the shoulders down. Six. Okay. Bring the knee into the chest again. Extend the leg, reach up at the ankle release.

We'll do it on four and go one. Keep going. Two, three, four. Good. And take the leg down. Really stretch it around. One, two, three, four. Good. And bring the knee back in hand under the thigh. Extend on to one. I'm sorry. You're right. I was wrong. And cross one, two and down and swoop around. Reach one, two and in extend up, we're going to do it on one cross. Lift. Cross. Really stretch that leg back, back and and up. Okay.

And then we come up and we stretch the other way. Lengthen to keep that left hip down. Five, six, seven, eight and lift up. Arm up and turn and reach out to the foot to seven and eight. Okay. And front and lift. And let's just do that. Nice hip stretch around, say lifted nice and tall one. So again, as you keep holding the knee into the chest, that's when you lower and lift leg six, seven, eight, nine and 10 and knee down and stretch forward. One, two, seven and eight. Okay, let's lay on our side.

Why don't we both face towards the outside? Okay. Ankle over ankle. If you wanna take the feet forward a little bit more, we're going to do egg circles, not the foot. And you want the top leg extended a little bit beyond the bottom leg. If you can extend the hand, that's fine or place it behind you or place it down by your center is fine. Now press up one and think almost lifting with the heel, not the toe.

Three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11. Okay. 12. Now point and place the foot right behind you. You guys go, I'm going to keep instructing you. Good. Lift up. One, two. That's it. Three. So keep the rib cage high. Four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10 less to 11 one more and 12 now you're going to turn over into the prayer position, but you're going to keep the foot behind you in the chest. Tie and live from the buttocks. One, two, three. Good. Four, five, six. Not as I'm breathing for you. It's okay as long as someone brings for you. It's okay. Tan, nobody. Breeze is not good.

And 12 okay, come front. And we're going to do little egg circles over the Yankel. One, two, three, four, five and six. Reverse one, two, three, four, five and six. All right, and now we're going to lift this up and lift the bottom leg up. One, two, three, four. And if you can take the arm out, six, seven, eight, nine, 11 and 12 and now just over to the other side, see how it all works into, but that's good. Again, think of it. This is the dance. Okay. Lengthen this leg above beyond the bottom leg and lift one to keep going for five, six years. The errors resistance eight.

So is very important. 10 less to one more and 12. Now put the foot behind the bottom. Yes. And let's lift straight up. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10 less two and 12. Good. Now turn over all into the prayer position, but keep the leg touching on the floor. [inaudible] yeah, so it's slightly crossed. You're going to be using your buttocks a little bit more. Lift. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11 and 12 good. Come front and little eggs.

Circles. We say egg circles. We don't want them totally rounded until this small. The think of big egg, big ostrich. Jake. Four five, six, eight, nine, tan. Really point those feet and 12 reverse one cause you just want all parts of the body engaged for five, six, seven. If you need those shoes to do it though. 10 11 and 12 the bottom leg and lifts up.

One, two, three, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11 and 12 okay. On your keep down. Yes. Okay. And let's do in mice, Cobra up. And when I say Cobra, pull the belly down. Think of your upper back as lifts you and up the arms and back down. And go ahead and lift the legs and down and Cobra.

Lift the upper body. Good. And slowly down and lift the legs and down. One more time and lift and down and lift the legs. Okay, let's take the hands back a little bit towards the chest. Come up into a tabletop or all fours and I want put your knees on the floor.

The knees are up under the hips and I want you to round the back. Round the back. Keep the shoulders down and straightened. Think of just the spine. Yours, you just spine is flexible. So all we want to do is stretch that spine. Straighten and round.

Straighten and extend. Straighten, round, straighten. Extend, straighten, round, straighten. Extend, straighten, round, straighten. Extend to more. Straighten round, straighten. Extend. Last one, straighten round, straighten X. Stand. Okay. Straightened and set all the way up on your knees. Take the arms forward and I want you to sort of lean back and you can face me if you want or if you say face each other and then front and back and forward and breathe back and forward. Now let's go back a little bit. Take the right arm up and place it behind you.

If you can place it on the heel, that's great and looked it up and front left. Place it behind you on the heel, up and front right arm, up and back. Lift and front and left. Arm up and back. Lift that you feel comfortable. If we do both arms, we lift up and grab a hold of the ankles and stretch that body forward and then ramp. Contract it and stretch it forward and contract it.

That's okay. Stretch it forward. Up and down. All right. How's everybody doing? Okay, let's, um, there's so much more to do. Can we go for another hour? No. Okay. Let's, um, sit facing each other with the feet together. Let's do a couple more things. This one is very simple. You bring the knee into the chest, extend the leg and bring it back down.

Bring the knee extend and down. So be sure you bring the knee into the chest. Extend and down. One more time. Bring the knee, extend the hold it there, release the hands, drop the leg three times. One, two, good three and bring it back in. All right, that was good. And now let's do the other leg in extend and release. So again, you bring the knee into the chest, extend for the leg release, bring the knee en, extend and release.

Bring the knee N, extend and release and hold it there. We leased the hands. Lower one, two and three. Bring it in opposite leg. We're going to do twice one and two and and extend and drop one, two and an opposite leg in extend and two and drop one, two. And in last one, bring it in. Extend, drop, lift, bring it in. Other leg, extend, drop, lift, bring it in and flow. The seven and eight. Okay, let's take the F, the feet out. If the arms straight up and back. We're going to do another pelvic press.

Lift the buttocks up, dropped the light, lift the right leg bend, turn in, up and down. Left Ben. Turn in, up and down, and then dropped the buttocks. Making that same March that we did earlier. Okay, can you try it? Good. Shield the pelvis, lift it up and right leg lifts up. Bend the knee, twist back, extend and down.

Other leg lift, bend, twist, turn, extend, and then drop the buttocks back to the hands. Really extend on the back. Open up the chest. Forward. Okay, stretch forward. Let's do it. Just one more time. Press a smaller back down. Lift up, lift the right leg up. Ban the knee, twist back. Extend down and left leg up. Band. Twist the leg and up and down. Okay, and sit open up the legs. We're just going to do one nice saw. Stretch arms out to the side. Flex the feet.

We're going to do the way I did it many moons ago. We're going to turn one. We're going to use the percussive breath for and no, we would take this little finger saw off little stretch, but we're doing soft. A little chill, but we're doing with the ProQuest of [inaudible]. Yeah. Inhale, exhale and the other way in two, three, four and then and reach two, three, four and [inaudible] and up. Inhale. Exhale. One more time. Do you, so I keep the feet flex. Turn one to keep it sharp. Four and [inaudible].

Okay. Sh little fingers. Saws of the little toe, three, four and [inaudible]. [inaudible] and up. And one more time to the opposite side one. Really keep those arms straight. Just move from the waist and from the rib cage bought six, seven, eight and reach two three, four an reach six, seven and eight maybe this side we did pose. I don't think you would.

I did. I miss the side on that side. We're good. Okay. Then where are you doing? Oh, we're even all right. We did it. Okay, cool. Take the legs together and as turn around again, flexing the feet and round again and straighten arch straightened round. Straighten, arch straightened round strain.

Arch straightened round. I'm going to come on the floor with you. We're just going to do little Fletcher bounces where we come back. The buttocks are on the heels. We do four little pulses or balances. One, two, three, four. Nose to the knees. They give lengthening. I want the top of the head beyond the floor and come down again and come on down baby. Bring the hands a little, little closer to the feet. Four and five, six, seven, eight nose to the knees and stretch to four an reach. Six, seven, eight. Been the neatest. Halfway.

Well up as if you're against a wall. Squeeze the head asked to come up and take a breath. Up and down. Two and down. Three and down. And thank you very much.

Okay.

Comments

I watched this class while cooking in my kitchen and now I cant wait to try it myself and share w/my studens. Thank you Risa for bringing such fun, creative and challenging moves to mat class. Gonna check out your other classes!
1 person likes this.
Loved this class. Inspired me to look back to my dance roots to bring a creative twist to my classes. Thank you!
Yes, I agree. I've never seen these movements in any Pilates class before and Risa explained them as being "old school" which I LOVED! My ONLY concern is why a level 2 class that only has 2 students performing the movements; would chose to use a student who found the movements difficult or hard to perform. This causes the instructor to have to stop, moderate and adjust that person and I'm not sure why an advanced level class couldn't pick students that are able to keep up the pace. Aside from that - this is an excellent video!
Hi Dawn, Thank you for your feedback. Level 2 for us is considered intermediate and we are always open to people needing to modify to suit their needs. It may be that we mis- labeled the class. The students in class are invited (as are you), not planted for any particular video. No matter how advanced a student is they may need to modify or have some clarification on an exercise on any given day. Everyone should check our schedule if they ever want to join us. It's fun! Michael King is teaching my class tomorrow night!
Studio at Padaro Beach
1 person likes this.
I saw many classes scheduled for filming this week when I visited your class schedule at Padaro Beach. Yeah!! Did Michael´s class happen to be filmed too? Eagerly waiting for a new offering from him. As one of the fortunate members of this forum to have actually taken classes at your studio TWICE, I can`t emphasize enough the atmosphere of acceptance and patience for students no matter what their level.
1 person likes this.
Joni ~ Thank you for your feedback. Michael has filmed a few classes this week and they should be on the site next month. I'm sure you will enjoy them.
1 person likes this.
I enjoyed this class. It was very moderate and I learned some other moves to add in my own practice. I would enjoy seeing this teacher create an advanced version with an accelerated pace.
Great basic workout! Will incorporate in my class.
I agree with Deborah Hinderstein! I would love to see Risa creating an advanced class with accelerated pace. I loved the fancy transitions and the way Risa performed the exercises, it is just in her body! Thank you!
Thank you! I would be happy to create an advance class for you all!
1-10 of 12

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