Class #142

Additional Stretching

15 min - Class
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Description

Meredith offers a short class utilizing a Foam Roller to help ease tension in several areas of the body. Using the Roller for both compression and stretching your muscles will feel open and your body loose. Beginning with the muscles in the hip, the class proceeds using the roller to address the Iliotibial Band, the gluteal muscles, the low back, the lats, the chest, and the shoulders. Add this class to one of your favorites for a comprehensive workout.
What You'll Need: Mat, Foam Roller

About This Video

Apr 15, 2010
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Transcript

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So we're just going to do a little bit of stretching on the roller. I'm, you oftentimes hear people with, you know, if you have tightness in your body, someone tells you you should go on a roller. So that's, this is how to do it. How should we start? Um, let's start with our hips, our hips and legs. So I'm on the side of your hip. You have two bones, you've got the bone, that's just, that's like the, the side hit bone. And then you've got the bone, that's your pelvis. And in between those two bones, you've got glutes. So what I'd like for you to do is get onto the roller in between those two bones. [inaudible] if you prefer to be on your elbow, that's fine.

If you want to be up on your hand, not super important, I'm going to elbow, um, and then just go heavy in it. And [inaudible] start there to just roll towards the bone. That is the, the hipbone that the ILIAC crest and then roll back towards the bone. That's more of the side of the leg bone. And then come back to the center. And then rock back into the large muscle that is your glute.

And then we'll rock forward and then go up and down. We'll go up and down and back and forth two more times. And if you find a place in, in somewhere in that movement that feels really sensitive to you, that is the place that your body needs for you to stay and put more pressure on and maybe just kind of roll a little tiny rolls on. So I'm not, I know being very clear about exactly where you should be because we're all a little different. So just kind of figuring it out, playing with it for yourself. Okay. And then this one can be quite painful. So just prepare yourself for that. Oh, we're going to go over that, hit that side. Hipbone and I'm gonna move this way so I don't roll myself off my mat. Okay.

So you would, right now you're just under that hipbone right on the side of your thigh. I like my foot to be in front, but again, there is no perfect choice. So you basically, you want that light to help you move and you want your hands to help you move and you're going to roll yourself down. So you're kind of guiding yourself out with your arms and you're rolling the roller down towards the down, the outside of the leg towards the knee, probably not right on the knee, just above it. And then go back and as you travel back, ah sorry, I hit this sweet spot.

Couldn't speak. As you travel back and forth along the leg, you can kind of biased towards the back or towards the front of the thigh and feel where you might need a little bit more energy or the roller to push in a little more. So it's like a self massage. Let me see. Well you don't hear any screaming. That's good news. It's mental screaming. I, I just thought Wendy's framed with her eyes. Oh, [inaudible] oh, okay. It's all sorts of things. You can roll with her Rolla.

We only have time for a few, but there's that. Let's roll off that were all there. That's a lot while it's happening, but should feel better once you get off. All right, so other side, just swing the roller around. Um, and then what we did was get right up onto the space between those bony landmarks in our hip and we were on our elbows and you can kind of do what you want, but we rolled back up towards the, the crest of the pelvis and then down towards, excuse me, the bone that's the side of the leg in the side of the lane and then just back. So you want to lean back into that muscle and lean a little forward into the front of the hip. And then again, I've now I'm going to stop telling you where to go and just let you kind of explore that space. Just rolling back and forth, up and down, side to side, around and around. Okay. And then just get over the hump of the, and we're rolling down the side of the it band. So it's pressing into the connective tissue.

They're using your hands as much as you need to. I use my foot to push someone that's not, oh, I'm coming back. And then again you can play with going towards the front, which is generally more painful. Um, but not always. That's where, that's where all your muscles connect into connective tissue and they get really, really, they get tight there. So what you're doing by pressing into them is letting some of the tightness go away and giving them blood, which will help them with an app a little bit. That's it really hurt.

It really hurts me. You can be honest. Oh yeah. No, no, no. Exactly. It's, it should hurt. Do you know anyone? Does anyone know anyone who doesn't isn't effected by this? I haven't either. Someone told me once that if you do this everyday I won't hurt.

I don't believe him either. And I haven't been brave enough to try to be honest. You did? Huh? I wonder. I wish. Granted I'm coming down. Okay.

So the next series that we're going to do is you're going to take the roller and put it behind you, right up behind your back and you want to position again. It's slightly different for everyone, but you want to be at least on your sacral area. So, um, I hold the roller still and I just pushed with my legs to get my spine up and over the back. Oh yeah. Very civilized. Okay. So just kind of settle yourself in. You'd want to feel that big bony base of the spine that is the sacrum on the roller. And then carefully pick up one leg.

It's always a good idea to hang onto your abdominals when doing things like this. Okay. And then just let the lower shin relaxed towards the back of the thigh and just rock over to one hip. Here we are in a different part of the glute and back through center and over to the other side. So again, everyone's a little different and there's no perfect place. If you need to do a little shifting, please make this work for you. Just kind of a slowly moving across the base of the spine.

And then one more to the other side. Turn this into an bleak exercise as well. Okay. And then we're gonna come back to center and we're going to take our left ankle and cross it over the right knee and you can keep the right leg, the right shin relaxed. You can lift it up and push a little bit. That's up to you. This the pushing thing will make it the stretch bigger, so we're going over to one side. Again, I'm going to do both so it doesn't really matter which side you go to and then back through center and then over to the other side. Feel different on both sides and back to center.

Let's do that one more time, especially as you move away from the hip. That stretching, that's when the stretch should get significantly bigger. Let's hang on there for just a second and see if we can't guide that lower leg up, a little breathe and then come back when you're ready. I'm just over to the other side. Continuing to use the lower leg to guide the leg that's stretching back and then come back, uncross that ankle and just hold onto the Shin or the knee or the ankle or wherever. Makes the most sense to you. Take the leg that you've just freed up and reach it out on the diagonal and then just start to take it away from you. Eventually it's just going to hang down.

I just want you to, as it lowers down for you to get a sense of reaching away, reaching out, letting the bones in the fly actually be pulled away from the hip joint. Can rest on the floor. Continue, continue to slide away from you. I can anchor with the back of the leg to get a bigger stretch. If you're not feeling a stretch at all in the front of the leg in front of the hip, really, it sometimes helps to take the knee that you're holding onto and move it over towards the shoulder on that side. If you are feeling a stretch, that'll probably make it bigger and then when you're coming out of the stretch, you want to make sure you're not just tightening that muffled again, so soften the knee, let the leg relax, and then just kind of slowly bend it and pull it up. That leg that we just pulled up is going to cross onto the left knee. Now, whatever you did with your foot on your left leg is what you're going to probably want to do here. Let's go into a twist.

So you're going to go in one direction, rolling over onto the hip. It's always important to use the abdominals for stability, especially when twisting, and I'm not talking about crazy contraction, I'm just talking about giving some support there. So in each direction, has your knee moves off to the side, pull your belly button back in opposition. This is where we just guided the knee a little closer or that with the bottom line. We pulled up and then we came back. We went over to the other side. Okay, the Nila closer on that side and kind of Mac.

Okay. And then when you're ready, grab a hold of that leg that's closest. Hold it in. Take the leg that you've just freed up and reach it out on the diagonal and then just start as it lowers to try to pull up on the abs to give the leg or the hip some freedom to settle land where it lands. Sometimes just a slight intro, a guide or idea of internal rotation. We'll get into a bigger stretch as well. So letting the leg be heavy.

Do you want to bring your knee out to the side? That opposite one, the one you're holding onto? Go. And then when you're ready to come back, putting Jennifer to sleep, uh, bend the knee, bring it up, and then just put your hands on your roller just to let your knees rest in towards your chest. And slowly roll that roll in and actually push in down on it with your back as you're pushing it away from you. So it gives you a little bit of massage to the very lowest back in the very top of the hips. And then once you get all the way down, just ugh.

I said, just relax your legs down on the ground for a minute. Let your backstay here for a minute and settle and then to get up it's probably, let's just move the roller out from underneath you a bit and then roll to your side. Just kind of get yourself up carefully. And then the last thing that we're going to do is to position the roller so that you're lying lengthwise on it. I'm going to get on my, maybe in a minute, but I'm going to just make sure you know what I'm talking about. So why lengthwise? So put your hips at one in and your head at the other. We're just going to do a couple of shoulder stretches and then we'll be done.

So start with the arms just above the shoulders, straight up from the shoulders and then turn the palm so that they're facing your knees. Make sure that the rib cage, the whole of the rib cage, all 12 ribs are down, and then just start to float the arms up towards the ears, but feel that the shoulders stay down or heavy. So the arms are just reaching back as far as you can without arching through the rib cage. And then you just bring them back. Let's inhale and reach back, keeping the lats engaged lightly and then exhale to move them back forward. And you can again continue to engage your back. And then as you keep going, just see if maybe you can go a little further. Jen. Um, don't bend your elbows, so just go as much as you can without allowing the elbows to Ben Cause they always will take the, that'll take away this stretch. Sika go ahead. Yeah.

And then back, uh, when you get to the top again, turn your palms to face one another and then open your arms out to the sides and you, and you don't want to think about just squeezing the shoulder blades and collapsing into the roller. You want to reach out and then you want to try to take your arms beyond or feel almost the feeling of trying to sh pull the shoulders away from the roller and then push the arms back or maybe relax the arms back is a better way. And then reach out feeling the rib cage, expand as the arms expand outwards and come back. So the rule of thumb here is as the arms go out to the side, the shoulders can elevate the scapula shoulder billons you gotta keep those still in order to get the most functional stretch. When you come back, bring your arms back so they face your knees and we're going to go through both ranges of motion in one. So you're going to reach up over your head and then you're going to reach out through that side, that tee position.

And this time instead of coming across the top, she's keep reaching until you come all the way down. Your arms are next to your sides and then turn the palms over and reach the arms up again. Me just make sure that again, the, the ribcage thing's a big deal cause if we're arching through our rib cage, we're arching our back and we want to make sure go ahead and reach out to the side when you're ready. We want to make sure that the back is nice and stable to get a functional shoulder stretch. Let's do one more. Also there's a little bit of Ab work just holding yourself still on the roller.

Okay, one more to go here and it's a little different to finish the one that you're doing and then you want to go all the way back up again. This time you're going to bend your elbows and as your elbows Ben, think about doing it from your upper back. So way up like swimming, [inaudible] and then bend. And as you've been in, as you come to about 90 degrees, try to turn the elbow slightly forward of the hands and then spread and then just keep bending, bending, bending. And what I mean by spread is, let me see, what do, I mean the feeling of trying to pull the arms away from one another. Let's go again when you're ready and don't rush for me. I'm just talking you through it. So straight up, bend the elbows and this was, here's what pulling, like trying to pull the arm bones out of the shoulder sockets. As you continue to bend, continue to bend, continue to bend.

And really soon we'll just do one more. We're reaching the arms up overhead and then bending the elbow slowly. And if you find a stretch in there that feels like might need a little bit more time, take some time, time, and then when you're ready, bring your arms down towards your mat and just roll off the roller onto your back. And it's always a good idea in any position on the roller when you're done with it, to just lie on your back and let it settle for a minute. And there are a couple of stretches on the roller. Good work. That's good.

Comments

Enjoyed it - thanks.
1 person likes this.
Elaine Ferguson
I wish you could have more classes using the foam roller. Thanks for this class.
Very informative, thanks!
This class is like magic for my muscles. It hurts sooo good in my hips while I'm doing it, and then I'm so relaxed when I'm done. Thank you a thousand times.
Notme
Perfect for me, I'll be doing this everyday before my rehab excercises.
Thanks for your feedback everyone! I appreciate hearing from you.
1 person likes this.
Perfect stretching and relaxation after my spin class!
Great to hear, Kristine!
1 person likes this.
Thank you!
1 person likes this.
This is what I need right now..thank you Meredith
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