Class #1699

Challenging Mat Flow

55 min - Class
140 likes

Description

You are in for a treat with this Mat workout by Portia Page. She includes many helpful modifications that you can add to the class if you need them for Push Up, Boomerang, and other exercises. Don't let the beginning of the class fool you. This class may seem easy, but the gentle warm up is meant to prepare you for the more challenging work later in the class.
What You'll Need: Mat

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May 27, 2014
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Hi, welcome. My name is Porsche page and you are in for a real treat today as we go into an advanced math class. And with me today I have Amy havens, lovely Amy and Eric AQuESTT, e dog. Are we ready to go? Press down through the feet. Spread the toes wide heels underneath the sit bones. We begin with posture. Take a nice deep breath and lift the arms up and over. And as you exhale, allow the arms to float right back down by your sides. Good.

We're gonna do that three more times. Each time we lift up, you want to gain more length between the last rib bone and the hip bone on each side of the body and keep reaching ahead up towards the ceiling. Anchoring down through the feet. Leg Muscles are fully engaged and drawing up the kneecap. Want to feel the low back, long tail pointed down towards the ground. We're going to stay up with this one and we're just going to do a little reach right and left and right and left.

Getting a nice stretch through each side, allowing the arm to bend just a little deeper every time you been getting a little bit further into that lateral flection and we'll finish one more set. Oh yes. Excellent. Both arms lift up and with a deep exhale side down. Soften through the elbows and now drop the chin down towards the chest and then look straight up as far as you feel comfortable going back into that cervical extension. Exhale, nose points down, and then inhale. Nice big lifts. Stretch to the front side two more times, just giving you a little bit of movement through the neck, preparing us for the hard work ahead last time [inaudible] and looking straight ahead.

Feel the backside of the body law. We'll look towards the right and center and then left and center. One more time, each side and left and center, and then just lift up. This is all about releasing. Let it go. And again, twice more. Nice. Take a nice big breath in. Okay.

This time we're going to rule all the way down. Feeling that spine stretch as you reach up and over, soften your knees as you get down. Let the chest just drape right over the thighs, back of the neck long. Take a deep breath here and as you exhale, roll up. Let the arms just stay right down by the thighs and continue to roll all the way up and I'm just going to move over here. We're going to do that again. Press down through the heels as the arms lift up. Nice big inhale. Exhale, dive up and over, creating as much length as you can in that lower spine and then allowing the shoulders to lift up towards the ears as you drape over the thighs.

Take a big inhale, your left, the back of the neck, relax, and then exhale, slow. Roll up all the way, one vertebrae at a time. We're going to do that twice more so as we sweep the arms up, we press down through the feet to get that nice long stretch and then exhale up and over diving. This time maybe the legs stay a little straighter. You need to bend. Just go right ahead. Just drapes relaxed through the back of the neck and then roll up plenty. That nice rhythm with the breath. Deep inhale to anchor down and a deep exhale.

This time as we come down, we're actually going to just stay here at the bottom and take one big breath, expanding the rib cage to the sides back of the neck long and as you exhale, feel the scoop up through the belly, but stay there and then you're going to walk your hands forward and come all the way to all fourths risks. Come right underneath the shoulders, knees directly underneath the hips and position your torso in the correct position so you're nice and long without an arch and without around nice and neutral. And we'll come into some sternum drops. So drop the chest down, keep the arms straight, and then press the floor away. And as if there was a suitcase handle right between your shoulder blades, you want to feel yourself being lifted up. Give a little pressure into the fingertips. Also to take the pressure out of the wrist last time, feel the progress down into the floor, and then come back into a neutral position. And let's take our right arm underneath us and come into this nice little stretch for the back of the shoulder.

Let your ears possible come down to the mat. And then if you could just take your top arm in front of you and then press that armpit. And here we go. We'll need this for later. And then bring the hand back, hooch, yourself up, and other arm. Slide it under palm up that the shoulder ear and head all relaxed down to the floor. Once you've got yourself situated, take the front arm, reach it down, and press the armpit towards the floor. So you get that nice stretch between the shoulder blades, it along the mid and upper back with your hand back up by your face.

Push yourself up and let's go into a little cow and cat. So first a cow with an inhale, tip the tail up, soften the elbows, look up, and then exhale, draw the tail under scoop. Let the chin drop. Good. Three more times. Deep. Inhale, looking up as much as you feel comfortable. Exhale, curl, Tuck, articulate. That said, nice breath, good. Twice. Inhale, find that night, nice rhythm and then like a wave variety at an exhale. All the breath. Excellent. One more time. Draw the shoulders back, look up, exhale, curl under into that cat and then come back into a neutral position here.

Lengthen from the top of the head down through the tail, and then just bend your elbows down and back. This is like a warmup for the triceps and this is a great modification for when we do get to pushups to remember this. And I'll remind you to, we're going to do two more. Inhale and exhale. This takes the tension out of the shoulders and the risk stop right there. Excellent. So now from here we're going to lift up one foot and go into what's called tailwag. So here we have this nice activation in the back of the thigh, through the hamstring, and look towards that foot is it swings into rotation and then the other way lateral flection. And as we swing the leg out, your femur is going into internal rotation. As we swing in, it's going into external rotation. Twice more, getting that beautiful spinal mobility. Good.

And one more set. Feel the press away from the floor to keep the wrists soft. Elbows soft. Come back to neutral. Lower that foot down. Now just take that same leg out. Go for a little stretch here. Press the toes into the floor and then give a little push back.

Oh yeah. Feels good. Level the hips. And then we bring that knee back down. Lift up the other foot, keep the knee int to the floor, pressing away from the Mat. And we look towards the same side and then away. Oh yes. Now each side might feel just a little different than the other. I'm a little lopsided, so this side feels very different than my other side.

Last time here we've got one more out and then come in. Come back to a neutral position, lower the foot down and just extend that like straight out, level the pelvis, tuck the toes under and then give a little press back. Should feel really, really nice. Good. All right. Come back and just take a seat facing me. We're gonna come onto our side and make a little z position with the feet lifting up tall and straight. We get this first, a little stretch through the hips, finding that position. Ear Lobe over shoulder, over rib, over hip. And let's bring the arms out.

Draw the arm bones back into the shoulders. Lift and open. Smile through the collarbone. And then you're going to go towards the bent knee. This Shin here and reap the, reach the arm under. So yeah, and then come back up the handouts. I can't come to the floor. Lift and sweep up the hips, give a big storage and then sit back down and we come into that stretch. Oh yes, and up tall.

Hand down sweep. Big Inhale to lift. Eric and I are going to high five each other and under, sorry, I'm missing out. I'm giving you a high five Amy. Good and sweep up stretch. This is great prep work for all the really hard work that we have coming up.

So these moves, even though they might seem simple, can actually be a really good exercise and a great workout here. Nice stretch. Stop there. And now you're going to swing your feet around. We're gonna face it. You guys will face in. I'm going to sit up. We'll get the other side in just a minute.

So anchoring down through the sit bones. All of us are seated pretty tall. If you were having issues, you could just bend the knees slightly and that'll sit you right up tall on top of those sit bones. I'm going to try to reach straight through. My arms are straight through my heels. Lift up, hopefully the bottoms of my feet are clean. All right, plug the arm bones back in and we're just gonna do some keep the arms out to the side. A little bit of work here underneath the armpit where we're gonna work the feet. So windshield wiper to the left and the right back and forth.

Now you're keeping the whole leg is still as possible and feeling the work through the ankle. Lift up nice and tall and let's turn our palms up and bend the elbows just a little bit. Good. Two more times. Breathing in through the nose and out through the mouth. Good. Now we're going to circle to the left. First. A big inhale, point to the tops of the feet. Exhale, swinging around. Inhale. And I find that sometimes I like to find myself sitting back like this and I want to reposition that. I'm stacked up nice and tall.

Inner thighs squeezing together and now we're going to go the other direction for five. So inhale as we sweep around. Good adjustments there, Amy. Good doing all right there Erica. Good. And again, thigh is super still, just the ankle. Just feels really, really nice and finish up tall. Let's let the arms just come down and feel yourself seated right up tall hands, light by your sides. Now press to the ball of the foot. Keep the toes up, point the toes, pull just the toes back and flex. So like you're pointing your toes and then reach like a ballerina. Pull the balls up and flex ball of the foot point.

He'll just the toes back and flexis articulation of the bottom of the feet. It does really nice. Get you ready for a run. If you're a runner or if you just like to walk and look good when you're walking or look good in your heels last time. Good. Press through the balls, the feet. Point the toes. Pull just the toes back and flex. Nice big tall stretch here. Reach your arms out in front. Take a deep breath.

Inhale. Now exhale. Let yourself just drape right over the thighs. Oh yeah. Nice. And then rural Becca and we bring our feet to the other side. Setting up. And again, this might feel very different on each side. For me, this feels a lot different on this hip. Lift up nice and tall. Again, plug the arm bones back in and we're going to go for that nice little side stretch. So reach, come back up.

Looking forward. Hand comes to the outside. The hips sweep up. Big Stretch for the front of the hip and then sit back down. Arms come out, sweep under, or Oh yes, up tall, hand down, up sweep and take a seat. We're gonna do that twice more ladies. And Oh yes. Shoulders down nice and long through the neck. Sweeping, lift up.

Sit the hips back down and side. Bend up, hand down, and sweep and lift. Okay, and down we go. Now we're going to come into a sideline position all the way. So just slide out onto one side, extend the legs along and you're going to reach out onto that bottom arm. I'm really particular with sideline legwork that we really keep the bottom leg activated. So I want you to think about that the entire time. So anchored down through the lateral edge of that foot by flexing the foot and pinkies reaching down. Then just take your hand to your hips and see that the hips are stacked and you can even feel your belly here that it's drawing in and you can let the head rest or you can cradle hand like this or you can take it here.

Now I'm a big fan of letting my head rest here because it's a great position for the neck and then this hand in front can be used to just give you that little elevation and that work right along the side of the body and you can leave the hand here or if you want to work a little harder, the hand can go here. I'll start there. We'll see how long I stay. Hover both feet just off the ground so that even the bottom leg is lifted and now we're going to start with the top leg. So you want to feel that crease right at the hip joint and then lower and then lift and lower and as if somebody's pulling that heel down to lengthen out the side of the hip. Good. You've got seven more. We do a total of 10 on each side.

Five keep reaching through the heel. Very feel the shoulder drawback in nicely tight to the belly last time keep the foot lifted but just hovering right above the hip. Now the bottom leg is going to work and I like to hover this arm or you can certainly leave it in front for support and we're going to lift up and down lift and Lord. Now I know you're really activating that bottom leg and we've got eight and seven. Keep the length and even here underneath where you think nobody's watching, you want to keep that length there and two now lower both legs down and lift up.

10 and nine feeling again the crease right here, belly button, two lower spine, shoulders back and down. And we've got five more. Five and four. Three, two. Now you're going to lower the legs down. Anchor through the outside of the bottom leg point, the top foot lifted a little higher so you feel that levelness through the hips cause we tend to do this getting into this crunch position, so stay long especially through that bottom side and circled to the front five. Keep anchoring down through that bottom leg cause you'll want to give up a don't to [inaudible] one and other side. Feel that length all the way from the back and the front.

All the way down to the toes and the heel, two and one. Now hand comes down. We're just going to do a little tiny kick forward to kick and our sweep is to the back. As we release the arm, hand comes down, just a tiny kick forward. Crease the front of the hip, and then reach, stretch three more times. I know it's hard to keep the balance. You're doing a great job. Don't worry, Eric, I won't kick you last time.

Here we go. Forward and now whole the leg back, arm up. Yup. And now let the foot tap down behind. You should get a nice stretch to the front of the thigh there. And then we're just going to reach the arm over and if you can grab with the other arm. This just feels luscious. Really, really yummy. All right, so now from here we're going to come all the way onto our Belize. Coming into a little bit of prone work here.

We'll start with a little bit of a prep. So bring the elbows down, four arms down and the thumbs are right about shoulder height. And make room for your shoulders and chest. Point the tail down and activate along the glutes all the way down the hamstrings and point your toes to reach that energy down and away from the top of the head. As we end here, we press into the forms and lift up into a nice little extension here. And then exhale, lower down and hover the nose above the floor each time in help to lift length, top of the head through tail, tail through the heels, down three more times. Inhale. Now as we're going through this, I want you to see if you can lighten the pressure on the forearms that they're almost just slightly hovering above the floor and lower down last time.

Lift and hold here in this position. Make sure that you're nice and lengthen. Eric, I know sometimes that your back bothers you, so if you need to come down just a little bit, you can, but draw the belly into support. And now let's hover the arms as the legs lift, the arms reach. And as the elbows bend the legs lower, you got five more reach and then draw back down and in and four, feel that lift from the back of the glute fold all the way down to the heel. Good. Last two, one more time.

This time you're going to stay out there in this nice long position and we're going to do a slow swim. So take your right arm and drop it down. Lift the left arm up and then we'll take the left leg up and right leg down and then switch. Wow. Nice and controlled as if we're swimming in slow motion. Fill the back of your neck. Long. Four, three, two, one. And release this time. Elbows up.

Lift yourself up. Sit back, knees wide. Oh toes in. Let the head relax. Get that nice stretch you the lower back and it's time to come on to the other side. Make you work together side cause it really sucks if you work the same side.

All right, so again, we find that nice stack position. I like to take the hand in front here. Find the positioning so that the ribs had hips. All are in line. And then once the handcuffs here, you just feel the belly drawing. You can confirm that the hips are stacked, legs are nice and strong, contracted look down. You might need to adjust that top hip and that also will help lift the pressure off of that bottom rib and create that nice long length.

Their hand can be here in front at the hip or I'm going to try again with the arm reaching right above the hip. Both legs just hover a little bit off the floor and that top leg is going to lift and lower right here at the hip. It's creasing. You have that activation through the bottom leg and then you want to feel your posterior and interior oblique slings working even in this position. So as well as the lateral side body. We've got five more and keep this from happening.

You don't want the ribs to drop like this. Got Two more. Nice and now hold the leg. It's just barely hovering above hip level. Now we work the bottom leg lift up and lower. Oh my goodness. The inner thigh on this side is like killing me. How about you guys? Six and maybe we pre fatigued it I think and three, two. Now we meet both at the top, lower, both and lift both and lower.

And we're all trying to do a great job of pretending that we're actually standing on those feet. So they're not sickling in, they're not turning out til we've got five and four, three, two, one. The bottom leg is going to lower anchor the outside of that foot point, the top foot and circle five, four, three, two and one other direction. Keep the length in both legs and along the waist to one. Excellent hand comes in front. We're going to need it. It's just a tiny kick forward. And then a big sweep reached the arm and the hard part is to keep from rocking all the way back onto your butt cheek.

So stay balanced on the side of the hip. This is a great one for control. Last time. This time, keep the leg back, stay nice and long. Pull the shoulder blade back and down and then let the toe drop behind. So again, you feel that beautiful stretch along the top of the hip right along the side.

And then you'll take the bottom arm reach and just give a little stretch for that top arm all the way out. Cool. Now, brutal, brutal, brutal, brutal abs coming up. Come onto your back. Actually, let's come to a seated position first or work into the slowly, and I'm going to come this way. Alright, seated. Nice and tall. Your heels in line with sit bones anchoring down through the feet. Lift up, up, up, and then a little roll back. Rock back to the tailbone, lifting the sit bones and then rock back up to the sit bones and you're going to roll back. Feel the scoop. And if you can, you can start to let the fingertips go. To have the palms facing down.

Good. Twice more. Rock back, and then rock back up. Oh yeah. This time, let's stay down. Feel the scoop deep in the abdominals. Soften the elbows, turn the palms in, and we're going to inhale, open. Exhale deeper. Scoop more, more. It's just brings everything home. Let me tell you right here. Stop. Now we're going to hang on to one knee and let's rotate away. And you're gonna do three more and front and good. Keep the scoop in the lower abdominals. One more time.

Excellent. Hold on other side for you. Want to keep the shoulders away from the ears? Keep that length in the lower back. Anchor down through the heels in the feet last time. Now just roll all the way up. Uh, and now we gotta roll all the way back. Here we go. Let yourself go. Keep the knees bent. Reach up and over.

Arms come up to the ceiling. Lift the head, neck and shoulders roll. So we're going to do this. Reach forward scoop, scoop, scoop. Reach past the toes and then roll back. Stay in that nice rounded position. Roll back. Good arms reach big stretch arms up to the ceiling.

Head, neck and shoulders lift. Feel that activation. Slide the ribs to the hips. Roll Up. Now I'm going to position myself a little bit more up and we're gonna go into rolling like a ball. Lift the feet up. Find the balance. A really nice thing to do here. If you need it, a modification would be to keep the feet down. I think we're all okay here to start a great way.

Also to modify as to bring the hands underneath thighs here. We're going to go for above the shins. Take a deep breath. Inhale, exhale, roll back. Keep the head lifted and in health balance. Oh, I'm a little cricket today. Two more ladies. One more time. Stay balanced on top scoop. Find that balance. This time we'll roll back.

Draw your right knee into your chest and we're going to set up for our single leg stretch. Come into a neutral position. Knee up over the hip. Reach just over the shins. Elbows out wide. Take a deep breath in and switch the legs. Keep breathing in and then exhale and inhale and exhale and inhale. Eyes look right down in between the thighs. Exhale, last set of the inhale and exhale. Draw your knees right into the chest. Let your head rest back.

It's a brief break. Inhale again. Exhale, knees up over hips, head, neck and shoulders. Up. Eyes look between the thighs. Double leg stretch. Inhale, arms up, legs out. Exhale, circle five more lower back presses towards the floors. The legs reach out last too. Nice work. One more time. Nice draw in head back, brief break. We come right into single, straight leg stretch. Lift up, knees above hips. Head Up, eyes look between the thighs, right leg up and left like out.

Double inhale here. Double Posts and when you can, even though we're giving a little tug on the leg, let the hands go. Light chest stays open. Last set, right like up, switch and release. Draw the knees in. Ah, almost there. Double straight leg stretch. Bring your knees right up over the hips. Slide the ribs towards the hips.

Lifted head, neck and shoulders up, fingertips by the temples. A really nice way to modify is to take the hands back just a little bit and press the head back into the hands. Why not the elbows? Lift the leg straight up. I'm going to do a little counting for us. It's down for a count of two and then up for four, three, two, one down for count of two, up for four. Three, two, one. You've got three. More like this, keeping the spine in that nice position.

Legs right up over the hips and feel the stretch in the back of the legs as they left last time. And a deep exhale to lift the legs. Bend the knees, draw the knees in. Deep breath. Okay, Chris crosses next knees right above the hips. Head Up, eyes. Look between the thighs, fingertips by your temples. Bend the right knee, take the left leg out and twist towards the right knee and switch. So it's an inhale for one set. Exhale for the next inhale and exhale.

Elbows out. Wide. Inhale and exhale. One more set. Breathing in and out. Ah, Woo. Place your feet flat. Heels in line with sit bones, knees towards the ceiling. Palms. We're going to take them up so that we feel that nice openness across the chest.

Press into your feet. We're going to come up into a neutral bridge. So just lift the hips straight up, back of the neck, goes long, press into the heels, draw the belly in, and then take a deep breath. And as you exhale, just allow the spine to articulate down, rolling all the way down one vertebra at a time, feeling that stretch along the spine. Drop the tail. Inhale arms lift up over your head as you exhale. Straight bridge up, hips lift. Inhale here at the top. And as you exhale, roll down, leaving the arms above us feels so if you needed to, the arms could lift up a little bit.

If your shoulders are not quite that flexible. Otherwise, leave them the hands back and down. And this time arms come right back by your hips. We're going to articulate up this time with an exhale. Draw the belly and lift the tail all the way up at the tub. Take a nice big inhale and feel that stretch over the top of the hips, over the tops of the thighs.

And then from here we're just going to go into a little bit of a hip dip. So drop the right hip and left, and now the left and up, down and up. You got two more sets. We've got just these little, I call them winks of our hips. One more time. Each side. There we go. Take a nice deep breath again.

Send it over the tops of the thighs as you exhale, roll down. Oh yeah, we'll come back to bridging in just a moment. Right now, come to a neutral position. Take the left leg out long. Flex the toes to the ceiling and anchor down through the heel. Lift the right knee above the hip and we'll go into circles. Circling towards the left leg, four and three.

It's like a little nice stir. Feel the pressure through the hands, through the arms. Now other direction for four. You really want to stabilize through that left hip all the way down through that leg. Last two and one. Now draw the knee into the chest. Lift your head up and just feel the stretch anchor down through the left heel. Feel the stretch even along the top of that thigh, giving a little press down.

It feels really good. And now we're going to go into a deeper stretch here. Leave the legs straight. Foot flexed, pointed toe on the right. Hands down, palms up. Now we circle small across the left leg and exhale three, two more for steadying through that left tip five and now other direction out. Inhale. Exhale. Sweet.

This is tough work. I said we were already done with abs for the moment. That I guess not, Huh? And release. Draw the knee into the chest. Ow head stays down for right now. Excellent. Bring that foot down. Left knee in. Reach the right leg away.

Anchor by pressing down through that heel. Toes flexed up. Lift the head, neck and shoulders. Eyes look right down between the thighs. Make sure your pelvis is nice and level and then we go into that additional stretch by straightening the leg straight up and keeping leg up. Just let the head come down and again, palms up open through the chest. Let's bend the knee cause we started with a bent knee on the other side and we circled towards that right leg anchoring down through the hip two and one and other direction. Circle.

Shins stays level with the floor. Feel the pressure through the arms and release. All right, we're going to go straight because we've already done this stretch, so let's lift the leg up. Keep the right toes flex to the ceiling and circle at around. Inhale, anchoring down through the right hip. Twice more.

Let's feel that femur right in the hip. Socket and other direction. Back of the neck. Long ribs connected to the hips and last time. Good and let's lift up. Little stretch. Lift the other knee up. Oh, nice and tight. Feet down, knees bent, palms down.

Took a nice deep breath. We come right into a bridge. Lifting up through neutral pelvis, feeling the lift right up all the way through the tops of the thighs. Back of the legs working. Open up the chest, right knee over the hip. Straighten the leg, Po pointed toes. Flex the foot drop. Keep the hips level and lift. XLH.

N Inhale for three [inaudible], two pelvis stays. Level one, keep the leg up. Tiny little circles. Four, three, two other direction. Four, three, two, one. Bend the knee. Cross. Flex the foot open. Now with the knee turned out. Just set your hips down. Ah, and lift up left leg. Oh yes. Little stretch to relieve. Now we have to do the whole thing on the other side. Knees bent, feet flat, palms flat. Take a deep breath.

Exhale, lift the hips straight up. Back of the neck. Nice and long. Left knee lifts right up over the hip. Extend the law like long and straight. Toes. Point into the ceiling. Flex to lower and point to left. Five up, four, three too.

It's amazing how each site feels so different and small. Tiny little circles. Four, three, two, one other direction. Four, three, two, one. Wow. Bend, flex, externally, rotate. Sit the hips straight down. Feel that Nice, luscious stretch and then lift. Reach through. Oh, okay.

I know enough rest. Let's just stay here on our backs. Lift the legs straight up. Let me go into some roll over. Since we're here, make this nice and convenient. Take a deep breath. As you inhale, point the legs away. Open up the hips and an exhale. Press through the hands.

Lift up and over feeling that nice. Reach to the legs. Inhale, open and flex and an exhale slowly. One Vertebra. Time down. Keep the chest open. Legs are still apart. Inhale, reach away. Point the toes, feet together. Exhale, up and over. Scoop the ABS thighs parallel with the floor. Open and flex.

Now as if somebody was pulling your feet in the opposite direction. Let the spine roll down and then reach away pointed. Come together and exhale up and over. Open the legs. Flex the feet. Keep the chest nice and open. Now we've done three in this direction.

We're going to keep the legs apart this time. Point the toes and do three in this direction, so Xcel up and over. Scoop. Inhale, bring the legs together and flex the feet and then find that nice long stretch as we slowly rolled down. Reach the legs away. Open big. Exhale inner thighs together. Flex the feet. Roll down. Nice work. One more time.

Point the toes away and open the legs. Deep. Exhale. Keep the length through the spine as you reach inner thighs together. Flex the feet. Ooh, yeah. Ooh, intense. Ben, the niece. Ah, Roy yourselves up. Whew. Let's face on our sides again. This time we're going to come into a side hover, you know, bring the elbow underneath the shoulder, lift the chest up, and then just stack your feet like this.

This is a really great place to find your side body because this is kind of where we want to be sitting, but we're not in front of the TV and when we are at the beach, but we're not on the sand. So here we want to prop up and really feel the connection right underneath the armpit. And that connection helps us to connect with the Serratus and t. Open up the chest and feel the squeeze of the scapula behind us. And that little squeeze keeps us smiling here. Hand on the hip.

We're just going to lift up, press the hips up, feel the squeeze again behind the shoulder blade and let's come to the next level. Or you can stay here by reaching out the top leg. Feel the squeeze in the back, but open up the front, top arm. Let's let it lift up. Lift the leg. 10 and lower flexor foot. Yeah, we go eight, seven, six. Great side body work. Four three, two, one and lower. Ben. Ooh, we're just going to come up.

Grab the sides of your feet and then get that nice stretch over. Sometimes I feel after I do that, I just can't even stretch over. You're so pulled in. Oh, that was beautiful though. All right, so now that we're in this position, you were going to stay on the same side. You're going to take the foot just like this, so yep, that's it.

Hand. We'll be here. You Ready? We're going to lift up. The hips are going to pike up, so reach up both feet. Stay in contact with the floor, look underneath your armpit, and then sit back down. Hello. Three more. Lift up and then sit back down twice. More. Inhale to lift and an exhale to lower last time, but we stay up. Leave the hips up.

Now your option could be to tap that hand down or you can leave it up. Just take the leg that's already ready to lift and just lift it into the air and pulse it for 10, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one, lower. Yes. Now let the feet come like this cause we're gonna come into our nice long side bend. You might need to adjust the arm a little bit just for these. So reach out big side stretch and then come back down here. I call it a side stretch cause then it takes, it makes me feel like it's less work when it's really a whole heck of a lot of work.

And I think that was, no, this is for one more. Yeah. Ooh Yeah. Okay. Let's just stay and just come right over into a plank. And while we're here, let's do four pushups. Bend the elbows down and straight and you can come to the knees if you need to bend. Straighten one more time. Excellent. And we prepped for our side. Hover other side.

Whew. It's getting hot in here. All right, so elbow out. Come nice and long. Okay, so again, pushing through the elbow and the forearm helps to lift up the side and find our stack position with ribs and hips, knees, ankles. All right, so press through. Lift up. We can either stay here or extend the top leg. Let's take the arm up and then lift lower lift. Feel the whole back side contract. Front side, open. Five, four, three, two, one. Oh, down. Now lift. Oh, this is my heart side.

Doesn't like to stretch. I know. Okay, so here we are. Open up that top leg. Lift up. Maybe move your hand out a little bit. Let's let this hand come up. We're going to lift the hips up on an inhale. Good into that pike position. Exhale, take a seat. Good. Three more times.

Good. Twice more lift and then lower. This time we stay up. Lift up. Option to drop that arm, but either way you want to lift the leg and we pulse for ten nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one. Ah, holy moly. Okay. Ready. Might need to move the arm out a little bit more. Here we go. Lift up, reach and stretch and back down.

They're like, you should give Erica a high five. Good. Twice more. Nice and long. Last time we stay up there, I feel that stretch come over to our hover position and we do our four pushups again, lowering to the knees if you need to stay on the toes or even doing the all fours modification that we did at the very beginning. Last time. Whew. Lower the knees. Sit back. All yes. No last would not even be close to complete if we did not do at least a few teasers open like rockers. Oh, kinds of fun, stuff like that. So we're going to get into the slowly just rock back towards your tail.

Let the knees fall out, toes come in and you're going to feel this nice lift through the upper body as you float the toes right up and off. So we'll just start with some little stretches cause we've forgotten about the back of our legs here. Right? Like extends out. Exhale. Inhale to Ben, left leg. Inhale one more. Set each side, single leg, getting our balance here. Now both. And we have to do this three more times. Okay. Last time.

Now your option to stay here or if you'd like to, we can reach and grab the ankles. Sit Up nice and tall. We take a sip of air. Exhale, roll back. Sip of air at the bottom. Find your balance. Twice more. Ooh, and last one. Sit up tall. Sit up tall. Bring the legs together. Tabletop arms reach out.

We're gonna roll down. Keep the shins parallel. Knees come over the hips. Let the arms come over the head. We come into a teaser. Prep arms. We'll lift up to the ceiling. Roll. Reach the legs a little bit longer, and then Ben come back, arms reach over. We're going to try that one more time. Big exhale. This is a great way to prep for teaser. Now let's go into straight legs. We'll give that a go.

Exhale, roll reach, and then roll back. Legs come up over the hips. Adjust where you need to. That's okay. I know we want you on the mat now. This time, let's stay up there and reach the arms by the ears if we can. We're going to lower the right leg up, left leg. One more set each side.

[inaudible] now bend, take a deep breath and as you exhale, just rule out and reach legs out long. Oh Gosh. Nice long, long stretch. Take a nice deep breath here and as you exhale, curl yourself up. Oh, nice. Now take a seat like it's just a little wider than your hips. Right at the edge of the mat. We're gonna do some saw, so not too wide with the legs. Rib stacked right up over the hips.

Heels anchoring down. We're going to twist to the right first with an inhale. Exhale, reach the left, pinky towards the pinky toe, but the right pinky toe. Inhale. Exhale, center other side. Inhale with a twist. Exhale to reach. Inhale up on the angle. Exhale back to center and again with that same breathing pattern. Exhale to reach. Inhale to come back up. Exhale, back to center. Anchor through the right sit phone, and then reach.

Inhale, come up. Now we change the breath, so it's a big inhale to reach and twist and an exhale to restack. I'm inhale to reach and twist. Pull back with the opposite hip and an exhale upright. Inhale, lengthen. Exhale. Restack one more time. Excellent. Bring the legs together.

Make sure you have room behind you because we're going to come into boomerang. Okay. Cross the right leg over the left leg and we'll start with just a little modification because it's a great way to work up to this. So you're gonna reach forward. Take the stretch cause this feels luscious. Now Roll Up. Bend your knees, scoot them in. Hands.

Come down. Roll yourself back. Hand. Stay there so you can roll over. Knees over eyes. Extend the legs along. UNCROSS to recross leftover, right. Bend the knees and separate the legs. Roll Up. Grab the backs of your thighs. Roll Up. Tap the feet down and reach forward.

We'll try that again. Stack back up. Tall. Grab in the knees like so. Tap down the hands. Reach knees over. Eyes. Extend. UNCROSS to recross. Right over left. Bend the knees. Separate the legs rural up. Grabbed the back of the legs. Tap the toes down. Now we'll move on to the next level. So sit up tall, try legs straight.

But you know, you can always bend the knees if you need to. Lift up, roll over straight legs. Uncrossed to recross inner thighs, tight oral up reach, you know, reach. We'll just do the circle with the arms and then let the legs roll down. We'll do one more like that and then we'll add the extension with the arms back. Yes, I like boomerang. Who is a nice challenging exercise there.

End of intense workout. Big Scoop reach. Now let's give it a full go. Shall We? Ooh. Up over scoop. UNCROSS to recross inner thighs. Tight reach, lift, arms, reach back behind. Extend and now or release the hands. Oh, I got another. Hi Simon there with Ms Erica. One more time gang. Here we go.

Breath is helpful here. Big XL to reach. Ooh. And Ah, reach forward. Oh my goodness. All right, so some of my favorite work is coming up. Before we move into pushup. Just rollover. We're going to come into a forearm plank, make fists and bring your knuckles towards one another.

Elbows out and underneath the shoulders. Knees are going to down and about hip distance. So you want to get the feet tucked under cause we're going to be lifting up the knees in just a second. So just find a great position here. Press down now you're gonna lift the right knee up, lower left knee and lower. One more time on the right. Feel the shoulders pressing down away from the ears, forearms down into the floor.

Now you're going to lift the right and swap with the left but don't touch. And so it's just like a little hover, just taking a little walk. And if you needed to guess what the knees could stay down and you could just lift one and keep the other one on the floor. But here we are with both legs is hovering, working four, three, two, one straight legs hold. Now we do a little sweep. So find pressure into both elbows.

Take your feet wider if you need to. We're going to take the right arm out to the side and then bring it forward and then bring it back, left arm out, forward and back. One more time out, forward and back. Left forward. Now we add the leg. Okay. So as the right arm goes out, the left leg lifts, keep the leg there, reach the arm, pull in and lower both. And here we go. Out forward, back of the neck long. One more time. Woo.

Oh finally got a high five with Amy there. I know Lou or the niece. Holly. Molly. All right, so I know I didn't keep mine very well either. So we're going to go into seal cause I like seal so you can always take the hands over like this. This is a great modification. But if you can just reach under, grab the outside of the ankles, rock back and we give it three claps, shall we?

One, two, three and back. Three claps on the weight. Yeah. So we got to go back three clips here, scoop hold and up. Three clips, three more times lady's head stays lifted. Oh these are so much fun. Now listen up. When you go back, you're going to scan up after this one all the way up. Oh, I didn't give you much warning on that one. Turn it around. I'll come over here. Come back to the edge of your mat. Take your feet, sit bone distance apart. Lift up tall, reaching down through the ankles to take a nice deep breath in.

As you exhale forward, bend all that way down. Soften through the knees, but the head and neck relax and we're going to walk out right, left, right, left breathing in three counts. Inhale. Inhale, inhale. Exhale. Three more. Oh, it was in by the sides. Yeah. Walk back. Right. Left, right left.

Take a nice long breath here at the bottom. Roll. Halfway up. Just halfway. Let the head hang. Soften the knees. And now you just going to let your shoulders make circles. It doesn't matter what direction they go in. Just let them hang other direction. If you can get that circle going on the other way and slow roll up.

Oh, okay. Let's face forward. Bring your heels underneath your sit bones. Lifting up nice and tall. Big Smile on the collarbone. All rise up onto the balls of the feet. Just hover the heels off the floor.

Stay there with the heels lifted and lift the arms out to the sides. And now over the head. Take a deep breath here. Leave the arms there. As you exhale, let the heels reach down, but feel the head reaching towards the sky. Good. Take another breath. Lengthen even more, and then exhale at the arms. Float down by your sides. Good. Now we get that nice shoulder release. Inhale, let it go for more.

One more. Take a nice deep breath. Inhale, arms up. Left-Hand grabs the back of the right wrist and side bend to your left. Reaching the right arm up and over the ear. Press down through the right foot. Reach up, release the rep wrist. Excuse me, shake out the hands above your head here and then right hand grabs the back of the left wrist and then side bend stretching over that left side, anchored down through the left heel. Come back up. Ooh.

Shake it out and shake it down all the way. Oh, all the way down to the fee. Yeah. Okay. I like to get coffee here. Why not take a deep breath and a deep exhale. Now just listen up. I'll come here so you guys know what I'm doing. Inhale, arms up, bend your elbows, take the hands back behind the head. Inhale, look up. Exhale, eyes forward. Inhale, arms up, and then exhale and a big breath.

And here comes the side cause we need it. Ah, let's try that again. Big Inhale up and like we're taking about, take your right foot behind you. Eyes down. Little one legged squad here cause it's fun. Big. Reach up and take the left foot behind. Little bow and we get our one legged squat. It got to get a little work in, even though we're stretching. Big. Stretch your arms out to the sides and really nice, awesome work. You guys. Woo.

Comments

6 people like this.
Great work. Really love the full body prep for all the tough stuff,that's what most people need before they start to challenge, well done.
Portia !! I have added this class to favorites.. I love that you start many exercises with then modification and then add on ! Simply Perfect class :)
2 people like this.
Wow,wow,wow! Such great work! Really worked into some deeper places, slightly different ways doing familiar moves. Loved it! Thank you!
2 people like this.
I kept waiting for the class to get really "bad" lol with Portia leading the way it ALL becomes do-able. What an enabler she is!

3 people like this.
Love Portia's classes!!! Thank you for this!
2 people like this.
Outstanding. My first class with you. Loved the cueing and explanations. Wonderful job. Thank you!
Thank you all for your wonderful comments. I'm so happy that you like the workout Enjoy and stand tall!!
1 person likes this.
Loved it! Thank you Portia. I did my training with Balanced Body, so the cues and moves were all so familiar! I just did barre training and have been watching the training video...I feel like you are my close personal friend as I have been spending a lot of time doing the dvd. Flow of this class was great.. Thank you Portia!
PILATES LOVE
This is the best Level 2/3 class Ive seen - fabulous. Love your
modifications. Perfect.
I also did my training with Balanced Body. Loved your class! I teach in a group setting at the Y, and will sure use some of your routine! Thank you!!!
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