Class #1830

Spine Strengthening Reformer

50 min - Class
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Description

You will get plenty of variety in Madeline Black's spine strengthening Reformer workout. She teaches new ways for you to learn how to move your arms from your back while working on stability and strength. Madeline also includes scapular stabilization exercises to prepare you for planking exercises like Up Stretch and Control Front.
What You'll Need: Reformer w/Box, Knee Pad

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So this class is designed for strength and stability of the spine. So I'm calling it a spine strength class. All right? So we're going to start with a low bar. We've got two red springs, or if you'd like to red springs and a blue spring. Just have the feet in a more neutral position. And that's a point where you feel the heel, where the heel meets the foot, so in the front of the heel. So there's some weight. And in fact, if you can see it as I put a little weight on her feet, it's very solid.

So you want to feel solid, you want the heels in line with the sit bones, toes relaxed. Okay, so first I just want you to feel, I want you to do a little self assessment. I want you to feel at your pelvis. Don't change anything, but just notice what side of your back of your pelvis is on the carriage is one side more weighted than the other. You might feel maybe more right buttocks weighted than the left. I just want you to notice that, not necessarily change it. And as we move it might start to change.

And then I want you to notice what part of your back has contact with the carriage. Perhaps you feel mid back versus lower rib cage. Maybe you feel one side of your rib cage more than the other. And then the shoulders try to sense what the shoulder blades do you feel that you have contact with both sides or as one side, little less ways. One shoulder, a little lifted off the carrot. Just notice it. We're not gonna make a change right now. I don't want you to change your position, but as we move, you should start to notice that that is starting to level out.

And then the head, it's kind of interesting to think, oh yeah, I have more weight on this side of my head than this side of my head. So we're gonna check in with that as we move. So now I want you to keep the spine in its position as neutral way. You are now position and I only want you to move your right knee to the right. So we're ab ducting the hip without moving the pelvis and then join the left knee towards the right knee.

Pelvis is still facing the ceiling if it can. Left knee, back to center, right knee, back to center. Left leg out to the side without moving the pelvis. Right leg to the left leg. A little as far as you can without moving the pelvis right like back to center. Left leg, back to center. One more time. Right leg. So we're doing pure hip movement. Left leg to the right leg, left leg, back to center, right leg, back to center. Good left to the side, right follows right. Come back to center. Left to center.

Now the legs are going to be stable. Now I want you to have your pelvis face the right without moving the legs. Ah, pelvis. It's a very small movement, good and center and on the camera you won't see anything and felt pain. Pelvis face the left. You might notice that you hip hike, maybe perhaps a little bit on one side and come back. Just notice that. And now face the pelvis to the right so you're gonna feel more weight in the right bud and come back to center and then go to the left.

You're gonna feel a little more weight on your left buttocks and come back. Now we're going to do it again with a little focus as your pelvis faces the right. I want you to think of reaching your right knee towards the ceiling a little bit. Does that work for you? As you turn, reach the left knee towards the ceiling a little bit and then come back down. So there's a little tractions that make sense. Your pelvis is going to face. Reach the knee out a little. Reach this knee.

The right knee is going to reach out. There you go. So you can use your foot press a little bit. I'll say that a little clearer. Let's have the pelvis face right and then as you're doing that, reach the left knee. Use Your foot a little bit. See how that helps move the pelvis a little bit more and come back to center and pelvis face left and you're going to reach you that left knee. Very nice. I think we can do this one more time and come back. Feels good, doesn't it?

And Pelvis face and reach. Not Too much. I only want the pelvis so don't let the lower ribs come up. And one more time facing the left and we're going to reach the right knee. It's just in the pelvis and the hip joint. This beautiful, good and come back to center. Now we're going to try to rotate in the rib cage. It's very small.

Just put weight on the right side of your rib cage on the carriage. So it's a slight little twist, a little more weight and come back to center. It's gonna feel like Justin engagement and to the left, correct. Good Center and feel the ribs on the right side. More weighted. It says if you're rotating to the right and come back to center this great and rotate to the left.

Can you feel how that engages the abdominals there and come back to center. We'll do one more to the right. Feel the weight of the right ribcage down into the carriage and relax and then rotate over to the left and you're going to notice one side is probably a little more difficult than the other. Okay. Now we're going to go to the head and the neck, so I want you to think of your left ear. It's going to go listen towards the ceiling to your left ears going towards the ceiling, but your head is staying resting on the head.

Rest good and come back to center. Now I could say just turn your head, but that would make a different motion, right ear to the ceiling. Just kind of feel like your right ears going up towards the ceiling, which is turning your head without lifting it off the head rest and come back to center and left ear to the ceiling. It's a different focus than just turning your head and come back to center. And one more time, right side. Excellent. And come back to center. Okay. Now we're going to change the feet to the frame.

So bring your feet down onto the frame. Good. And have contact us midfoot. So move your feet a little bit more. Good. So now, now notice in your body, do you feel any different like your pelvis, rib, shoulders. After doing that rotation, you might feel that you are a little more equal, your weight. So now I want you to keep that sensation of those contact points of your body. And I want you to take a breath in. As you exhale, all I want to do is unweight your right foot, just barely lifted off the frame, just and your legs very heavy. Hold it, hold it, hold it, hold it, and place it back down. And again, left side now and unweight your foot barely lifted up. Hold it there. Excellent you guys.

And come back down and we're gonna do the right side again and just barely lift. Excellent. And come back down. Can you feel how that activates the trunk and barely lift? This is good. And they're doing a beautiful job of not shifting on the reformer. Very good. Okay.

Now we're going to bring the right foot up onto the bar and the left foot up onto the bar. Good. Alright, so now stretch your right leg out straight. So your calf is resting on the bar. Great. Alright, so we're gonna do a similar thing. You're going to unweight your left foot off the bar and hold it. Take a breath as you exhale. Unweight your right leg. Exhale. And now hold it. Hold it, hold it. Feel your lower ribs. Hold it in.

Place the down on the bar and place your left foot down on the bar. Yeah. So what's going to happen is you're going to start to feel that you're gonna lose your contact points of your lower ribs here. Or maybe you're going to shift your weight and your pelvis. So be conscious of the reformer carriage giving you feedback. Let's try it again. So you're going to lift the left foot off, barely off the bar. Another breath. Exhale. Lift your right leg up off the bar and hold it. Hold it, hold, hold. Okay.

And place the foot down and left foot. One more time and left foot. Up and right leg and hold. Keep breathing. Hold, hold. It's very good. Just keeping her back nice and stable and leg down. Foot down. Good. Let's bring the right foot onto the bar. Stretch the left leg out and we'll do three times on the other side. Take a breath in. Feel the lower rib cage. Exhale and unweight your right foot.

Lifting the left and hold it. Keep breathing, hold, hold, hold and place the leg down, left foot and then the right foot. Yeah, I want the straight light to come down first and exhale again. Right leg up, left leg lift and hold. Hold that rib cage on the carriage. Shoulders relaxed, yes and straight leg down. Bent knee down. One more time and exhale and coming up and lift the other leg and hold. Could hold, hold, hold and place it down and foot down. Good course rank there. Okay. I'd like you to take your head rest down. If it's up and we have two red springs is good. I'm going to have your feet, both knees bent, feet on the bar.

I'm going to do a little, I want you to do an articulating bridge now and we're going to do the articulating bridge without moving the carriage. So two red springs is not enough to keep the carer, so if you slightly push, the carriage will move. So really try, we'll give you a break on the first one. Try not to move the carriage so you're ready. Take a breath in. Now roll the pelvis, curling. Reach your knees over your toes, rest on your shoulders. Very good. And then inhale there. Exhale on a roll through your spine. Nice and easy.

Feel those contact points onto the carriage roll into neutral. Inhale again, and exhale and curl. Reach those knees over the toes. Nice. Very good. And down. Curl, roll and good. And one more time. And reach those knees. Curling reach. That's it. That's it. Keep in the thighs towards me. Beautiful. Take a breath in.

Exhale and roll it down. Curl, easy. Beautiful. All the way down to neutral and rest. That's tough on the hamstrings. Okay. We're going to change the spring to a blue spring. Light. Light blue. So go ahead. Yep. Just to blue and we're going to do the hovering bridge. So it's another kind of bridge except for this time you're just going to float your pelvis off the carriage so there'll be no curling. You'll stay in neutral.

Let's keep the Achilles long on the bar. Now if you notice with one spring, it's very easy to push the carriage away from the [inaudible] so you already have to be engaged. Let's have the Achilles long here. Good. All right. Do you have to keep the, uh, activity in your legs, right, the hamstrings to keep it there. Now barely lift your pelvis up. It's a float. So your tights are still on the carriage. It's excellent. Now you're going to go out and in, out and pull it in. Keeping the weight of your tail down. That's it. Out and pull in. Good.

And keeping that Achilles long if you can out and come in. Good. Yeah, it's very tempting to, to plant our flex. Point your feet around the bar. There you go. And in, let's do two more and reaching out. Good. One more and [inaudible] and rest. Okay. Blue Spring is good. Let's bring both knees up to your chest. Doing okay?

All right, so we're getting ready to do hands in a strap. So we're going to take the loop and do it a little different hold. I want you to put around your wrist, turn your hands. So the loop is going to be between your thumb and index finger. Then straighten the arm up your knees or to your chest.

Come bring your knees up. Great. So your palm is going to be flat and kind of pressing. Now here's the challenge. You're not going to change those contact points of your hips or your ribs on the carrot. So exhale, just pull straight down and go back up. Now this direction is not as difficult as the next ones we're going to do, but we're going to do five. So that's two very good things that I notice.

And what you might want to notice is how much shifting's going on with your pelvis on the carriage or your rib cage, especially the lower rib cage. I'm going to do one more and then you're going to switch to a circle. So you're gonna come up and we're going to go out to the side. Now this is the difficult range. Pull down good. And the other thing that you might notice, your knees might start to turn. Hmm.

So in your effort to keep your trunk stable on the carriage, the knees will start to turn. So just pay attention those things and do your best to try to keep that good. We're gonna do two more circles. Good. Yeah, I feel that nice connection into the ribs. One more. Go ahead and bring the arm up and we'll switch loops. Great. So we're going to put it through the wrist again.

Turn your hands to the loops between thumb and index finger. Right. You go without straining the finger. Nice stretched hand. All right, let's do it together. Inhale here. Exhale. Just straight down about five towns down and up. Good to go ahead. All right, excellent.

I notice on one side when I do this, that as I pulled down, I tend to shift my rib cage to one side, so try to keep the breath so that the ribs are staying anchored onto the carriage. I think that's five isn't it? And then come up and we'd circle out to the side, pulling down a little harder on this side. That's it. So breathe into the right side as you Paul, so that you can keep your rib cage over to that side. Good. Good. All right. There you go. Yep. Excellent. Good breathing. One more.

So now we've got that core nice set up here on the obliques on the side. So we're going to come up now into a quadruped head position. So we're going to put the bar down. All right, so we're going to come up far down, like we'll switch to a red spring. I think we need to have the bar down if we're going to put our hands on the frame. So yeah, the reformed will have to be pushed out. So one red. Okay. So you're gonna Kneel on a Quadrat pad. Positions your hands are on the frame.

Your feet are going to be against the shoulder rest, toes tucked under. Good. Now, depending on where your bumper is on your reformer, I'd like the hips to be in a hip flection. It can be a little bit more than 90 degrees would be preferable actually. So that's not working. Can you go back more with your hips back more with your hip? Yes. Yeah.

So the angle is it's a little bit more than 90 good. And you're only gonna stabilize through the shoulder blades here. So you have to push down with your arms and keep your spine up this way. Can you sag from me once? Drop your chest down. Yes. We don't want the chest down. We want to keep this activity in here, right?

So we're going to support part move to start with. So you're going to inhale as you exhale, move the carriage back a little way so the knees are just under the hips, maybe slightly behind. Good. Now hold the hip position. Use your arms, press back through the arms, back with the arms. Good. And bring the arms back. Shoulders over the wrist. There you go. And then the knees come back in. So again and go back. We want to keep this connection with the lower ribs and then the arms move 30 ago. Keep that working there.

Nice and arms come in and then knees come in and legs back and arms press. Nice. Arms come forward. Then these come in two more times. And legs back. Press through the arms. Nice. Arms over and knees in last one. This is excellent. And back and arms. Good.

Just watch those lower ribs there. That's it. And arms and knees come in. Okay. Well if your wrist, if you need a break when, just sit back on your heels for a second. We're going to do a sequence here on the knees and wrists. So at any point you need a break, just sit back for a second. Give your wrist a break. Okay. Well I'm going to break your back. Okay, great. All right, so sit back and the hip flection and we really do want to make sure even you're in hip flection, that your sacrum is loud as can be.

I should be able to put a water bottle on here and it won't fall. There you go. Nice. All right. So what we're gonna do is you're gonna simply on an exhale, you're going to unweight the right hand and unweight the left knee. So you're just going to lift the knee off. Yep. And come back down. Good. And let's do the other side. Left-Hand right knee comes up nice and come back down.

Good and right hand, left knee. So we want to see this come up. Keep this connection here, this level and down. So this is hiking just a little bit and let's do the other side and lift so you don't have to lift very high. It's like I barely should be able to put like a little piece of paper under here and down. Let's do one more each side. So on this side, try to not, that's it. Draw in through here. Nice and down. And one more.

Oh and [inaudible] down. Okay, let's take a risk break. Good. That was excellent because that's your prep for the next one, right? All right, here we go. Hands back. Now this time you're going to a s we're going to unweight the right hand and left leg again, but we're going to stretch the right hand forward and the left leg is going to go back in between the shoulder rest and try to hold to try to stay level here. Very good. And bring it back in. The important work is the standing arm in the standing knee.

So let's try the other side. Yep. And the challenge is not to the carriage yet. And then other arm and leg out. Good strong arm that you're standing on. Strong knee that you're standing on. You guys are making this look easy and I know it's not and come back in beautiful and other side and reach. God, you don't have to have your leg too high. Drop it just, just a tiny bit that that's it. Cause I want to keep this lump beautiful and come back in here.

We're not doing an error. Basque Arabesque. Arches the back. Okay. And we're just trying to keep the pelvis level. There you go. Very nice and reach and in. All right, one more time. Let's go. We're going to move the carriage this time. So arm and leg out. Now find your balance. And if you can, you're gonna move the right knee back and pull it in and back and pull it in, especially you can back and pull it in and back.

Exhale and two more and back. Pull it in. Excellent back. Pull it out. And in arrests, Bravo, other side and arm. Leg Out, balancing. Good. Here we go. And that pull it in and that pull it in and keep that standing. Armstrong. Good. Gack pull it in.

Reach one more and rest and sit back. You guys did great. Relax. Okay, so for this class we need to have some pads for our needs. So we're going to come off, take the springs off, completely. Move the bar flat and we're going to take a, the pants for the knees. I'm going to kneel down inside the reformer, actually facing the carriage and we want to be as close to underneath the carriage as possible.

Your feet will go under the bar and maybe in that little hole and if you have a headrest it should be up. So it doesn't bang the end of the reformer. There you go. Great. So first you're gonna, uh, come down again like a quadrupedal position, but we're gonna follow the arms and elbows are going to be on the carriage. Now it has to be on the back, not too close to the edge, but close enough because as we move the carriage, I don't want your face hitting the carriage. So, so Folger you can fold your hands just kind of like in a relaxed position. Good. So we have a nice plum line that they're doing from tail to head ribs. These are the contact points that we're being conscious of.

And what you can do is slide the carriage away and you're going to start to lift your hands. So only your elbows will be on the carriage. And you're going to upwardly rotate the shoulder blade. We're going to extend the upper spine a little bit here so you can look up a little bit with your breastbone. Imagine you have an eyeball on your breastbone. That's it. Now you're going to drag the carriage back with your elbows. Drag engage through here, bring the spine up in a nice long positions.

We're not flexing with this. And again, go out now. So I want the neck just a little bit more light. I want you to think of an eyeball looking [inaudible] keep moving the carriage as you go. That's it. Keep moving a little bit further. You get a full stretch full length in your waist here. Go. Let, let your scapula go there. Good. And then pull in. Connect your lower ribs a little bit.

You're arching just a little too much for me to curl there. That's it. And so I'm trying to get length. And you feel that keep this lifted here. The lower ribs stay lifted. We're stretching the Thoracolumbar fascia actually. And then pull it in. Can you feel that length through your back? Yeah. All right. Very nice. Good and slow is good.

Enjoy. This is a wonderful feeling. Yeah. Good. And then pull it back in. Okay. Now we're going to switch the hands once, once we're back, take your right hand. We're going to go across the reformer this way. So your fingers are facing this way and your elbows resting and you're gonna take your left hand on top of the other hand. Excellent. Good. Now I'm going to keep the waist long and this is a shoulder stretch. So we're going to do two things. One, we're going to push with the top hand.

This pushing is actually going to make you turn to look over your left shoulder and this arm is going to lengthen out to doing two things. You're doing a rotation and a side bending with a thoracic cause she in the mid, that's it. Don't go too far on the shoulder. I don't want to go too far and then pull it back in and bring yourself back to central position. So it's a rotation. Yeah, we, I don't want you to getting too high in the shoulder and rotating. That's it. Use this hand. You kind of reach it. That's it. And let, let this move this way right about there is good. And then coming back. Good. Come back to the center so can make sure you come back to the center position.

Yeah. Good. One more time. Feel the rotation. That's it. Good. Let's just go down more there. Beautiful. And then come back. Now you have to use your obliques to come back to the center. Good. Let's switch sides. All right. Switch arms. So lift arms across, right hands on top of the other hand and start to slide and press and look over your right shoulder. Get this nice twist in the thorax here, and you can look a little more up over your chest. You can extend just a little more into it. Nice.

And then coming back with the rotation. So we're doing rotation and side bending, but also a little extension in the upper back, not the lower ribs. That's better. Nice. Beautiful. So yeah, so I feel different than the other side. Yeah, very good. And then pull it back in and we've got one more good with the rotation. Good. Swatch that a little bit. Beautiful. Great. And come back and, okay.

So now we're going to come out from a reformer doing okay. Good. All right. So another challenge where the core, what we're going to do is we'll have a really no one red spring and you're going to have your hands, uh, on the uh, shoulder rest and your feet on top. So we need to move this far here. Okay? Yeah. Okay, we'll push that out. Yeah. So toes up on here. Hands on top of the shoulder, resting. There you go. So the lighter the spring, the more difficult this one is.

So if you want to practice with two red springs to begin with and then take it down to one, that's a good challenge. And depending on the length of your reformer to the wood-frame here, some are further away than others. So the closer you can get, the better. So right now we're going to focus on getting the hips over the knees, even though the arms are in a little bit forward. Fluxion here. And all we're simply going to do is we're going to exhale and we're going to lift the knees on, wait the knees and stay back with the sit bones like the old Jack Rabbit. But facing the other way.

Hold, hold, hold. And knees down. Excellent. Inhale, exhale again. And lift up. Up. Beautiful. Up. Hold, hold, hold and down. And again, an exhale and left. Beautiful. That's it. You got it. Hold, hold, hold and rest. We've got one floor and exhale. Core lift.

Excellent. Hold, hold, hold and rest could work. All right, come on up. All right, we're going to do swan in a box now. So let's get our box in the long position. Uh, we'll have one red spring I think would work. Hello Bar. Okay. Long position. So this wanted, there's a variety of swans, but the one I mean is to have your head at this end versus that way.

So you'd be lying on your stomach. Hands on the bar. You'd help there. Got It. There we go. One red. Okay. So what I'd like you to do is have your legs actually a little wider, not quite to the edge of the box, but fairly close to the box edges here. So they're a little bit wider.

And I'd like you to actively lift your legs up just a tiny bit. Not Bending the knees. Feel the length, just, yeah. Do you feel how that engages the whole posterior hip and back of the legs? So I want you to maintain that so your legs aren't hanging low. Very nice. Hands are wide. So here we go. We're just gonna push out heel though.

Scapula rotating upwardly and bending the elbows. Now I want them wide. Good, good. So the tips of the shoulder blades go ahead and go outward. They start moving in this direction and then as you bending, they start to move back in this direction. So you want to feel that rotation. This is rotating this way and I feel good.

And then this is rotating this way as do a few more. Good. Now they can rotate in, but not too far there. Do you feel the work now? Yeah. You are losing your scapula. You were abducting them. You were bringing them too close here. Can you do that? Go in that way. See that? That's not what I want. Can you feel the difference?

So we got the, you'd have good upward rotation. Now you have to keep the width of your back. But let the Scapula. Yes. You don't change your spine. Let the Scapula slide on your rib cage. Don't let your spine change so much. That's it. And the work that they're very good. So why is we work on this?

They are do a few more as we work on this progression. I want you to keep that feeling. Yeah, very good. Ah, you just lost it right there. Did you feel that? Yeah. So try to keep that connection you have to reach to reach your elbows out wide. Yeah. Keep your spine up. Yeah. And push away. OK. Coming in one more time. That's better.

I kind of have to hold him there for you. Okay. Now stop for a second. I want you to now turn your hands inward is a very strange position, but I want your index finger along the bar like this. Now the elbows are not going to go up. They're actually going to drop a little bit and they're going to reach outward there. So we are, I, even though your hands are turned in this way, we're still emphasizing this rotation. Yeah. So be careful that the elbows aren't too, this is going to be good for you.

Can you feel that I could hit now push away on this. Push away and bring it in. Find the width. Yeah, this is, this is a good one for you. Yeah. You keep working that one. And remember this one in your practice? Yeah. And push it out all the way. Yeah. You don't have to straighten. That's it. Good. It's different, Huh? That really helps with the scapula. Very good.

Now your elbows are starting to go up too high there and come in [inaudible] cause I don't want is the humeral head to rotate. Yeah. Inward ahead and push away. It's Scapula. You see? There you go. Do you feel a difference? There you go. And keep that humeral head. That's good. So the danger of this position is the rolling forward here that we want to keep this back, but the arms spiraling inward. Excellent work the, now you feel this here, not you. This is good.

This is the point where you should feel this right here. Okay, good. Now we're going to do the right arm. Only. So put your right and keep it right hand there. It puts your left hand in front of the box this way. So you're just going to touch the box yet you're can kind of touch. So go ahead and try a few push out. Now we can go a little faster.

Now you've got the field, so too heavy push, go a little faster. And in there you go and push the resistance. Okay. And in. Okay, this is good. And push and in and push and let's come in and switch arms and push. [inaudible] good and and good. Keep working under here. [inaudible] the challenge with the one arm is that you might want to twist a rotates.

You still have to keep that contact of the lower ribs here on the box so you're not twisting at all. Okay, one more. Okay, so now I have some coordination challenges for you. Okay. Rest for a second. You get to stay there. You okay? So you can do one arm, but what I want you to do is you're going to push off, you're going to jump with one arm and come down with the other ones. So you have to switch your hands like this. So as you jumped, the other hand comes to the box and then as you're in the air, you're switching.

So you land with the other arm and then you push away and then you land with the other arm. You're ready. And I watched that and you're, you're already preparing. But I want you to keep that scapular there. Okay. So here we go. So go ahead and push switch. Nice and push switch. Good. And try to place your hand more in the corner. That's it. And push and give more. Push. Go flying.

Go flying into the air. Get some air. Good. Watch this scapula. As you land knows you're landing. Can You keep that connection there and not get there? The landing could shove your shoulder into your ears. Yeah, very good. Few more times. Good. Keep pushing. Get some air. Yeah.

Push away. Watch your right shoulder there Hailey. Yeah. Right here. Your right one is when you're landing. One more. Okay. Now do doubles. Push away now both arms, land and push both arms. We'll try not to bang, go ahead. Push. That's lose. I feel that strength there. Good. That's it. Land softly there.

So you can land through your arms or you can land through your back. That's much better. If you're land with your arms, you might crash the reformer. Just do one more. Okay. And rest. Bravo. Come on up. Okay, so now we're gonna remove the boxes and change our spring to a blue spring. And we'll get to use our pants again because we're going to be kneeling on the floor again next to the reformers. So you want some pads for your knees?

Blue Spring. Yep. Good. So you're going to take your right hand on the shoulder rest and your left and push it away. Just push the carriage away ahead and then the left hand can be just resting on the frame. Great. So you got to push the carriage away and then flatten your back forward into a nice, yeah. Nice flat, almost a quadripartite again. Okay, so this is another work. So now what's gonna happen is the carriage is shoving. Can you feel that shoving your scab is? So push away more towards the pinkie side of your arm and see if you could get that Scapula to move away from your spine. You don't have to be quite so low.

You can come up a little higher. There you go. And say my dear Ben. Your elbow without moving the scapula. Now the Scapula is not going to move. There you go. Now push away and push away. Yeah, good. You know, can you come a little closer to the reformer because you see your hand in the angle of your arm. There you go. It was a little high. So the angle's a little lower than your shoulder, not above it. Good.

And push away. Get that Scapula move there. You feel it? It just slid out. Now keep it out there as you bend. So you're, you're bending, but you're resisting. Oh, that's perfect. Let's see how she's doing. So do about five of those. That's really good. Yeah. Good for you. Push away. Yeah, a little. Now push away a little more. I want that scaffold even wider on your back there.

Now we want to keep it there. As you bend to your elbow has to come up with a tiny bit. That's far enough. Don't come in too far. It's a small movement. There you go. No scapular movement. That's perfect. Yes. Scapular stability, strength in the back.

It's also important for spine strength. Good. Let's do a couple more. That's great. That's great. Arm Work and then bring it in and we'll do the other side. Beautiful. All right. Okay. We're always different, right, and left sides.

So let's see how this goes on this side. So you push the carriage out. Your arm is resting on the frame. Good. Nice. Long Spine. Good. Now this other shoulder, now this is your right one. Is that one that, there you go. So have your elbow out maybe a little bit and wine through here. Now you're dropping your sternum. Just a little. Bring your spine towards yourself.

That's it. Are you going to push away and then bend and keep it there? Good. And push away. Good. Excellent. [inaudible] oh you're right side taught your left side. Very good. I mean two way. Yeah, through the Pinky side of your arm to connect into that. Very nice, good stability.

And we're going to need this when we start doing some arm balancing and planks. So this is going to really important prep for that. So I would recommend doing a few of these before any kind of plank work at all. This is, it looks fantastic and it feels good too. Very good. All right, so now we're going to rest.

Bring it in and come on up. All right, so after warming up that Sareda so bleak connection, we're going to do side arm pull so we can remove the mats and I think lights spring a long straps if you want. I think you could Lincoln your straps a little bit cause we had shortened them. So we're going to kneel on the side and we're going to do that hand grip again. So we're going to do left-hand first sideways. Okay, let's do the left hand first across. Sorry. That's what you meant. Okay. I wasn't sure. All right, so you're gonna reach across and you're gonna do that same thing with the loop. You're going to put it on your wrist and grab it through the thumb.

And I want the palm facing out and the thumb down, right? And you can start across the body. Yeah, good. Drop your arm a little bit. So bring your hand across and down. There you go. You feel where it starting. So it starting low and across good palm is out. It's a little different than the tradition you're pushing a little bit in here.

And we're going to draw the elbow up on a diagonal and then wipe your hand and turn it over. So your thumb is up and you'll find a loop in your thumb. And then bring the thumb down and down towards your opposite hip. Pull the elbow, feel that muscle again in through here and extend the arm up. Good. And then thumb is coming down. [inaudible] and across. Good. And again and again, that Scapula is going to rotate up. Beautiful and in, doesn't it help to push a little bit into the loop?

Excellent. And pull and parece and down. Let's do one more and keep the breathing. And of course the kneeling positions difficult in terms of your stability. There you go. And across, let's switch sides. Excellent. You can get it for you. Alright, so hand through palm, facing out, thumb down.

We're getting ready here. Great. All right, so l the hand starts low by the hip or your shoulders are square. Hips are square and pull, elbow up and then turn the hand over and hand down. I'm done. You guys are doing great shoulder. It looks good and pull thumb up. Feel that connection right under. In here. Good and in. I'll keep it as your hand goes down. Keep this work there.

You feel a difference? You got to keep this attention right in through here. Good. So it's easy to feel out here. It says the arms coming across. You need to feel that connection through here, which is a combination of serratus and [inaudible], Dorsey work and posterior shoulder. It's all good. All good. Okay. All right, get two more to do and then we'll get a let your arms rest.

You guys have been working in real hard and keep that connection through here. Go ahead one more and pull. Shake. Shakings good and rest. Excellent. All right, let's get the boxes up and we're going to do a little version of short box series. Uh, good. So it's across the reformer. We're gonna want, um, first we're gonna want a no strap, and then we're going to have the strap. So let's free up the strap.

Let's actually move the carriage out so that I get the bar here again. So the strap is available for us. Okay. And then we'll just put on all the springs, her stability of the carriage. There you go. Got It. And your straps available to you. Okay, perfect. All right, so first you gonna sit with your feet on the frame again as we did before. Good knees are bent. Okay. And you can sit back a little bit more.

All right. So this is what I want you to do. I want you to take your hands and place them on your hips like this. And I want you to draw your hands inward. So your pelvic bones narrowing as you, yeah. So kind of push like that a little bit and I want you to feel your sit bones a little wide and I want you to feel your tailbone moving away from your pubic bone. Can you imagine that tailbone moving away if the little sensation happening in your core and in the bottom of your pelvis? Yeah.

Now I want you to try to maintain that and just start to lean back, see if you can lean back and not change. So the motion is coming from the hip joint and the pelvis is moving with the rib cage and then come back. So we have head, rib, cage and pelvis. So they're going to stay together. But you're going to keep working that sacrum in that position. Let your pelvis move your Baxter and your backs moving. Your pelvis has to move, that's it. And come back. So soccer, it's hard. It's hard. I want the pelvis to keep moving. So your, your weight's gonna Shift towards the back of your sit bones, but you're not gonna lose that connection of your tailbone reaching away. Yeah.

One more. That's it. More pelvis. Get your pelvis to move to the back of your sit bones. More your pelvis, not your hips, not your shoulders. I mean, one more pelvis. Move your, yeah, you can move your pelvis. Stay here for a second. Now, roll to your sit bones in the back there. Keep going. Everything's moving together. Yeah. And come back. Yeah. So don't go so far. Okay, so what I'm trying to say is this, the rib cage, if this is a box in the pelvis, is a box. They're moving together, you say, and the extensions happening at the hip as opposed to pelvis. Stop moving. And my back keeps moving. So the rib cage, so there's this connection between the ribs and the pelvis that stays the same.

But your pelvis has to keep moving. It has to keep moving. It has to keep moving. Yeah. So it's more important to feel that than it is to go all the way back. Okay. Yeah. It's a challenge. That's their ego. The East centric control of your abdominals. It's hard. Okay.

So now I want the same feeling, but now you have your feet in your straps there. Okay? So the lakes are going to be extended and you can have your arms kind of low like this, right? And we're going to practice. Same thing. So imagine your hands are here. Now draw your pelvis, narrowing it together, right? Feel that tailbone moving away from the pubic bone, right? And then start the lean back. And again, leaning back. Much better.

Look at you very good. And come up again and again. Keep the pelvis moving. That's far enough and come back because your back starts to move and pelvis as you're doing great. More pelvis there. That's enough. So there's a strong connection between the pubic bone and the bottom of your sternum and it's not shortening and it's not lengthening. Right?

So as you're leaning back, this is remaining the same length. Yeah. Now just getting longer right there. Just at that point, it started getting longer. Keep the same length, not shorter, not longer. It's better. Okay, rest for second. You get that idea. Okay, now we could do the same thing again. You're going to lean back, keeping this length. And then I just want you to rotate. Look over your right shoulder. Come Central, look over your left shoulder. Concentra. I don't want the arms moving too much like this.

So if you can keep your hands in front of your chest and turn your rib cage, not elbows. Okay, so here we go. So keep that length in the front. Here we go. Leaning back. And when you find that perfect, great. Now stay there and rotate. Look over your right shoulder, turning the rib cage. So the rotation is happening from here and center and rotate to this side [inaudible] and center and come back up. And again, keeping this length the same and leaning back. Connect the ribs right there. Perfect. Rotate good and center. Keep that length.

Don't change it even though your ribcage rotating, beautiful and come back center and come up. Let's do two more this time. Go left cause I think she went right twice and come back and leaning back. Finding that connection. Beautiful and rotate. Very nice. Center and rotate and center and coming back up. Very good and rest. Excellent work. All right, so we're going to come up and we're going to do a kind of a upstretched plank.

All right, well this feeling, now you're all really warm. We're ready to do some really challenging work. So we'll move the box away and we'll set the bar up on a low bar and I think we're going to want a red and a blue spring. Oh, we have all of that. Take the springs off to move down. Okay. Yeah, I think low. All right, so come stand on the reformer hands. Do you know up stretch? Okay, I never look good. All right, so standing up on the reformer, hands on the bar.

Feet are going to be against the shoulder. Rest with the heels up slightly so that your weights on the balls of your feet. Good. And then bringing the carriage here. All right, so let's get this arrangement here at rest are good and I remember that feeling. You got of your scapular rotating. There should be an upper rotation with a little extension.

Bring your breastbone up toward there. It is the sea. We need to get the muscles here. This is the lower trapeze. You can feel that working. Yeah, very good. You too. A little bit more lower trapezius. I said connect. There you go. I know I worked your arms so hard. Okay, so just push back a little bit.

So pushback from the sit bones and the legs. Push back and then pull it in. Yeah, good. And again, push back. Use your hamstrings. Push here. There you go. Anchoring it in. Push back. Good. And bring it in. Now what I'm looking for is not dropping yet, so keep this working here. It's just lengthen. There you go. And bring it back in. So don't drop your button.

That's very good length in a way. And come back in there. There's a little bit different. And keep this working here. Lengthen away. Good. One more length in a way. Good. And now kneel down when you come back to the bumper and just rest for a second. Your arms are tired. Okay, great.

We're going to push out. Then you're going to drop into a plank out there. Bring it in. Push out, hips come up. Okay, ready? Five Times. Let's do it together. All right. And push out. And now let your hips go down. Bring the carriage in and go back out and come up. Alright, so go back far away. That's it. Away, away, away, and dropped down out here. And then bring the shoulders over the wrists. There you go.

And then push with the arms and the legs and lift the pelvis up. Nice line. Keep this work here and legs, hamstrings, push back. Good. And come in very nice and pushback. Hips up. Okay. One more. I think. Yes. Down in your back's really looking good.

And back. Hips come up and rest. Ooh, take a rest. Feels different when you've got the, this kind of control in here and the little bit of shaking. Okay, very good. So now we're going to switch to going back onto the elbows and we're going to do a control front on the elbows. Okay. So this is a little precarious. So I think we need to have, I think we decided on a red spring. Yeah. So let's, cause it was a little heavy. So you're gonna come down onto your elbows.

Your hands can be on the side of the shoulder. Rest this way. The little pinky side. Just yeah, that way. And elbows in a little bit more. I'm trying to bring them in. All right, so here we go. We're going to bring the feet up onto the bar, lift the knees up and just go for it. Press out. Good. Very nice. And now we come out and lift your pelvis up. Good.

Now think of what we did on the reformers, sliding the elbows forward. Slide the elbows forward. Bring the body down into that plank. Good. Now pull it in. Bring the hips up and press it away. Think of the elbows moving away. Now move the carriage away more with your elbows. There it is.

And pull it back in. Good. Can you do two more? Excellent. And out and lengthen a little more here. Ah, push the elbows away. Yes. And in last one, you guys are doing awesome. So much fun and lengthen. Reach away. Reach away with the elbows and pull it back in and rest. Come on off carefully and rest. Okay, good work. All right, so now we're going to do a kneeling side stretch.

So let's get the boxes back in the long position. One red spring is plenty. We need pads for the knees unless you're on carpet of course, but there will, we're going to be kneeling on this end of the reformer. Now I like doing this with the box and the bar up so that as we're lengthening, we're reaching up and over the bar as opposed to collapsing on the side. So the hands going to be on the box slightly in front of your shoulder. Good. All right, so just press the box away a little bit. So again, we're engaging those muscles here. Now inhale, reach the other arm up and then start to reach over and think of yourself going up and over the bar and push the box away and open up that side body.

Good. And then come back down. Good and up again. And lengthen. Push the box away. He'll let scapula again. Move away from the spine. Opening the rib cage. Good and coming back. Good. Let's do two more. Inhale and lifting up and exhale as you reach.

Beautiful and come up. Last one. This is your nice stretch for all the hard work you just did and reach and come back up and let's switch sides. Turn around on their arm. Great. And push away. First she pushed the box away to engaged armpit and then reaching up side bending. Good. Finding that length. Okay. Go ahead and come back. [inaudible] now nearly makes it harder to keep that connection with the ribs to the pelvis cause the big stretch. So go again on the front of your thighs here.

So be conscious that as your side bending, you're not chatting your rib cage forward. There you go. Cause we want to get a nice equal stretch on both the front and especially in the back. Yup. And reach opening up this side. There you go. Can you feel that more in your back? Yeah. Very good. And one more. And reach and coming back and, oh, thank you for such good work. Thank you so much.

Comments

I wish she used more verbal cues when she said " engage here" while she used her hands on her clients. I was working out with her and unless I also watched the video at the same time, I did not know where "here" was. Otherwise an excellent shoulder stability routine. Thank you!
4 people like this.
Beautiful class! So Madeline: precise, creative and so well thought-through! I think, watching the whole class first and then doing it is the best way to take advantage. The cues are maybe a little unusual, and we have to try and understand what she is aiming at, BUT THEN !- you find the fantastic world of Madeline Black! Thank you, I loved it!
Paola Maruca
As usual, when Madeline Black teaches you already know it is not going to be easy (well, we all know Pilates is not easy anyways).....Fantastic work, Thank you
1 person likes this.
I do all your Pilates Anytime classes right away. I have done this one twice already. Loved this class! Thank you so much for sharing your creative work with us!!
NICE SHOULDER STRETCH FROM QUATRAPED POSITION
1 person likes this.
I have been teaching for 13 years and have never had the privilege of taking your class. I have taken the class twice, have learned so much. The class was extremely challenging and my body feels great thanks. Needless to say will be enjoying more of your classes. THANK YOU!
Madeline Black
I always share the classes that feel balanced and strengthening on my body as well as basing it on biomechanics/fascia work, so I am happy that it feels great to you all, thank you. Periwinkle: next time I will try to be more conscious of cueing for the audience rather than the bodies in front of me, hard to remember teaching in the moment! Thank you for the feedback.
Amazing methods for core engagement and disassociation!!! Pleasure!
2 people like this.
Madeline, great class love the core work and noticing of our imbalances. Would love to have the privilege of taking a class from you. The specifics of scapula mobility and stability really helped me with clients that squeeze the spine into adduction. Thank you for a very skilled class!
I loved everything about this class! Your cues are amazing and the exercises you invent are unique and super helpful. I am trying my best to come see you in Maui! Aloha from Kauai!
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