Class #297

Abdominal Mat Challenge

60 min - Class
9 likes

Description

In this 60-minute Mat class, Kristi starts class with some interesting and very challenging abdominal variations. This class offers a variety of exercises that aren't normally grouped together in order to keep you guessing where Kristi is taking you next. Class finishes with Leg Pull Front, Rollover, and Seal Puppy. Enjoy!
What You'll Need: Mat

About This Video

Oct 28, 2010
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Transcript

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Sitting up on your sits bones nice and tall. Let me kind of just roll through some of this and expect you to take care of yourself. I expect you to kind of check in and see what feels good and what doesn't ease into it, and then when we're going to move, so sitting tall, we in him. I've got my feet apart about sitz bones. Distance XL. Try to get a little taller even though you're exhaling.

Let the shoulder blades be a little heavier. Inhale and exhale, engaging the abdominals a little. It's just a sense of contraction or support. Inhale, we'll move on. This one. Exhale, we roll back tucking the pelvis a little bit underneath you. As you stretch out the arms and once your arms are straight, you'll stop. Inhale to come back up all the way. Yep. We're just rocking through and exhale. Squeeze. Rollback. Yeah. Thinking supple spine. Inhale, come forward and length enough. I think we did this last week just like this.

It's that same serpentine like motion, inhaled leading with the crown of your head. When you get over your hips, you just lengthen up and exhale the heck kind of a good time to free up tension to remind yourself of those key points, which is generally shoulders down, a light engagement through abdominals throughout was that vendor again, Boyle. Boy, a lot of energy in these parts these days and last time we're going to come up and stay up. I believe we inhaled there, right? So just exhale and hold. Grab on a little more firmly underneath your legs, squeeze through the inner thighs a bit, although they're still apart. Inhale and stretch up. Get a little bit of back extension, upper back extension. And really if anyone wants to see our house get struck by lightning w on video, let me know. Did you see that right? Didn't you say Mandy? I did and then I got rid of it cause Carrie's cussing and release it. Yeah, one more time. I no, it's amazing. It is stunning. And then, Oh, you've got to see it. It's stunning. We both hit the deck. All right, let go.

Inhale, exhale. We roll down I, well yes, that's what I do. Inhale and exhale up. I was trying to film a lightning bolt and I, you know, that's what you get. We're going all the way down for a couple of pelvic curls. Let's do it. You may need to adjust yourself as you go, meaning onto your mat. Arms are down, gently press into the mat. Inhale, exhale, roll up through the spine. So one thing rail taught us is that, you know, this warmup is not just, I'll tell you, I'll say the rest of minute, exhale come down is not that I think we necessarily need these basic moves, but I do think it's a good place to just, you know what's coming in a way, you know, you know, I'm going to do a couple chest lifts, you know I'm going to do supine twist and that's your chance to connect. Okay?

So let's get to the top. I've got you all in different paces. So everybody that's down, stay down. That's up. Let's have you come down. We are all at the bottom. Oh, that's much better. You can help prepare two more. We XL sink ads, roll up through the bones of the back. Feel the back of your body. Relax your toes, relax your fingers. Inhale, exhale down. Just one more time like that in him.

Exhaling, the breath is meant to help, not hinder. Inhale and exhaling down from there. Go ahead and take your arms out to the tee position today though. I said T start there and then go into goalposts like so. All right, carefully. Now if that doesn't work for you, you can go lower, meaning bring it, make it more like a w, but let's see if we can stretch it out. Bring your knees up to table top one at a time. He's zip them up so you feel the ankle bones. You feel the knees coming towards the front window here. We inhale, hold it there. It won't be as far. Probably exhale.

Feel a heaviness through the upper back to go the center. Inhale the other direction and exhale back to center. The opposite hip does lift. Feel that little bit of reach out of that hip and exhale again. Inhaling over to exhale your range of motion dictated by your ability to keep the opposite shoulder down. All right, so might be less than normal based on how I have your arms. Maybe not, but we'll see probably and exhale. Go on for two more. Inhale, feeling this just direct rotation simply right across the waist.

Last one, and leave your legs in the air. Just keep your hands going back behind your head, fully laced the fingers. Let the elbows just come off the ground so you have more room to let the shoulders fall. We inhale. Exhale, curl head, neck and shoulders up for a Chesler. Listen up. Inhale, stretch the legs away from you. Exhale, pull them back in and go down. Inhale, exhale. Upper body rolls upcoming high enough that you feel the low back release.

Inhale, stretch the legs out XL. Draw them in. Inhale down upper body. Exhale rolls out. Inhale, stretch it out. If it feels like too much too soon, just do one leg. Exhale, bring it back in. Inhale, head goes down and exhaling up. Take your time, get their both legs out, or one if you're alternating and drawed giving you two more. Inhale down. Exhale, be mindful of the spine, right P kind of feel for what's happening there.

You know the action just by the cues, but what's going on in your body. Last one and draw it in. Keep your body up where? Inhaling on the XL, just rotate to the front. Inhale, come across the center, rotate to the back, and inhale. There's going to be a small tendency to swivel the hips here. Don't let it happen. Complete isolation and slow down just a tiny bit, Andy. Just a smidge and good. Good, good, good. Hey, Aaron. Oh dad. Both errands across from each other again, we're doing one more. Come back toward the front wall. The window. I mean, take the opposite leg down.

Grab onto the leg that's still in the air. However you want to. Doesn't matter to me. Pull yourself up a little. Pull the leg toward the midline. A little squeeze. Both innercise toward each other. Let go. It's inhale. Stretch the top leg. Exhale, pull in. Upper body doesn't change much.

You can intend to go toward it, but it should be just as high as it was, as if you're sliding that inner thigh up against the plate window right in the middle of your body. One more time and hold opposite arm reaches outside that leg and just gently reaching into it. The arm itself doesn't do much. It's the breath that kind of moves you. Hm? I think. Hold it there. Stretch the bottom leg out. Bring it in to center. Go the other direction.

Opposite like down so they closest to the window. Dan, you grab onto the leg. I'm liking it underneath. Personally. Pull yourself up a little. Rotate your chest. A little leg toward inner thigh. Hand goes back behind your head. You inhale, stretch the leg out. Exhale, draw it. Let the leg be light. If you tighten up the leg, you're losing some of that energy you could have in your abs.

Focus around the rib cage and abs and three and push away. Exhale, four fully rest your head. I highly encourage you to either hand over, hand it or lace the fingers. Last time here, hold it there. What else did I do? Oh right. Thank you. Arm just opposite so you can even push the forearm into that arm and make the leg be toward the center. And we did. Exhale. Look at your abs for a moment.

See them drop downer end and one more holding it there. Stretch that lower leg out. Put the hand back behind your head. Bend the knee comes, center legs go down. Upper body goes down. Upper body comes up. Oh, come, come, come chopped up. Here we are both legs, up, legs go down. Upper body down. Oh my God. Upper body. She's a feats both legs. Who knew? Legs down and now here's what you watch for.

This is intense. We know that. So don't just do it. If you need one break, take it more importantly. Here we go. Close legs that make your backstage absolutely still as they lower. If you can't get there, come down sooner. Here we go. Meeting with your upper body. Here's this last one up both legs. Drag it up. Hold, stretch the legs out just a little.

Don't let the back change meaning away from your thighs. Go away. Pull them in, push away, pull them in, push away, taking it higher as you go. We're going to form or take the legs a higher one and draw it in. Keep that upper body up. Act like you're going to get up to, it's going to end vertical even if you don't get this straight legs. Three, stay up with it. Four. Sorry. You're right Aaron. Now straighten the legs. If you can't straighten him, it's okay to have them bent. Lift the pelvis up one and then put it down.

That's how slow it is lifted up to hold. Put it down inner thighs. You can do this with your head on the ground if you need to and down, you really can. It doesn't change a whole lot. Might make it harder, but at least her neck more hurt. Come on one more. Oh, you love it. I know it. Knees are down. Stretch your legs out. Reach the arms out and opposition. Inhale, head, neck and shoulders level. Look to your legs. Exhale, trust it. It's okay if it takes time from here going forward a little bit. Hands go just outside your legs, palms down, come into a straight spine, kind of push on the mat or the floor.

Find your straight spine, pull it, push down to round your back, and then go down. Just giving you a little breather in the middle. You inhale, start the exhale. Watch collarbones, so just stop where we normally would at this time. Let your hands, Ben or elbows ban right by your side. Guide yourself up to straight spine and you just gently think like you're going to unload or you're going to, I can't do it, but imagine you're going to lift both legs and then draw the abs back from there. The low belly, let go the arms. If you need to bend them a little, you can. Okay. I want that sensation of active contraction. Inhale, exhaling up hands go by your side, extend your back.

You can even add a little bit at the top here and then low belly pulls in. Not much of a push on the arms anymore. One more. Just like that. Inhale, arms up. Head follows X. Hey for the moment, hands back by your side. Straighten your spine up, then add a little bit of pressure just to encourage the upper back up. Release the hands recheck pelvis. We're going just to the shoulder blades to rotate to the front of the room. Arms kinda low. I recommend Xcel to come up a little bit on that side. Going over to the other side and down just to the shoulder blades and center yourself out. Boom. Other way.

Exhaling swivel or rotate to the front and come down center wallah too easy for your hands. Just go a little higher as you're coming down. So right here they would be coming down a bit and then center to the back. When you come through middle. I would love it if your arms were shoulder height. Wow, look at that. Pretty [inaudible] and let's just come to the center and roll up last time up.

Keep your connection through your belly, draw the legs in if you need to. I'd probably scoot forward a little bit on your mat and it is rolling like a ball. I'm going to borrow a few things from Julia and Littleford right now I don't think he'll mind and that is to come into rolling like a ball with is if you're going to do it like normal, so does get there. You're just behind the tailbone, inner thighs, light, glutes, let go, reaching forward. Here we go. Inhale, roll back, exhale up, hold and inhale back up. Whole inhale.

Now if it's hard to roll or if you're feeling tight in your low back, you can spread the ball out a little bit and hold on just like normal. That's all good and back. Oh, same exercise. Take your arms a little wider. Doesn't have to be a tee, just a little wider. You mindful of coffee tables or people next to you and back head never touches the ground on a rolling like a ball. One more. All right, and finally we're going arms up. Be careful, Andy. You've got treadmills behind you. This one, you'll go a lot faster than you think you're going to. So be careful. Here we go. Inhale back. Whoa.

Exhale up or maybe further as the point and back expected those arms up. One more time. [inaudible] to come up and let's stay at feet down. Slide back to a straight position. Aaron, Aaron, Aaron and grace. Huh? I know exactly. Aaron. Taller. No, cause then you guys go.

What was I doing? All right. Theater apart please. Arms are right behind you. This is in honor of Aaron Goldschmidt for a little spine stretch. Inhale, grow tall. Exhale, engage your abs. I want you to think about just abdominals for the moment.

Now prove it to yourself. I'm not changing it yet. Just inhale, exhale and pull the abs further back as you imagine or feel your vertebra stretching out in front of you. Getting longer. Not necessarily further down, but you could inhale. We'll just roll back up on this one. Use the back extensors now or the back muscles to lift you. Alright, one more tip here. I'm grace. Lean back a little. Pull the ribs in a little and now just think tall, tiny bit ribs more in the tall. That's it. That's quite straight. That's very good. Alright, here we go. What did I say? Exhale round. I said I was going to recommend something, but I don't remember what feet flex for hamstrings if you need it.

Inhale into back extension. So we're leaning onto a diagonal hangout. I want to check positions tonight. Hang out there in your mind's eye. Can you feel a straight line from your sacrum to the back of your head or do you have something happen in, in the middle that doesn't feel right. If so flat or Benji's and tall. Good, good, nice. Erin Cashman and she's been working on it. All right. Extend your arms.

Inhale rebend and as you do, just soften hair. A little good. Rebound the arms behind you. Good. Exhale round forward and roll yourself back up. Lovely. Inhale growing. Make it active. Even now. Exhale to round forward probably if you let your elbows drop just S. yeah, that way you can spread out. Inhale into back extension. Good.

Keep your firm grip. Exhale arms as this shoulders fall down your back. Inhale refold the arms as you get even longer. Lovely and exhale to around forward and roll up. Let's do it again. Inhale.

Almost losing your ribs here and Kachin rounding forward a lot of words in here rowing. It's an exhale. Can you be in this position and think I'm light. I'm easy. I'm floating. Inhale, replace the arms. Not a lot of tension there. That makes it so much easier to be long. Exhale, round and roll. I'll add the fun part. Next. Inhale. Not that you haven't been having a fabulous time. I'm sure rounding even be kind of a good idea to press the backs of the legs into the ground.

That would be good. Exhale, arms changing it. Now I you've all done it. Inhale, bend to 90 degrees at the elbows. Exhale, rotate to the front, so keep the diagonal that you are on. Inhale, extend the arms. Try to take your spine with it without hunching. Exhale, center. I'm going the other way. Inhale, rotate. Oh, sorry. Come back. Exhale back in the center. My fault. Inhale, bend, elbows. Exhale, rotate in. L extend arms. Get long. Take your low back with you. That's it. Grace and I don't know where the breath is. Back to center. Inhale, replace the hands behind your head and exhale to roll up. Can we let me do that one more time. See if I can get the words out in here.

Exhale. Chances are I won't. So keep the breath that you start. Inhale back extension, find it, milk it. Exhale arms. Inhale, bend elbow. It's the spine rotation. The arms. Just follow in hell. Extend. Exhale, center. Inhale, bend. Elbows get longer on your back.

It's done an arm thing. Exhale, rotate. Hips are still inhale, extending your arms. Beautiful and center straight on. It's holding it there. Inhale and exhale. Just round over. As you're down here. It's a good opportunity to redraw the abs into roll yourself up. Bend the knees, sit forward a little bit for OpenLink rocker. So getting into it as kind of everything I think.

And it's just behind the tailbone. Draw the feet in almost as if you're pushing against something here. Make the hamstrings work. Let's go up. Feel how long your back can be and it's not always looking up. A lot of us look up too much.

Look straight ahead for now and and when you see your chest rise then you can look up a little bit. All right, here we go. Inhale, roll back, exhale up, and then at the last moment to lift and inhale. Keeping your connections throughout and inhale. Nice. I do think the trick is trying to squeeze the sit bones together and it as an image. If that doesn't work its inner side, you know all those other things. Another thing that will help you is as soon as you go down slightly, look down, keep the eyes in the same spot the entire time and at the last minute.

Look forward in a net. One more. Oops and hold. Can you draw a deepen to the abdominals to allow the legs to hang out? Up there? Legs are soft. Bring them together. Separate them, bring them together, bend them and roll down. Good. Good.

From there, the arms are overhead. Bring the feet in a little closer. Separate the feet for shoulder bridge, palms facing the ceiling at the moment. Let's leave him there. Inhale, exhale to rural through the spine to pick up the pelvis to find the hamstrings and hang out. Worth looking down your own body for a second and just see if you feel level taking the the let's say right leg. Slowly take it up. I'm going to have to adjust to keep it nice and level and here it is. Exhale kick down. By the way. Um, if you can get your shoulders and arms on the ground, go ahead. Um, it's somewhat challenging to to leave them up so it's up to you.

Don't let the shoulders on the ground mess up the straight line through your body. Andy, how many have we done? Eight already. Is that eight right there? Tell me when to stop. Hold there. Thank you. And we lower the hips. I did not roll down. I just touched down and push back up. One, the thing to watch for here is that the rib cage doesn't lead. It's trying to lead with the pubic bone a little more. Next one up. Stay up, point the toes, replaced the leg, take the other side.

Hey, you can also do this with the arms down by your side. If you want an exhale, press down one flex to come up and too sweet. That's kind of a lot going on here. So if the pointing and flexing in the foot gets in your way, just don't do it. Just pick one Oh seven right on eight. No. Next one up stays up flexed foot and you just lower touch down and drive energy through that lower foot one and lift two very excellent.

Four and down and five damn six. Nice Mandy. I, that's all I did. Return the leg, my fault. Too busy watching you and we roll down your back. Leaving the arms up. Yes. From there.

Draw the knees in and up a little late for this but we'll do it anyway. [inaudible] that's exactly what you think it is. Should we just do the 50 we'll see. Inhale, exhale, lesson. This is not a sale, but I am going to ask if maybe we don't pop the arms. We just reached forward and up into three, four, five. Now let the arms push all the air out and two, two, three, four, five and little glute contraction. Not a lot, but some helps and if you're looking kind of straight ahead on your horizon, maybe you'll feel those collarbones nice and wide halfway there.

If your back starts to come up, you've got to raise the legs. It's not worth it. You can also try it lower. That would be fun. That'd be really fun. I think one more. It's possible to this is it. Good. Draw the legs in. Hold on. Rock yourself, stretching your legs out. We'll take one quick stretch forward. That's enough. Come back up.

So like Sufi, I mean ultimately you're in charge, but I'm suggesting we carry on. Let's go here then the other, so your legs are straight out in front of you. You're tall, the feet are flexed so that you watch that you're not changing the angle. Coming towards the front of the room, we rotate and get [inaudible] spine is all spine, spine. Exhale, extend your arms. Inhale, drop the shoulder blades to bring the arms back. Exhale, center other way. Don't go fast.

Kind of make sure it's all the core muscles doing it. The whole trunk. Extend the arm, you know, replace the arms, touching the sides of your head and back and in Hills barreling. Squeeze the glutes. Exhale, extend. Inhale. Feel the depression of the shoulder blade a little and one more like that and then we'll put something else with it. I'll think of it when we get there. Return yours.

Good here. Not, not big change, but here it comes. You can also bend the knees or sit differently. If your hip flexor start to get in your way. Hold it there. Inhale, get taller. Things that help Duluth scenario size, gently reach. It's not about the arms, it's the muscles around the spine. Okay, one more hold. Reach the arms all the way up.

Fold them and back to center to the back. Inhale, rotate. Don't let the hip flexors be a huge problem here. Extend you do it. You can just bend the knees and you'll still get the work. And we did six breaths. Ooh, beautiful. Nobody's using the arms in some places. The spine. Last one. Shoulders fall heavy. As the arms go up straight, they then bend behind your head. Come back to center for the lovely big inhale.

Flex your feet if they're not already and hinge back. Exhale, roll down, keeping it connected. You lightly touch the back of the head to inhale, lift. Exhale, roll. Oh boy. Oh boy. All the way over. Inhale, rolling up. I'm going a little faster on the return trip and a exhale and inhale. Yeah, let's do the next few pointed. Inhale, roll up. Now we do hinge here. I want to avoid one thing. Check this out for one second. Avoid a big, okay. You do. You get the big curl, but we don't want to get a collapse so you can curl all you want.

You just got to keep the upper body moving backwards. Here we go. And inhale. Yeah. Over inhale, roll at hinge. Tuck your pelvis, but keep your body somewhat for that. Sit. Wow. That's much better. Last one. I think I said that already, but here it is, and lumbar spine, long neck. Great. From there, I am more walking myself right off the mat. That's good. From there, you still have your hands behind your head. Once you readjust, crawl your head, neck and shoulders up. Yeah, and then give yourself a little bit of a tuck. So we brought the upper body up. Let's bring them lower body, lower trunk inwards.

I had to personally bend my knees. Just a smidge to do that. All right. The right leg floated off the ground just barely. It's an inhale. Exhale like you're reaching to the opposite side of the room. Lift one. It almost goes to the ground. Lift the same like two very tiny move. Third leg is almost effortless. Four out of five.

Five. Hold it up there. Press across the mid line. Exhale. One, two, tiny. Yep. Three. Let's reach the arms forward. Come up a little. Hold it there. Lower the leg down. Other side up. Hands back and reach one. It almost comes down head. Gently press the back of your head into your hand. Literally push your head back into the hands a little, but don't let the hands move.

I feel like you're picking up the like right into the chest. One more. It comes up, it stays up and then you press across the midline. One, two arms, come forward. Three, four and five. Set it on top of the other one and roll up. Good. Let's see, we all have the same leg, probably not uncross, just so I know what we're doing cause it's, that's the easiest way to do it. Um, if I, if I know bend your knees, I'm going to do the one that we've done before where, let's take the um, let's just make it simple. Right leg over, left, right ankle over left. Use your hands to now sit on your left butt cheek sort of off to the side.

So writing coal on top. Yup, exactly. That's right. That's right. I know you're still facing front. Chest is still forward. I'm just sort of off on the one side. So returns forward. Yup. This side of the room reached towards me. You guys are going that way. Are we going that way? Now what I would do is push your legs out a little bit.

Use ankle to ankle lock for now. You don't need that. But it helps initially. Here we go. We're going down to the shoulder blades. You can hold ah, and up. No momentum. Good. Fantastic. Maybe at the very last second, get a little more rotation at ver. Just the last moment, like a little Oh right there. You don't have to do the sound though. I'm not doing any. Again, that's the phrase that came out of me the first time.

Oh and one more time. [inaudible] not so big of a deal. Right. Bring the legs in hands. They're going to need to be down to get to the other side and switch the cross to the leg leftover. Right. If that was so easy, bring your legs in closer. Although we should probably be relatively even. Here we go. Yeah. Yep. So you guys are all reaching that way down we go and and basically keeping the curve inhaling or exhaling down. I don't know. What did I give you a breath before? Definitely exhale. Coming up.

I think I'm doing a two breath pattern. So inhale, exhaling up, a little extra rotation. If you've got it in you just checking for it and now test how much you actually need to lock the ankles. I mean there's still crossed, but how much do you need them? Probably not as much as you think. Last one's coming at ya or do ya? Okay, let's just send ourselves off. Feet apart. Fingers face your heels.

We're doing just a little table initially. I'm not not great for everyone's wrist, so you can certainly go to the side. You can use your fist if you've got weights nearby, which we do, you can take a big wait and hold that so that it's the ground. Otherwise we're just going up and down for a few. Shoulders are down and back. Use the back of the legs to lift you up to find just a table like position.

Open the chest is a great place to open it up for some of the things we're going to do. Then come back down, lightly touch, do it again. If you're feeling particularly open or not tight, stretch your legs out straight. This isn't the next option and up and up and up. [inaudible] one more like that. [inaudible] and from here, draw the feed in. Get just behind the tailbone.

So I did a little tuck of the pelvis to do that. Bring your legs up to uh, that position. Just a little do that. And we slowly rolled again just to the shoulder blades. Okay. Now make sure your whole back is down. Bring them needs to tabletop, then stretch them out. I won't make you do that every time. Bring them back into tabletop and now we roll up [inaudible] and make it look easy. No one has to know. Only once you get down and only if you want to stretch the legs out for a little extra challenge, pull them back in more tabletop. The harder it is, you can also push them away as you roll.

Sometimes contact with the legs helps. Didn't really do much in terms of taking away from the, the abdominals either, which is kind of nice. Reach out, pull in and up. Now I'm gonna add one thing to that. You can boycott. I would totally understand. Here it goes, which would mean you just do an extra breath. We're down. We stretch the legs, we'll go a little lower. Lift them up, fold and roll up. [inaudible] roll down, stretch the legs low. Pick them up, make sure your back doesn't move.

Bent and up. We up for one more and roll. Then stretch them, lift them up, bend and roll up. Oh, Christy wasn't ready. All right, so all we're doing, I'm heading into roll overs. Do you need a stretch first? Okay, good. So, um huh. Let's just spin to your, facing the back of your mat and put your right foot forward.

So you're all facing that way. You're all facing that way. Yeah. Okay. So the right foot forward that year I was like to adjust myself so I'm just beyond the kneecap on the left side. Back toes are down for now, uh, period. And then as far as the foot, the right foot, you want the knee over the ankle or about like that before. If you're going to take your arms off, what you want to do is bias or attempt to tech the pelvis. So it's like I'm about to lift my chest, but I want the pubic bone to come with me and only if it feels right and okay.

Mild, take the arms to the knee or you can even go further and reach the arms overhead requires a little more balanced, but in any case you are stretching both sides of the body. The point is the hip flexor of that leg in the back, but is your back long even though it's arched a little. All right, take the arms down and I think I'm just going to switch from here rather. Well we'll go into the hamstring. I'm sorry. Keep, keep the forward leg where it is, but you shift your body back. I can't do it all the way. I actually have to physically pick up my leg, move it forward a little bit to in order to stay level or close to level. Here's the deal. We're trying to stretch the hamstring, the back of the right legs, so you need a flat back to do that.

Even if you have to bend your knee, bend your knee first, get the flat back, and then see what you can get with straightening the leg. Don't forget to include your neck as part of the long line of the back. Good. Some of you need blocks. I see. Well done. Well done. Balanced too. Alright, let's soften that hands. Go back down and then change legs still facing that direction.

So we did the hip flexor stretch first, adjusting it so that you, as you start to shift your pelvis forward, it's an attempt to tuck the pelvis optional coming up onto the hands on the knee. Great. She looked pretty flexible. I'm just curious, can you shift your hips more forward towards the one? Yeah, there you go. No problem. Big, deep inhale. As you exhale, let the arms come back down. Push, push into the forward foot a little. Just to unload the back knee as you transition into the hamstring stretch.

So again, in order to stretch the back of the leg, we do need a flat back. I'm gonna make one little adjustment, windy like that. And then if you good, good, good. You hold them back on me again? I don't know. I think you are right. Yeah, yeah. Right. Yeah. You hold it. I think you can move your left leg more forward.

You might need your hands to do it. Yeah. Sorry, I didn't mean to do that. Sorry, I didn't mean to do that. Good. All right, good. So that's that. Help yourself out of it and we'll come right back. Round to facing front. Actually facing front. Front.

Perfect. Perfect. Perfect. Exactly. I've got that half on their right arm. You're all on your left arm for, um, side bend. So we have the legs crossed. Stretch them out a little bit away. I didn't think to get sticky mats out. So we'll do three and three. Um, first of all, lift in a way and just cause I'm, I'm guessing this first one, let's make any adjustments we need to so you can help the person in front of you or behind you if they're too high. So we do use the feet. You do use the inner size and we lift up to find a T position.

Yes, that's it. Um, maybe Aaron Cushman down. Just [inaudible] good. All right. And Mandy hips down to T yes. And now feel energy coming out to the crown of your head. Push energy to your feet. That's a part people forget. It's not up. It's that way. All right, here we go. Inhale.

Exhale over. Oh, feel that now. You know, bro along. Squeeze your glutes a little. Don't make your arm do it all. And Ben too, lightly touch. Let's go again. You exhale. Find the obliques. Now here it's like the armpit reaches to the waist. Get that big shake and inhale, stretch out and, and ice. Inhale. Exhale over. Inhale long and Ben, three twists in Hill from here. Pike, they have lifted up. Reach across the chest. Inhale, open, nice and long and hindered the waist or bend like we were before.

Lift up again, bend and reach across. Inhale, reopen half this, getting to be too much and hinge or bend ways. Go ahead. You could do it here. Inhale, lift up. You could round your back and enjoy it like so. It's a little different feeling, but it's still quite good actually. I meant to do it that way first and we're coming all the way down. Oh, thank goodness. Right?

Draw the legs in and your fingertips are behind you on the map. Just army on the floor. Bring your legs up. Uh, stretch the legs. It doesn't have to be straight. If you can go to straight. If you've had too much hip flexor dude here and it's going to go to the side, to this side, to this side, this side, one more each way. Trying to just feel that rotation back to the center. Let's be come down, sit up, let the knees go to the side and just enjoy a stretch forward. I'm starting to, in doing this stretch, I'm thinking flat back forward just to get a little through here, which happens to be part of the hip flexors. All right, let's do it again and again. You can, let me just show you a quick modification.

If you're not into that right, you can just do their, okay. Otherwise we'll do either the same thing or using the arms and opposition. Preparing for the hip circles, so fingertips or back. Find your legs. Could be done on your elbows too, by the way. Not if you're gonna use the arms, take your legs to the right, the arms to the left. Just switch. Whoa. And not really choosing a breath, but I like what I'm hearing over here. It's just, and eh, try to feel that rotation. Boom. Let's do four more. One and two and three and four.

Back to center. Boom. Bend, sit and stretch. So that speed increase there at the end was every attempt to get out of it was like a board, a board. Oh, I need a little back extension. So sit how you're most comfortable, you know, without a couch. Uh, okay. Wendy's there. That's good. That's perfect. I'm going to sit like, so you're happy. You're happy. All right. I'm doing a little upper back extension. So be careful of, um, low back.

Squeeze through the glutes, a little or innercise. And I'm going to actually pull a little, my rib thrusters. Be careful you're not doing that. You're going up. Everyone's going up. Here we go. We inhale to lengthen. Exhale. Just stay there for a second. I'm going to make it a different breath in.

Now really go all the way where you're lifting the chest but you're not leaning back. It's as if you're doing a reverse crunch, add crunch, but instead doing it with your back extensors release. Horrible queuing. But I think you know what I mean. Squeeze glutes and I only do that so you don't move the pelvis and lift into it. I'm inhaling into it. Exhale, release. So sometimes if I just say you are trying to work up here, you can kill yourself better if that works. If it's not working for me, although I'm looking here, we go up in here a little more from the chest, maybe. Excellent. And release. Last one. I'm going to add arms to it. Here it goes. Get to that position again and then reach one arm up the other arm up.

Take a big inhale there. Don't arch the back to do it. Exhale round over and Rola. I do believe we have another side to do. Don't worry, everyone's hands are in the middle of the room. Ah, ah, promise. Actually never hesitate cause I really was like gambling when I said that. Alright, three and three. Um, you know to do. Here we go. Inhale, lift. Use your feet. Use your legs. Yes. Up and over. That's your exhale. Inhale, get long. Bend the knees come down.

You'd lightly touch trying to stay in between two planes of glass and up and over. There's no rotation with the exception of your head. Inhale back to the line and and inhaling. Exhaling all in her backhaul and down time for the twist. Right here it is. Inhaling up. Exhale you pike. It's like a twist of pyramid, reaching across the chest, not to the ankle.

Inhale, reopen either hinge or bend the knees so you could just bend at the waist. You won't get to the ground all the way. That's your inhale. Exhale, hike and reach. There's not much weight on the back leg here. Inhale, reopen, hinge, or bend. It's up to you. The hinge is a little more challenging on the Opal leaks, but also the shoulders. So be careful. Last one were each to open and come on down. Grace to me, right? SU, turn onto your abdominals.

Jess, come all the way down the sand in here tonight. Starting with the basic Swan or Swan preps, your arms are by your side. Chest is all the way down. Shoulders are reaching, legs are also reaching. Okay, and by that I D they're on the floor, but they're reaching from here. Attempt to do a bit of a pelvic tuck. You see there's a sense of drawing that abs up off the floor. That's great.

From there we inhale without putting more pressure into your forearms. Start to lift the back of your head like you're looking forward. The opposing thing is your shoulder blades pulling down. So it's a reverse articulation. Lifting up to, I don't know, just opposite your chest line right from there. Add a little pressure into the arms. If you have an exhale, you probably should inhaling now only go as far as it feels comfortable.

I'm not trying to get with a bunch of the low back. Uh, let's come on down and I'll give you a proper breath pattern. Okay, so you're looking at the map and you draw the shoulders down. The first thing to move will be your head. Inhale. As you start to tip the chin forward, a little start to pick up your whole spine with just your back muscles. This is inhaling the next Hill to add the arms into it. They may or may not come off the floor. Inhale, as you start to draw yourself forward, like you're going to drag yourself forward, I'm just leaving the legs down today and boom, recommit the shoulders down your back. Tip the chin forward as you lift up, no arms yet. Use only what you can with your back muscles.

Then add a little pressure into the forearm, the whole forearm to lift up. Watch the legs. Don't skull a much here and then come forward reaching, articulate down. How to love this exercise. Let's do one more. It's a tip of the chin forward like you're looking forward to the shoulders. Oppose it, pulling down. Nice. Look forward a little more. [inaudible] and I am the only one I didn't get was the one I was to.

And then a little further. We'll do one more and you have such good back extension. I'm going to show you what I mean cause [inaudible] exactly. And town. So Aaron Lardy, you have this lovely way of you started so beautifully. Hopefully mine looks okay and then right about here you stop, but you don't need to some people that will probably be appropriate, but for you you get to, yeah, I haven't done anything with my low back.

Right. Well we'll see. I'll watch him. Here we go. Everybody, we start with the head almost all the way down. She's going to tip forward inhaling [inaudible] okay. Are they sticking your chest out? Yeah. Now it looked forward a little bit there. There you go. Do you feel that gorgeous? If you need, I don't know that you need any more to come up, but if you want to come up and I'm going to say actually with you, sit down for this, get paid for you now reach your chest forward to go all the way down and it's like you're pulling yourself up. Gorgeous. Did it feel a little different? Yeah, it's keep your head kind of slightly moving with it. All right gang, come up to your forearms and you all saw that demo.

So that's kind of the place we want to beat the idea of. Can I feel that reverse articulation I should say. Be careful not to collapse here. Aaron did all of that. All of you are doing that with just your back muscles. You could almost lift your elbows off. Yeah. All right. From there.

And if it feels too hard, you go forward. Make yourself feel the upper back. Both legs reach so far. They hover the kneecaps header and we're going to kick, kick, kick, kick, single leg kick. Here it is and it's inhale two, three, four and exhale two, three, four. It's one, two, three, four and out. Two, three, four. Don't forget all that work you just did in your back. Extension Oh two, three and inhale, two, three, four, an hour, two, three. And on the next one, just hold there. Actually just pause. How are you going to look at your own leg? What I'm trying to avoid is this. I'm seeing a little of that. I'm exaggerating for the point right now.

Get it straight up. Okay. If not slightly out. I'm talking to mostly you, but not really. Um, okay. Let's see it go a little slower for now. Let's and kick one, two, three, four, two, three, four and one, two, three. Yeah, no, we got it. We got it. And inhale two, three for animal. What? Last set for real and you have to tell me I get self conscious very easily. All right. Now just stretch your legs out, going, come up to rest position.

If this doesn't feel good and it doesn't for a lot of people, another option is simply to go to your forearms and tuck pelvis, dropping your head. That sometimes does enough. If that's too much effort, you just go to your back and draw your knees in. Let's come to hands and knees. Hands just below your shoulders. Uh, you have a lot of options on what I'm going to give you. I'm heading into leg pull front and then I'll add that side variation. If you've done it with me before, you can always just stay in plank or even on the knees.

Extend one leg back and then the other, we've put weight on him. The feet are slightly apart. And from the moment, just flex your heels pretty strongly and make them level. In other words, you don't want to roll out on your feet. You want to energize evenly through the feet. From there, keep your feet flex, draw the shoulder blades down your back and reach through the crown of the head. So you're going the other way with the upper body.

And if you find you spread yourself out too much, bring your feet a little closer. Alright, point the right leg and lifted up one. Try to get it up beyond the height of your body too. But don't move your body to do it. Three, five, hold it there. Actually no switch legs and wa reach it to lift it to three. Just lift a little bit away for good and five foot goes down.

Lift up the pyramid shape. Yep. But to the sky, you can walk the feet a step or two forward and then take your chest even closer to your thighs. So grace, move your feet in or your hands back a little bit. Yeah, that'll just take some weight out. Good. Now for you. Let's stretch here. No, you're good. No, I just want to work it cause I can and then this is really good here. Gently pull this. Pardon? That's all. How's that? And then flex your bicep.

Thank you. All right, back to the plank. Adjust your feet if you did before going back to the right leg, the other foot is flexed. Hips level back. Let's flex both feet. So at the moment your knee cap points down. Well it always will. So will the toes take the leg out to the side. Hold it there.

See about taking that other arm off and to a tee position. Oh yeah, bring it back. Put it down. I had no idea how I was going to do that other photo. You can just pretend you're going to take it off. It'll work. Flex the foot, take it out now. Don't just jump into it. That's the other thing. Take that leg as far to the side. That might be enough transition to a tee tee position with the opposite arm and bring it back. Yeah, down to the knees.

So we have a talk. Can we do it again there? Was there a question? I really did and I was going to do it until I did. So I met that with the arm and that was a like, all right, let's go one-on-one zit. Find yourself now. Don't psych yourself out, right. You'll probably do better this time. Now that we all know it's coming. So don't psych yourself out.

Pick the right leg up and things that help us to reach it. Take it out to the side and kept stays down. Transition a little. Try not to tilt, reaching the arm and put it back. Whew. Other side. Notice where you go. When you're under stressed, you instantly go to your shoulders if you know that about yourself, plan for it and bring it back. All right. Give it a little bit into the knees. Jump forward. Have a seat. All right, let's take it into, um, I want to go with that little rollovers into seal puppy kind of. Again, I know an odd place to put some things tonight, but it's just feeling good.

It's got arms are by your side extending the legs up. I'm going to encourage you to use the triceps a little. If it's available to you and you don't move your back doing it, lower your legs down to about 45 degrees. Collarbones wide. Inhale to 90 degrees with the legs. Exhale up to the over. Flex your feet. Now take a second here. You know how it felt a moment ago when your feet were flexed and you were holding yourself in the middle?

You want the sensation of both sides of your body helping you here. Don't just use your abs. It's not good enough. Separate your feet when you lower the feet. If that's available to you, your body, your back shouldn't move at all. Now roll down. Now it will. In other words, you're not bending at the waist to make that happen. Circle the legs. Once your tailbone touches and around.

Inhale 90 exhale up to go over flex, separate, push against the air as if it were thicker than it is touchdown. And now from your throat, you start rolling down. Enjoy the hamstring stretch. Find the tail bone, point the toes close and inhale. Exhale over flex. Separate, lower and, and only one more up should go over flex. Separate clothes. And from here, bend the knees. Roll yourself up and keep your feet in the air when you get there. Seal puppy.

So your gender under hug the [inaudible] upper leg into the upper arm and the upper arm into the upper leg. So you have full circle of energy there. Yeah, one foot down. Are there more? Ah, that's going to be good. That's going to be good. Andy. Whatever you want to do with your hands now. Lovely. Here we go.

And don't plan on landing it. It's different. It's going to take time to get used to it and and nice. And we go and you know what to do. It's three beats. One, two, three. Exhale. One, two, three. And it's the inner thighs moving the hip joint. One, two, three. Up one, two, three, and back. Look at Andy. Go last one back end up.

But I'm gonna stay seated. Oh, battling Christy bed one and then set your feet down and let's end this baby standing tonight. So I'm going to do one where you're just hanging over yourself. So just come to feet parallel. Nice, very bench. She kinda down more than Europe at the moment. Balance out your weight through your feet.

Release tension through the neck and shoulders, whatever you have to do. [inaudible] an inhale. Exhale. Begin to straighten the legs as you fold in. Half more, keeping your face pretty close to your legs and bend again. I feel the shoulders still kind of gently falling down your back so they haven't slid off your back yet. Nice grace and extend Ben again this time. Let's just straighten the right leg. Keep the left knee very bent so your hips will be out of alignment.

The feet are still balanced though. Both heels are on the ground. Bend both knees, drop the hips a little and straightened. Only the left leg, sending that hip out almost to the side or at least up higher to the ceiling and the other one drops down, touching almost your forehead or nose to the knee and just switch again. This 10 can you lift the toes of the straight leg, just the toes and bend that opposite knee more evenly. Weight the foot, the toes go back down and we transitioned again last time. Find your stretch, even weight. Bend the knee a little more than you did before. Pick up the toes. The ball of the foot is still down. By the way, head is heavy, toes are down, both knees bent. Draw the abs in and up. I think it might be a good idea to take hands above knees and use a little bit of arm pressure to help you roll up, stacking your spine, lifting yourself up over your feet and then from there just let the arms slip forward and up. Inhale, exhale, letting your arms just drift down where it feels most comfortable.

I'm doing one more of those. Take a big deep breath up. I'm almost done here. Bring it down. And then with your arms heavy in neck long, take your left ear to your left shoulder and gently, gently, gently, gently let the right arm be a little heavier or even reach it down and maybe even out a little nothing, nothing too heavy. Take your face. If you're left here, still left shoulder, just look down to that left corner. Still gently reaching your arm channel. Just roll to the center.

Pick your head up in the middle. We'll go the other way. That other arms free right here to right shoulder, left arm heavier, no excuse to sync on yourself. You're still tall. If it feels good, you may want to reach the arm out, away from the body, a little for additional different stretch, and then look down what I call the right corner. Roll your chin toward the center, picking your head up. Reconnect and just float the arms about halfway out. And as you exhale, let go of any tension. One more time. [inaudible] and great work. Thank you guys.

Comments

Nice workout! Thank you Kristi!
CJ
kristi, great class. we love you in canada. blanche.
Another great class, thanks!
Great class Kristi!!!
Thanks!! I think I had a nap that day
Loved the class....and the abs variations! Gives me some interesting ways to further challenge patients and clients.
Thanks, enjoyed the class.
I like this class! I've been away from Pilates for a bit so some parts were tough, but great workout. I feel it!
LOVED this one,Kristi! Great variations and cues to deepen the most basic work, bringing more depth and refinement to it! Thank you so much!!!! :))
Juhuuu, today I have enjoyed this video! That's still good.... (big smile) Please, for Christmas...LOL can you please make such a video....(60min,Levell 2 or 2/3) PLEASE!

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