Class #3488

Reformer Movement Patterns

60 min - Class
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Description

Look at the similarities between different exercises in this Reformer workout with Meredith Rogers. She continues on from her Fundamental Reformer Progression, getting into more advanced movements. She explores the relationship between different movement patterns so we can understand what we need to work on in our practices.
What You'll Need: Reformer w/Box

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Jul 12, 2018
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Hi, thanks for being here. This class is intended as a continuation of a reformer reformer asset it progression that I've been working on for a little while now. Um, so this is class number five in the progression and we'll be getting more into some of the more advanced movements so this class can be taken on its own, or if you're curious about exploring a little bit more deeply, the relationship between the foundational movements and the more advanced movements as well as just playing a little bit with variations on some common themes. I go back and check in. Those of us who have been following this progression series have been practicing the fundamentals and then practicing the next step. So here's the next step. Ready?

So we're going to start standing. I have one red spring attached to my reformer. I'm going to start just by standing, just almost close to the foot bar right up close to it. We're going to inhale and take the arms out to the sides. As the arms come up overhead, I want you to feel that you're lifting your chest and letting go of anything that isn't serving you in this moment so that you can press your arms down and concentrate on bringing into your experience what you do need. Okay, so let's do that again. In here. I'll take up a lot of space.

Reach the arms up overhead, let the chest lift, get longer in your spine, and then press the arms back out to the sides. Is that you could touch both sides of the room. Feel the spine lengthen, feel the arms come all the way down to the sides of the body. Okay, well let's just do that one more time. We'll reach out and ah, this time, instead of coming down to the outsides of the body, let's dive up and over the foot bar, taking the hands just onto the carriage. Right at the edge of the carrot, we're going to eat Ilan gate through the body and bringing the back out into a long, low diagonal, and I'm just reaching right over the top of that foot bar.

We're going to inhale there. Exhale, push the reformer away, roll through the spine. So there's a ripple effect. Okay. And in here, so if you have been working with me through this progression series, you'll see things that will repeat. I think repetition is a, it's an important aspect of this work as well as looking at the relationship between different movement patterns. We want to be practiced in our movement patterns. We find the long spine. This feels amazing to me.

I'm trying not to lean forward or away from the bar. I'm just trying to hold that bar right underneath me and keep my pelvis right over my feet. Push the reformer ways we dropped the head between the arms and we're going to do one more inhale as you reach out and exhale as we come back in. And just one more time like that and I'll reach out. Exhale, come back in and then leaving the reformer as it is on the stopper.

Come all the way up through the spine. Take Yams around and up, open the chest, lift the chest, and then let's just squat down and add some spring. So I'm going to choose to use three reds in one blue spring for my footwork and I'm just setting it up. Now. From there, we're going to come and lie down on our back and we're just going to do a real simple warm up today. Get the body prepared for some more challenging movements later. So starting with the heels on the foot, bar, the arms next to the sides of the body.

Inhale as you exhale, feel the weight of the feet on the bar and then just begin peeling the body up off the reformer, sending the arms long, reaching the head out and back. Behind us you're lifting the hips, nice and high, taken India and then Exa as we hurled down through the spine. When a feel the activity in the arms, there could be light activity in the arms, it could be light and reaching activity in the arms. We just want to make sure that we're connected to our whole body, so maybe the arms press back a little. Maybe the arms are reaching forwards. Maybe they can do both things at the same time in healing at the top, lifting the Hipsa, excelling as you roll down. So mobilizing the back of the body by using the front of the body to create said mobilization and would just do two more. Exhaling to lift.

Yeah. Inhale and exhale to peeled down. Okay. Keeping the gaze soft and one more inhale and exhale to the left. [inaudible] and in here. And exhale to lower down.

Yeah. And then once you arrive all the way down onto your back, just turn sideways so that your back stays on the reform. Or sorry, I'm going to give you that view instead of the upside down view of my face. Okay. All right. So we're gonna bring the hands behind the head and then just let the lower legs relaxed towards the back of the head. I'm inflection right now, limited.

Take my upper body over the back. Inhale. Exhale, curl the head and chest. So this is one of my favorite ways to do a warmup. I just believe that. So nice to have some extension work in our, in our flection abdominal based program. So exhaling as we lift in a little while, we'll we'll focus on just maintaining trunk flection, but for now, let's enjoy that full range of the thoracic spine. Taking it over the back in here, bringing it up as we exhale.

Okay. We'll just do one more. Xcel to the left. We're going to hold there. Take the hands to the backs of the thighs. Keep lifting the body. Bring the hands back to that behind the head. They'll take one leg down and shange keeping the height of the curl, feeling the back side of the leg that's reaching for the floor.

Stay nice and strong. Nice and engaged. We'll do three, three, two, two, one, one. We're gonna take the hands to the outside of the lifting leg and pull into rotation. Lift into rotation. So fill that. You can use your arms not only to help you find deeper work in your body, but also to feel the rotation, that deep rotation of the rib cage. We're going to do three more. [inaudible].

Two more. One more hands behind the head and no, we just continue down across the, as you're coming through the center, try to keep the height of the body. We just do two more of each. [inaudible] one more of these. Yes. The simple things can be the most difficult. Lift the head and chest. One more variation. Take the hands behind and just start to take both knees away from you and then both knees come in, both knees go.

I feel the chest is and trying to follow the knees forward and poor bear could do this in a full tabletop position. I'm just letting my lower legs be fairly relaxed. We're doing three more. Two more. Excellent. Dig Deep. One more. Take the hands behind the thighs. Rock.

I lay back on the reformer. Okay, so the heels of the sheet or on the bar arms come to rest down at our signs. Revisiting our pumping series. We stretch out and pull. Feeling again, just going through a checklist of of things to check in with. Where is the neck? Is there tension?

Where are the arms or the shoulders sliding up against the shoulder blocks or can we feel that the arms are reaching all the time? So there's about a bunch of things. You probably have your own personal checklist that check in with the things that you like to check in with. We're doing this one and one more so out and pull pause and tiny pumps. So there's a push in a pool staying nice and close to the bumper, reaching, pressing the arms into the mat.

Last for three to stretch out and bend using our footwork. So those are the continuation. We're on our toes now. A continuation of our warm up, get the body nice and ready all the way out and all the way, all the way out and all the way in feeling that full length. Can you transition energy from the center of the body, from the center of the body has where the legs straightened front from the back of the head and last for pulling three, pulling it to pulling in one more ounce and back. And two, not every movement gets TB advanced.

We'll get there, but I assure you in a little wow. Heels together, toes apart on the bar, rat through the back of the legs. As you press out, bringing the legs together and Ben Pressing out heels pressed together and stretch and bed and stretch. Feel the abdominals. Connect. Feel the full length of the spine. Bring awareness to your breath and how you can bring each movement its own breath. We'll do one more out and pause.

Tiny pumps. Pressing the heels together, being aware of the backside of the body, being aware of the orientation of the pelvis. We have four, three, two. Take it all the way back and bend it. You know what I have to say is I'll just suggestion there was maybe something that you need to bring to your practice. And so we all look for what we need. Stretch all the way out. Why be heels and pull back in. Stretch all the way out and pull back. Anchoring through the back of both hips all the way out and pull back and okay.

Feeling the heels sliding towards one and on that Amir sliding towards one another on the bar to keep the insides of the legs active and strong. We'll do two more outs and back in one more ass and back in and how we pump. Pump out and in getting into the breath. Last four inner thighs, outer thighs too, and take it out and bend it and moving to the toes. Keeping that sense of inner thighs drawing inwards, stretching out, resisting Karajan stretching out.

[inaudible] just breathing. We have four more. Checking in to check in with my scapula and make sure they're not pinching together. Checking that their ribs are soft. Last time bend and tiny pumps out in and out and feel the abdominals pulled back away from the fabric of your clothing. And we are two for three working both directions. Two and one come back in.

Come to the center of the bar on the toes. Press all the way out. Take both heels down and both heels up. Can we connect the lifting of the heels down in, up to the backside of the legs, all the way up the legs. Can we connect the lifting of the heels all the way back up the backs of the legs into the front of the body so that we're lifting from the center of the body and we'll do four.

I believe that if we think about it, anything enough we can create sensation. One more. So we go up onto both toes. Ben. One knee, one heel drops both feet lift and change. So into our prancing. One foot pushing into the bar as the other heel is pulling under the bar. So the heels are that, sorry, not the heels, but the feet on the bar are equally active to one another.

Equally active to one another. Yeah. Okay. So we're going for an up and fury up and then to working the scas one, Eh, eh. Good. Well if both heels bend both knees, reach out and set the back of the knees on the foot bar.

Lift the head and chest up. We're going to try to roll ourself up from here. Oh, I grabbed the foot bar. Snuggle the knees right under the foot burden. Lift the chest up. Okay. Reach down here and readjust your springs. I'm going to a red and a blue spring.

Taking the arms forward again, pressing down into the bar with the backs of the knees or the back of the calves. We'll shift and come all the way down. I promised you some thoracic holding challenged, didn't I? Here we go. We'll start with the coordination. That's from way back. Way Back in our progression series. What we're going to start revisiting thing. So in here as we XO, we lift up, stretch the legs, open, close, bend and exhale. Lift up the leg.

Straight. Open, close pole. Lift the body and exhale, lift, stretch, open, close. Pull in. Really Stan. Exhale, left open, close. Pull in. Here's a different type of coordination. XL to left. Hold open the legs, reach through the legs and lift one.

Lift to lift three separate the legs, bend the knees and come down. Exhale, head and chest. Open the legs, reach through the legs and lift. One to think of just going higher, not down in a legs that come together. Arms separate. And one more time. Exhale, lift open and reach through to one arm. Separate legs come together, bend and come down.

Exhale, lift the head and chest externally, rotate the hips and the shoulders open. Hold the back and in here abdominal openings and together and in here and back and in here and back. Three, two, one. Then the knees lower the body and lift the body. One leg down, one leg, so it's a push. Pull, a push, pull. Push for last two, keeping the chest lifted. One more.

Both. Thanks. And I pose legs down and up, both legs, down the chest, both legs with the chest and up. Two more times, keeping the height of the body. One more time holding here. Reverse curl and reach the arms. Reverse girl and reverse. Curl and down to more. Rover. Scurrah and down. One more time. Reverse curl. Place that head down and we're going to come from there.

Take the legs down, lift them. We're going, no rollover. Flex the seat. Keep the legs together. Just roll the body down. Roll the body down as the legs go down with arms, lower the arms down, practicing the roll over. Exhale as we lift up and over, flex the scene, roll the body down. Just do one more like that.

That's getting us prepared for another thing. XL Rollover. Flex the c roll down all the way. Once you arrived down and bend your knees, place the straps on your feet. Revisiting our circles coming back, getting the hips nice and warm.

Three take the legs down around and take the legs around and take the legs down. All round. And let's do about three more today. Feeling just that fluid motion in the hips. Yeah. One more. Down and around. And then reverse open and reach down and together.

Lift open and reach down and take out. And I'll, if so, we're keeping the trunk stable or giving ourself a chance to catch our breath so to speak. [inaudible] do three more like that. So nice fluid, even circles. Okay. Coming all the way to the bottom. Bending the knees into the extended frog so we take the legs forward, keep the heels on the seam. Linus, their legs open.

Feel the outer hips and the inner thighs working together to stabilize the carriage. As the heels come back together and stretch out. Open the legs, heels come together. Knees press apart and press add. And inhale. Feel the work in the hips. Exhale in here.

And press two more open. Feel the work, create the work. Inhale and press. Last one. Open. Come through and press and Ben. Take legs out, reach, bend, keeping the carriage still. Reach away out.

Find the stretch and then pull from the stretch and bend Oh Ben full through and bend to a more open come together. One more time. The hips should feel nice and warm. Now Open. Come through heels together, toes apart. Lift the legs up so that they're just vertical. When I do the long spine again.

So you're going to press into the straps with the feet. Keep the carriage still as you roll up through the spar. So this exercise is very closely related to an exercise we're going to do in a minute. So from here you roll down again using the legs just enough to keep the carriage still, but not enough to move it out from underneath us. Is that an obvious cue? Maybe.

So what I mean or a different way to say that is there's a fine line between how much or how little to use the legs as you're looking to stabilize the carriage low, not enough, and the carriage will move too much and the carriage will move. We just find that perfect amount of work there. Calm down together. We'll do one more so left reminding us that the back of the body has to work really hard in this movement and roll down, rounding, flexing through the spine, come all the way down, down and together we'll just do a few short spines because they feel nice and because next time after we've continued to practice these almost through every single one of these classes. I'm going to teach you one more thing in the short spine, but we're not going to do it today. I'm going to just put that little, that little spoiler there and then you'll have to watch the next one and then bringing the legs through and forward. Inhale, lifting the legs towards the body.

We bring carriage all the way into the stopper. As we exhale, we keep the carriage still lift up. Then the knees healed, really deepen into that flection, deepen into that flection reached through and come for just one more left, a n over with the legs. So the carrots come to this. Stop or roll through this spine. Lift up, bend the knees in. Okay. Oh No. Roll down.

Coming all the way through. Take the straps in your hands, make sure you have a tiny little bit of space between your shoulders and your shoulder blocks. Sin. Set the arms up so that the hands are right over. The shoulders are going into the Jack Beck. Just want to illustrate that. Yeah, similarities are the relationship between the long spine and the Jackknife.

So this time we press with the arms and then how we learn the roll over just to get into this position. From there, the legs go down, they reach up, we use the back of the arms, we use the back of the legs, and then we slowly articulate the body rolling the body down. So that's the next step to our rollover. It's very relatable to the lung spine in here and Exa up and over and reach up, up, up, up and exhales or rural down keeping Longreach in the arms. [inaudible] and take the legs down, lift the arms up. We'll just do one more lifter. Reach up and over. Reach up.

Oh the way [inaudible] and come down. [inaudible] if the RMS and Denise said the arm is down the street, the knees over the foot bar again with the arms up, lift the body up. Okay. And once again, find that nice lifted position in the spine. Feel so good in the upper back to me.

[inaudible] okay, so let's go to one red spring. Okay. So we've done a lot of different lunges throughout this progression series. We started with the standing or the most basic gone through the kneeling. We've gone through the full Lens, which we're going to do again today.

So you're going to step up onto the reformer and take one foot back up into the shoulder, the older block and put the other foot up onto the foot bar. And then we just get into that nice long position with the back of the leg. Really firing in that back leg. We have a pause here, do a couple of breasts and then we're going to try just take the pelvis straight back, trying to keep the back as long as we can, as much as we can into extension. And then then didn't, so we did this last time and I told you that this time we would let go. So today's the today, but if that's not something that you are interested in doing or doesn't feel available to you at all today, you just keep your hands down on the bar. So if you're letting go, we're going to do that now.

Bringing the arms out to the side and then we just take the carriage out. Yeah. And back and take the carriage out and back. [inaudible] and take the carriage out. Strong through the back leg and back. Bring the hands back to the Bart.

We'll do one more hamstring stretch there. [inaudible] oh, come in all the way. Step down and change sides. [inaudible]. Okay, so we start in the lunge position with the knee just over the ankle on that side. Really strong through that back leg. And then we take the pelvis back, lengthening out through the spine [inaudible] and come in lifting the chest up whole away from the knee.

Yeah, go one more time. Lengthen out [inaudible] [inaudible] lifting the chest up away from the knee. Here it is, finding our balance, bringing the arms out to the sides and let me just stretch that top leg, their front leg forward. There's a one last step to this exercise just so you know the progression continuous, but I don't know about you. I feel like I need to practice this one for a little bit before moving on. Come back in. Place the arms down, hands on the foot bar. Step both feet back. See if you can bring the reformer right into the stopper.

Coming right away into the up stretch three. So we bring the hips up, we come through the Ab stretch to all of these things. We practiced in pieces. We come all the way forward and lift the hips, heels, reaching down. Nice long spine. Press out, keeping the upper arm still. So we're pivoting around the shoulder joints there. Lift up, we'll keep the carriage.

So when you lift from the front to the back, Meredith, and when you go out, sometimes you just need to remind yourself that all the pieces are important. Oh, the tiny pieces we go out, come through, find the stopper, come through to the AB stretch position. One more time out and forward and lift. So coming back down into the elephant position, feel that you're pressing the weight of your body back into your legs, pushing into the foot part with the arms. Take the carriage out, back in. So this is one from our early days and back then. And that's, that's all we do. We continue just to go back all the time to the basics because the basics are where each of these more complicated movements come from.

And here's one now taking the left hand to over towards the right hand, taking the left, like off the carriage, around and up to the back. We do the elephant with Arabic task. Heel goes out and lift that back leg lifts. As we bring that supporting leg underneath us. Out Lift and the lift the back leg come around the side with the leg, placing the left arm back, bringing the right arm through. Bring the leg around in a press out if the toes of that leg that supporting Lang reach out.

Keep the head just between the arms as we pull in and out and pull in one more time at and pull in. And then that like comes around. Step in. We'll separate the hands, get nice and low. Take the carriage out and back. Just three more. Inhale and exhale. Inhale and exhale.

And then bringing the knees down onto the mat. Bring the feet together just over the headrest. Take the arms out on the foot bar. Just sink down and give yourself in this shoulders stretch. Okay, so from here, let's roll back up.

We'll add another spring and go into our nice stretches. Go into our knee stretches, so we'll revisit a similar pattern. Arms start on the flip part where we're pulling back away from the flipper with the abdominal. We're going to take the legs out and then really resist as you bring the carriage in in here. Exhale, resist. As we bring the carriage in in hills, we feel the shape, the supported curved shape that has so many relationships, so many relationships, just a nice stable trunk.

We're just going to do one more. So now the magical part where we lift the knees, keep them local, press out and pull in out and pull in out and pull in one more time. Now can you keep the shape in your body? Lift one leg off and out. Pull back in a pull back in. One more. Put both feet down. We'll do one getting set up for the other side out and pull out.

We're just tucked in around with that. That nonmoving leg. Place the foot down. When we're time at come all the way in, lowering, lowering, lowering play Sinise down. That one needs practice for me, so that's just full disclosure can to bring ourself into the down stretch. Just the, just the basic down stretch for now.

Promise to a new different variation on this exercise, which we'll come. Inhale, lift the body into the bar, feel the back of the legs are strong, the abdominals are strong, the upper bodies lifting up in back and we'll just do one more. So the exercise of the variation we practiced last time was to around the spine and straighten. Press that with the legs and come through into the down stretch. Round the spine. Keep to heels on the shoulder blocks. Straighten, press out with the legs. Hips go down, chest reaches up and back. We'll do one more around Streeton. Press at, lift the hips up around.

Here's the second piece. Straight in the back. Press out with the arm. Press out with the lay eggs. Come all the way through, lifting up off the bar and around. Straight in the back. Press out with the arm, press out with the legs. Come all the way through. One more time around. This is called the Cobra and streets and into shoulder flection and into hip extension all the way through into the down stretch.

Bring the feet together behind you. And once again, just sit back into that resting position. [inaudible] so let's roll app. We'll exchange the red spring for a yellow spring and we'll do a different kneeling variation of arm work. [inaudible] so you're going to come just up into the shoulder blocks with the sigh that out the inside thigh. Take the strap in your hand and hold it just below the rib cage.

From there, the upper arms going to lift the bar. Lower arm reaches out, we bend and come back. So we go up our arm, lower arm, lower arm, upper arm and upper arm, lower arm, keeping the body just stable. We'll do two more [inaudible] last one, keeping the elbow higher than the hand threw out. And then we'll come across to the opposite hand. Elbow in front of the strap, lift up and come back up and come back. Keeping the body squared and back to them, or reaching just up in a straight lie. One more. Okay, come all the way down.

Carefully bring yourself to the opposite side of the carriage is out doing a lot of reformer noises. Hips, press forward. Handholds the strap, the elbows just up from the shoulder. The shoulder blade is on the outside of the rib cage and we just press up from there, keeping that upper arm nice and still biasing towards little bit of extra rotation. Press and bench press and bend. Press and bend. Come around. Change hands, both arms out to the side. [inaudible] trying to make it hard to tell which arm is pulling tension and which arm is not three more.

Yeah, trying to keep both hips facing forward. Two more and last time and then we'll come all the way back. We'll place that strap down. We'll just come around to the other side. So we start with the inside. Sigh right up against the shoulder. Block that outside hand holding onto the strap. We're going to take the arm out. Keep the elbow just higher than that.

Hand through, so out. Press Ah, bend and come back in out press. Ah, you want to think about that post terrier deltoid as you're going to straighten your arm two more times. Upper arm, lower, lower arm, upper arm. One more. Let me take the strap in the opposite hand. Feel the lift of the hand is directly relatable to the feeling of pulling the shoulder blade down the back. The arm reaches straight up and come straight back down. One more time, like you're just drawing a straight line and then you can bring the strap with you. Just carefully bring yourself to the other end of the reformer.

Taking the strap in your hand, pressing the pelvis forward. Sometimes that's the hardest position to achieve is getting aligned. Their elbow go straight up from the hand. Eyes are down and we press straight straight up. Okay, so really advanced arm series to do correctly.

Yeah. One more [inaudible] and then I'll come all the way up. [inaudible]. Well if da and Dan and raise both arms and down feeling the rotation of the shoulder blade as the arm is lifted overhead last too. [inaudible] one more and then come all the way out. Reached down and put the strap away.

We're going to go to back to a red spring and we'll revisit that long back stretch. So we talked about this last time or we practiced this last time. We're going to go back to it and I just want to note the, the relevance between this exercise and the next exercise that we'll learn, which is the tendon stretch. So your hands are just on the outside of your hips and a step out. Step out, bend the arms, roll through the spine, lift the hips high, so as you tucking in, you're using the backs of your legs are getting very round in your back.

This is the tendance stretch right here, right here. This feeling, lifting the back of the legs, deepening the abdominals, straighten out your back. End Bend. Inhale. Exhale. In previous sessions in this progression, we've done chest shrugs or just stabilization exercises. So if this hasn't, I feel I can available movement to you. You could do that rounding. Yeah, pulling back, lifting up out of the arms, bend, roll through, pull back in and stay stable in the shoulders as we unwind. Step in from there. Today we won't do the full tenent stretch.

We'll just do a little prep. The tendons stretch that we can practice until we meet again. So what you'll do is you'll come onto the edge of the reformer on your toes, really right where the toes meet the feet. What I want us to do is hold onto the bar and then keep the carriage still as you just step up. Okay, so today we're just going to do tiny tendon stretch. I want you to feel here that you're pushing two into the bar with your arms that you're using that to create a really deep rounded shape with your body.

And then we're just going to go out in here and back in and out in here, back keeping the heels down. Lift. This is the hard part of the exercise actually. So if we can get this one really solid, next step will be a little easier. Really use your arms one more inhale and exhale. Bring the carriage all the way in. Then Janiece and step off. So we're going to grab a box, go into our side over as we were done, a lot of different variations on those.

Starting from just holding the body still to moving the body, to moving the body with a longer lever. And today we'll add some rotation. So I like sighting. So let's put the springs on. I'll bring the leg up underneath the strap, come onto the headdress with your hand, find a straight line.

Start by bringing one hand behind the head. We'll bring the other hand behind that. We'll go down to three and a down to three and ah, one more time like that, down to three. And Ah, adding in the long lever arms. We go down and up. Open the arms and rotate.

Come back long lever, arms go down, lift open the arms and her otay and back. Arms reach. Go Down, lift up, open the arms, rotate back to center, back to arms overhead and all the way over. I'm going to give us a pause here just to breathe in. Stretch. Maybe it feels good to you to a lot. The top of the pelvis. Roll back feels really good to me.

Maybe you want to rotate the body and turn to stretch out through the lower back a little more. Okay. It's taking a few breaths and then coming on. Changing sides. Yeah, I mean onto the outside of the head. He owns behind the head.

Finding your straight line going over and AH, over and reach out. One more. Reach out, find your longer lever, reach down in here and ah, arms out, rotate. Come back, arms over head. We go down and AH, Ahrens add, turn your body, come back, arms overhead, go down and ah, arms open, rotate, combat arms overhead. We take it all the way down. [inaudible] hmm. And I need to pause for a minute to enjoy our stretch.

So allowing the hips to maybe roll back or roll forward or push the leg out through the strap or really whatever feels good to you in your body here and turn if that feels good. Yeah. Okay. And then come up. What we're going to do next is just a combination of the back extension movements that we've already learned and also something new. So I recommend a red spring or blue.

You'll decide I'm choosing a red for myself. Let me come onto the box. So we energize through the langues in her reach forward for this. So today we'll go a long arms, come straight to the body prone one bend and straighten your elbows. Take the arms out to a t, bring the arms back, bring the whole piece down. So we need a breath pattern in there, don't we?

Let's inhale and exhale. We just breathe how it suits. Take the arms out, bring the arms back and come down. We'll do that three times. Reach out to lift stat, then press arms, reach out and back. And when I said three, I didn't mean only three, I actually meant three more. Sorry if that's disappointing. This is the last to come out. Ben. Straighten, reach out, pull back and lower it down. One more time.

Pull back, been press reach out, pull back, come all the way down. So if you have your hands wrapped like I did, we're gonna unwrap them. So the last thing that we're going to do is we're going to take the hands on the underside of the strap. So the thumbs face out, the straps are in the hands. Create length, create energy. In the center of the body. Gonna bend the elbows in, lift the back, straighten the arms, hold the body highs, the arms reach overhead and take everything down. Then the elbows re chow.

Take the arms around to the front and three more bent. Stretch back where it was. Come around to the front and the body goes down and bend and reach. Take the arms around to the front and down. Last time, band lift, reach, arms come around to the front.

All the way down. We'll hang the straps back up onto the hooks. We'll step off the box and put the box away. Okay, and we'll come full circle. So coming back around, standing just in front of the foot bar, taking the arms around and up. [inaudible] I don't know about you guys, but I feel like I worked and I definitely know what I need to practice.

[inaudible] and you bring the chin to the chest. Take the hands onto the reformer. Lengthen the body out. Long. Wait, just back into that pyramid shape or long back. Let's bend the elbows wide, bringing the carriage towards the top of the head.

Stretch the arms out and are tickling back through. Just allowing the body to have a little stretch the back muscles to have a little stretch, hamstrings, to have a little stretch check back in at the end bend. Yeah, and stretch. Push the reformer away as you roll back all the way in. One more time at home, Eh, and Ben opening up the back stretch and Rola, let go and [inaudible] bringing the arms up over her head.

She then the length of the body [inaudible] opening the chest as we take the arms all the way down. Okay. That should give us something to practice for awhile.

Reformer Workouts: Fundamental Reformer Progressions

Comments

1 person likes this.
Loved it Mer :D
And I loved the way you left the 'stage' :D
Like you so muchhhhhhh
AnnS
1 person likes this.
Right ON! That was a week's worth of whatever! Thanks so much for the challenge, Meredith.
1 person likes this.
Felt awesome and went so fast! I loved when you said “you can’t use too much or too little leg when doing long spine.
I still need to work on standing front splits with no hands, tendon stretch, and for some reason knee stretch has never been my favorite exercise. I’ll keep doing it though. Thank you Meredith!
2 people like this.
Thank you for creating a deliberately paced 2/3 class. This was my first 2/3 class in three years (due to trying to rebuild my body after surgery and pregnancy). I felt strong, thanks to your guidance!

Just wondering if you could do a jack knife tutorial. That’s something I am a bit fuzzy on (and was unable to do today).
1 person likes this.
Love the creative variations on the moves. Thank you for an inspiring class.
1 person likes this.
Just used your class to inspire my own class! My clients loved it! Thank you for inspiring me and keeping making me a better mover and teacher!!! Can’t wait to visit you again now that my son has moved to California!!
Thank you so much everyone!!
This class was SUPER hard for me so kudos to you all for making it through.
I appreciate hearing your feedback so much.
Stacey I will put your jackknife tutorial in my request queue.
1 person likes this.
Hi Meredith! I absolutely LOVE your classes on PA. In the beginning of this class, you mentioned this was a 5 class progression with this one being the most advanced. However, I didnt see the other classes listed. Can you please let me know what the class numbers are so I can take the others? Thanks so much!
Thank you Karin!
#1 class 2993
#2 class 2994
#3 class 2996
#4 class 3168
And this is #5.
Hope you enjoy the others!
1 person likes this.
Hi Meredith. These progression classes were amazing, thank you so much! I can't wait for more! :)
For some reason, I have a very hard time doing the rollover. Any suggestions? I can do them on the mat, no problem. That's why i don't understand why this is so difficult for me. ????
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