Class #458

Strengthening Towel Flow

55 min - Class
36 likes

Description

Use a Towel to strengthen and stretch in this Mat class taught by Meredith. You will challenge your shoulder stability and flexibility as well as learn how to use your towel to assist your abdominal work, hamstring flexibility, and spinal flexibility.
What You'll Need: Mat, Towel

About This Video

Jun 09, 2011
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Transcript

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All right, well let's start standing. So we've all got towels. We're going to use them in a minute, but um, yeah, we'll get used them in a minute. Let's fix them now. So what I want you to excuse me do with them is roll them up so that they're link wise, make like a little roll out of it. These are quite long. Um, which is good. But like just a regular old bath towel. Do the job as well. Um, by bath towel, I mean more of a hand towel size longer as good. We can do a lot with a long towel actually. And then, uh, let's start facing forward and once you get your towel rolled up, just lay it down at your feet.

Yeah, probably. Okay. And then just, I'm checking for alignment. Just look down at your feet. See that they're facing straight ahead and going up the chain. See the ankles straight up and down. Just over the feet and knees, just over the ankles, the hips just over the knees, shoulders, just over the hips, the head on top of the shoulders. And we start with the standing roll down. Inhaling, feeling the ribcage expand to the sides. Exhale, allowing the head to draw forward, feeling the contraction of the abdominals.

As you just allow your body to lightly reach into the ground. The head relaxes forward. The arms are relaxed with the shoulders in place on the back and we exhale drawing up through the abdominals. It's making your way up, coming all the way to standing. And again, me inhale, reaching the arms down. These should be just near the sides of the thighs. Exhale, the head goes down first. Draw a ride way back through the abdominals as you continue to articulate the spine so you're folding your spine forward on the further your body goes, the more that you want to focus on the upward pull through the abdominal muscles had reaches further into the ground this time and there's another inhale.

Exhale. As we start the journey back up, letting the pole the shift a little forward, peeling the spine, and let's do one more in healing. Prepare, exhale. Just checking in, allowing whatever other stresses you have in your life to go away. Maybe they'll go just out the top of your head. Checking in with your body, linking your breath to your movement, exhaling to come. Oh, while you're there, grab your towel and bring it with you as you roll up. Okay, so we're going to come into Pele's, um, stance here, a lot, easy position, and you're just going to take your towel out in front of you. Oh, Deb, you're leaning back a little bit. All right. Arms just in front of the shoulder. So just opposite the shoulders. We're right away. We zip up from the heels.

We're right to the, where the legs meet the bum. And then from here we just pull apart on the towel a little bit. It's not actually going to change much, but as you exhale, just feel, it's like the shoulder blades are drawing slightly towards one another, not squeezing, but just pressing in as you try to stretch the towel. Really sit a little and stretch the towel. Just do that a few times. Feeling the upper back muscles working.

You're doing it again, dad, go this way. There you go. It just, it'd be more of like a rib cage down the front of the body. It'll feel like you're a little round. Perfect. [inaudible] with like a little pulsing action. We're going to go ten nine, eight, seven working from underneath the shoulder blades, keeping the abdominals pulled and zipped in too. I think one. Let's take the arms up overhead. As we inhale, feel the spine lengthen upwards. Your arms will go as far back as you can without lifting the shoulders or arching the back, and then we just push the towel back down.

Breathe in as you length in the arms that feel the spider reaching into the air and then press the arms down. Just make sure that when your towel goes overhead, you're not arching your back in order to bring it where it goes. So the ribs to be connected down the front of the body, we still have nice, tight, strong legs. Maybe we'll go a little further each time and then press the towel down and then reach the Tele and press the towel down. Let's do that one more time. [inaudible] excuse me.

And then from the top here, we're going to inhale. Taking the towel up. I want you to again, feel a sense of trying to stretch it. As you bend it, it may go behind you, it may just touch the top of your head. Feel the shoulder blades draw down as the tower reaches back up in space and then take it back down. Let's go all the way to the body. This time. Inhale all the way up, challenging the fly, the flexibility of the shoulders. Feel the shoulder blades draw down, continue to stretch the towel and come down. Feel how that warms up our upper body. Keeps strong through the waist, strong through the legs, pull back, reach up and go forward.

Let's do that two more times. It's up. Pull down stretcher and go forward. One more to go up, pull back, stretch up and hold. Take the body over to one side. Keep the head frame just between the arms. Exhale to lift back up, growing taller through the body and he'll reach over and out and exhale to lift back up. And again, we're working away like our body is a tree limb and our legs are the trunk of the tree, so the trunk stays super solid as the limbs just sway back and forth. See that one more time around to each side. If your hands get a little tired, you can make fests or I like to hold with my thumbs. Okay.

We're going to come back to center. We're going to lower the towel all the way down. We're going to go for a shoulder stretch here, so you're going to come up. Don't push it too far, but try to, you want to be right at the edge. Just relax the arms backwards as far as you can.

Maybe you'll get all the way around maybe. Well and then come up and come all the way down in heel. We come up. If you liked the the one where you bent your elbows more, that would be appropriate as well. Just challenging the flexibility of the shoulder. That and so strong legs. Inhale, exhale, reaching behind. Yeah, just drop the left shoulder a tiny bit yet. Good.

Let's go two more times in Haleigh and reach behind Anna and damn high. How do you think, how do you say last one reaching that? Nope. And that's okay. All right. Take your feet out wide. Okay, so you have the heels reaching in towards one another. Ah, you can again, just wider arms is, we'll be a little bit different than narrow arms as far as easier. So I'm going wide. We're going to, you just roll it up like a, um, I don't know. Can't think of it. Roll it up into a donut. As you inhale, bend your knees and pull the towel into your chest.

Elbows are as high as the shoulders, so you want that perpendicular alignment of the elbow to shoulder. Press the legs out and straighten the arms. Then the knees on the elbows, bringing the towel into your chest, focusing on upper back control. If it feels tense on your neck, bring the towel a little lower and press and pull to the chest to try to sink a little deeper into that plea and pull to the chest. Try not to bend forward with the body. So you want the trunk to be just over the pelvis and forward warming up the legs here.

Let's do five and forward pulling from the shoulders so it's more of a back movement than a hand or arm movement. Keep the towel stretch like you could bounce a quarter off it if you wish to. Here's our last one and then coming up again once again to tell it goes over the head. Once again, we're going to stretch over to one side. We want to get a little bit further with the legs at wide. Annex a lift, shoulders down in her reach across an XL. Lift this time as we take the spine over, let's press the hips out to the other sigh and exhale to lift.

Then take the spine over, pressing the hips to the other side and exhale to the left and then just bring the towel down and we're going to come to the mat to just sitting down. Isn't it funny? As soon as the traffic, as soon as the daylight savings come, the traffic gets bad right away. All you need is an extra hour of daylight. I don't know why. Okay, so we still have the towel. If at any time you want to put this down, if your hands get tired, if your arms get tired, and this is just pull out ease, you can put it away. And here comes Lisa. Oh my goodness. Hi Lisa.

So you guys can find towels. Um, you guys wrap a towel around your feet. Hold on, close to your feet and give yourself a stretch. Couldn't find towels just at the back and then continue to hold with your hands where they are and press the spine out and forth. So it's like spine stretch forward here, but you get to pull with your arms. Give yourself a little tiny bit more XL as you curl back away so you're still holding onto the tower. Rounding the spine rolling backwards this time instead of forwards.

And then inhale like a wave. Take the chest forward, send the tailbone backwards and use the arms and the towel to assist you there. Xcel feel the pelvis tuck under. Curve the spine back. Um, avoid the temptation to a hunch. The shoulders are to really lift them into your ears. On the inhale, we pull ourselves forward. So there's a little bit of arm involvement, but mostly it's spinal movement. Sending the chest forward, maybe you'll go a little lower to your body this time or to your legs and flexing back. Lovely. Curling the spine. Here's our last one. Lengthening the body out, flexing the body back and then coming back just to upright. Unhook the towel from your feet.

Bend your knees, a telus going to stay out in front of you. And um, for those of you who just came in, I said, if you want to put the towel down, you can. Okay. Inhaling, prepare. So we just get a little shoulder work, which is what we're doing here. Pulling the towel apart or stretching it. We curl down, rolling down just to the bottom of the pelvis in Ewing to pause there excelling, to curl forward. Set the shoulders over the pelvis and then lengthen the spine, pressing the shoulders back. Exhale as we curl down again. And just rounding back, finding the low back maybe. And then curling forward. Shoulders over, hips, abdominals deep to the spine and left. We need to do that one more time. Rolling back and rolling and left. Exhale, this time we're gonna change it a little bit till we find our way back down.

Find a place where your body feels strong and then inhale the towel up and exhale to bring it down. And in here we stretch overhead again. If you want to challenge yourself, try to go behind your head. But if you're doing that, don't judge the neck flow. It's just arms. Spine stays in alignment. Last two times are, and Dan, one more time in feeling the body up. Exhaling. Inhale, pause and XL to come.

Sitting up tall. We're going to rotate in my direction. Turning, keeping that rectangular space between the arms and the chest. Peel down on that side of the body. Take a breath in to hold. Exhale to roll right back up that side. And Inhale, come center. Inhale as we turn the other way. Exhale, feel the pelvis move first. Deepen the abdominal contraction. Inhale, pause, exhale to a roller.

Sit and tall and come center. Go and again to the front. Excellent to roll back, mobilizing the sides of the waist, coming up, back to center, over to the other side. Feel the rotation first and then the movement of the pelvis. Bleaks working hard and then we come up and come back to center. I'm gonna change it just a little bit. We turn exhale to go down.

This time when you get to your low position, you're going to raise your towel, EPR, rotate your body around to the other side, curl up that side and find center. Here's the breath. Inhale to turn. Exhale to reach it downward. Starting from the pelvis. Keep the shoulders down. Inhale, reach up, spiral the body around to the other side. XOP left that side and come back to center. One more time around.

Inhale and exhale robe and I mean he'll be arms come up and across and we XL so Rola and unwind. Last time. I like these long tiles. There's a lot we can do. This is going to be fun. Was Up then a cross and Xcel to come up that side. Find your way back to center and just make your way down all the way, bringing the towel with you, and then we're just going to slide the feet in for a pelvic curl. The towel can rest at your side for a couple of moments.

So we've got our feet on the ground, our arms, long and straight neck, long and straight. Breathing and prepare. Exhale, we curl the spine up, leading with the pelvis, articulating a bone by bone until the knees in the shoulders. Create a a ramp, a straight diagonal line. Exhale, allow the chest to drop through the arms. Press the shoulders back as you do so. Peeling the spine down to the ground and reaching the arms in the direction of the heels. Inhale to pause at the bottom XL to articulate this fine up curling, carving the spine in healing to pause and excelling to come down. Well, let's do three more like that. We're reaching up.

I'm gonna change it just a little bit. We're going to inhale. Take the arms overhead, keep them just off the ground, but reach them behind you as you take your body into the ground. Changes a stretch a little bit. Feels good. Inhale, take the arms over the shoulders. Xcel peel the spine up and he'll just float the arms overhead, but feel how the shoulders stay stable. It's a similar move into what we're doing with this whole earlier. Hexcel. Peel down.

Feel the shoulder blades moving in the direction that the spine is going as the fingertips reach oppositionally arms forward over the chest. Here's our last one. Excellent Tacoma. Inhale, the arms go up and exhale. We curl down, peeling the spine, and then bring your arms up and just down into a low v position, but walk your feet together. We're going to do a modified spine twist here so the knees and feet are going to stay together. Let's take both towards me. That opposite foot will lift up all the way off the ground. Exhale, using the obliques. We travel back to center.

Inhale as we come across to the other side, and exhale back to center, so it's beneficial here with the feet on the ground to use that to your advantage. Let the hip flexors stay out of the equation. Just mobilize the spine. Feel the obliques working for you as you shift from side to side. Inhale as you come across, drop the rib cage back towards the Mat and then finish with the pelvis and inhale across and exhale back coming towards me. Here comes to change. Inhale, take the top leg and stretch that leg out straight, but keep the knees connected XL to come back to center and fold the knee. In.

Inhale, we take it to the other side. Exhale, the knees are glued. It's only that lower limb that stretches XL to come back home and to rebend the knee. Let's do one more each side. Inhale, Lacrosse, stretch the knee. Exhale curve. Carve back and bend. Last time in he lacrosse ribs. Pull back in opposition to the toe. Exhale to come back and set the foot down on the ground. Take your towel again, maybe make it a little anyway, it's going to go behind your head. Okay, so I'm putting mine just at the base of my skull and then I'm going to have my elbows just pointed right up over my shoulder blade.

So I've created a little hammock with my towel. Breathing in for the chest lift here. Feel the back muscles turn on as you lift and curl into your chest. Lift the head stays heavy on the towel, but the spine is pause as you inhale and then exhale to release down. I'm laughing because cause let's go again.

It feels almost to me like one of those Ab crunchers. Maybe you know those machines. Anyway, what I like is the support for the neck. Let's think about Pele's instead of the AB crunch. Here we go, neutral pelvis. So as you're curling your head and chest up, you're trying to keep your tailbone on the ground. Inhale, we pause. Exhale, working east centric, stretching the abdominals, but continuing to keep them active as we're going down to the ground. Here's our last one.

It's an Xcel to lift and inhale to create intensity and an XL to release down to the ground. Moving on, coming back up into the chest lift position, pausing there, intensify if you can, and then exhale, turn towards me. Brewing in the elbows with you. Try to keep the elbows in the same shape so the rotation happens around the rib cage. Again, let that have it be real heavy in the towel so the abs have to work harder and come back and reaching across. Sending that opposite elbow towards that inside knee and across and center and across and center. Last time, both sides across. Bring it home across brewering and home.

Inhale and release it down all the way coming up again on the exhale. Here it is. Lifting, sliding the feet a little closer to you as you will. Slide your five and then press your chest towards them. Pick up the legs, take both chose down towards the ground. Exhale to drag the toes back in. Inhale the toes go down, kind of light, arms on the towel, but keep the chest pressing to the thighs in. He'll take go down. Exhale, took pullback, deep abdominals. I say flat on the ground and exhale to pull back. We're going one more time.

Inhale down and Xcel up. Pause here to just the right leg to the ground and then exhale. We change in heel. His legs pass excellent as they come into contact. If it doesn't feel good for you to have your head in the towel, you can always put your head down.

You can always put your hands behind your head. You can always just reach the arm straight forward. Lots of options here. Say Two more to each side to one. One both legs up, just the chest down. Just the chest backup. Again, take the leg closest to me towards the ground.

Turn to the leg away from me. So we're back in our rotation and we change. No this time. Let's see if that bent knee can pull into the elbow. But Keith, the upper rotation really strong and stable. So in order to touch the knee to the elbow, don't throw your neck out of alignment. It's not that important. Just reach up and across. Last three, two and one. Both sides for one, both knees up.

Take the towel out from behind your head and lower your body down. Let's wrap the towel around the knees and just use it to pull the knees towards the chest. Okay, we're going to bring the towel back on. Have I've narrowed my hand position slightly? So ma'am, harms are a little wider than my shoulders. Legs start at tabletop. We're going into the a hundred so it's an exhale to lift and then we're just going to modify it a little bit by inhaling, stretch the towel towards the knees and exhale to press the towel down and inhale to reach the tail towards the knees and exhale to press the towel down as you're reaching your tail towards your knees. Don't curve the shoulders to do it. It's like an energetic, trying to get a little higher. Might not see much for your shoulder blades down. So as you press down on the top, do it from the back, but don't fall back. Here's five and yeah, in yeah, and for re and three reach and to reach and one hold there.

Lift the arms, bend the knees, lay the head and chest down and in. Place one foot down on the mat at a time. Stretching the legs out in front of you. For the roll up legs are strong and stray pressing. We're going to lift the head and chest as we breathe in. Feel the ribs connect.

Exhale to curl through the spine though. Tell us is just on the front of the shoulders, the spine rounds, and we hold excellent to articulate this. Sign down. Feel the pelvis move first. Feel then the bones of the lower back, the middle back, the shoulders come down the head in the towel reaches overhead. Inhale, head Shasta and exhale to curl the spine Nav Annex. I'll tell a down, keeping that towel just a little bit stretched and releasing down and lifting. We're rolling at an inhale and exhaling to calm down. Last two times. Lift and curl.

Hollowing out the abdominals as we are in that forward position. Rolling back and down. Here's our last one. Ironing out the spine into the ground. From here, we're just going to take a quick stretch forward. Again, holding onto the towel. Just bend the elbows to the sides and guide the chest towards the legs and then let the spine extend. Continue to help yourself with the towel as you stretch the spine forward and re round the back. Okay, we're taking the towel off the feet and we're coming up to sitting nice and tall, straight up through the spine for the twist. So it's an inhale.

We're going to exhale to double pulse towards me. Turn, turn and come back and a turn, turn and come back. Think of a slightly forward pull of the spine, not that you're leaning forward. Just your tempting very much not to lean at all back. Check in with the feet. They should be connected together and still the had just moved with his spine as we reach and come home and reaching across and come home holding to my side.

Stay there. Pull the towel to your chest, lift the chest into the towel, press the towel away. Let's lift it up. Now bring it back down and return your body back to center. Here we go, and he'll turn. Exhale, bend the arms first. Stretch the arms forward. We'll raise the arms up, bring the arms down and come back to center. Inhale to turn. Exhale to been stretching the towel, pulling into the upper back. Inhale, arms straight, XL, arms overhead, spine. Longer. Inhale, arms down.

Exhale, back to center and how we turn. Exhale, bend the Elvis. Stretch the arms. Good spine Deb. Lengthen the arms up. Sit Tall, sit tall. Breasts the arms down and return back to center. One more time around its inhale. Moving with the breath. Exhale, let all the air out. Inhale, stretch. Exhale up. Inhale and exhale to center. Last time in.

Exhale, pull. Inhale, stretch. Next lift. Press Down, Rory. Bend and come back. Oh, I made it. Just made that up at the very last minute. Bend your knees, set your towel down, reach around for your ankles. There's rolling like a ball. So we're going to hug the knees right into the chest, round through the lower spine, elbows wide, shoulders down, hovering the feet up. And then it's just an inhale, a gentle rock back through the spine. Exhale to balance just behind the tailbone.

As you come up and we go again in your back and exhale and inhale back and exhale left. And again, trying to keep a consistent measure of the thighs to the body. The heels to the hits a couple more times. And last one, I'm gonna change it just a little bit. I'm gonna have you let go. Roll back just to the shoulder blades.

Stop behind the pelvis. Stay round. Inhale, stretch the arms out the legs. Exhale, curve the back back and reach forward of the legs are hanging on. Roll the Toma, stretch the body. Re round the body. Curl back, lift up. Exhale. Inhale, stretch. Exhale, recur in here we go back.

Exhale, we come, we linkedin, everything getting longer XL to pull back. I lost that one last time. Coming up, stretching out, rebound, and just drop the knees open to the side. Okay, take a quick stretch forward. We're going to pick up the towel again in just a minute. No, here it is for a modified saw. Okay. It's going to be a little different than you than you're used to.

But here goes, so why don't we all turn towards me for us. Here's our inhale. I'm going to take the towel down, reach the top arm up and reach forward. So now your is kind of almost vertical length and now sitting up and return to center. Inhale to turn. The bottom edge of the towel goes down, the top goes up, so it's at the bottom of is kind of reaching towards that bottom ankle or shit. Lift back up straight and return back to center. Inhale, we exhale to reach across an inhale to come back up and exhale to center. And in Hilton, Sharon Henry, down and up and left and right.

Just move as though your breath is the rhythm for a dance. Exhale, lift longer and taller and back. And in an exam, keeping the shoulder stable to how stays just in front of the chest as you're in through the rotational component. And then just level with the chest as you go in through the rotate. Uh, the twist last one and we're going to come back, bringing the knees together. Take the towel over one foot. Okay, we're going to connect the needs together. I'm not sure that this will work with a tablet. Let's try use your arms, pull yourself up. It's like a single leg tease are here, and then as you exhale, we're gonna roll down and have to let that leg come with you.

As you place your spine down on the ground, the legs gonna come up and then starts to roll the body to the leg. Allow the leg to draw down towards the opposite knee. Think strong abdominals. Connect the knees and lift. So here we go again. As we exhale, feel the pelvis move first. The knees are still connected. Role as far as you can without moving the leg, and then allow the like to just lightly reach up. Still off the shoulders. We're going to curl back to the leg first and then lift. Bending the arms and pressing the spine into the foot.

Rounding back as far as you can. Then allow the leg to just lightly come. It's mostly abdominals reaching back and lift. Let's do one more like that. We're rolling and allowing the light to just float through space. This time. Bringing the head of old the way down and pull the leg back further. Keeping the bottom like bent the pelvis squared.

Allow the leg to start to travel back, bring the head up, curl the abdominal full or curl the spine forward using the abdominals and for the last time lifting the spine and then bend that knee and let's change science knees together. Starting with extended spine, Elvis to the side, shoulder blades pressing down away from the ears. Exhale as you curl back again, the pelvis coasts for a solo or back tries to come down and then when you need to, that leg just comes with you. So I'm staying off my shoulders for the first bit and then curling forward. Tried to get the body to move before the leg moons and then they move together and then we pressed the chest up, bending the elbows wide to the side and then you curl back pressing bone by bone into the ground. It's kind of a subtle one, but I think that with the help we can find fair amount of really strong controlled abdominal work of lifting the spine to the towel.

With the towel and we've got three more to just back the leg. Lightly reaches through space, reaching just to the shoulders and then letting the leg come back, curling the spine to the leg and lift the last to reaching mag. Well, I mean the lake to the left, curling the spine back. Always challenging yourself as you curl the lower spine to keep the upper spine strong or not allow the collar bones to round. This is the one where we came all the way down and gave it a soft, a little bit more of a stretch and then unwrapped the foot and place the towel just across your belly for a second. Take the hands a little more near.

We're going to bring the towel back behind the head. Bring up the legs, curl the Haddon chest up off the mat. Here's our double leg stretch, so send the elbows forward towards the thighs a little bit and then press the shoulder blades down. We are just moving the legs straight out in front and bent and straight out in front and XLT, Ben, heavy head and Paul. I'm going to change this one right now, so we're going to go out. Inhale, exhale, pull the legs up. Inhale, drop the legs down to keep the spine steady. Exhale to bent. Inhale, legs out, white legs, heavy, strong abdominals. Inhale, legs up, or exhale. I think it's inhale now I'll figure it out.

And here we go. In her legs, out straight. Squeeze your bottom, pull the legs up, press the legs away. Keep the spine steady and bent. Last one, inhale out. Exhale, pull the legs up, press the legs away. Then the knees bring the knees to the body. As you just let your head come down for a moment. Curl the head back up. Try to press the chest into the thighs which are at the boom and just arresting towards your body. Come back to a tabletop position. Take one like straight up and one leg down, straightening it out, but go as low as you can. So if you can go all the way in anchor, that's great.

If you need to stay a little higher to keep the back steady. You do. I know this is slow. Let's switch the legs. Reach one way away as when stretches to this guy and we change and we were hitch and we curve through it from the rib cage. You bringing the chest to the thigh and we curve and let's speed it up a little and reach, reach, reach. I've taken the pulse out today and hurried such a single reach.

It's like you're trying to do the splits in the last two on both sides too. Here's one on one. Let's go both legs. Then bend your knees. Oh, have your head to come down. Here comes a crisscross. Lift the head and Chester [inaudible] closest to me. Bend. Stretch the opposite leg up and bring that opposite elbow towards the knee. And then across. So one leg straight and one knee benches turning and turning and turning.

[inaudible] I'm gonna make you think here. Turn towards me. Stretch that leg towards stray. Ben Hur, Richard out as you bend, so it's like a bicycle. Stretch that leg out, straight the bottom, knee bent, stretch. Then bending the knee that you're turning to lift. Bend the knee that's coming from straight. Stretch it up. Then the knee that you're turning to stretch it out. That bottom like Benz reached two more rate last time.

Reach, come to center, bend the knees, take the head down. That was a ass [inaudible] right? A mind body technique is a not all right, bring the arms. Just serve the shoulders, put the towel down or keep the towel. I'm gonna keep my towel for today. Um, just holding it just above the shoulders. We're gonna reach the shoulder blades away from the ground and press them back in. Just do that a couple times. Reach the shoulders away from the ground.

And while you do that, get the legs in preparation for another pelvic curl. Go on one more time. Feel that the shoulder blades are down still and steady. Exhale to peel the pelvis up, pressing the pelvis towards the towel, but the ribs towards the ground. Inhale, hold and exhale, release down. Feel the shoulder blades reaching into the ground. But the towel just lightly reaching up. So the arms are long and stretch. Go.

And again, one more time. Excellent. Tacoma. Sending the knees energetically out over the feet, feeling the hamstrings working for us in healing to pause and excelling. We come down, here comes the shoulder bridge so we roll up again. If you need to put the towel down, please do listen to your body coming up. Let's keep the left leg on the ground and pick up the right.

Try to bring it back towards that towel. Take the leg away from you and pull up and away and pull up. As that light goes to the ground, press up through that free swing and hip. And not that the hip is free. Swing the leg is, but you know what I mean. Reach and pull. Last three, two more.

Last time. Lift the leg, fold the knee back in. Roll down just to the bottom of the rib cage. Feel the shoulders, press back so we're not curling the collarbones forward. Roll Baca, keeping weight on the right foot. We bring the left leg in, we stretch it lightly to the sky, and then it's down and back down. And the pelvis is high and level. The shoulders are steady and still there's not a lot of slack in the towel. Last four, two left, three up, two and one lifting it up, folding the knee back in, reach the arms overhead and just slowly bring your body down into the ground, curving it as you come and release.

Take the right leg straight out on the ground and you bring your towel around your left foot. If it's not comfortable for you to have your one leg straight and one leg straight at the bottom, just bend that bottom leg. So we're just gonna do a single leg stretch and just start to bring your leg back. But assess it as you bring your leg back. The pelvis is in neutral, so maybe we'd have a look at it and then bend the knee just a little bit. Create some tension with your arms as you stretch the leg towards the sky in. He'll pull the abdominals back away from that bending knee and then feel as the leg straightens, it almost relaxes up while the femur bone sings a little deeper into the hip.

With that intention, I feel, or I believe that you'll be able to get further and get a greater stretch. Inhale Tibet, the abdominals. Press through the floor into the earth underneath and last two we stretch and one more time and stretch and then just maybe, maybe we'll let that light come a little closer to us. Anchor with the bottom side. Take the towel in there, right hand. The left hand is down on the floor for balance and just bring that left leg across the body, stretching through the side of that hip.

That's not enough of a stretch for you. Pull the toes of that left foot back towards the right ear and then think about planting or anchoring the hip on the ground. Okay, we come back to center. We're going to change sites. Yes, wrapping the towel around the foot, anchoring with the bottom leg, stretching that leg up to where it's straight and comfortable for you. If you can't totally straighten it, that's fine as well.

Here we go with this gentle Ben. Feel the contraction of the hamstrings as that knee bends, and then the length fitting contraction as the leg straighten. So shortening the massage and lengthening the muscle, but working it in both directions. You can put as little or as much tension down on that leg with the pull of the arms I do about forum or inhaling annoying thing and three length and backwards, increasing flexibility of the hip while maintaining integrity of the pelvis. Last time, let me stretch the leg up.

Take the towel and the left hand the right arm down to the ground and just keep that right hip pressed into the ground. As you take the leg off to the side again to try to anchor the pelvis down. Uh, I think about pulling the sit bone of the leg, that stretching down into the ankle bone of the leg that's on the ground. All right, let's bring it back to center. Lose the towel and turn towards me. Okay. Coming all the way down on our side. The legs are going to stretch out. We're going to start with just some side lifts. So either your arm on your thigh or down on your mat. The leg stretch away, check that the bottom knee is rolled into the top knee so the inseams of the knees are connected. And then we just stretch the legs away.

Reach the arm if it's on your leg down in the direction of the feet when they left, and then just lower Lidl and left and lower Lidl and left. Feel a sense of reaching long in both directions of staying in. Of course that your feel your upper obliques, but let's try and stay as connected to our entire way. So our entire power has maybe one. Squeeze your bottom a little last four, three, two and one. Okay. From here we're going to bend the knees.

We're going to do a little bit of rotation around the hip joints, so start with just an external rotation so the feet stay together and the knees open. Highlights. I put my hand on my pelvis so I can feel that it stays still and then squeeze down like you have something to push against. Open and press downs. We've got a little inner thigh work on the way down. Think about squeezing from the [inaudible] dominoes and up and down kind of quick. Ah, Dan, last five. [inaudible] and for, so here's our external rotation. Three.

We're going to take it into internal rotation right now. So as we do that, I want you to envision the head of the Femur, the head of the bone spiraling inside of the hip joint, knee together, feet together, me up, foot higher than me. Knee down, foot down and go knee, foot, knee, foot, last one like that. A two more like this? Yeah, down here. Last one. Like this down down. Now we're just going straight from one to one. Sue, go me up, me down. Neat. Up Toes, touch ne down, niece, touch toes, knees, toes, knees. One more toes. Knees. Now go-tos. Think about increasing the external rotation of that hip joint as the leg just lengthens and stretches. Rebuild the knee and return the knee. If you bring the knee up, lengthen the leg out of the hip joint, stretch it away. Re Bent and bring it in. Three more like that. Stretch on folded in.

Bring it home last to lengthen, folded in and bringing it home. Here's our last one. Keeping that pelvis nice and stable and bring it down. Take your hand on the Mat. Help yourself up as you come up. Take bottom leg out from underneath the top leg and bring it up against the opposite leg. Um, is that okay for the Mermaid?

We're going to reach across the body over towards that way you guys. And that way you guys, we put the hand down, curl through the spine, drawing the abdominals back into the spine. Allow the hand to come down. As you inhale, just feel the shoulders gently pull down and lift your chest through your arms for a gentle back extension. As you exhale, re round your spine. Open up the arm. Inhale and exhale. Coma your Kaylee's top arm up a little forward if you need to or across suggests would work. If shoulders aren't okay and then lift down and he and Jack, he was right in here and down. Exhale, turn the body, be light on your arms.

Just feel that your abdominals are holding you up in plays. Lengthen out through the chest, re round the back. Inhale the RMO. Exhale we left coming all the way up first and over and then lifting up again. One more time. Arms out to the Cy Engenia. Taking the hand down a light on the arm. Turn at the waist, feel the shoulder blade of that supportive arm. Draw down.

Now feel bowl shoulder blades draw down as you send your spine forward. Re around the spine. It's subtle. Happens around the lower spine. Coming back and lifting a and bringing the top where I'm overhead. Okay, let's come all the way up. Reach down and put that elbow forearm down on the ground. Stick your head, stretch your legs out a little further away from you.

Just got something funky happening with knee. We're going to do the side bend so your legs are crossed at the ankle, top foot in front. From there, we're going to press the legs that press the spine up. Reach the top arm overhead so it's gonna be a relatively small movement where you're just going to take that arm in. Thread it underneath us. Try to press the bottom pelvis towards the arm that's coming through. Inhale open, back out. No, I'm not lifting.

I am turning so I'm, I mean the pelvis is going to move a little bit but I'm not lifting it up to avoid it. And let's do two more reaching across, opening back out because I last one, reaching a nerve, opening that gap and then just gently come down to the knees again and then we'll bring swing my legs around to Viet I side sliding all the way down, allowing the head to rest on the arms. If you're not comfortable with this straight arm, just fold your elbow underneath you and put your hand head like that. Okay, so inner knees connected. Here comes the side lift. We just stretch the legs out out in a way and then lowered. But they never really touched the ground. He was reach away. If your hand is on your side, stretch the arm in the direction of that.

The legs are moving so you feel a little bit of connection to the back and action to this both sides of the body. Using the full excalation. So as you breathe, make sure you're breathing all of the area of the body. It will help you feel your abs more. Last two times reaching out in and reaching out and up and down. And then we just brought the hand down to fold the knees underneath us.

Come to about a 90 degree angle at the hip to the knee, to the front. And here comes our external rotation. We just keep the feet together though. Roll it back and forth on one another, knees down and press. So it really challenged the work within your own body. So you go where you go and then try to go a little further.

Not without losing integrity though. So let's go to your limit. Keeping the spine and hip stable. Okay. And here comes our external rotation towards internal rotation. So we're going to go up with the foot, spiraling the hip joint with the hip within the hip joint and down me. First the foot comes up, the knee reaches to the opposite knee, the knee comes down, the foot goes down, find the external rotation, a lift spiral inwards. And down.

Last two times reaching a turning the knee down and the foot comes down. Here's the last one. Reaching the Nia, turning the knee down and then here we go. Justin knee. And now the toes come up. The nigos down, the toes go down, the knee goes up. So we just rotate in and rotate out. I don't rotate in and rotate out. We've got two more to go is our last one. And then go back to the external rotation.

Stretch the leg out with the intention of trying to turn the knee behind the body. Fold the knee back in and bring the knees back together. Then him. Now Xcel is like stretches. Reach it away from the hip joint out ling long and rebound. Here's a lot of less. Three abdominals controlling the spine. And last two times stretching, uh, reaching a long ways away. Try to take that foot outside.

Is that last one? Bring it back and bring it all the way down. Helping yourself side. Slide the bottom me out from under the top knee. Just put that bottom foot up against the top thigh. The arms are out to the sides.

Helen does modify how you need to with a straight leg or, okay, so we're all going to the inside of the room now that way, and then turn the body and then gently allow the spine to rise for like you're yawning through your spine. Re round through the lower spine. Keep the collarbones long open out the arm, lifts through the waist. Place that hand down. Raise the opposite arm up, and then stretch to the side. Let's lift up. Exhale, stretch the arms out. India. Let the hand come down. Exhale.

Here comes our big turn in her light on the arms. Let the spine reach forward. Inhale, uh, I've lost it. Three our amat. Ah, I'm into the air and over the top. All right, here's a little bit better queuing. Let's move over. That's our inhale. Exhale, we curl the spine. Inhale the shoulders, draw down the chest. Presses for the abdominal support. Yeah, XL re round the spine. Inhale, open up that arm. Exhale to lift your body up in the annex.

L for the stretch. Have a one more and a hand comes down. Spiral this spine around. Keep the collarbones long. Lengthen out. Feel the shoulder blades present to the waist. Rerun the low spine open. Now lift up top our mat and just stretch out. Okay, come in all the way up. We're gonna take the legs out to the side so they should be facing the same direction that they just weren't good.

We're all in our forearm now you got the top leg crossed over the bottom, like modifying this by keeping one knee on the ground should you wish to, but if not, let's go straight legs working neo Blake's to hold ourselves in this position. Feel that bottom shoulder reaching down top arm is up. It's an inhale here. Exhale as you reach underneath you not moving the hips a lot. They will shift some. So think more of the spiraling around through the waist and the shoulder stability like you're threading your arm through very large needle last two times, reaching through, bring it back last one time, reaching through, bringing back and then just bending the knees to come down.

Okay. I'm wanting to finish with back extension and I'm wanting to do it with the towel and I'm thinking that we'll do it sitting. Nope, let's do it kneeling. Is everyone okay on their knees for a few minutes? Helen, if you don't wish to be on your knees, grab a box or take one of those balls and sit on it. It'll work just perfectly. Anyone else wants to would rather have something to sit on rather than being on their knees. That would be fine as well. Okay, so just face me. I'm going to end pretty similar to the way we started.

So some of us missed the beginning, so I'm going to do it again. Um, just focus on the ribs knitting down the front of the body so we're not leaning behind the hips, taking me arms forward. I'm going to raise the arms at shoulder level and bring them up overhead. And then just to think about swimming. So you know, swimming where you're trying to get your head arms above your shoulders. Just take the arms back to that position. Lisa, I don't want you to do that. You'll just do what you need to and then come back all the way just down to the chest and then we're going to take it up.

Just challenging gently the flexibility of the shoulders and then coming down and then going again. I've seen just gently behind and I'm going down and hold this one. Take just the left arm and press it back a little, bringing it back just the right arm and press it back a little as the arm moves. The one that's moving to the back, try to keep the opposite arm relatively still. Yes. I'm wondering if just like, okay, everyone come down, bend the arms into the chest, turn the, so here you are. You've got your shoulders in line with your elbows.

Turn the arms like this. The towel is going to be just in front or slightly below your nose now. Now towards start to stretch it over the forehead. Try to just gently, Lisa, don't at least it's got a neck injury, so we're just going to let her be free of this, but the rest of us are trying to reach the towel slightly behind us. Rebend your elbows that tells going to travel forward goes just in front of the flower forehead and then forums down. Here's some breathing. Ah, here comes everyone in here.

Start to reach this arms just slightly over and back. Feel here that the shoulder blades are heavier, not really even pulling on your towel much, just a sense of the arms. Lightly reaching in space and then revenge Durag the shoulder blade staff and then return the poms. External rotation of the shoulders, elbows forward of hands or just underneath hands, stretching the arms up, letting the spine grow, letting the arms lightly reach up in space. Re bending the elbows, bringing the hands back one more time, reaching, stretching back, bringing it back and then bringing it down in once more. We'll try for that shoulder stretch. I would leave. At least we're going to come up. Here's what I would do, Lisa, put your towel down. Everyone else, just hold on to your towel.

At least just do it without and go wide is why did you need to, so reaching up and then just try as far back as you can without shoving or forcing. And then back and down. So if you, uh, you guys go again, if you had some show, if you have any neck or shoulder problems, just do it without and look for rotation through the shoulder joint and then you just come back and then you come down front. Let's do that one more time. Yeah, and back and back and forward. And then just allow your child to come down to the ground, but your hands just in front of your knees. Roll over your feet, putting pressure into your toes. Just stretch down through the heels and then we're just going to press the feet down into the mat. Allow the body to fold forward over the legs and having one breath in just to hold here, just to hold. Let's bend one knee, let the opposite hip press out to the side. Come back towards straight. Then the opposite may come back towards straight, maybe a little bit softening through the knees.

And then we just spiral upward through the spine, feeling the alignment of the body, the knees over the ankles, the pelvis comes over, the knees, shoulders over the pelvis, head, arms that any of it. Only enough energy. Exhale, pressing, anything stale away. And you know, one more time filling up and Xcel reaching down. And with that, thank you for coming. We're all done.

Comments

1 person likes this.
Loved the fast pace of the class. Instead of using a towel I used the OPTP Stretch Out Band it worked great!
1 person likes this.
Great class. I used an excercise band and loved it!
1 person likes this.
Too many diversions with people arriving late and the instructor making comments on traffic.
1 person likes this.
As I've often heard Christie say during your classes; "yummy"!
1 person likes this.
loved the class! I used the band instead and worked just as well..thank you
1 person likes this.
Great class. I also used the band and made modifications to up the challenge!!
Thanks ladies! Always happy to hear from you.
Pele
1 person likes this.
wonderful as usual. you have a gift of keeping the class moving even while you're talking and giving detailed explanations.
Thank you Pele...what a kind thing to say! You made my day:)
1 person likes this.
Wonderful workout!! Just joined and getting back into the swing of things. Loved your class!!
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