Strong Base Reformer

Hi, I'm Courtney, and I am so happy to be back here on Pilates anytime. I have a workout series plan for you. That's six classes long. We use the reformer, and we're using dumbbells or hand weights in this series. There's six classes, and the classes were all build on each other, where we start with building a base, and we work our way up.

So we're gonna collectively get stronger. I have two sets of weights. One is heavy and one's a little lighter. My light set is five pounds and my heavy set is 12. But you know what? I'll probably change it day to day in my own personal workout, so I want you to feel free to do the same thing on your side.

What we'll do in this class is three sets of the dumbbell and three sets on the reformer. Are you ready to get started? I have two red springs and one blue spring on. My foot bars and my footwork setting, and we're gonna start lying down, getting warmed up. Just drape those legs over the bar and wherever the bar hits your legs is exactly where you're supposed to be. Arms go up. Take a big breath in.

On one exhale, we roll up and over, and you can hang out here for a little bit. Drop the shoulders, reach the crown of the head forward, and pull the abdominals back away from your thighs. Now you're going to want to keep that c curve as you roll about halfway back and then roll the rest of the way down really resisting against gravity. Do it again, exhale up. Your exhale is your gas pedal. Now resist the temptation to lift the shoulders. So you reach forward, but pull the shoulders down halfway back and the rest of the way down. Alright.

We're gonna do four more here. Go at your own tempo. So for this entire series, you get to pick the pace. I just wanna remind you that your breath and movement speed are connected. So if you're gonna move little fast, then you're gonna breathe a little fast.

If you're gonna move a little slow, then you're gonna breathe a little slow. As you roll down, see if you can get the lower back to touch the mat. So lower back touching down, shoulders away from the ears, and let's do one more all the way up. Finding that scoop and all the way back. Now let's go into one of my favorite exercises.

I feel this is a very high reward exercise bridge because we have all that tension on. Carriage is not gonna move. Put the heels of the feet onto the bar, about hip distance, lift your hips and settle in. So you can see I'll often kind of wiggle around it's so that I can find the best position for my bridge. Arms are straight and long by your sides.

Think of train tracks. They go on forever, but they never meet or widen. You're gonna roll down one bone at a time. So using your breath, upper, middle lower. Now you're not done.

Once the lower back comes down, you wanna release into that more neutral position, scoop the abs and roll back up. So this movement is about articulation. One bone at a time in the spine. But it's a really good way to find your abdominals. On an exhale, I can track to roll up.

Once I'm at the top, ribs are tight, glutes are turned on, and then rolling down. Now the other thing that you can bring attention to is the sensation of length. So I roll up. And in this position, I wanna think knees reaching over the toes. I wanna think hips lifted high, so I'm opening through the front of the thighs. But I also wanna think of lengthen my spine.

So as I roll down, my sit bones are being pulled or stretched towards my heels. So at the end of this movement, I feel taller and longer. Okay. Let's do one more here. Coming all the way up into your high bridge position. So I'm lifted nice and high.

I want you to pause and check out your own bridge. If your hips are here and you have another inch or two that you could lift, meet me at the top. Remember, lots of glutes, and length through the front body. Pick a leg and stretch it up towards the sky. Now, I want you to work to keep your hips as square as you can, and you're gonna do that by really activating through the supporting leg. So it's this leg holding me up abdominal staying strong to keep the pelvis level. Flex the foot as the leg drops down.

It can go as low as you wanna go as long as the hips stay level and then point and lift back up. We're gonna do 10 of these. You can match your breathing to your movement. I like to inhale down, exhale up. Pull your chin away from your chest.

We got three. Two, and one, hold the leg up. I'm gonna flex the foot. I feel more length in my hamstrings when I do. Drop the hips about halfway towards the mat, push down into your stabilizing leg to lift up.

Now here's something else I want you to bring awareness to. How is that left knee? If it's rolling open to the side like this, which is common, bring it in, hug your left inner thigh in towards your midline. Five, four, three, two, and one. Place the foot down and reset. Squeeze the glutes. Remember, it's gonna be the opposite leg holding you up here.

Extend the leg to the ceiling. So core is tight, hamstrings and glutes. When you're ready, leg goes low, keeping the pelvis as level as you can. Lift. There's a little momentum here, down, down, you're using dynamic movement to create length. So instead of holding a stretch, the movement is creating the stretch. Four, three, two, one, I'm gonna flex the foot.

Go about halfway down and then push down to rise up. So I'm pushing in my arms, pushing into my right heel. If the knee is rolling open on that right side, bring it in. 10 is a great number for reps in this series. Alright. We'll do four more.

Four three two And one, foot goes down. And then remember your sequence, length, parallel, and then get that tailbone to pull towards the heels. One section at a time, finding that length. Well done. Alright. We're gonna drape the legs over the bar, lift the arms. Let's do another set of those roll ups.

Remember the exhale is your power up. Shoulders stay down. I like to go halfway pause and then really control. I'm doing my best to keep my legs heavy on the bar and not lift them up when I roll up. If you're noticing that you're skipping part of your spine, take a little bit more time to roll through that tighter area.

So for me, that's my lower back. We'll do two more here. All the way up. All the way down. And then on this next one, we're gonna stay up.

And we're staying up for two reasons. One is I want you to reach under your legs and take off one of those red springs. So you now have one red, one blue. The other reason we're staying up is we're gonna do a little core series here. So keep the legs relaxed, come into your c scoot position where you're rolling back, pull the shoulders down and windmill.

One arm back, exhale return. Other arm back, exhale return. This is an awesome way to warm up the shoulders. And again, connect breath to movement. So I inhale whenever I stretch and get big, exhale, come back to center.

One more each side. No tension in the neck. The lower you are to the mat, the harder you're working. And even yourself out. Now instead of coming up, you're gonna go down.

But this time, just to the shoulder blades, just here. Hug your knees into your chest, curl nice and high, and keep the tailbone and the sit bones down. So the scoop is really coming from the upper spine. We're gonna do some core exercises here starting with our single leg stretch. So one knee in, one leg out, exhale to switch. Now where you were, look changes where you work. So if you're looking up, you're gonna feel and work a lot of those neck muscles.

I want you to tuck your chin to your chest, look down towards your thighs, and focus on using more abdominals. One more. Come in through center, double leg stretch. So both arms and legs stretch long, exhale circle around. Both arms and legs stretch long, exhale. It's really hard to fight the temptation to look up here.

Reach and circle. Just do two more. Reach and circle one more. Reach and circle hold. Hands go behind the head. Straighten one leg and twist towards whatever knee has been, and then go right over the other side without stopping in the middle.

This exercise is all about stabilizing the pelvis. Well, getting that lift and twist through the upper spine. Lift and twist three, two, And even yourself out, one, straighten one leg, reach up with both hands and grab it. Now that bar is not gonna be in your way because in this version of scissors, we're not focused on the down. What instead We're trying to focus on a pull up towards the chest. Pull pull.

Pull pull. Pull pull. I wanna leave my hands pretty much where they are and try to get my leg to meet my hands. Pull pull. Three, two, one, last move. Lights go to the sky, curl up nice and high.

Hands behind the head, flex the feet as the legs go low, lift five, four, three, two, and one, take it down and rest. We're gonna come into another bridge series, but this is not the same because we've reduced the tension, that carriage is gonna wanna press back. So let's practice keeping the carriage closed, lifting the hips up, Again, settle in, find those arms like a number 11, hips are high, and thighs are reaching forward, knees over toes. On a breath in, we're gonna push the carriage all the way out. And I want you to notice something. As my knees drop, so do my hips.

Now watch what happens as the carriage comes in. My knees lift and so do my hips. So push all the way out and everything comes up. What's really common is as you push out, you're good. You drop. As you come in, you stay low.

So if you're feeling that, find that correction, hips high. Let's do six more. So 10 is a pretty good number. If you're a counter and you wanna know exactly how many reps you should do of an exercise, I'm just gonna say ten's gonna be our standard for this series. Arms are long. I like to inhale back, exhale in.

Inhale back, and exhale in. So I'm really conscious. I'm not just trying to close the carriage. I'm trying to lift up one more time. And now bring the carriage in. We're doing a flat back hinge, so really tighten your core to keep the shape of your spine. And then exhale lift from the seat.

Inhale down and exhale lift from the seat. Care just staying as close as you can keep it. Low up. Lots of connection to the upper abdominals, ribs joining towards each other. So pulling in towards the midline.

Three. Two, and we'll practice a weight transfer move here. One, so carriage stays closed. One leg comes up, pick your favorite leg, place the foot back down, where you got it, then take the other leg up. The more you do, the easier it gets. Because you're able to anticipate the challenge.

The surprise is gone. You know what it's gonna feel like, and because you can anticipate, you can kinda be proactive in how you recruit your muscles. So I know when this leg comes up, the opposite glute has to work. So I find it, and I keep the pelvis stable. Three, two, and one, even yourself out. Then let's do a nice roll down. All the way down you go.

Find the length and the articulation. Alright. We're gonna grab our straps for one more exercise before we come off the machine. I like to use the short loops on this tension. I've got one red and one blue, move down away from the blocks. We're doing the 100.

So curl up, extend your arms, extend your legs, pilates v, and breathe. 10 sets here. One. Two, lower the legs the harder you work. Three, pump intentionally with the arms, in through the nose, and out through the mouth is the breath.

We did four. So that's five. Big breath in through the nose. Big breath out. That's six. It should take about five pumps of the arms per breath. Seven.

Eight, nine, and 10. I always like to finish with a little hold before I come out of the exercise. Alright. That's the only thing we needed the straps for for that one. It's a good thing we practice over for our roll up because we're gonna use that to get off the machine every time we're supine. So one big exhale. Gets you there.

And come on off. Now it's time to grab our weights. So I'm gonna grab my heavier set of weights to begin. For me, these are 12 pound weights, and we're gonna start with our dumbbell series. Starting with squats, the weights come up onto the shoulders. I'm in a wide stance, and I prefer to do my squats in turnout. I come down into a low squat position, knees over toes, nice flat back, and then I use my lower body to find that lift.

Inhale down, and exhale up. So if working with dumbbells is new for you, you're in the right spot. This program is gonna begin by teaching you some pretty basic weight training fundamentals, right? And then we're gonna build on them. Inhale down, and exhale up. As I lift, I'm driving down through my heels. I'm trying to keep my spine long.

So what I'm not doing is rounding my back. My tailbone and my booty presses back, and I go as low as I can feel that my spine stays long. If my spine is rounding, I've gone a little too low in this position. We'll do two more here. Now the great news about this dumbbell series is that we repeat the same thing.

So if it's new, you'll have plenty of time to master it. Alright. After our squats, we go into a series of lunges stepping back. So roll your shoulders down your back, pick your favorite leg, step back, and lower into a lunge. Drive your heel down to rise up, and we're gonna stay on the same side. Down, And, now there's two ways to do this lunge. One is to stay very straight and tall through your chest. So your shoulders stay over your hips just like this.

This is a great way to really work. Your quads are the front of your thigh. The other way is to lean forward when you go back into the lunge. This move is gonna transfer the weight more into the back of that standing leg, targeting the glutes and hamstrings. So there's not a wrong way to do it, but you might have your favorite way.

Let's do one more here, and we'll go right into their side. So step back, and power up. Inhale down, and exhale up, knees tracking over the toes, and just check your upper body, make sure the shoulders are backing down, and not up by the ears. Now my goal is to find fatigue. So if you wanna do heavier weights than me, you should grab them.

These are 12 pounds. You could do as heavy as you can do 10 repetitions. One more time here. And rise. The next move we're doing is an RDL. So in this move, my feet are hip distance.

My knees are gonna bend a little as my hips press back. My weights stay really close to my shins, and I lower my body as low as I can keep my spine flat. Then I wanna drive myself up by contracting the back of my body to lift. Inhale down, and exhale up. Kind of pinch your shoulder blades together behind you, and pick a spot on the floor, like maybe three feet in front of your toes to look at.

Inhale down, and exhale up. You wanna go slow down, find that resistance, but then I want you to feel a bit of power on that lift up. Push evenly into both legs. And one trick I like to do on this is I sort of press out in my feet. So I wanna feel my upper outer hips engaging as I left.

Two more here. One more. And lift. Well done. Okay. So the next move we're gonna do with these heavy weights. The last one is a row.

Stand with your feet together, lean your chest forward, and bend your knees. The arms lower, so the hands are right under the shoulders. Both elbows lift at the same time. There's a squeeze in my back, and I resist to come down. Every time my elbows drive up, I'm also gonna tighten my core. So exhaling when the elbows come up is key.

Lift and lower. My elbows drive back. There's a squeeze and lower. Lowering with control, And noticing that even though the arms come down, there's still that connection to the back. So avoiding watch this dropping into the weights. Lift squeeze and lower. Let's do two more.

Lift one more, lift and rise to come up. Good. Like I said, we're gonna repeat this three times. So you're gonna be a master at it when you're done. Switching out to your lighter set of weights, we're going into our lateral raises. So standing with the feet about hip distance, weights just by the thighs, we go up, and take it down, and then we go out, just to the side.

And take it down. Now I want you to make this exercise as much core as you can. So if your body is moving, like you're leaning back, you're gonna wanna minimize that. Keeping the abdominals tight, maintaining your vertical alignment. And again, as best as you can, no tension in the neck. Lift this exercises for the shoulders.

So it's definitely easy to feel the neck. One trick I like to do is just keep my elbows a little bit soft. For me, that helps to stay out of the neck and more into my back. Standing nice and tall. Let's do one more each direction.

All the way up. It's important that we learn these foundational movements because we're really gonna build on them in the classes to come. Okay. We've got bicep curls next. I like to have my feet together for this, ribs close, elbows into the sides, bringing the arms in, and down. You can see my arms are just a little bit wide, and my elbows are squeezing in. And what I want you to feel is a sense of resisting on the down.

We're gonna add some upper body variations and lower body variations in core with this move, but I want you to really find that control. Before we make things more complicated. The goal is to keep the upper arm bone really stable. So not letting it swing. Three, Two, bringing those Pilates principles into the weight training, and one. Now our last movement here is our tricep kickback.

Coming into the, kinda that row position we were in, pulling the elbows up this time. Spine is long. I extended the elbows, finding straight arms, and then I bend the elbows back to my start position. Again, what I'm trying to do is find that abdominal connection with each press back. You'll see us do a really similar move to this on the long box with our arms pulling straps.

So this would be a great time to feel how the core integrates to feel that sensation of length, head away from tailbone. Upper arm bone stain lifted, squeezed into the body and stable. Four, three, two, and one. And Royce. That was great. So we'll do three sets of that exact series in this class. Let's go back to our reformer.

We're gonna take one spring off, take off your blue, and leave on your red. Meet me in a seated position. We're gonna face back. Lakes can go through the shoulder blocks, ankles can cross if that's more comfortable for you, and you have options. Grabbing the longer loops a little bit lighter.

Grabbing the shoulder loops a little bit heavier. Turn your palms up on an exhale, meet me in a c curve, bend your elbows, find that same bicep curl position we were in, straighten the arms all the way. Ready? Bring them all the way in. And out. So it's such a great learning opportunity to use the dumbbells where the arms can move independently, and then come onto the machine and feel the difference of the reformer and the spring, specifically, with the springs, we've got eccentric control that we really have to master. Sholders down.

The higher your elbows, the harder you work, three. Two, let's make sure we're straightening the elbows all the way. And one, bend your elbows to 90. Give me a hold here. Maybe you can deepen that c scoop.

Just the elbows up for 10. Energy through the legs, energy ops through the crown of the head, four three two one, straighten the arms, take a little stretch towards the toes. And if you do have your legs crossed, this is where I would change So you have the other leg on top. New move. Come back into that scoop. This is a single arm row.

So again, hopefully you can feel how we connect the dots between what we do on the dumbbells and what we do on the reformer. They're complementary. They're different, but they're complimentary. I have my elbows wide when I do these rows, but you could do elbows narrow. If that was more your jam, it would look like this.

Pull back. Pull back. You'll see narrow rows later in our series. Try to keep the shoulders down. Again, anytime we work the upper body, it's really common to get that neck tension.

Last one on each side. And then let's practice kinda like that lateral raise movement, but this time we're going out to the side and forward. Out to the side, and forward. Now these exercises could be done in a vertical spine. So if you're feeling tension, you can come up here, or if going back into a C scoop just isn't your jam today, meet me up here in vertical.

Three, two, if you are sitting tall, though sit tall, really tall. And one, hook up your straps. You're gonna need me in a straddle. So widen your stance. Take the hands onto the shoulder blocks and hover the hips. Hips stay low, knees are open.

Heels squeezing underneath the frame of the machine. Chest is gonna come forward. Narrow elbows, pushing the carriage all the way forward, and then bringing the elbow back. It's kind of the opposite of our row. You'll notice in this program, and within each class, we blend movements that push, like this one, and movements that pull, like the ones we just did. Push.

So the spine is long, the core is tight. If you're familiar with a plank, I want you to feel that sensation now. So zipping the abdominals intentionally contracting the core three dimensionally, front, back, sides, top bottom, three, two, and one. Take a seat on your carriage, and we're gonna grab those drops again for another pull exercise. Now we're gonna go into the full back rowing series and pilates which is a little complicated, but definitely worth it. When you sit, when you roll back, keep just a little space behind you.

You can say I have maybe four fingers worth. Start with the arms long. If this is a new exercise, follow along with me. If you know it, go right into him. Round back. So I'm gonna roll back, bring my hands towards my chin, elbows are high.

This is the first move you wanna find. The second move is when I reach my arms out like a t, my pinkies are up. And I'm pushing back like we practiced earlier. The only difference is my palms are back. Then I'm gonna do two things at once.

Dive forward, reach to my toes with the crown on my head, but then reach back towards the footbar with my hands. I lift and circle my arms all the way to my feet. I lose tension when I do that. I rebuild the spine and the whole thing starts again. So I find position one, scoop, and row.

Two is when I open. Three is that double move, push, and pull, kind of at the same time, circle, and rebuild. We're gonna do one more here. Arms back. Such an amazing shoulder mobility exercise, push, circle high, reach to the toes, and then rebuild.

Now it gets a little bit more complex When we do the next version, nothing you can't handle. We're gonna turn the palms up and lean back in a flat back as we do a bicep curl. There's position one. Position two is the hardest of the whole part you gotta sit tall and reach your arms to the sky, then you allow the weight to pull you forward finding length, still in your flat back. When you can't go anymore around your back, do a full circle with the arms, all the way to the toes, and rebuild. We'll do it again two more times.

So lean, lift, stretch, scoop, and rebuild. One more time. Lean. Like, you're in a bridge right now. Keep those upper abs tight. Lift, lengthen, and circle. That was awesome. Okay. Meet me back in the straddle, except this time we're still using those straps.

So same position as before, but you're probably gonna wanna step back because you're strong. So we talked about what those narrow rows look like. Let's do them. One double, one single, with a twist, each side. Double, single, Double. Single. Now, the more you do this class, the stronger you are going to get.

So grab those shorter loops. Or step back if this is not enough tension for you. One more round. Double, single, single, and hold. Lift your heels high. Sit your hips low. No tension, those straps.

We're finding some heat in those thighs. We do have that weight series next. Five, four, three, two, and one, take a seat. Okay. Before we go to our next move, meet me on your knees, and down onto your elbows. Let's talk about a plank because I keep referencing it. So let's actually do one. Wrap your hands around the shoulder blocks, push against the wooden platform with one leg and just pause.

So you're gonna be supporting your body, primarily using your core, your middle, your abdominals, your butt, your inner thighs, your back. So think about that, fire into those muscles, and then take the other leg back to meet him. Now, what happens in a plank is gravity kind of pulls you down into this position. So you'll often hear me say we're tucking the hips under and scooping the abdominals up. So see if you can find that position.

Then we push the elbows. Forward forward. Forward forward. Four forward 10 is a good amount. When you're in a really good form, like, really good alignment, when precision is high, it feels harder.

So you don't need to do as many. Three, two, one, and bring it in. Now we're gonna come right down to that exact same position, but this time our lower body's gonna be doing the movement, so elbows are down. I've got my elbows right under my shoulders. I push out with one leg. I don't wanna be surprised, so I really find that abdominal connection before I lift off.

My heels are together for this one, and as I bend, my knees come apart. Then when I press, they really squeeze my legs together. Inhale to bend, exhale to push. Four three two And then one. I like to hold, correct, if needed, and then come on in for a break. Alright. Nice.

So we've introduced that plank. So now it's no longer That's something we have to imagine. It's something we've actually done. It's our second set of weights, grab those heavy weights, and meet me in your squad. So in the beginning, I said, I like to do a turned out squat position.

I have my dumbbells up high by my shoulders, Nice long spine as I go down and up. This is just my preference. I like to get a little bit lower in my squat. I feel more glutes and more inner thighs. But there's nothing wrong with being in a parallel position. Looks like this and push up.

So you might have your favorite way, or you do the class one day, turn out, and you do the class another day parallel. So there is not a wrong way here. Keep the spine long. Notice if you're tucking the tailbone. Again, it helps if you find a focal spot, like three feet in front of you, and just fix your gaze there.

Two more. And then one. All the way up we go. Using those heavy weights for our lunges. So shoulders roll down and back, standing tall. We're gonna stay on the side that we start on for about 10.

Lleaning forward, more glutes, staying vertical, more front of the thigh or quads. It's nice to have options down and up. So the sensation is driving down through that standing heel. So you rise finding the squeeze in the back of that thigh. Three, two, and one.

And I actually love doing these in bare feet. So you can see how my ankle moves. And the muscles in my foot engage. And there's like little corrections that we make. I think that's really important, right?

So through these little adaptations, adjustments and corrections, we've become more able to recover in everyday life, whether it's playing a sport, or just taking a walk. Down, and up. Three more. I like lunging back pretty wide, and I'm trying to get my back knee down pretty low. Last time, and up. Okay.

So into that RDL, we're bending the knees when we go down, but we're not coming into a squat like we did earlier. So it's a soft bend, but the big difference here is my hips are pushing back. Back, back, spine staying long, and then I'm using the muscles in my back of my body to help me rise up. Now it is really helpful If you have a mirror, and if you have a mirror, you're gonna look at your profile. And you're looking at your hips drive back and that your spine stays long.

Inhale down. And exhale up. So another thing I love about this exercise is the stretch that you get in your hamstrings. If you keep your back really long, and you drive your hips back lifting your tailbone, you can feel that dynamic length. And those muscles are the same muscles that are gonna pull you all the way back up.

So you stretch, and then you squeeze. Let's do one more. Stretch down and squeeze up. Okay. Take a narrow stance. Get low. Lean your chest forward.

It's time to row. There's a squeeze at the top and a resist to go down. Lift and hold. And lower. So pinching the shoulder blades together behind you without lifting those shoulders up by your neck.

X he'll pull. So you want the chest to be low here. To increase the challenge, we want gravity, working to challenge us. Pull squeeze, control the length. Two more.

Core tightens every time you row. One more. And let's put the heavy ones down. Switch out to our lighter set. And dial in that lateral raise.

If you stand with the feet together, you'll have more challenge in the stability side of things. Lift hold and take it down. Out to a t, and take it down. So there's so many exercises you can do with dumbbells. I just picked some that I thought I liked that were high impact.

You got a lot of results. And also you'll see how these exercises evolve over our series together. A little more complexity. A little more challenge. Now as I lift, I don't need to go any higher than my shoulders.

In fact, if I do, that's when I kinda start to feel my neck. Little softness in the elbows can help if your neck is feeling tense. Alright. We'll do one more each. No swinging, no leaning, super strong in that powerhouse. For my bicep curls, my elbows are squeezing in, shoulders are open.

I wanna come up and then down with control all the way. And then up and with control. If you wanna see what it can look like gone wrong, it's that. The elbows lift, or it's that. The spine moves. So now that you know what can go wrong, keep the core tight.

You can also do this exercise standing against a wall, if you're not sure. So if your back is against a wall, then you know you're standing straight, tall, no movement, all the way down. Four, three, lengthen, two, And one more. One tricep kickbacks. So I'm turning to the side so you can see the profile of my body. My spine is kind of like this zigzag shape.

Shoulders are squeezed, neck is long. I'm kicking the weights back until my elbows are straight and then bending with control. So dumbbells allow you to work the body. Parts at the same time, left and right, but really help you work on asymmetry. So if I had a single weight source, I could be pushing more with one arm than the other. And you might not notice.

But when you have the dumbbells, you can see it, and you can feel it. So if you do have any asymmetries, which we all kinda do, this is a great way to build strength, in the areas of your body that are a little bit weaker. Four, three. One more time. Keep those arms straight and long. And take it down. Alright.

You get to put these weights down. We've got one more set on the reformer. And if you have that single red spring on, you're exactly where you wanna be. Starting from the floor with some lunges. One foot is against the shoulder block.

Hands are gonna be on the hips, and I want you to stand real tall. So keep that standing leg straight for a second. Just kind of feel where your pelvis is in space. That's why your hands are here. Then kick the carriage forward and hold. Now, we've practiced our lunges already.

So we know that if we lean forward, we're gonna be working more glutes. If we stay vertical, it's gonna be a little bit more in the front of the thigh or the quadriceps. You have options. I'm gonna lean forward for mine. Now, the other reason we have our hands on our hips, it's not just to feel where the hips are or if we're twisting.

It's so that you can feel how your abdominals engage while you drop down. So kind of place your fingers towards the front of your lower abdomen. And as you go low into that lunge, can you feel more contraction in the core? I want you to work to straighten your back leg all the way. So often, I have to remind myself to really push into that back heel.

Three, Two, and on this next one, hold. Place your hands onto your foot bar and we're going into long stretch with both feet onto one shoulder block. So bring the chest forward over the bar and float the non working leg up. Because we practiced a plank already, you got this. You can feel the tightness that you need in the core, shoulders down, and glutes. You keep all of that collected as you press back as far as you think you can go, and then bring it forward, shoulders over wrists. Squeezing the legs Pushing back as far as you can go, keeping everything connected.

Let's do three more. Two more. Don't forget that that lower body is working too. Like squeezing last time. Push push push push push push push.

Pull. Nice. The knees can come down. And before we move on, I want you to separate your knees, placing both feet back against the shoulder blocks, both hands back to the bar. Gonna come into a modified version of that plank, which means your knees are gonna stay down. Push back, kinda like what we just did, but this time we're doing a wide elbow press.

So my chest comes over the bar, and I'm pushing back. Wide elbows, and push. So instead of a push up, this is a push back. Inhale to bend in, chest over bar, and exhale. And for me, I like to really try to keep my feet against those blocks. It's actually more challenging.

If you can push your heels into the blocks, you're gonna feel more abdominals. Two more. Wide elbows, neck long, one more. Bring it all the way in, and then I want you to transition to a seated position. We're gonna set crisscross applesauce, and if this doesn't work for your body, find a move that does.

You might sit up on a prop or extend your legs long. I'm gonna just kind of scooch in front of the shoulder blocks a bit. I don't want them to be my way. Reaching behind grabbing your straps. Now, in this position, the weight's gonna try to pull me back like this.

So I have to keep heavy in my legs, and I am gonna kinda lean forward, but just a little bit. Barely, you can notice it. Bring the elbows in, push forward into your offering. I have my palms up, pinkies and thumbs level, I squeeze in, and I push out. Now, one of the things I want you to really focus on here is that there is intention in both directions of the movement. So as I push, I can feel intention because the spring's helping me.

But as I pull my arms back, I have to create that awareness. So I pull with control and push. One more time like this, and push. We're gonna add an open close here. So as I open, pinkies stay lifted, close. Don't let it pull me back. Bend. Push open, close, and bend. Do it again. Push, tailbone heavy, ribs closed, and spine long.

There's a lot to think about. Welcome to Pilates. Alright. We'll do one more like this. Big push, big open, close, new move. Hands come behind the head for your salute or shaving. So I'm gonna make a little triangle with my hands lean into it even more And then keeping my thumbs connected, I push forward until my fingers separate and my elbows straightened.

My shoulders have to pull down on this one. My abs need to pull in on this one. Long neck. Five, four, finding that fixed gaze. It really helps.

Three, two, And one, that was awesome. Okay. We're gonna repeat the flow on the other side, and it starts with those presses back. So transition to kneeling, feet against the blocks. If you were doing the move like this, I want you to change your feet. Welcome back. It makes a huge difference.

Core stays tight. Me stay down. This time. Let's do narrow elbows. So coming in and pushing straight back. In, and back. Chest over the bar, and back.

Try to push evenly with both hands and straighten the elbows all the way for three, two, and one, bring it all the way in. We're gonna do lunges first, so one foot on the ground, opposite foot comes up, hands on hips. There's a reason they're there. So use them. If you're rotated, correct. If you're releasing your abdominals, connect. And then we're gonna lean into it to work glutes.

Or we're gonna stay vertical, more quads. If you stay vertical, you also feel a bigger stretch in the front of that hip, and you might be all about that. So you do it your way. Push, and bend. Don't forget to straighten that back leg all the way. I'm not sure if you notice or if you're doing it too, but I keep my standing foot pretty close to the frame of the machine. It's actually touching in. My calf is touching the frame.

And so it helps me with tracking. So I know my knees are going right over my toes when I have the frame to guide me. Alright. Let's hold the next one low. Both hands come on. The chest comes over.

There's a reason we're setting this up nice and slow because we're gonna build on it. Chest comes over. Like comes up. I squeeze my heels together. I pull in.

So the weakest link here is the middle. You might feel like you wanna droop down, but you're not going to pushing out. And pulling in. So the movement is happening at my shoulder, but the work is kinda everywhere. Whole body, glutes, inner thighs, abdominals, wrapping, shoulders and arms working.

Three, two, And then one more. And done. And I'm gonna come off the machine on the side where my weights are. Let's grab them. Let's finish this flow. So this is our third set with the dumbbells.

By now, you're like, I got it. I got it. Good. Then you can do more reps, more weight, and focus more on form. I'm in my turnout again. Waights are high on my shoulders.

Push and squeeze. So I said it before. I'm gonna say it again. Keep that back straight. Tail bone presses back.

The way you rise is by pushing down with power into your feet, and you're gonna feel more seat, more booty if you use those heels. Down, up. These are 12 pound weights. One way to change up this flow is to one day use medium weights, like 12, like what I have, I I'd say that's medium or 15, and another day he's really heavy. See if you can do this with twenties or 20 fives. I bet you can.

Even if you do less reps, you can do it. Alright. Rise up. Let's do our lunge back. So you'll see I always roll my shoulders back. It kinda sets me up.

I pick a leg to start on. And I rise. The knee gets low. And for me, I like my chest to come forward just enough to feel the glutes working more on that front leg. A good number, if your counter is 10, right around 10 reps here.

Inhale down, exhale up. Two more on this leg, and right into the other side we go. If you're standing on a really squishy surface or like a mat, balance might feel harder, which is great if you wanna challenge balance. But if you wanna work on a flatter surface, harder surface, it might feel a little bit easier. Inhale, exhale. Even though I'm leaning forward, I am not collapsing.

So chest still stays wide. Two more. Last time. And rise. Okay. So into our LDLs, I have feet about hip distance.

I want you to really feel the mechanics of this because we're gonna build and make this series a little more complex. So sending those hips back, leaning the chest forward, If I could draw arrows, like direction of energy, I would have an arrow from your butt pointing back, an arrow from your head pointing forward. Then I would have an arrow from your butt also pointing up and an arrow from your heels pointing down. And then reverse those arrows. So hips back, crown of the head forward, and then drive those heels down.

Inhale, low, exhale high. It is easy to collapse in the shoulders, especially if you're using weights heavier than I am. So if you need to do a little reset, roll those shoulders back, and find your lats. Last two, and one, into the rows. Narrow stance will be a little bit more balanced, lean forward so gravity makes the exercise harder lift and squeeze lower without releasing the shoulder.

This is definitely core work. I can feel it in my abdominals and my back stabilizers. It's stopping me from rotating. Crown of the head forward, releasing those dumbbells right under the shoulders, driving the elbows up and back. Five, four, three, two, and one.

We're done with the heavies. We're gonna grab the lights, and we have our three exercises starting with our lateral raises. Chorus tight. Stand against a wall. If you're not sure if you're wiggling, you go up. And you go out.

Little softness in the elbows. Great exercise for building strength in the shoulders. Like I said before, you have to consciously work both arms independently. Right? So I can't pull more with one side, otherwise you're gonna see it and kind of retrain if you have a dominant side or a side that kind of takes over. Right? Alright. We'll do one more up to the side and finish this set with a forward and side.

Bicep curls. So I like legs together. I wanna feel a little more core. I soften into the knees. My elbows hug in, and I squeeze up.

Rees down without moving the elbows. And go all the way down into that long line. Caller bones are wide. This is definitely time to put down the lighter weights and grab the heavier ones if you want to, curl in stretch down. XL when something feels more challenging.

So in this case, we're gonna breathe out to contract up, inhale to lengthen down. For Three, two. Last time, squeeze it all the way in and control it down. Okay. Into the triceps. So I submerge my thumbs on the bottom.

I don't think it's cheating. You go into your bent over position just like your row, and that's because we want gravity to make the exercise more difficult. We don't wanna be here. Easy, way too easy. So trying to get that upper arm bone parallel ish to the ground, straighten and lower.

Push resist. And since you're into Pilates, you know how to over complicate and exercise. So you can think about a lot more than what's happening at the arms, squeeze your back, tighten your core, lengthen through the crown of the head, Heck, we can even talk about the feet, right? Push into the four corners of the feet, squeeze your inner thighs. Three, two, and one. And done. You guys did a great job today.

This would be an awesome time to put your feet in the straps and take the reward that you so deserve. I'm gonna end class here. I wanna remind you. This is part of a series of six. This is the first class.

This is our base. We're learning foundations. This is a great place to start, but I want you to come back and continue to build with me. I'll see you guys soon. Bye.