Pikes and Peaks Reformer

What's up a familiar? It's your girl, miss Michelle. Again, with you, and I'm so excited to bring this movement with you today. Foundational Pikes and peaks. I know you've learned so much already, and I hope that this will build upon what you already know. Okay? If you're ready to work with me, let's come to a standing if you're not already standing. I have my feet a little bit wider than my hips, and I want you to just kind of find that balance, zipping up through the center line of your body and just feeling where you are in space, feeling your feet, big toe, little toe, heel onto the floor, taking a deep breath in and out, and now I want you to shift your balance to one side of your body, pick one, and just find that balance on that foot. Why? Because it's a challenge. Go to the other side.

That's not my good side. Let's come on over here and just find the balance because I want my feet and my ankles to wake up and go to the other side again. I know. It's like, why do we do this? Because that's why. I feel good. One more this way, and then we're gonna take a lay down on the carriage. Yeah? There's our balance.

Maybe I wanna take a little fold here. So I tuck my tenon to my chest and did a little roll down because my body told me to do that. And I'm gonna roll up the head's left and to come up, shoulders roll back, and then I'm gonna take a seat on the reformer. Starting off with our footwork, I have all springs on, depending on your machine, all springs on, three reds, foot rests, is up foot bars up and headrest is up, having my toe creases on the foot bar pulling my tummy down through the carriage, heels are in contact toe creases on to the foot bar and push away. So as we're moving through our footwork, toe creases are on, just bending and straightening here.

And if you feel a little bit of creativity today, just push yourself a little bit further than maybe you have for and just play around, like, you know, I love to play. So we're doing about eight to 10 of these. And when you've done your last one, bring the carriage home, close it nice and softly, have my arches on arches on that little bird on the perch and then push the foot bar away almost like you're doing a squat, right? Still feeling the backs of my arms onto the carriage, wide collarbones, pushing away, feeling my seat really turn on as I resist pushing, and then bringing that same hamstring curl back to close the spring. Right? About two more of these. Last one for me and bringing it in heels on. Heels are right there on the foot bar, pushing away, feels like my toes were up if I'm standing on the on the ground.

I'm still doing that squat, reaching the head long away from the toes, even though I'm on this, carriage pushing it away. And what all this is doing as you keep moving through the footwork is getting the body ready for the pikes and peak the pikes Can I say that? Pikes and peaks that we're going to do. Gonna do one more out. Take it in and close less springs. Then toe creases go offer my tendons stretch, tendons stretch push the foot bar away and dip those heels underneath the foot bar.

If you're a dancer, Releville might sound familiar, still pulling that tummy in. Stretching and reaching through the heels, reaching through the top of the head, all happening at the same time. Two more. This is my tooth, and one knees bend, close the springs. I'm going to sweep my lovely self up to change the springs, leaving a blue and a yellow on, and then we're gonna lay it on back down. Alright, my dears.

So our first exercise here while we're laying down and controlling the carriage is gonna be our dead bug. So dead bug looks exactly like that. So bringing the legs to table top ish. Okay. So this is our box that we have here. Ahead and curl the head neck and chest up towards the knees. So if we were like doing a true true dead bug, we'd be here. Right? So we could do that.

Palms are facing in or you can give me that 100 esque reach with the fingertips. Yes? So hold either. We're gonna hold here for five, four, three, two, one, and rest, resting my feet on the foot bar, and I'm gonna go one more time, and then we're gonna move on. Go ahead and bring those legs up to tabletop. Fingertips reach or up or out.

Head neck and shoulders curl up and hold. I'm gonna do this one this time. My shoulder blades are still on the carriage connecting for five. Four, three, two, one, and arrest everything down. Feed on the foot bar and then grab those loops.

We love our loops. I have my thumb outside the loop and my fingertips through the middle, bringing both legs to my tabletop taking my arms out to the side like the letter t and still pulling my belly button down towards the carriage. Bring your fingertips down towards the footbar by the hips and then bring them back out to that t. Very good. Holding that balance. While you move the arms and while that core, that powerhouse is firing off, let's do two more. Last one, And then leave the fingertips as a t right there. Go ahead and take your fingertips up to the ceiling a little bit wider than your body, and we're gonna laterally pull those ropes right in front of us.

This is a front pull straight fingertips towards the foot bar, still holding that box there with the hips and the knees and the Titzis one more. Come back to the center. Take your arms back out to a tee. I know. This is fun. You're feeling the fire.

Let's do those circles here. Arms up. And around for three. Two little slack. Keep the slack in the rope. One, and then circle around.

Three. Two. It's sweaty in here. One. Now bring the backs of your arms to the carriage.

So we're right here. If this is a lot for your legs and your abs, go ahead and put your feet on the foot bar. Otherwise, keep them in tabletop, and now we're gonna take the fingertips to the carriage for that tricep extension. I'm gonna do about five of these. Last one, really reach, reach, reach, reach, reach, are your abs calling? Are they crying? Are they saying words to you that you normally wouldn't say in church? Bring it all all the way back. And then rest the toes on the foot bar replacing loops on the pegs.

Don't make a lot of noise like me. I'm gonna lower my headrest right now because we're going onto a bridge series. Remember, your feet are up, your headrest is down. I'm gonna have my feet a little bit wider than my My hips here, my arches are on the foot bar, and you might wanna need to scoot a little bit away from the shoulder blocks. Possibly, I don't know up for you. Alright. So here, I'm in my bridge. If you need more spring, please put it on.

You ready? We're gonna hand straight up lots of control. Don't go fast on this one. So hips come up, hip points are coming up towards your ceiling. Keep pressing the arms down into the carriage. And then lower down. So this is more like a hinge. Right?

Hips come up. Press the feet into the foot bar to find that forward plank. That's what you have here. Okay. And lower down. Can we do one more. Please for me. Alright. Bring it up. Hold. Can we hold that there? If you feel like your bottom is leaving the storyline, give it a little push forward and hold that there.

Hold that bridge. And then lower it down, hinge it down, and we're there. I moved it I moved it a little bit, but y'all know what I meant. So so from here, I left to go knock kneed. So I'm gonna just really take my feet a little bit wider out and then bring my knees together and see how that feels on my hip. When you do this, you may not come out too far.

So let's try about two or three of these. So keep the knees in contact or towards one another and then lift just a little bit. I know this is weird. Right? But it opens up those hip capsules. Right? So we're getting the synovial fluid in our hips moving because we're gonna be hiking. I'm gonna do one more for me up to you.

Bring it back and we're there. Go ahead and bring the legs back to your start position. My feet are on the foot bar. I'm closing the springs here. Now we're gonna go into leg circles. So my leg circles, I want you to feel the leg circles without the straps first. Okay? So take the legs up to a 90 degree angle right there. If you need a little bit little bit less or more or to bend the knees, totally okay to do so.

So I'm gonna have the legs come towards me, keeping my hips nice and square. Open around and bring it back. Feelinging my abs, turning on. So this is without the straps. One direction. One more.

How does that feel? Let's go the other way. The feet go towards the foot bar, open to the side and close into the center. Good. Good. Great. Take those feet to the foot bar. Now we're gonna try that same exercise with our feet and straps because we know you love feet and straps. Right? So we're gonna do the same thing about five types. So push that foot bar away to put the loop on and now I have both loops on my feet.

Arms are at my side on the carriage, and let's try going out first this time. So feet go towards the footbar down, around and up, and I'm keeping a small imprint or a small circle that I'm using. Now depending on how you feel, you might wanna go wider, but I think you you can feel yourself five. I'm gonna do about five in each direction. One more for me here.

Take a pause, go the other direction. My hamstring said, hello, Michelle, they checked in with me really quickly. You saw that pause there. Right? That's why I love Pilates because no matter how long you've been doing it, it's always new. That's my new tagline.

Oh, this is the body I showed up in today. Let's do one more. Last one down and around and up and I'll just take a second to give myself a nice little stretch. So if it feels good to you, go ahead. I'm gonna flex my ankle so I can get a nice little stretch in my hamstrings.

I'm holding both of the strings just for a little hello stretch. And then when you're ready, go ahead and take your feet out of the straps, and then place them on the pegs, and then we're gonna pop off to the side gently and carefully step off to the side. Now I have on a blue and yellow. I'm gonna pop that blue off and place a red on. Okay? So heavy ish for you. Come on to a kneeling position on to the carriage and find your wideness in your hips right about where your knees are.

Maybe your feet are in the in your shoulder blocks. Maybe they're not. So here, I wanna think of a quadruped position. So send the hips back. If it's okay here, you can do this here at the foot board or you could take it down to your platform.

So finding that square where your shoulders are in line with your wrist ish and the hip is in line with the knee. So while you're here, I really want you to think about like a cat cow position. Pull your abs up and through the back as they're going through the ceiling. So bracing through the hips, let the muscles wrap around the quads, the glutes, and really find that strength in your box. Okay? This is our box position.

We're here. We're holding. If you feel like you need a little bit more, maybe take your knees off. I'm not doing it, but I'm just giving this to you. Okay? And rest. So it looks a little bit different. So I want you to see that again.

So we're gonna brace everything holding that box in this quadruped position. And then we're gonna loosen it up. You ready? Okay. Squeeze everything. See that? Nothing squeezing. Squeezing.

Squeeze that there. I'm taut in my shoulders, wrapping the quads, wrapping the glues, watching the muscles turn on as I just hold this box because Again, this is something that we need to practice on all the time. And then send the hips back and do a semi kind of rest pose just a little bit, and then take your hands up to the foot bar. Now this is a favorite thing of mine. So here I have my knees still. I'm gonna actually take my knees a little bit further back and take my feet through the headrest area if that works for you.

For me, I'm gonna send the hips back and leave the arms on the footbar so I can find a 90 degree angle between the arm and the shoulder and just find the stretch pushing my triceps in like my armpit area down towards the carriage head is in line with my shoulders. So my ears and my arms are in the same plane and taking that stretch. And if you want to come out of it, come out for a second, and then go back into it, I really want you to feel that stretch and connection through the arm because we're gonna need that later. So head down, ears and arms are in alignment. I have my fingertips straight because my, palms are pressing into the foot bar to find more connection through this muscle line here. Also muscle filling the muscle through my intercostals and my serratus muscles.

So that really is important for pikes and peaks. Good. And we love it here, and we're gonna come out. Yes. So as we come out here, I want you to find that quadruped position again. So this time, I'm gonna use the platform and lower my chest towards the carriage and thread my left hand through the right, and try to find my shoulder stretching here. So, again, this twist in the torso or threading the needle is going to help you find a little more room in the hips, more room in the chest to give the stretch.

Come through the other side. You're gonna need it. And why will you need it? Because we're gonna do hard things And why can we do hard things because you know how to do hard things and come back through. So if you're okay here, go ahead and bring yourself back up to the foot bar. I'm gonna take my feet into the shoulder blocks.

I have a red and yellow on. If you feel comfortable here, you can go ahead and press out straight into your long stretch position or your plank. So holding and bracing here, pushing my legs back, finding my balance, having straight wrists, finding that nice little long stretch. Finding that pike and peak and that plank. And I'm just gonna move forward and backwards. So think moving plank. I'm not interested in how far you go back.

I just want you to move just a little bit forwards and backwards. Challenge yourself. Two more like that. Last one, close the springs, gently bring the knees down. So our feet are gonna stay where they are.

So this is gonna be a up stretch. I'm sorry. Down stretch ish. So when we do down stretch, our chest are nice and high, and we have our wrist nice and straight, we press back with our the back of our legs. Right? So, press back with the feet and find that plank. This is more about the back of the legs and the glutes than your low back, and then bring it close the spring. Bring it forward. So push back and then find the clothes in the spring while maintaining that shape, maintaining that plank.

And I'm really, really pulling my abs up and back and I'm feeling my hip flexors pulling back as well. Do one more here. And you know, you wanna drop your chest and think that you are a character on a movie on a rock and press back and give yourself a little bit of a break. A tiny bit of a break. We love it. And then come back up.

And I want you to find that quadruped position again. Again, using the platform or the foot bar, I'm going platform. I'm gonna do knees off, but when we do fitness classes, it's called box. So I'm gonna tuck my toes under and find my balance. Both knees come off, pressing my heels of my hands into the platform and finding balance here. Holding for three.

Two, one rest. Okay. Did you find that one? Can we do it one more time? On of Esmas, again, find that balance. This is gonna be the best one that you do. Find the balance, press the heels of the hand into the back form or the foot bar, and then lift both knees off holding that box.

Three, two, one, and lower that down. Let the feet go flat and go press back into a child's pose. Feeling good. Feeling great. Wonderful.

Alright. Because we're already here, I'm gonna go ahead and take that red spring off. Okay to leave it as either yellow or blue up to you. I feel a little bit strong today, so I'm gonna go blue. Alright. So I'm gonna go into a quadruped position. I have my feet through the headrest.

I want you to find that loop on the side. So it's behind me here. I have my feet a little bit wider touching both shoulder blocks. So my head is reaching along through the front, and I take that arm and press it forward, come through finding my balance. Now if you feel like you're pitching forward and you need a little more security, send your hips back a little bit further to find more balance. Yes.

So if my hips are back, there you go. I normally do three of these. I'm doing three with you, but I did one for demo. Yes. And then come back out and then place that puppy down. Let's do the other side.

I'm gonna keep my hips back. So this other hand is nice and planted. Hips are going back, reaching through. I did four on the other side. So I have to do four here. Yes? Squeezing, bracing, last one.

Reach and then bring her home. Place that back on the peg and then find your true quadrant position here. Again, my foot is through the headrest. Everybody's machine is a little bit different. I want you to find that balance and then send that right leg back into a balance, bracing at the abs, lifting that right leg back, and then I want you to just find that nice line from the top of your head through the toe. Right? So here, if your hip is out, send it more towards the floor, so you could have a nice square hip holding that balance for three, two, one, set that down, switch out to the other side.

A little bit sway. A little bit rosy toasty. Alright. There's your balance. Yes. Alright. Yeah. Normally, I'm looking about 45 degrees underneath there.

So I'm reaching long. If you find your hip is twisting, twist it back. Hold that line. Nice strong line from the head to the toe for three. Two. One, you're amazing. Take that knee down to the carriage, maybe scoot yourself forward so you can send those hips back into a child's pose. Give yourself a couple seconds here. Couple breaths. And when you're ready, carefully step off to the side.

Now what's going on with my reformer? I'm gonna take the foot bar down. And as far as your spring convention goes, I wanna have supportive springs for me. I like a blue and a red for this exercise. So feel what you need to feel supportive. Yes. Going to get the box.

So for my box, I have it short box style. So against your foot rest or what is this called? Your shoulder rest. And we're gonna have that there and then we're gonna take our forearms onto the box and then take the feet onto your platform. So hold this position here.

See how you feel here. If you feel okay, go ahead and press out into a plank and hold that plank. Okay? If this feels good, stay here. Okay? Now if you want extra credit, you're gonna pike those hips up and really pull your tummy in towards the ceiling and then plank back out to come out of the pike. Yes? I'd say do about three to five of these. These feel really good. And all that hip work that we've done already makes you feel invincible. This is my last one.

Extra credit. Come on out into that plank. And then I want you to bend those knees come into a kneeling position and just scoot the box right back out. One more like that. No, maybe two more. Close it. Come on abs. You can work and boom.

Neil down carefully step off to the side. High five. You did it. Alright. So did I? Alright. Take the box back. We're gonna pick that headrest up when we get back this way. And we're gonna try some side lying things that you already know.

So I'm going to take my foot bar back up. I'm going to put in a high position for me because I want to do some fun things while we're here. So spring conventions, I have a red and a yellow on because I want a little bit of feeling So I'm kind of going onto the carriage side lying stacking my hips, then finding my head on the headrest and hugging either the peg or the shoulder block, stacking the hips, reaching long through my head. So you see my hips are here nice and stacked. I would love for you to pick up that top leg and just reach it long through the foot bar if that's available to you. Yes.

If it's available hold that there. We're staying in line with the hip and still bracing at the abs. Okay. Hold it there. Is it okay for you to do a couple circles? Little small circles here as one of my friends say the size of a blueberry little blueberries blueberry blueberry blueberry blueberry those are three called the other way blueberry blueberry blueberry reach that leg long and then then it and come on back. Now we're gonna take that foot to the foot bar. Oh, press away. We're just gonna press away and then bend and straighten here.

So here you're gonna really feel that took is turning on. Squeeze and hold everything. Tell me still pulling in, doing about three to five of these, and really feeling my heel push into the foot bar like I'm doing a squat on the floor, but this may be more accessible for folks who don't find squats, Lovely like I do. It's a modified squad. I think I've done 57.

Let's do one more and then break it home. We love her. Wonderful. Now, we have another side. Let's go to the other side. Step off or just get cute and go over. Little coquettish. Yes. Come over to the side.

Same setup. Now you get to see the work happening here. So here's the stack. I'm gonna reach this leg nice and long and the the objective here is to find that hip strength and to find where the AB Doctor and the AD Doctor this turns on to support that leg where it is. So I'm hovering that leg out.

Then I'll try my little blueberries, three circles in each direction. Three two one other way. Three two. One, we love it. Bend that knee.

Bring it home and then place your foot on the footbar pressing away, turning on that glute. Look at that. Boom. Keep that pressure on the foot The heel is pressing in that's tightening there. It's almost like you're doing a pistol squat, but you're laying down. Right? If you've never seen a pistol squat, Google it. Alright. So one legged squat.

Yeah? Last one ish, bring it all the way home, and then carefully step off to the side. Because now we're gonna face the back of our reformer. So go ahead and let that head rest go down. Springs. So you have options here.

One red, one blue, two red up two jus. Alright. I'm gonna go ahead and put my foot bar down because sometimes I feel really long. So go ahead and sit on the carriage, feet are gonna go through your shoulder blocks, maybe the legs are crossed. Maybe they're not. Do whatever makes you happy. So we're here, we're gonna grab our lovely loops, tall, nice tall posture, and I want you to just find where you are here in space.

So you wanna make sure you have at least a hand behind you. So just kind of roll back and see how that feels. If that feels okay, we're ready to roll. Alright. Are we ready? We're ready. Alright. For our back row, bring your knuckles together and bring your your hands right about to your chest. And then I want you to find that roll back, roll it back, and then come back forward. Good. Stack.

That's fine. We're hinging. So when I'm hinging here, my hips are pressing forward, It's really my hip set of sending the carriage back and forth. If you see that, look at the initiation from the tailbone there, and then comes back. So I want you to think about that every time you do it, squeeze Yes. We love it. Let's just do one more because I kinda give you extra credit there. Come on back. Do one more and then stack the spine.

Come all the way up. Take your arms to the side of the reformer. Fingertips are through the loop and your palms are facing behind you. For these are for triceps. So pushing back just past your hips and then come back.

Keeping in your posture, tall, bring your tummy nice and tight, legs are crossed or uncrossed up to you. I'm gonna do about five of these. Triceps. We're working all the arms. Push it back. Push it back.

And I get to sing today. And one more, nice and strong, and then bring it up. For this next exercise, we're going to hold the loop almost like a fist. So we're going to hold the loop nice gentle grip. And as we're here, we're gonna bring our knuckles towards our chest, they're facing. And as we keep opening up, the arms will open to the side. There you go. Look at that.

And then come through the center. Their side. So these are flies or a variation of a fly. It could be the letter x, it could be the letter y, it could be a t, but this is gonna get you work in the shoulder. The side body, the hips, as well as the serratus inter intercostals.

We love them, and then bring it back home. Nice. Right? So now we'll eat a scoot up us a little bit and bring your feet flat to the headrest. This might start looking familiar. Alright. So my fingertips are still through the loops. I want you to keep the knuckles touching and then give you that curve and the hips to find that little c curve there and maybe open up the the hands a little bit wider and find a bit of a teaser.

So this is my right foot, have my right foot up here, and I'm keeping this curve in my spine to keep filling my powerhouse and my abs pull back, switch legs. So it's almost like my arms are in a hug a tree position, and I'm maintaining this teaser esque position. One more single leg. Relax the shoulders, arms are strong, switch legs. And then place it down.

Sit it back. Are you ready for the the grand finale? Not grand finale, but you know, one of those. So go ahead and give me that hug a treat. Give me that wide stance with the arms. Nuckles are facing each other. And I'm gonna take both feet. Well, let's do one. One foot up and the other one will come to meet it. Yes.

We're holding there for three, two, one, and a rest. It's a lot of work y'all. High five. Last exercise here. Again, those knuckles, I have the loops here, nice and tight, straight arm posture, but I wanna lean back just a little bit. My arms are straight here. I'm gonna give a bicep curl.

So bicep curl here, curl it up. You're looking like you're at muscle beach trying to catch a hottie. Yeah. Stretch, reach bicep curls. I wonder how much weight this is. I'm not gonna tell you how much I weigh, but anyway, one more. Strong.

We love it out loud. One more. One more. Love it because it feels good. Nice. And then take a forward fold stretch. Nice work, y'all.

Alright. Are you ready for the last part? And we're out of here. Go ahead and place those pegs on. We're gonna put our pegs down and step over to the side. I am going to already left it there. Leave my foot rest down if you didn't already leave it down and come to the front of the reformer.

Last part of the exercise is gonna be our pushup. So tall nice spine. Arms come up to the ceiling, reaching the head nice and long, fingertips reaching long, and then I want you to bend the head towards her former arms are reaching for the carriage, almost like you're going over a barrel, find the carriage. My thumbs are under the carriage as I push the carriage away to come to a flat back position, and then I'm going to roll the top of my spine up almost like elephant and then press it back down nice and straight. Maybe when I'm here, I I notice how my feet are flat on the floor, how my hamstrings are stretching, and then I curl from the top of my hips through my back, one bar spines, thoracic spine, cervical spine, and then find that curl in the spine, and then flatten that puppy.

Now if you want to pike it up, push the hips back, and then let the feet rock back a little bit. Yep. So you have options here. That's another pike. There's another peak. We always do exercises that are going to help us with activities of daily living.

I'll do one more nice little push up with a flat back. Push it away When you push it away this time, hold it here, keep holding, pulling the belly button up to the ceiling. Nice soft knees if you need them. Option here, do push ups. You're going to bend the elbows to let the carriage come towards you, press it away.

And to you, press it away. One more to you, and press it away. This time when you come back, keep the hips where they are, let the body close the springs by coming up curving through the spine, keep that curve as you find your fingertips back up to the ceiling. Nice and long. Take the arms back behind you. And you are amazing.

Pikes and peaks, foundations. I'm so glad I got a chance to do this with you. I'm so appreciative. Thank you, and I will see you for the next workout.