Long Back Stretch

Let's take a look at the long back stretch. This is such a wonderful exercise for so many reasons, and it's also not it doesn't sound like what it is, and that's one of the reasons I enjoy it. This exercise requires so much upper body strength and control in order to get the long back stretch portion of it. So remember, we need to make sure that we first have enough stability and strength in order to support the upper body with the arms and the upper back. I'll talk about that more in a moment.

Set up for this. I've got you on or I'm on one spring. I'm on one red spring right now, which is just the regular spring. There is the option to put the green spring on, which would give you a little bit more support when you're out there, but also requires a little bit more strength when you're out there, which you'll see in a moment. So I recommend really just one good spring for this particular exercise.

So take a moment. The foot bar is in the middle position for me. You don't wanna be too high, you don't wanna be too low, and you wanna take care in mounting your reformer. So I'll always put a hand first on the foot bar and the other hand as I step up. And I'm having a seat on the foot bar here.

Putting the hands so they're close to your body. I like to take some care and wrap my hands a little bit underneath the bar. To make sure I've got some support from my hand, but you wanna be sure not to wrap the thumbs. That wouldn't feel so great when you're out there. So keep the thumbs with the rest of the fingers.

Now, we're going to walk the feet forward a bit, taking the bottom off of the bar, placing the feet all the way up against the shoulder rest. Chest is open, and the back is straight here. Many people lean back too much into their arms here. You see how I'm leaning back? I really want you to work on pressing your chest forward. Let me show you. This is chest expansion.

Chest expansion, which we can do sitting and kneeling and whatnot. You want to really feel that you are expanding your chest your arms are behind you and you're pulling strength from that position. So hands in position, walk the feet into place, heels are flexed, up against shoulder rest. So instead of leaning back, I'm pressing forward simultaneously pulling back to keep the carriage at the stopper. Now first, we need to be able to bend the elbows maybe all the way to the mat, press back up with good shoulder mechanics.

So that would be the very first piece of this exercise. If you are unable to bend your elbows without your shoulders going up into your ears, then I would recommend practicing practicing just the tricep dip part of this with bent knees. I'll show that for a moment. So here, my knees are bent. My chest is open. We would just practice this. So I do this with a lot of people in my studio so they can build the strength.

For the next exercise or for the full exercise. That is long back stretch. Here we go. Assuming you've got the strength and the stability to do that tricep dip, we add on So placing the hands, stepping the feet forward, making sure you're not leaning back. You're open through your chest. We first bend the elbows.

We use an exhale to reach up. We are rounded through the back here. We come all the way back to the stopper, straighten out the back and repeat. Bend the elbows, reach up using the core body to do that. Notice my elbows are straight.

My back is rounded. I'll come all the way back to the stopper That's where I straighten out, still shoulders forward, not over foot bar. Step out of it with care, and that is the long back stretch.