PRO | Around the World 4 Point Flow

We're gonna make two changes. One is change your spring. You were on a red. Now you're on a blue. The other one is you'll bump your foot bar up to whatever your footwork setting is.

So mine's ready to go. Let's do some more kind of around the world stuff. So we'll start in a quadruped kneeling facing back position. Grab one rope, and the higher you hold the heavier it's gonna be. So your options would be to hold the loop, hold above the loop close to the knot, or your work your way even heavier. It's really important that you find the right position for you because I want the exercise to be impactful and effective.

We're only gonna do about eight to 10. So if it's not heavy enough, you gotta choke up on that rope. I've got one blue spring on. Here's my four point kneeling position. So exhale straight arm pulls back, higher than the hip, inhale forward.

As the arm goes forward, maintain tension in the springs, so stopping right under the shoulders perfect. If you're somebody who likes to add the balance coordination part into it, go for it. Sometimes we have the option of training strength or training balance. So if I want the weight to be heavier, I probably won't introduce the balance. Does that make sense? If I'm training balance, I'll keep the weight a little bit lighter.

The next time the arm is up, hold it up, bend and extend, let's do eight. Now, for me, every time I straighten that elbow, I'm reminding myself of a couple of things. To reach through my toes and crown of the head, finding that straight, long line, to keep my core tight, and every time I straighten the elbow, I engage more abdominals, and to pull my supporting shoulder down. Away from eight years. Last time, bring it in, and bring the knee down.

Now this is the same strap you're gonna use, but make a switch so you're holding the short loop if you have it. Your whole body will rotate towards that strap and I'm back in that quadruped position. You have two options, rope behind the elbow, or rope in front. You won't know what you like better until you try. So let's dive into it. Rotate towards the risers. Rotate towards your foot bar and extend the arm, and all the way back through.

The rope should not feel like it's about to decapitate you. That would be an indication that you're reaching that arm a little too high. Just straight out in line with the shoulders exactly where you wanna be. In a four point kneeling position, you have a great opportunity to lift the sit bones, zip up through the deep and low abdominals. So you're activating your core in this very long spine position. Three, two, One more time here.

This is another around the world series, so we're gonna keep working, but in a different orientation. One, hold that rope, could be short loop, could be long loop, and bring both hands to the front of the carriage. Once you're there, it's pretty easy to pivot. And then you have two options. Leggs can be together between the shoulder blocks.

You're gonna choose this option if you're pretty sure you're gonna go into a balance. Or you're gonna go wide legs like this. And you're gonna choose this option. If you're not gonna go into a balance, maybe you've got heavier tension, and you're focusing on power and strength. So choose, and let's go.

Opposite arm to leg is up, I'm pushing straight forward and bending in. Sholders can be tricky. So if you're feeling discomfort or stress, play with palm position, palm in might be better for you than palm down, lower the height, use the long loop or reduce the tension, and you can do this move without any strap at all. Four, I will say if you're adding that balance, be intentional with that back leg. Three, two, one, The arm comes down. Now whether or not you have that back leg up, pick it up now, so we're all gonna meet here stabilizing knee between the shoulder blocks, back leg lifted.

Sometimes, I'll adjust that stabilizing leg and move it back. So do you do you? Eight push ups. These are kind of unique. I want the back leg to initiate the movement, so I'm going hip extension and that's queuing to my brain, drop the chest. So I'm feeling that whole back body, one shape down, one shape up like a boomerang. You'll notice my elbows are wide, That's just my preference for today.

You could do narrow elbows, narrow elbows, targeting more triceps, wider elbows, targeting more pecs. Last time, and bring that back leg all the way forward placing it down. So now we're in our proposal position facing front, and I love this position because the possibility of falling forward or falling backwards has really decrease substantially. Now I'm wobbly side to side, but I don't feel like I'm going this way. This is a great position if coming up onto your knees is newer for you. We're gonna go right into triceps, so lean into it.

Weight that front heel and kick it out all the way. Now if this resistance is feeling heavy, you got options. I would say leave the spring as it is, but choose the long loop or take both hands in, and you could do this with both arms like this. So it's a very accessible no matter where you are today, pushing all the way out eight to 10. Three.

So not unlike the standing exercise, I have to anticipate. It's gonna pull me back. Two. That's why all of this is core work. That's why we love Pilates. One, bring it all the way around. The hardest thing in this whole flow is hooking this drop up.

Let's see if we can do it. If you don't drop it. Okay. Cool. So from here, hands go on to the foot bar. Back leg is gonna come all the way forward onto that platform. Now, you know this coming into that lunge position.

Like comes in, leg comes out. If you wanna stop the video and get a platform extender, pause. I won't even know. What feels good for your foot is good for me. Mine's working just fine here.

All the way out and in. So we've worked this position. Let's add that upper body reach. Now we're doing it on the machine, more stability, more challenge. Full range here.

Four Three, two, and one. Hands come down. The foot that's on the platform goes down to the ground. So we practiced our pikes already in two positions. Now we're doing them in a different orientation with less assists from the machine, more work from the core. I'm just wasting time, not jumping into what I'm stalling.

Let's do it. So the hips come up, the head goes down. That's that pike, and then lengthen. If your carriage is hitting the back, You can either land your landing foot a little more forward, or move this back foot more towards the center of your carriage. Hips go up. Three, head goes down, shoulders over wrists.

You know it. Two one more time. One. Well done. Bring it in.

And let's do the same thing again. Reverse order. So knee down. Foot forward. There is my switch. Here we go.

So I had to choose if I want my foot to go on the inside or outside of the spring. You might have the same decision to make. I don't think there's a bad choice. Score off the hips. Here is the pike.

Hip's up and landing. Same move we just did, other side. Sometimes it's nice to do something right after, like left side directly into right side. It's a learning opportunity. Into the lunge, controlling that landing, Notice that my hands are wrapped over the bar.

So I'm rarely opening my fist, maybe for a quick wrist stretch, but the reason my hands are wrapped is I wanna use the entire arm including the forearm to hold my weight up. I don't want my hand to slip, but I'm also not pushing just directly down to the wrist. I'm squeezing my fingertips up. Let's do two more, see if you can feel that. One more.

Bring it up to the platform. Use the machine to help you find your balance. We've already trained our body. We know what it feels like to find that full range of motion. We know how to anticipate a dynamic balance and stability challenge.

We meet that challenge, lift the arms. All the way out, lengthening, actively engaging the whole body. It's a whole body move. Four, three, two, One, bring it in. Hands go down. The platform leg steps back, and you're now ready for the other side.

Grabbing the strap. We use the short loop So we wanna recreate. It's in the opposite hand of the leg that's forward. So if you ever have a hard time remembering that, just put your hand on your leg. If you can make that connection, you know you're in that proper cross diagonal position.

I am leaning forward, abdominal stay engaged, bend and extend. A few mantras that are going on in my head, I'm trying to sequentially activate. So instead of just powering that arm forward, I'm thinking shoulder down, then power. I'm thinking abdominals engage core tight then power. I'm thinking weight into my front heel, then push All of these little seeds that I'm planting, they help to build stability and control in the move. And then you get to the point where they feel more intuitive, less of a conscious thought, more of just an activation.

Three. To last time. And then from here, the hands come down, that front leg extends back. Take a second, change things up, adjust, we're gonna go into those push ups. So reminder, the back leg is lifting, and that's gonna cue drop the chest.

And there's some more traditional moves that we do. On this machine where we wanna find this connection of hip extension to initiate the movement. So this is a great place to dial it in, to feel it, to learn it, to make it familiar in your body. Once we're familiar in a move, we can really dive in to the nuances. Right? So give yourself some grace.

Do these moves tens, twenties, hundreds of times, and you'll get something different out of it each time. Alright. One more. And then you can choose to keep this balance alignment or both knees down. Both are great options. I just wanna remind you if you're working heavy tension, take the balance part out.

So choose balance or strength. You can change an exercise really easily. By just using those two concepts. Four, three. Notice my hands wrapped again. So it's not an open hand like this, using the hand, using the forearm, using my lats, Last time, hand goes down.

So you'll pivot so the whole body turns 90 degrees, and then switch that loop so it's in the other hand. If you didn't try the difference between strap in front or strap behind, try it now. So I encourage you you just have to find what's gonna work for your body today. I intentionally rotate in both directions. So I'm rotating my chest, looking at the riser, rotating my chest, looking at the foot bar. And I'm not trying to lift my hand really high.

Shoulder height is exactly where I want it to be. Four three two One. Awesome. The whole body rotates. This is where we started. Seems like it was so long ago.

Where are you gonna hold? Low, medium high? High is heavier. Wrap the fingers, knees are wide. And then straight arm pulls back. When I lower the arm right below the shoulders where I wanna be, if you are in a balanced position where your challenge or stability's challenge, Keeping tension here at the start and beginning, and at the end is gonna help your stability. If I go all the way to no tension and back up to tension, that's what really makes me feel off balance.

So if you wanna go into this, you wanna remind yourself, keep tension here and push. Keep the arm up. Go for your triceps. Every time you straighten the arm core tight. As a teacher, I love this variation because I know I'm gonna do the long box variation at some point with my clients So here we can really talk about the co contraction of the abdominals with the arms, the lengthening through the head and tail.

It's very relevant. If I don't do those things, I feel wobbly. So if I learn them here, I'll do them when I'm on the box one more time. Bring it all the way in and bring it down. Okay. Let's bring this kind of to center to close. So when you did a lot of unilateral work all the way around the machine, coming into center. Let's do elbows connect or palms connected elbows wide, pressing out to those long legs, heels together toes apart.

You know what you love at hips up. Now what we wanna feel is after all this work that we did, this dynamic flexibility, my hamstrings feel longer. My spine feels more mobile. And if you wanna push this just a little bit more, you can walk the feet up. I'll tell you why this is more challenging.

Two things. As I lift, there's more weight onto my upper body here as well. So more shoulder stability required. It also requires more range of motion in my hamstrings and my shoulders to get that scoop. So one's not better, but there are two different variations. One more time. Bring it all the way in, and bring it down.