Men's Health Reformer

Hello everybody, my name is Andrew Aroustian, and thank you for joining us for a Men's Health Reformer Class. Helping me today, I have Michael. Thank you so much for joining us. Now, I'm gonna get the reformer set up for you to begin with. So with this class, I'm gonna set up the reformer here with a long box on.

I've placed the long box over the shoulder rests, and that's for this particular model. We're using the balanced body studio reformer here, so it may be different for your machines at home or what you're using in your studio, but for this particular for this particular class, I've placed the long box over; and that's to give us a little bit more length and room and you'll find out why a little bit later. The foot bar, I've set that on the lowest gear, so it's not completely down, it's just on the lowest gear. It's just sort of a little bit lower than the long box. And again, that just gives us a bit more length and you'll find out why shortly.

I've got one red spring on, so a full spring, and I've actually shortened the straps a fraction. Okay, and that's just to help me with a little bit more of the repertoire as we move forward in the class. Your choice, you don't have to make them too small but however works for you on your reformers. All right, I think we're ready to start. So Michael, what I might get you to do is stand in front of the reformer in the foot bar, place your hands onto the corners of the box.

We're gonna start with a nice little bit of body prep here. So starting with a round back. So let's round that a little bit more. Just find that length through the spine. So as you breathe in, you wanna push the box away.

Now, it's on a red spring so this is gonna give a little bit of feedback here. Exhale, round the spine to come back. Now I want that spring to be a fraction, a little bit heavier. Normally, I would do this on a blue or a half, but I want the little bit of extra feedback here. So we don't have to worry about range, that's just not really as important at this point for what I'm after.

What I'm after is an activation of the thoracic and lumbar extends as we flatten the back, and then a nice bit of feedback to help stretch on the way back. Do two more. Inhale, think of sending the chest out. That's it, exhale, calm back in. You wanna keep the legs sort of the same distance away from the foot bar the whole time so that we get this articulation through the spine.

Good, now we'll add some rotation. So place the back hand to the front corner. Place that front hand out to the side. Now, what you're going to do is rotate your body and again, move through the box. So again, there's a little bit of tension on there so you don't have to go too far and really sort of dump into the vertebrae and into the ligaments here of the spine.

One more, take a nice bit of rotation. Good, Michael, very nice. And then place that hand back on the box. We do the same thing on the other side. So this arm out to the side.

Good, as you inhale, I like to do this on an inhale 'cause that helps to stretch the tissues of the back as we go. Exhale, come back up, good. Inhale, that's it Michael, very nice. Let's do one more. Inhale, gimme that rotation through the spine and coming up.

Beautiful, thank you. So from here, I'm gonna get you Michael now to lay down onto your back onto the box. So where I want you to set yourself up, everyone's gonna be a slightly different obviously when they lay down on the box, depending on how tall your men are in your class or in your private session or whatever you're doing. But you're gonna bring yourself a little bit further back and you just want the back of the also put, so just back here, sort of above the neck to be rested on the box, yes, so you can feel how you can still open through the throat but there's not a lot of tension happening there. Hands are on the front of the face of the box to give you a little bit of support.

And you've got your archers or your heels on the football, whatever feels the best here. What are you going to do, Michael, is you're gonna lift your hips up just like we did before. So as you breathe up, lift the hips up, that's it, and then come back down. Now, as Michael's doing this, I'm gonna add a few more springs. What that will do, maybe an extra two heavy springs, and what that's going to do is just gonna keep, just to help keep the bed stable, just so that we're not rocking and rolling anywhere.

Good, come down. So let's do six in total. So as you breathe that, again, just lift the hips however you decide to lift, but try and curl and articulate on the way down. Good, three more, Michael, doing well. And exhale to lift, that's it.

And breathe that as you come down. One last time. Exhale, lifting the hips up, finding that stretch through the front as well as activation through the back. Excellent. Good.

Back line, done. Now, let's move it on. So moving yourself back, I want you to get the back of your shoulder blades only. So just the shoulder blades, not too far. Keep the feet on the foot bar here; and your choice, you can either keep these feet knees bent, or even if you'd like, which is actually quite nice as well, if you lengthen your legs over, you can actually get yourself a little bit of a feeling of pull, or even a slight bend, and you can hook those heels, the heels hooked.

And again, you can have like a little feeling of pull, so let's actually keep that there, that's quite nice for you. So as you breathe in, you're going to lengthen over the box, give yourself an opportunity to open the throat, stretch that thoracic spine, good. Now, let your rib cage bring you up and a bit chest slipped we've got right here. Inhale, think of yourself being a waterfall and going over the back of the box. Exhale, lift, now it's important not to just let yourself fall over the back.

You still wanna keep those abdominals on in that eccentric control over the back of the box. Oh, little few trembles of truth going on there. I love it. Feels so good as a Pilates teacher to feel that, doesn't it? It's awesome.

Let's do three more, yeah? So, Michael is as well is hooking his heels here and his hamstrings, and the back line of his body are working. And what happens when those hamstrings are on, that pelvis is getting anchored down to the box beautifully. Last one, Michael, and come up. You're gonna hold this, we're going into the hula, and remember that's the rotation, however, I'm gonna get you to bring your feet back on the box.

This can be a progression if you like. So as you inhale, you go over the box. As you come up, lift the front leg and bring your elbow towards the knee. Good, inhale, go back over. We're only gonna do two on each side here.

So this is a good abdominal warmup as well as as a bit of mobility through the spine. Beautiful work, Michael, nice job. All the way over. The last one, exhale to come up, stay in your chest lift, lower the leg. Good.

Lift both legs up one at a time into your tabletop position. As you inhale, tap the foot bar. We're only gonna do four here. Exhale, bring the legs up. Now, this can be modified to a single leg lift if there's a little bit of instability through that lumbar spine.

So this is the progression, remember, you can include those variations if you like. Hold the tabletop for a spine twist. Inhale across. Now, this is gonna be probably one of the smallest spine twists you've ever done in your life. The range is not important.

You're in that chest lift, you're engaging the abdominals already, especially, oblique, in this trunk flexion so just be, you know, considerate of that range. Good, one last one. Excellent, you can lower your feet now, Michael, place your hands onto the box there and let yourself come up into a sitting position. Very good. Come off the box.

I'm gonna bring the springs back down to one. So one heavy spring for this next part. We're gonna start working through the back extensions. So laying down on the box with your hands here. Thigh on first, that's it.

Now, so Michael, slide back a little bit, a little bit more chest off the front. Sort of nose at the foot bar-ish, depends on how long you are, I suppose. Legs, hip distance apart, so don't squeeze them or have them too wide. Try not to get married to that. Just being nice and lengthened into the hip bones.

All right, so we've warmed up that front part of the body. Now, let's flip it and think about the back, okay? So, four points into your back extension here. So you're gonna press out number one. Now, keep the arms nice and straight and strong.

Think armpits to springs as you lift up. Beautifully done. Pressing it away. And then elbows to floor as you come back in, good, and exhale to press. Inhale, think about you armpit as you lift.

We only do four here. Press away and come back. And remember, we're still only at the start of the class, so range is really dependent on your client. There is no right or wrong here. It's wherever your client needs or wherever you need to move on this reformer.

Last one, pressing out. Also think about letting the abdominals go here. Yeah, give them a stretch. Now, what we're going to do is staying here. I'm going to add a little tricep press to this.

So place this hand, Michael, on the side of the box with your arm straight. And you're gonna squeeze into that box. So lift your head up slightly. Good, now, just with this right arm, we're gonna do a little tricep press. Exhale to press away.

Oh, good morning. And come back in, elbows down, good. Let's do six here. And press away. Good, triceps, we love working the triceps.

And press, good. We've got three more. And exhale to press. Three. Good.

And press for two. Very nice, Michael, good job. Last one. Notice how Michael's keeping his shoulders nice and level? You wanna try and avoid any of that rotation.

Good, let's swap the hands over, long line. That other hand that's pressing into the box, it's gonna give you a little bit, again, stability here. It's gonna engage your lats. It's gonna help you keep the trunk from overextending. We're also working into that eccentric control on the way back.

Three more, very nice. Good. And two. Last one. And again, this can be done with both arms or single arm, it really is up to you and up to your clients.

Okay, come off the box there, Michael. Really well done. We're moving on now into our leg and footwork. So what I want you to do here is we'll start by setting the foot bar up and setting our springs. Now, I would suggest to work up to all springs for this.

You know, it's really up to what your client is up to, what your class is up to. Today we're gonna go for three reds, but I would suggest working your way up to a nice strong spring to really get that activation and full body global muscular activation. All right, getting ready for integrated training. So, lay down onto the reformer. That's it, thank you, Michael.

We're gonna do three footwork positions to start, then we'll go back and add a little few elements of eccentric training and power strokes. So just start off with full range. So on your heels, pressing out. We're gonna do 10 repetitions. So all of those things that you already know with your leg and footwork.

What we're looking at here, 'cause we have the heels on, we're gonna start to think about engaging through the hamstrings just to start, and then get those quads working. We do want to work the quadriceps for our male clients. It's really important for them and really helps keep them motivated. Feeling like they're doing some good powerful work through the quads, which is important. Good, let's just do four more.

We can pick up the pace just a fraction. And now, Michael's doing a beautiful job keeping all of those things stable as we normally. Notice, if your springs are a little heavy for your clients, you'll probably notice them tucking the pelvis quite a lot to help to get that bit up, so just be aware of that. Yes, Michael, exactly. We're going onto the arches here.

I'm gonna keep them hip distance. I'm gonna keep them wide. So pressing away, now, when you come out here, let the heels drop and let the toes lengthen. Delicious, right? And then bend the knees to come back in.

Good, and you can just keep going. This is gonna give that plantar fascia really nice little dig and control, and a little bit of fascial movement here, which is gonna be really nice, especially, if you're on your feet a lot as well. All right, let's do four more here, Michael. And pressing away. Full extension of the legs if you can make it.

Beautiful, two more. Very nice. And one to go. Good. And hop there, good.

So we're going into a V position next. Keep the knees nice and close, kind of about reform a width. Let's just say that for good measure. Press away when you're ready. Now, we've got the V position.

So with the V position, we have externally rotated thighs, which then brings us into a more glute max and the glute orientated style of work here. So still working the butt, still working in the quad, still working in the hamstrings. And with that load, that gradual load, you're gonna really start to see some strength changes as you move through these programs. Good, two more, Michael. Two.

And in, beautiful work. Last one. Good. Now, we've got our guys ready and used to what the positions are, we're gonna come back to the heels. And just one other thing with the headrest, I've got the headrest down for Michael, but if you would like to lift the headrest up, especially with some men, you may notice that kyphotic posture. So having the headrest all the way down might be a little bit, you know, uncomfortable, so you can lift it up.

So it's up to you again. Now, let's move on to our power stroke eccentric control kind of movement. So just like in the mat work, what you're going to do is you're gonna have one count out nice and fast. So power stroke out all the way out, and then three counts, slow to return. And out, and 3, 2, 1, and out, slower on the way back, 3, 2, 1, and out, three.

So what this does, and out, is it gives us that bit of power to begin with and that eccentric control to return. What I want you to think about as you're doing this is try to minimize the time it takes for you to stop the carriage and then to start it again. So what you're looking into a little bit more of a Pilate metric style principle, applying that to the footwork, which is really gonna get some strength gains into those legs. Last one, and out, and come back in. Beautiful, Michael.

Going straight to the V again. So while we've done the power stroke and eccentric control for quads and hamstrings, let's not forget the glutes. The same thing, out, and 3, 2, 1, and out. Yes, good, nice work. So it's also a little bit of, you know, bit of this going on, too, rub the belly, pat the head, gets us more into that bit of cognitive strength mode as well.

Good, let's do three more. And out, and in, two, one, and out, and in. Good, Michael, nice job. Last one, and out. Good, I'm gonna build on this one more position.

We're gonna go heels wide, so that's, yeah, yeah, good, excellent. Heels wide, same deal here. Straight out, and in, in, in, and out. So if you're looking at this position, if this position was upright, we're looking at a nice deadlift kind of position here, yeah? So we're in the same kind of realm of what's going on here and men will be quite familiar with this position.

So, feeling good here, getting some glutes, hamstrings, quads, to works in. One more time, and out. As they say, your friends don't let you forget leg day so just remember that. All right, so bring yourself back to your toes for calf raises. So stretch the legs out.

We're going to do a nice, slow, even breath pattern. So inhale to lower lift the heels, exhale to lower lift the heels. Make this flow. After all this work that we've just done, all these different movements and different shapes and things like that, it's nice to just center again. So, let your guys work on their calves, as I said, "Friends don't let you forget leg day." Let's get those legs working, get those muscles toning.

And also helps to stimulate that lymphatic system, also with the calf raises. Really nice exercise. I'd love to keep it in here. Do two more calf raises, and then you'll go into some prancers, Michael. So one heel down, one leg bends.

That's it, and then swap it over. There you go. So just swapping over into your prancers. You can add your pace here, you can slow it down, whatever works for you. Looking good, let's do four more.

We've got four, and three, and two, last one, and then return all the way in. Excellent work. All right, time for a spring change. So what we'll do here is we will change the springs to two heavy springs. So two red springs, one red, one blue, one red, whatever you're up to, whatever case you're in.

Today, we'll go one red, one blue. Michael, if you can just grab your straps for me, they're just on the pegs there. That's it. I like also for my clients to get a little bit of autonomy when they come into their workout. So yes, while I will change springs and do as much as I possibly can, it's nice to be able to let your clients feel a bit connected to the equipment as well.

You know, I guess it brings that little bit more motivation style of work in there. Now, Michael, what we'll do is lift your legs up. No don't, not yet, just lift your legs to tabletop. That's it, hold that there. Now, heels together.

I don't care if the knees are not together. Actually, for you guys, it's probably better not to overly cube, squeeze the knees together, that just starts to add a little bit of TFL and a little bit of things that just may not work for your guys. The heel squeeze does, that does work. The knees can be a little bit relaxed. Is it comfortable?

It's better that way, isn't it? Yeah, good. Now, from here, we're just gonna start with a bit of prepping for the hundred. So just lower the arms, lifting the chest lift. So lift your head and shoulders up as well, that's it, and then come down.

Let's do four of those. And exhale to lift. Starting like this, use any progression you want to use, whether it's legs out and in, whatever the case may be. Last one, hold it. There we go, for a set of the hundred, your favorite.

That's it, and exhale, good. Now as we work through the hundred, Michael knows how to count this so I won't be counting for him, but give your guys an understanding of what it's about. Why are you doing the hundred? What's the point? We're boosting that cellular respiration.

So we're getting the oxygen in on the inhale. That oxygen's going through into a cellular level to convert into energy. And what that does is that then boosts all of the oxygen outta blood through the body. You've also got your lymph nodes under your arms getting a nice little stimulation. So we've got lymphatic movement going on here.

So we don't even need to worry about legs out, legs up, whatever the case may be. We're good with our a hundred, we nearly done? I wasn't counting. One more set. Four, five, and exhale, two, three, reach and halt, keep the legs where they are, lift the arms up, lower the head, you can rest.

Good. Really important to get rests in between your exercises as well. Yes, we want them to flow but we still need to be realistic and give our guys a bit of a rest here, too. All right, so coordination. We're gonna do a little bit of a buildup to coordination today.

So whatever your client's at, you can go straight into the coordination, but I like this exercise 'cause we are going to start working hips and shoulders at the same time. So knees up into tabletop. Now, Michael, what you'll do is just lower the arms chest lift again, just do that for me, and then lower down. Do fall like that. So that just gives an idea of, okay, that's what's happening there when the arms come up, the head comes up, when the arms go back, the head goes down.

Stay into your chest lift again, Michael, so lower your hands, lift, and hold. Now we're gonna work the legs. So what you'll do is press them out, open, close, bend the knees, that's it. Press them out, open, close, bend the knees. Two more like that.

So this is just splitting up that exercise, yeah? Last one. Now lift the arms, lower the body. Now let's put it all together, you ready? So you're gonna exhale, lift legs first, arms second, and head.

Beautiful, that's the one. Press, and... Good. Realistically, the feet shouldn't move in that first position. If we're working all the joints correctly, they really shouldn't move.

Last one. And press and... Beautiful work. Feet down, you can have a rest. "Thank goodness," he says.

All right, now, I'm gonna add a little bit more spring to this. So I like to do feet and straps on two springs. All right, so from there what you're going to do is straighten your legs for me, Michael, put one foot in, press into that foot and then lift the other leg there. So I like to do all of that flexion work and the abdominal strength work in that first section before we hop into here, just gives us a little bit more feeling of of flow for me. All right, Michael, V position with your feet, bend your knees and just hold, just rest.

So just hold that, just push a little bit more in your feet. That's the way. So just holding here. Now, we've done a lot of dynamic work, it's time to just bring us down into a little trough again. So remember your peaks and troughs is really important.

Just rest. Now, as you breathe out, little frog stretch your legs, that's it, and then bend it in. So you don't have to worry of being too wide with the knees. You can kind of just let your knees drift on the side of the straps there. What I do want though is this feeling of pump from the thigh bones.

So think about your thigh bones pumping in, pumping out. So what you're doing, again, is stimulating your lymph nodes in the groin area. So that lymphatic system is getting a little bit of push and a little bit of stimulation here as well. So good, Michael, we'll do a couple more. That's it.

And one more, and press. And now straighten your legs completely. Good, now for your guys, remember that we're not gonna think about bringing the legs overhead. I don't want any of that sort of stuff. We're gonna keep these circles small, okay?

So you're gonna lower them down, circle around and up there. That's the range. That's all I want. Why? It's because I want those hips to feel like they can move or the thigh in the hip joint can move freely and without too much hoopla. I think that's an Aussie thing, without too much hoopla.

Good. And let's reverse those circles. So adding the inner thigh component here. That's it, Michael, very good. Good.

Do three more. More of a tremble of truth. I love it. Two to go. Last one.

Good work, Michael. All right, now, you can bend the knees if you like. If it makes you a little bit more comfortable, just rest. Just push into the straps a bit, yeah. So now, I'm gonna work into a little bit more full body articulation of the spine.

A little variation of the short spine. I really like this for male clients. Again, if the hamstring length or the back chain length is a little bit of an issue, no worries, you can do this one easily. So hold onto the shoulder, the pegs behind you, Michael. Good.

We're gonna stay in this little frog position and what you're going to do is you're gonna use the pegs to help you. You're gonna pelvic curl. Think about lifting the knees up and over the shoulders on your exhale. Take your breath in, and then roll back down in the same shape. Push forward with the feet, just to there.

Good, now think about lifting the hips up as you go. Yes, Michael, that's it. Take your breath in to hold and then press it down. Very good, nice job. Take your breath in, exhale to lift the hips.

Now that you've got it, you can feel how it's a little bit more of a rocking motion, isn't it? So we're not really looking for too much activation. Good, I am track. Good, two more. Rocking...

And back. Last one, doing beautifully well. Think about that nice opening of the back and then come all the way back down. Good, well done. So coming out of feet and straps for me, Michael, you're gonna take one foot out at a time.

So take this one out first, find the foot bar, important to do. Good, and then take this one out and then come all the way back in. Good, we're gonna keep those two red springs and do one more abdominal exercise just to kind of round this out. Gonna come into your tabletop position again. Arms up towards the ceiling.

Almost like a butterfly prep, okay? So now we've added that extra spring, we've warmed the body up, we're into the integrated training section. So come up into your chest lift, lower the arms. Hold that there, turn the palms in. Now breathe in as you open the arms out, the biggest breath in you can possibly do.

That's it, exhale, close, but keep that head up. As you breathe in, use the breath into the back to give you your height. So if you think about that breath, Michael, as you come in, expand the wings and then close. Now, my beautiful lungs exercise here. Three more, and close, obviously, my favorite.

Two to go. And close, almost there, good job. Last one. And close, palms down, arms up, head down, and rest. Well done, awesome.

Come off there for me please. Good job. All right, so this next part we're gonna work a little bit more upper body, a bit of back focus here. Shoulders, back, looking at those sorts of things. So I'm gonna lower the foot bar.

One spring, so I've got one red spring. Now, Michael, what I'm gonna ask you to do is you're gonna kneel onto the carriage, facing the shoulder rests, and just have your toes kind of hanging over the edge like your little chest expansion position here. That's it, you're gonna use your toes to kind of help you grip onto the edge of the bed. So sit down onto your heels. Now, if this knee flexion is a little bit much for you guys, that's okay.

You can do all of the things you normally do in your classes; either wedge underneath the heels here, or use one of the posture arcs, or a yoga block, or anything like that. Or even sit them here with their legs forward or crossed. Many, many different ways to do this, I just thought we'd do it this way today 'cause I like this position because... Now, Michael, grab onto your straps for me. Now, you'll notice here that in this position, 'cause he's so far back, his arms are quite high, almost shoulder height.

And that's where I want these arms to stay with just a fraction of tension without pulling the better way. So that's the whole reasoning for shortening the straps and for getting him to sit quite far back. So what I want you to do, Michael, is as you breathe out, you're going to lift one arm and lower the other into this little opposing shoulder work, and then come back. Good, just keep going. As you exhale, now, the whole thing about him sitting on his heels is that I want him to feel the connection of his sitting bones onto his heels.

And as he works through, try not to let go of that connection 'cause we can tend to drift forward if we're not really holding on through the abdominals and back. So it's a really nice proprioceptive cue for you guys here. Good, do two more. You can stay quite close to the body 'cause he's elevated. And last one.

Good. The next part of this is you're gonna turn the palms in, you're gonna open out to a T, but you're gonna be in a diagonal T, and look over that low shoulder, and then come back in. That's it, Michael. Good, I'm gonna do this as an inhale, and then exhale to come back. So I've just changed that breath pattern.

Again, your choice. And open. Good. Good, good, good. We're getting that little bit of extension and rotation as well.

We're really working the posterior delts. We're really got all of these back muscles working as well. Last one here, Michael. That would do. Very good, nice job.

All right, let's get you up. Working into a little bit of obliques. So turn around and face there. That's it, now you've got the knee up against the shoulder rest here, and again, another reason why we have the shortened strap is to facilitate this position here. So take the front strap and we're gonna work into some oblique rotation.

Now important things to note is hands in front of the chest plate. So that initial rotation is important. You're gonna have hips even to the center. That's it, good. As you breathe out, you're going to rotate.

Now this range does not matter. What matters to me is that you keep the hands in line with the sternum, the chest plate. That's gonna really encourage this beautiful work through the obliques. Three more. Good, Michael, nice job.

We're staying on the single heavy spring. Remember you can change this to a blue if you'd like. Last one. Good. Next thing we're going into the draw the sword, I call it the draw the sword.

So hand across you, Michael, and just be a little bit more centered to the front there. That's it. So as you inhale, the elbow comes up, as your exhale, the the arm comes out. As you inhale, the elbow bends. as you exhale it returns.

Three more. Inhale, draw out. Now, this is where I want the external rotation of the humerus to come in. Get the rotator calf working, get all those shoulders nice and stable, and press. Good.

That's it. Last one, Michael, you're doing beautifully well. Elbow and rotate. Good, good, good. Bring it in and return.

Beautiful, good job. All right, swap the straps over and we'll turn around we'll get a nice view of this from behind too, so you can see how it looks in that range. Here's your strap. Michael gets to look at the dolphins. Beautiful dolphins this morning.

Now, nice round. Now, give me that first little bit of rotation. Yeah, good. Good, good, good, good, good. As you exhale...

So notice how he's almost going from rotation to neutral. And that's fine, that's good. That gives us that nice lengthening of the abdominals to start with, or the obliques to start with, and then we've got that beautiful connection of the muscle fibers as we work across. So I'm not overdoing the range. Two more.

Very good. Good, last one. Very nice. So you'll have your left arm into the strap and you'll go into this position here so just looking at me here, that's it. Elbow just in front of your shoulder and bring it out.

Good, I can see the whites of the eyes going on here. Yeah, so inhale, elbow, exhale. Now, if this is a little bit strong for you guys, that's fine, bring it down to that blue. But we do wanna progressively load the muscles and the joints, but do it intelligently. So don't go too hard, too fast.

But this is good for Michael. One more time. And inhale, that's it. And out, that's it. Good job, Michael.

And then come back in. All right, going into a thigh stretch. Similar to what we did in the mat work, so turn around and place your knees up against the shoulder as I'm going to add a lot of spring here for him. I'm gonna give him three heavy springs. I want a lot of spring 'cause I want him to feel like he kind of sits into the tension.

So come up to a kneeling position up against the shoulder rest. Hold onto the straps here. So into this part of the strap, you don't have to hold onto the buckle. That's it, good. Again, we've got a bit of a shorter strap so the canvas is good to hold onto that.

Again, imprint. Imprint, imprint, imprint. Lengthen through here as you breathe, then you hinge back. Now, just let yourself be in the spring. Exhale, pressure feet down as you come up.

We'll have three only. Inhale, length and out. Range is not important. It's all about how much you wanna open up the front of that body. Very good.

Excellent, good job, Michael. All right, coming from there, come up off here. We're going to lift the foot bar up, two red springs, so two heavy springs, and again, it's just, if it's much of muchness, you can adjust your spring load as you wish. I wouldn't go too lighter than maybe a one and a half at this point. You know, I would just sort of leave it about there, one and a half to two.

Now, getting on into your plank position, hand, foot, hand, foot. So right hand goes onto the foot bar, left foot pushes the carriage away, other hand comes on, and we're in there, beautiful. Look at that, straight away. Now, I want him to go into a pike. So you're gonna lift your hips up and let the carriage come home.

And I want you to help your clients here. I'm not important, it's not important about straight legs and all that sort of stuff, we're here to help our clients out. So as you inhale, lengthen out to the position. Beautiful, Michael. Exhale, hips up.

That's it, good. Inhale, lengthen out. Now, you run the risk as well. The lighter the spring, the more work into that plank exercise. Pick your poison, whatever works for you.

Two more. And lift, and this next exercise, everyone knows here we got pushups. Not so low. So go into your pushup, inhale, just to there, exhale. Press for six.

And five, good, and four, we're gonna thank you for this, and three, that's one, two to go, last one, none. Beautiful, hips back up, heels down, going into the elephant. So go into your elephant, so draw back, Michael, and bring it forward, that's it. Now, this is a great way to really help to elongate the hamstrings. I don't want straight legs, it doesn't have to be straight.

We could also do a little bit more of a flat back version as well that gives the hamstrings a little bit more work, or we have a round back. It's really up to where your client is. Do two more, Michael. And last one. Now, beautiful little stretch.

We're gonna put the right hand on the bar. Now, a bit lower. That's it. Gonna be in this rotator position. Give all the thoracolumbar junc, thoracolumbar fascia, a nice stretch right into all that tissue into the intercostals in the rib.

So same thing. He's like, "hurry up, hurry up and do it." (Andrew laughs) Two more. And two. Last one. Beautiful job, Michael.

Hand up here, other hand through. Again, you can see this now. You can see this beautiful line and how all of these tissue is getting a nice little wring out. Good, one more, Michael. That's the way.

Good, and come on off, and you can come off the bed there. Nice, excellent, good job. Excellent, excellent work. All right, almost there. Almost there, let's head into our functional stretch category of the class.

So Michael, a little basic lounge. So what I want you to do is right foot at the front of the bed there, left foot onto the shoulder rest for a hip flexor stretch. That's it, I'm gonna turn this foot under and try and get your heel back onto the shoulder rest for me. Yeah, there you go. Nice.

Now press the back leg back, and down you go into a stretch. Nice and easy. Hold it there for as long as you feel you need and then come back up. Let's do three of them. So just bring the carriage home with your hip, that's it, and press it out.

Now, I wanna try and keep the knee kind of still, and then bring yourself up. That way, yeah, nice. Last one. Hold the position. Now, stretch your front leg.

Now, you may need to lift the hips and bring the carriage in a little bit, the most important thing is that hamstring stretch. Couple seconds there, a few breaths, let the carriage come in. Good job, Michael. Swap sides for me. That's it, let's go on the other side.

Good, good, good. Good, if you can just make your foot a little bit more that way. There we go. Good, drew the carriage with the leg. Good.

And up you come. Nice. Yes, perfect, good. And bring it out. Really feeling that length through the front of the hip, into the knee, into the quad.

And a lot of the quadricep works so this is beautiful time to release that. Now, we're gonna add that hamstring stretch. So straighten that left leg. So straighten the left leg. There we go, so just adjust your reformer to whatever works for you.

All right, and come all the way back in. Good job, Michael. Okay, now the final thing we're going to do is, Michael, you'll step into the well for me. So just go into here, I'm gonna lower down to a half sort of a blue spring and do almost like a reverse roll up under a little bit of low. So a bit of traction work as well as activation and stretch.

So Michael, just place your hands onto the shoulder rest there. Now, you can bring your feet a little bit further forward. That's okay there. Now, what you wanna do is you wanna exhale round and pull the carriage in towards you at the same time. And then inhale, kind of leave your hips where they are.

Exhale, the ribs bring you up. Inhale, now let this stretch you. Ah, nice. Good. Yes, one more please.

That's it, and round, and release. Good, take your hands out of the strap, that's it, and roll up. And there we have it. So that's our Men's Health Reformer Class. Thank you so much for joining me.

I hope to see you again real soon.