Free your pelvis and relieve your back pain with these two Yoga hamstring stretches: Dandasana and Paschimottanasana. You’ll begin with Dandasana, also known as “Staff Pose.” Dandasana is an easy pose where you are sitting upright with a forward bend posture that will help improve your sitting posture and core strength. Ready to take it up a notch? Paschimottanasana will take you to the next level of flexibility by lengthening the hamstrings as you lean forward to hold the feet.
Whether it’s on the mat or in straps on the reformer, I love to teach the Side Lying Legs sequence. These exercises work a variety of muscles; they target the small hip muscles that support and stabilize your hips and pelvis, as well as the hamstrings and back of the legs, your core and your obliques. They also help to tighten your butt and narrow through your hips (Who doesn’t want that!?) Trust me, these exercises are not called “Butt Busters” for nothing.
The Hundred is a classic Pilates exercise; in fact, it’s the first in Joseph Pilates’s Mat Sequence. Truly, this is one of my favorite exercises that I love to teach in class, or even to do myself when taking a class! This versatile exercise can be done on the Mat, Reformer, Tower and the Chair, and I just love how it engages the core and challenges us to execute it correctly every time.
The breaststroke exercise is my absolute favorite Pilates exercise to teach. In fact, if I could pick one exercise from the Pilates repertoire to practice for the rest of my life, this one would be my “main squeeze.”
Here’s why: we are all slouchers. I know, I know, you’ve heard it before—but it’s true! We often initiate movement from the lumbar spine, which really should be more of a stabilizer, instead of the mid to upper back, which is where we should be getting most of our movement from. When our upper back becomes over kyphotic (rounded forward) it becomes both stiff and weak, wreaking havoc on our spine and neck.
The good news is that you can work to correct poor posture and its accompanying pain through Pilates!
I love squats! (Those of you who take my Run Fusion already know that, because we do a LOT of them.) There are so many different varieties and athletes can continue to challenge themselves by adding variation.
Walking squats, single leg squats, or squatting on an unstable surface can help add core, hip, glute and foot strength.
Work on a proper squat form in place, then try walking it. Finally, give the BOSU ball a try.
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