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Hi. This is Ilya from Pilares Anytime. And today, I’m here with Monica from Germany. Thank you for joining me. And we’re gonna do an Aldoa class. If you have never done Aldoa before, I would advise to go to in producing a class on Pilates anytime, which is perfect to get started.
Otherwise, you can try follow me here. What we’re gonna do this time in the class is called anti gravity, Aldoa. We’re gonna do some, a little more advanced position where the body is not even. We use unilateral posture, so that’s why it’s a little more demanding and a little more advanced than the previous one. Eldoa creates space in the joint. So today, we’re gonna take care of some joints and some functional units of the spine. So we need to warm up the spine, of course, but we also need to warm up the whole body from the ground up because you’ll see how arms and legs put it in a lot of tension during those positions.
So let’s start with the feed parallel. You relax everything. And from a good standing position, we start rolling and unrolling the feet. Nice and easy. We need to put some oil in the joints. Right? So now we’re gonna start articulating the toes, the ankles, and we’re gonna move them around a little bit.
Then we go with a feet closer together, hands on the knees, and we circle the knees. The circular motion is amazing to warm up the joints in general. And the knees is one of them. And you go reverse, you go the other way. So in a very gentle way, we get our body ready.
To push and to get a lot of tension into these positions. Now you come here. You separate your legs a little bit. You bend your knees. And we go up to the pelvis.
So you go retroversion, anti version, beautiful, and you go in and back and pull and release. And, again, the retroversion and the version. Now let’s keep a little bit of a retro version. We spread your feet a little wider in internal rotation. Perfect. Because the internal rotation is helping us to fix the pelvis in this position. Now with the arms out, we’re going to translate. We go to the right.
And if you mirror us, you go left and you go switch out and out. So the pelvis is still, and you shift I always picture, like, 2 parallel lines, right, and the shoulder shifts and the pelvis stays. Reach, reach, reach, reach, exhale as you reach so you can get a little deeper. Last one. Let’s do one more set to the right, to the left, and center, relax the arms down for a second. Now we’re going to lace the fingers and lift and reach tall. Now here, keeping the pelvis where it is, we are going to reach up and over to one side. Always make sure you’re not collapsing.
You’re reaching in a high diagonal and then center. And now you go other side. You retreat, retreat, reach, reach, and center. And, again, lengthen for you watching, you go to the right and center, and then to the left all the way. And center, release the arms down, and now we go more dynamic in this side bending.
So to the right, you go 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8. Now we switch other side. You go lift. 2. 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. Now only 4. We go for 1, 2, 3, and change. And you go 1, 2, 3, and change. Now 2, 1, 2, 1, 2. Again, 1, 2. Last one, 1, 2, and release. Now last thing in this position, we’re going to lace the fingers behind the head, and we give ourself a little neck pull over here.
You push the head back, and we’re gonna do a little more translation here. You go to one side, and to the other. We have less freedom with the upper body, so it gets a little more into the rib cage. And it’s more powerful or also more warmed up. So really, really good extra translation for the warm up.
And then center. We can release the arms, and we bring the feedback in. We’re gonna loosen them up a little bit. And now we go into flexion. So with the feet parallel, I want you to drop the head, drop the shoulders, roll down, easy roll down. Beautiful. Relax the head. And now into your stomach, you’re going to roll back up and open the chest again.
Very nice. And we go head down, curl, bend your knees, We don’t wanna stretch the hamstrings. It’s very, very light in the body. And then you pull into your stomach and you slowly unroll the way up. Now same thing to the side. We go positive torsion. So we start here to the right head down, shoulders turn.
Bend your knees and you go. Your hands are up going outside the right foot now into your stomach. You unroll. The way up. And now down to the other side, to the left, release, release, release, stretch pull into your stomach and slowly come up. Now one more thing before we go down onto the mat. We’re gonna bring the heart rate up a little bit. So, you know, though, we don’t have the 100, but we can go some mark do some marching. So we march And we pick up the knees at a nice space, but then we also go and stretch the arms up overhead.
Right? So this increases the heart rate, and we can really get into some physiological, you know, preparation for the body to get into the class. So just a few more seconds here. We’re gonna go, arms up, knees up, at a nice space, few breathe, nice posture, you reach, and you left, left, left, left, left, left, left, left, left, left, left, left, left, left, left, left, left, left, left, left, left, left. Beautiful. 10 more seconds, almost there. Good. Now keep marching. We release the arms down.
We keep the march going a little longer. And here, we can slow it down now, and we go into pulling up the knee out to the side. So we prepare a little more the cocks of immoral joint. Perfect. And now here, we also go back to prepare the hamstrings, right?
So we go kicking back straight back. Perfect. 2 more. Now we put the foot out to the side into a little internal rotation. And now we go across to the opposite butt cheek.
So with more of an external rotation, So we take care of all of them. 3 different hamstrings, and we moved all of them. Beautiful. Now shake your legs off, your release, and now we go down onto the floor. You can face me, and we sit down for one more warm up for the spine.
We call this the good morning exercise, right, because it’s very nice. It’s very it’s perfect to do it first time in the morning when you wake up. So you’re gonna grab behind the thighs, and we’re gonna start slowly head the pelvis back and then you come up. Perfect. So Monica is going already pretty deep into it.
That’s okay. But if you feel a little stiffer, just keep it smaller. Okay? It doesn’t have to be big. It just needs us it’s useful to warm up the spine, the lumbar spine, and so on. I’ll always think about the rollback bar when I do this, right, You have a good resistance. You go back. You open. You stretch the posterior part, and then you come up.
Let’s do two more. You’re gonna go back. Open. Open. Open. And then curl back up.
And again, you go back, back, back, and come up. Perfect. So now let’s start working with the the upper body. Okay? Whenever the upper body works and the arms are intention. We need to do what I call the Spiderman Arms.
So you go stretch with the arms, big external rotation and you push, push, push, push, push, perfect. Externally rotate everything you reach, you spread your fingers. You maintain, maintain, maintain, maintain, and then slowly release. Let’s do it again. So Let’s turn this way so we can continue.
We’re gonna go, and we’re gonna stretch the arms out to the side. Nice and strong. You push away. Good. Keep that same tension as you go up in a y, and you push, push, push. And then you go up to the ceiling again. You push, push, push.
And now we take a break. Slowly. Release. The tension. Always slowly when you release. You did great. Now let’s put the feet forward.
90 degrees at the knees. That’s perfect. And now I want you to dorcey flex the ankle and you open out knees and feet. That’s great. So let’s hold on to the knees, and we grow tall. We took care of the arms.
We took care of the legs. But we also need to bring the spine in axle extension. Right? That’s the most important thing. Now from this position, let’s think about getting the little toes all the way up to the knees. You stay super tall, and now we go out with this to the side with the arms, the neck is long.
We go up to the y and you push, push, push, push, And now you go all the way up overhead and you push, and you just stay there. You maintain that tension. You keep reaching, reaching, reaching, reaching. Don’t look up too much. Look forward so that we have a nice, long neck over here. Beautiful.
You lift all, you lengthen length and lengthen here, and you push me up towards the ceiling. Very nice, maintain. Maintain, maintain, maintain, big external rotation at the arms, really good money come, maintain the lift. The spine is perfect. Now close your heels a little bit.
That’s it. And little toes coming up. Very nice breeze and never hold a breath. You maintain. You push, push, push, push, push. You reach. Very good.
Give me 5 more seconds. Push up here. Good more. 4. Nice. 3. Breathe. 2.
1 now slowly. Release the arms. Very nice. Slowly release the legs and slowly release everything. There is a lot of tension that we create that we head to the body when we do an outdoor. Right? So that tension is necessary to create this space.
Our muscles are working so hard, right, to get into those positions because we normalize the joint that way. Okay? So really, it’s it’s very hard when you’re in it, but it’s really rewarding when you get off the position and later during the day because you do feel better. Now face me again, and we’re gonna work a little bit on the shoulder blades because it’s not just the arm. Right? When we do this rotation or this reach, it comes from the shoulder blades. So we need to be able to get into there with freedom.
So here, I want you to go in external rotation like before. And from this position, I want you to pull the shoulder blades back a lot. And then forward a lot. Good. And, again, pull, pull, pull, and push, push, push, state, or keep going. Pull back and now push forward here more. Good. Try not to move your neck as you do so.
You stay still, shoulder blades. That’s great. Now come to me. Push more. You can come here more, more. That’s beautiful. One more time. Pull, pull, pull, Mac, more, more, more, more, more. That’s nice.
And come forward. Push. Push. Push. Push. Good. Slowly. Release. So now every time we’re reaching away with those arms, We need to think about that incredible push that we did over there. Now let’s go to one, very important position.
We can cross the legs And the legs are not important here. We already did this one in the other class. It’s so important because it really, is T67. It’s really important to have this link open with space because it’s where our neck starts going forward. Right? So when we have neck issues, forward head posture, it starts at T67. Okay. So from here, We’re gonna balance in between the sit bones.
We want to make sure that we are nice and even on the pelvis, and we don’t wanna archer fallback. Right? Same thing. We need to be in the center as as precise as possible on the signals. Now, the axle extension is there so I can put the hands on top of my head and push into my hands and grow as tall as I can. Now, from this position, we go stretch the arms out in a t position. We already know the arms We already know the decaptation and the push that we need to give.
We just go maximum. Well, like, 150%. Now from here, we go to a y and you push away. You lengthen lengthen lengthen lengthen. Now from here, Monica, bend your elbows. Touch your fingertips.
And you slowly go up halfway. Stay. You stay. You recheck everything. Now on the next exhale, we try to go up as much as we can. So lightly touching with the fingertips. You go. You go. You go.
You go. You go. And now we’re into it. Now stay there. Maintain the push.
Maintain the reach. So pretty good. Now I want you back here a little bit. Very good. The head is good. Lift. Very nice.
Now use the diaphragm breathe. And try to push your fingertips all the way up to the ceiling. Beautiful, Monica. Keep reaching up, up, up, up, head back into my hip a little bit. The head and the hands back on top of your head.
Very good. Push up. Breathe. Yes. As you exhale, you reach up more. Email maintain. Very good. Exale reach more. Enail maintain.
Really well done. Push push push push push push. Very good. Very nice. Push, push, push, push, keep reaching, reaching, reaching, reaching, good, relax in the face. Relax the chest maintained, keep the push beautiful, nice mark, keep pushing, pushing, pushing, pushing, and now super slow float down. Slowly, slowly, slowly.
Always release these positions very slowly. Did you feel it good? Do you feel it okay? Here in the mid back? Here, I mean, the spine was long. The spine was long. Right? So the whole spine is an elongation, but then you’ll have that stubbing sensation there where you’re opening up the link, which is, really, really good. Now let’s go to a little bit of a harder, Aldoa, because this is unilateral.
We’re gonna do different things with harm arms legs. So we are going to sit exactly the way we did before for L405. Right? So this position over here, the little toes come back, bend your knees a little bit, always our 90 degrees and open. That’s our starting point. Okay? Get their heels closer to your seat.
That’s good. Now you go and you lift tall, You maintain a nice, nice lift. Now let’s put the hands on your hips. I don’t want you to shift the hips away. The hips are still here. From here, I want you to stretch the right leg long.
We do a little bit of a banana foot that puts tension in the lower limbs, and then we go out in abduction a little bit with that leg. Beautiful. Now together with the arms, we go to the front. We go up to the ceiling. You push, push, push, push, push. And now from here, from this maximum lift, we release the right arm down onto the straight leg.
And here, we push, push, push, push, push. We want to feel almost, like, almost electricity from the palm reaching up to the ceiling, to the arm, to the spine, to the hip, and to the leg. And we push, push, push, push, push, push, push, like crazy, maintain the tension, maintain, maintain, maintain, stay there, maintain, beautiful, big toe, and you push your left, very nice, Breathe, or try not to rotate the head, stay in the center here, and you reach up, good push, push, no side bending, Stay back here just a little bit. Yeah. Up up, up, up, up, maintain, maintain, maintain, maintain, maintain your push. Very good. Lengthen up here. Stay just a few more seconds.
You lengthen length and length and length and lengthen. Now follow me. Slowly, we release only the right hand and then the elbow and then the shoulder. And then we release the foot, the knee, and everything else. And I want you to release the fine. Now moving back and forth a little bit, just to breathe and to make sure that we don’t create too much tension.
At the spine. Now we need to set up the other side. Right? Otherwise, we stay crooked. It doesn’t work. To get a full decoitation, to get space at this level, which is a very important level, T12L1, because it’s where the spine really changes And the vertebra changed from thoracic to lumber. It’s a key point in the spine for rotation and for many other reasons. We need to do them both. Okay? So we’re gonna go again 90 degrees, flex the feet, you open, and you create that tension with the little toe coming up to the outside of the knee.
Now we grab the knees and we lay told, we need to find that perfect axle extension, which I know it’s very hard, but the more you repeat it, the more it feels familiar and comfortable. Now from this position, let’s add a little something this time. Let’s put the hands behind the neck, and you push back into a little neck pull. So that we are sure that we have this perfect axle extension. Hands on the hips, we don’t move the hips in the pelvis We stretch the other leg out, banana foot, internal rotation, and we open the leg out a little bit. Now from here, both arms reach forward with that big spiderman arm position reaching away.
We go up with both arms. We push and we grow super, super tall. And now the arm of the straight leg comes down and you push push push push push push and you maintain the tension. Lengthen length and lengthen. The spine is straight. The shoulder is back a little bit and frontalized.
I want to feel a lot of energy from the palm reaching up to the ceiling all the way to the hill reaching away. Push, push, push, push, push, push, maintain, maintain, maintain, length and lengthen lengthen. Beautiful. Breathe. And we never stop breathing. You need to keep that flowing.
Otherwise, it creates more tension into the body, and it’s not good. Now you push, push, push, push, push, a few more seconds, almost there, or each other, we’re gonna release this position in a slightly different way. So instead of starting at the arm, now Keep pushing with your arm. Keep pushing with your spine. I want you to release the foot of the straight leg, the straight leg, the bent leg, then we release slowly the arm, and the rest of the body.
Perfect. Let’s go back to a few more movements of flexion and extension at the spine. And, actually, this time, let’s head a little bit of translation side to side as well. So you go shift and shift. It feels good. And it’s a lot loser, right, more mobile than when we started. Cool. You did great. These are very difficult positions. And now we continue with another unilateral posture, but in a completely different position in space.
We go on all four. So we’re going to place the hands right underneath the shoulders. We can go with a little surnar rotation at the arm, so it creates already low tension in the fascia. Turn out a little bit more perfect. And now the pelvis over the knees.
That’s perfect. Now first, we just relax. I want you to do cat and cow and really enjoy those movements. So you drop your head, drop the table. No tension here. It will be beautiful. And then you reverse. You open a new arch.
You left, left, left. Nice. And now you go head down table under. You pull easy here. Not tension. Head. That’s it. And now lengthen away. The head reaches forward.
The sit bones reach back. Let’s do one more round. You’re going to curl. Good. Relax the head. You can say no. Perfect.
Now this is the hardest thing. From here, I want you to reach a flat spine. So slowly. Yeah. Now this is pretty good. Lift up here a little bit more.
That’s good. Nice. Keep this, and we’re going to work retraction and protraction again. So from here, drop the rib cage down to the floor. Beautiful. Don’t lose your head. Stay a little higher. Yes.
And now you push this up to the ceiling. Very nice. So you go down, drop the rib cage, very good. Her shoulder blades are touching. That’s what we want. And then you push the floor away, and you create space in between the shoulder blades.
Very nice. One more time. Drop down, down, down, good. Download the chain a little higher here. And then you go, oh, up here, up, up, up. Good. Try to freeze this position for a second.
You reach forward and you reach back on the signals. That’s it. Just there it is. Stay. Push into my my hip a little bit. Yes. Just keep your sit bones back. But they’re nice and long.
Very good. And now for a second sit back and child pose and take a little break and relax. We’re going back to that position very soon, but I wanted you to rest your wrist before we stay there. Too long. Because now I will ask you to pick up one arm at a time in that position, which is not easy for the alignment and for the wrists.
So let’s go back in, the tabletop, the perfect tabletop. We’re gonna go in external rotation, We already warmed up. Oh, that’s perfect. Very good, Monica. Now from here, very small. I want you to pick up just a little bit. Your left hand without moving anything else and down. Now the right and up very good and down.
So the body’s not moving. Push up into here a little bit more. Yes. Lift up the left just a little. And down. Very good. Lift up the right just a little and down. Wonderful.
Now you she knows how to do that. Really well. Keep the spine long. Now without shifting your body away, lift up your left hand and bring it forward, towards me. Good. Go into the spiderman position with tension pushing away with the palm.
Now the harder thing is you don’t want a side bend on the opposite side, keep this side long, and down here. Now we open this arm out to 45 degrees, and here we are. So push. Beautiful. Be very nice, Monica. Push external rotation of the arm, and maintain.
So this is a hythoracic link. It’s there. Push, push, push, push, push, don’t drop the don’t lift the shoulder. Yes. Very nice. It’s difficult. It’s difficult to maintain. It’s difficult for the wrist, but really good for the release of t 45. You keep pushing, pushing, pushing, reaching, reaching, reaching, reaching, give me a few more seconds.
And now slowly down, release the arm, and sit back for a second to relax. So not easy, but really good for the work of awareness of the body and, awareness of the upper thoracic fine. We’re gonna do the second side soon. I stay there a little less than the full minute because it’s good to build up to it. If I stay there too long and the position is too much off, it’s not worth. Right? So little by little, as you feel more aligned, you can stay there a little longer.
Now let’s go back one last time to the tabletop position. Beautiful. You lengthen and you grow tall, but good. Now she comes back here and it’s she’s perfect because she has it. Now you’re going to lift up the right hand and come forward to me with Spiderman. Arm position. So you’re ready push. Don’t shift this way.
Stay in the center. Good push more, more, more, more. Nice. And now here, you open it to the side. Keep the external rotation at the arm and push away. So push out of the window. Yeah.
That’s nice. Push, push, push, push, push, keep pushing into my hip here. Nice, maintain, maintain, maintain, maintain, push, push, push, push, push, reach, very good, Monica. Maintain. You hear she’s breathing. That’s great. Never hold breath and be a lower. You need to breathe. Otherwise, you’re gonna end up with a headache at the end.
You push push push, you lengthen 5, 4, 3, 2, and one slowly release. Very nice. You can sit back for a second and stretch. Good. Don’t worry, because the next one is gonna be really nice. This one, we did the the hardest part of the work. Okay?
So now come up, and we’re going to lie down, and we get into one cervical l dua that is really It’s really nice. It’s c67, and it’s wonderful because of we’re gonna push the arms down and away from us, and that will create a nice release at the trap as well. So why don’t you bend the arms and you keep the feet down for a second over here? Yes. So Not all the time, but I feel that, we’ll put her in a better place if I gave her a little lift because I want her neck aligned to the rest of the spine. So let’s lift the head up for a second.
We’re gonna go here. You can release down. And I like this alignment better. She’s right there, right, with a low. We really want this axle extension always there to be able to decrypt and create space in the, individual link.
Now let’s bring both knees into the chest one at a time that great flex the feet. Now lifting arms just off the mat. Dorsey flex the wrist big external rotation. Skip your fingers spread, and I think you can externally rotate more. Uh-huh. That’s it. Maximum.
Always maximum. Now you can lower your arms down a little. Yeah. And now reach away. Push away with the arms and lengthen the head back and towards me. So very good. Now why don’t you look down, try to gaze down? That’s good. Perfect.
Very gentle. Now keep reaching back here with your head. And un shrug your shoulders down in a way. That’s beautiful. Color bones are long and open.
The arms are pushing away, but it’s still pushing. It’s you finding the tension. So very safe for the body in general, for the neck, and for everything. Now keep your neck long and breathe and reach. Beautiful.
Push, push, push, spread the fingers. Very nice. Easy at the jaw. Chin and girdle, girdle, treat, treat, treat, treat, treat, beautiful, maintain just a few more seconds. You lengthen lengthen lengthen lengthen lengthen.
Very good. And now slowly, slowly release the tension one foot at a time down. And now you can just move the neck gentle the way you like to move it side to side could be good, up and down with the chin, just to get, you know, the blood flowing and get everything back to moving again. And now I think that we deserve some up, so a stretch for the end. So we’re gonna come up kneeling on the mat, And, there were a lot of positions with the knees bent, right, in that position, even T67, sometimes it bothers the hips a little bit.
So we’re gonna undo that tension that we created with this stretch. So we’re gonna step forward with one foot. Perfect. We create a good base of support, right? If we are, like, tight like this, it’s difficult to balance. If we open the foot out a little bit, we are stable. Now let’s try to move the back foot out to the side a little bit to put internal rotation on the leg that we’re on the side that we’re stretching.
That’s good. Very important, retroversion of the pelvis. So we’re not just gonna do a split or a lunge. This is very specific for the Eliacos and the soas muscle. So from this position, I want you to keep that right reversion, but also we want to lift the spine.
Nice and tall. Like, if we’re doing an outdoor, right, we grow a tool. Now lean forward a little bit and push with the arm in that Spiderman position armed to create tension. You can help with the other elbow on them. Yeah. That helps with stability. And you push, push, push, push, push.
Now keep growing tall, and I want you a little farther back here. Oh, that’s nice. Because, again, I know that you probably can go in the full pilates play, but I want you to pull back here and get the tension as you grow tall. Told, oh, that’s it. Beautiful push. So think about the pond reaching forward, the hip reaching forward, L3 coming back here, not rounding. Just pull back. That’s it. And the knee back. Okay.
Very nice. And now to get a little more into the psoas part, very small at the waist, the sideband to the left sideband away from the hip that you’re stretching. Just so they’re here. Pull pull pull pull pull, pull, pull, maintain, and then slowly release the tension. And we switch. We’re gonna do the other side.
We’re gonna go kneeling forward with the other foot. The leg comes out. Retroversion and reach. And you push. Very good. Stay there.
So do a little more introversion. Good. No rounding here. Nice and long at the upper, and you go palm and hip. L3 and knee back. That’s good. And your push, push, push, push, push, reach, lengthen, length, and lengthen, growth hole.
Maintain, maintain, maintain. And now just a little bit, we’re going to sideband the way. So little sideband away from the hip that we’re stretching to get into the psoas part of the muscle. And then slowly release the tension and release everything. Perfect.
How do you feel? Amazing. Amazing. Believe me. She worked really hard. It’s not easy. It feels like It looks like it needs to be in, but it’s not. There is a lot of a 4 for the big from the big and the small muscles.
To really hold those positions. Right? But, yes, they usually, it’s so hard when you’re into position, but then so relieving and so it feels so nice when you get out of the position. So follow the class, follow the rules of the class, meaning, like, the arms, attention at the fashion, and so on. If you have any fusion. Just avoid the link of the fusion because we don’t wanna create space where there is no space to create, but otherwise, it’s a very safe method that will help us keeping our body healthy and young.
