Quick Fit with Cassy

- 7, 12, and 5.

No, I'm not referring to meal times, but to the number of vertebra in your cervical spine, 7, your thoracic spine, 12, and your lumbar spine, 5.

Hello, I'm Cassy Vieth with today's Quick Fit routine, designed to keep all those moving parts fully mobile in all their directions.

So clear a little space around you and we'll get started.

[gentle music] Your spine is meant to flex, extend, laterally flex, and rotate, and often in combination, as you'll soon be doing.

Let's begin by using the arms to get things warmed up.

We'll do some simple arm swings, just right across the front of you.

Let it go loose and just let momentum help you stretch.

Add your breathing, nice and long inhales, and extra long exhales.

And as you can see, I'm starting to widen my feet.

My knees are soft, a little bend in the hips, and I'm starting to involve the ribs.

Okay.

[inhales] Inhale, exhale.

[exhales] Pull in your stomach, go a little deeper, and then we'll do the other arm.

You ready?

Easy at first.

Letting gravity and momentum take the arm.

[inhales] Exhale.

Begin involving the torso.

And you can even start involving the neck by letting your face turn and look at the floor.

Go as slow as you need to, depending on how you're feeling at the moment.

If you're super tight, ease into it slower.

[inhales] Okay, last one.

Now let's work on the shoulders in particular.

We'll just roll the shoulder forward and back.

And if you're mirroring me, which I recommend, so we'll be on the same page, this would be your left arm.

Roll the shoulder forward, roll it back.

If you're not exactly sure what I mean, think about the hand, palm up and then palm down, and keep it going as far as you can.

And remember, if you're having any pain, you're going to wanna avoid that particular move.

Maybe have your arm a little lower, or in a slightly different position.

We don't work into any bad pains here, okay?

Exhale; no knife pains.

Reach it over the ear, and I'd like you to shift, so you stretch from your hip all the way up.

Stand it up and move that shoulder back, the whole arm back as far as you can, elbow towards your back pocket.

All right, a couple more rolls forward and back.

[inhales and exhales] Okay.

Over the ear, shift, to the ceiling.

Pull as much of your shoulder and your chest and your armpit back, elbow into that back pocket, and roll it forward.

And let's do a nice, smooth sweeping move and down.

Fabulous, let's do the other side, all right?

Shoulder rolls forward.

Roll it back, roll it forward.

Roll it back.

[inhales] Add the long inhales, extra long exhales.

And now let's move over the ear and shift.

Up, and move back.

Trying to move back from the shoulder, not the elbow, okay?

And elbow to the back pocket.

All right, and roll it forward, roll it back.

You can involve a little bit more of your spine if everything else makes sense.

You can stick the chest out and then roll it over, and over the ear, shift, and up.

Reach it to the ceiling.

Now, move that elbow behind you as far as you can, as if you could tuck it in the back pocket, and we'll do our final one, making everything flow.

[exhales] And up and back.

Nice job, okay.

Let's switch arms again and do some deep side bends.

So get in a deep pli, reach it over, breathe it in.

Get ready to do that again.

Make sure you're opening your knees as wide as you can.

Look at your knees and toes, make sure they're going in the same direction.

[inhales] Breathe it in and then exhale.

See if you can get a little lower.

[exhales] Fabulous, let's go the other way.

Okay, lift and drop it down.

As your legs warm up, you'll be able to get a little lower.

And check your form, okay.

Breathe it in [inhales] and exhale.

[exhales] All right, let's turn it towards your right and we'll do some windmills.

So let's bring that arm from the back up over and a little lunge, reach.

Reach with both arms, okay?

So we're twisting the spine using the legs.

Nice full body move.

Pull the stomach in.

Breathe it in, exhale a little deeper.

Twist through the spine.

Okay, oops.

Be as stable as you can with your feet positioned to help with your stabilization.

And good, one more.

Twist the spine and reach.

Fabulous, let's go the other way.

Get stable and draw that arm behind you, up over the head, and reach behind you, up.

Okay, make as large a circle with each arm as you can.

[inhales and exhales] And reach.

Reach further, reach further behind you.

Lift that arm up behind your head and over the top, and reach.

[exhales] Come up just a little.

[inhales] Adjust your feet if you can get deeper, and exhale.

[exhales] These are so good.

[inhales] Breathe it in and out.

Lengthen.

Nice, long lines, everybody.

Last one.

[inhales and exhales] And reach.

Good, let's come up and let's walk your feet in.

And do a few spine rolls.

So all you'll do here is gently relax forward, letting gravity pull on your arms and your head.

And if you just do these tiny little shifts through your hips, just let the upper body follow along.

Now, pull in your stomach and slowly roll up one vertebra at a time.

Reach up to the ceiling and then reach alternately, one and the other.

Feeling that stretch clear down to your hips.

Stretching your fascia, your muscles, everything.

And one more time, spine roll, [inhales] down, rag doll left and right.

These feel so good.

And then we'll roll up slowly.

Tuck in your chin, head coming up last.

Reach it to the ceiling, like a big skyscraper, right [inhales] and left.

Lift.

Try to pull that arm back from your shoulder.

Other one, lift, [inhales] and pull it back.

This feels so good.

There are intricate relationships between the spine and other regions of the body, such as the shoulders and the hips.

Keeping all of our joints mobile is the best way to remain youthful and reduce pain as we age.

Just check back here daily at pbswisconsin.org/quickfit to keep moving your entire body so you can stay loose, strong, and independent, because life is movement.

– Announcer: Funding for Quick Fit with Cassy is provided by Focus Fund for Wisconsin Programs and Friends of PBS Wisconsin.