- Let's get that heart rate up.

Thank you for joining me here at Quick Fit .

I'm your host, Cassy Vieth.

As you know, our heart is a muscle that needs to be trained regularly to remain strong, so when life calls upon you to work harder and faster, you can meet that challenge.

Even seated, we can get our heart rates up, so join me now for a quick and effective workout.

[upbeat music] Even though we're seated, we're sitting on the very front edge of our chair, and we have a nice three-point base.

Our behind is at the front edge of the chair, as I said, but our knees and our feet, are out in front of us, not tucked underneath.

We wanna have a nice, solid, stable base.

All right, so, let's lift one shoulder and the other, and don't forget about your breathing.

Okay, nice four-beat inhale, [inhales] and an extra long exhale.

Now shift those hips, use your feet, widen them.

And shoulders, shoulders, shoulders, lean it more.

Hips, hips, hips.

Last one, shoulders, shoulders, [inhales and exhales] and hips, hips.

Good job, now let's punch it right and left.

Bear down in your core so you're nice and tight.

Then down.

[inhales and exhales] Forward, one, two, three, four, down.

One more, forward, two, three, four, down, two, three, four.

Good, right and left.

Lift that elbow up, reach to the floor, out to the sides.

Reach, reach, reach, reach to the floor, floor.

One more time, out, out, out, out, down, down, down, down.

Good, now let's lean it back and twist, twist, twist.

To the sky.

[inhales] Twist.

Lean it back.

To the sky.

Again.

Back, reach, reach, reach.

To the sky.

[inhales] And row it forward, forward.

Bear down with your tummy.

Tuck your butt, okay?

Reach, pull back, reach, pull back.

[inhales and exhales] How many is that?

About four, five, six, good.

Seven and eight, good job.

Let's lean on that leg and reach out with your left arm if you're mirroring me, and lift, lift.

Okay, we're supporting our torso by leaning on your leg.

Move that arm a little closer to the head and back.

Catching your breath, other side.

Right out from your shoulder, lift, lift.

Working your way a little closer, out by the ear, stomach's in.

Switching sides.

Out, out, working closer to the ear, [inhales and exhales] and switch arms, ready?

Lift, lift.

Pull that stomach in.

Hold it here.

All right, support your core by pulling in your abs and lift, lift, lift.

Push your feet into the floor, that also gives you some more strength and leverage.

Switching positions with your arms.

Ready?

Lift, this is great for those weak upper backs.

And now let's start again with that arm out at your side, working those middle trapezius muscles, you've got those upper traps on the top of your shoulders, but you've got a few more, couple more sets that work their way down.

And all of those rotator cuff muscles, and that's all in your upper back.

And they're so weak.

So we need to focus on them.

Switching sides.

Lift, two, three, four, five, six.

Last time, lift, two, three, four.

[inhales and exhales] Hold it here.

Okay, brace your abs, feet under your knees, reach it back by your hip and lift.

Little pulses.

And then we're switching positions.

Okay, lift, lift, lift, and relax and roll it up.

Catch your breath, pull a big breath in and exhale.

All right, left leg.

Let's move it out and in, out and in, pick up the pace.

Three, four, five, six, seven.

Switching legs and out, in, out.

Nice and light.

Light, tight stomach.

Switching sides, four, four, three.

You can hang on to the bottom of the chair to help you get some more abs, to help you do this quicker.

It's a small, snappy move.

Now, two, and two, singles, out, out and in.

Out, in.

Last couple.

Excellent, now leave your legs nice and wide.

Front edge of your seat, arms are wide, shoulder height.

[inhales] Big inhale, and exhale.

Push those feet into the floor to support you as you lean well out and over.

Okay, reach, reach.

Bear down with your abs to support this.

Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five.

Hang in there, four, three.

Shoulders are still at shoulder height, right?

We're not letting them drop.

Good job, all right, now let's turn to your side in this nice partial lunge or a safety lunge because we have the chair half under us.

Find your toes and your ankles under your knee.

Lean it out, pull it back.

Reach.

Reach.

Now kind of reach higher, try not to reach down towards the floor.

Reach.

Three, two, and switching sides.

Good, all right, get set up.

We're half on the seat, find your toes.

Foot's under your knee, and reach it.

Pull it back.

Reach, pull it back.

Use your front foot to support your back foot.

Five, four.

Stomach's in.

Three, two, last one.

All right, good job.

Facing forward again.

We're going to do get-ups.

It's a modified squat actually, but we're getting up out of the squat.

So lean it, lean it, lean it till you can push through the heels.

Up, up a little higher.

A little higher, pushing through the heels, but your feet are flat on the floor.

By using your heels, you're not just using your quads, which is what happens when you only push down through the front of your foot.

All right, and up, and down.

Turn sideways again, get in that lunge position.

You really want to strengthen this front leg.

Yes, you can push with the back, but focus on the front.

We're not pushing with the hands, and up.

Hands are just for balance, all right?

And up, down.

Two, three, up, down, two, three, up, down, two, three, up, couple more of these.

Pop it up, down, two, three.

Last one, down, two, three, up.

And switching sides, dee dee dee.

All right.

And down, two, three, pop it up.

Down, two, three.

Down, two, three.

[inhales and exhales] Good, hopefully your heart rate's up, your blood is circulating, carrying in nutrients, carrying away toxins and waste.

[inhales] It's all good.

All right, and slowing it down.

All right, let's just do some simple figure eights, catching your breath, controlling your breath, okay?

Breathe in for like five or six seconds, deeper than you think.

And then exhaling for a nice, long exhale.

And try to get out as much as you can, six or eight seconds.

All right.

[exhales] And other arm, cross it over.

Okay, breathe it in, two, three, four, five, six, and blow, two, three, four, five, and six.

Few more of these.

So your elbow's up, the back of your hand moves across.

Now your elbow's down and you can see your palm.

That's how we do that, and it seems confusing when you're watching me from that side, facing me.

All right, let's do a couple halos.

Big inhale, [inhales] long exhale.

[exhales] Switching arms, big inhale.

[inhales] Hopefully your breath is under control again.

Two arms out, nice, wide knees, and twist.

Breathe it in, blow as you get to your limit of your range, like right about now, exhale.

[exhales] Good, and then come up into a nice arc and down into a circle.

One more of this direction, and we'll switch and down.

[exhales] One more, and blow.

So good.

I hope your heart rate is up and you're breathing more heavily than normal.

Classes like this always lift my mood and clear my head.

So join me here again tomorrow at pbswisconsin.org/quickfit because aging well takes daily action.

Until then, get up and keep on moving.

- Announcer: Funding for Quick Fit with Cassy is provided by Greg and Carol Griffin, founders of ElderSpan Management, Focus Fund for Wisconsin Programming, and Friends of PBS Wisconsin.