- Hello, hello, I'm Cassy Vieth and this is Quick Fit .

Today's class is all about toning the glutes, the glute maximus, medius, and minimus.

Sounds like a Transformer movie, doesn't it?

And if we can make our maximus into a minimus, we're really doing something.

Ah, enough of the bad jokes, let's just get down to the floor and begin.

[upbeat music] We'll begin laying on your side with your knees slightly bent in front of you.

Make sure you sit tall.

Don't let your shoulder come up by your ear.

Lengthen the spine, all right, as we begin, the first thing we'll do is just lift the knee.

Keep the ankles together.

Slight reach forward, lift, don't hold your breath.

A lot of reminders throughout this class.

Knees together, lift the ankles.

That one's different, isn't it?

This'll be lubricating and rocking that hip in the socket.

Also, I want you to get the idea of how high you have to keep your ankle so that you don't drop it and use the quads.

If you do that, we won't be working the right muscles.

All right, so let's keep that ankle as high as the shin.

Okay, so lift, lift, lift, and lift, ankle in line with the knee.

Let's bring it to the front, lift, lift, lift, lift.

[inhales] All right, we'll start moving that down more in line with the hip, lift, and make sure you're not jamming.

Okay, don't just jam your leg up.

Let's squeeze it up, squeeze it down, nice and intentional.

[inhales] And then a little further around the back, lift, lift, lift, we wanna work the glute medius, which comes around the side of your hip.

Okay, let's extend that leg.

Get down to the floor and lift, slight reaching forward.

Moving that leg back a little more, feeling your glutes activate.

Lift, lift, and lift, very good.

Switching sides, do it quickly.

It's part of the workout.

Get that elbow right beneath your shoulder, press hard into the floor.

Lengthen, lift the knee.

Keep running through the inventory.

Long neck, long spine.

[inhales] Don't hold your breath, keep breathing.

Slight reach forward, lift the ankle, lift, lift, lift.

[exhales] One more time with the knee.

Lift the knee, ankles down, lift, lift, and lift.

Now get the whole shin nice and horizontal, ankle is as high as the knee, ready?

Down, lift, slight reach forward.

Don't roll back.

Don't let those quads cheat.

If you need a break, take a three-second break, but keep the form strict.

These glute medius get very weak and when they get weak, the quads try to take over.

I'd rather you took a little pause and then join again with the right form.

All right, lengthen that leg.

[inhales and exhales] Stretch it out.

Lift, lift, go slightly back.

There you go, activate those glutes.

Lift, stomach in, long body.

All right, time to switch, do it all again.

One more time on each side.

Start on your elbow, knees slightly bent, long spine.

Lift the ankle.

Lift, lift, slight reach forward.

Lift, ankle down.

Knee up, lift.

[inhales and exhales] Don't hold your breath.

Don't slouch.

Lift, lift.

All right, hold it up in the air.

Double check, is your ankle as high as your knee?

And lower and lift, lower, lift.

[inhales and exhales] Squeeze it up, press it down.

Squeeze it up, press it down.

Get your core involved, down, lift and be... Be critical of your form.

Move it in line with the hip, down.

Lift, squeeze, lift, squeeze.

Activate those muscles that go all the way down your thigh, down.

Lift, inner thigh and outer, a little bit more to the back, lift.

[inhales] Keep... [exhales] Keep breathing, breathe as heavy as you need to.

And long leg, stretch it out, and lift.

Lift, lift, lift.

[inhales] Almost done.

You guys are doing a good job, lift.

And up, and switching sides.

Last time on that elbow, long neck, take a deep breath.

Lift that ankle, lift.

[inhales] Lift the knee, lift, lift, lift, lift.

And pull leg, bring it to the front.

Drop the shin as a unit, down, lift, slight reaching forward.

Long neck, ribs aren't on the floor.

Lift them, [inhales and exhales] keep it going.

Move it, move it, move it.

More towards the back.

Keep going, lift, lift, lift, and long leg, long arm and squeeze, squeeze.

Stomach's in, lift, very good.

You guys are almost finished with this part.

We're going to be doing your back a favor.

Strong glutes helps your back.

Your low back in particular.

Last one, very good, all done.

Almost all done, roll onto your back.

Do some bridges.

All right, I'd like you to press through your heels.

Press, squeeze your glutes, hold, and lower, squeeze.

You can even press your heels down so hard that your toes come up a little bit, press and down.

Walk your feet away a little bit more and down.

Squeeze, keep going, lift, a little extra squeeze at the top before you lower, squeeze.

Center up your feet.

Let's cross that left ankle over your right knee.

Hold, get a nice, long line.

Get those hips up in line with your shoulders, your shoulders and your knee.

It makes this nice bridge.

Lower, lift and hold.

Keep squeezing up.

Hips are in between your shoulders and your knee.

Nice line and down, lift, hold.

Press, press, press, press, squeeze, and roll it down.

Switch sides.

[inhales] Press that knee down.

Just like that.

Press those hips up and hold.

Are your hips up in line between your shoulders and your knee?

And lower, right back up, press, press, press, down and up.

[inhales and exhales] Keep breathing, hang in there.

Might be hard work, but it's worth it.

Keep going, let's do three, and two, and one, good job, good job.

All right, let's quickly stand up.

Finish this workout standing.

Make sure you have a chair handy.

I'd like you to walk until you have your knees right up against the chair.

Bend your right leg and reach over.

I love using the chair because it puts you in the right form.

Now we're not using our hands to do the work, we're using our leg.

Hands are on the chair just to check our balance, but you can really feel the glutes and the hips activating in this one-legged move, and the chair keeps your knee from going too far forward.

Helps you really isolate work in the muscles that I want you to work.

And your hip has to really stabilize all those small tissues and muscles right up around that joint really have to kick in and do their job.

All right, switching legs.

Okay, we're right up close to the chair.

Bend that left leg, hips back and forward.

We're not pushing with the hands.

Just helping us to stabilize to get the work done.

[inhales and exhales] A few more.

Good job, good job.

All right, push this chair out of your way.

And we'll just finish up here.

All right, we're going to do, make sure you have some space around you.

We're going to do these forward lunges and a slight diagonal back.

So a big step forward, lunge, push off, diagonal, kind of diagonal back, hips back, forward, push off to the back.

One more, swing it.

Catch yourself.

Push off, to the back.

Nice stretch and up.

Let's switch sides.

Left leg, push off.

Diagonal back, swing it, drop, push off, hips back, one more.

Drop it down, push it off, stretch it, and up.

Very good, that's really not an easy exercise.

So last thing, let's just start with some narrow squats.

Very good, little wider, very good.

A little wider, hips are going back.

We're not kneeing forward.

Hips are back, little wider.

Every rep, down into a nice, wide plié.

Trying to keep those knees as wide as the feet, just holding it here.

A few heel lifts.

[inhales and exhales] Hopefully your breathing is up like mine is.

[inhales and exhales] Don't hold your breath.

Nice, deep breaths and extra long exhales.

Lift, lift, lift, down, and squeeze it up.

Such a good job you've been doing.

I really appreciate you doing this class with me.

Let's finish up with a figure four stretch.

Hips are back, just a little pressure down.

Feels really, really good.

[inhales] Inhale, cross that ankle over the knee, sit it back and exhale.

[exhales] Those were a lot of great oldies but goodies.

That's because they're effective and they get the job done.

I appreciate you following along with me.

And I look forward to the next time we're together at pbswisconsin.org/quickfit, where I'll be showing you more ways to stay in shape and having fun while we're at it.

And remember, life is movement.

- 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.