Hi, I’m Laurie Hernandez. Welcome back to Cirque It Out
direct from Cirque du Soleil in Las Vegas.
Today, we’re Cirquing It Out at “O”, one of Cirque’s most celebrated shows.
If you haven’t seen “O” yet, you definitely should.
The stage itself is amazing and so unique.
The stage transforms into a pool for aquatic performances.
You have to see it to believe it.
Ready to work out the CirqueWay?
A huge part of the Cirque du Soleil show “O”
takes place in the water.
Some of the performers in the show have backgrounds
in competitive aquatic sports
like the artist who inspired today’s workout, Michelle.
- Hi Michelle. - Hi.
Michelle is a world class synchronized swimmer.
She is going to be put through the paces
by Performance Conditioning Specialist Leland Barker.
- What’s up? - What’s up.
Synchronized swimming requires a unique set of athletic skills.
Keeping those skills sharp is the basis of today’s workout.
Let’s Cirque It Out.
[Cirque It Out]
The synchronized swimmers at “O” spend a lot of time sculling and egg-beating
in addition to the obvious one, swimming.
This workout will focus on strength and mobility followed by conditioning.
We are targeting the hamstrings, glutes and adductors
with proper lumbopelvic rhythms
to develop strength and mobility for the egg-beater.
We are targeting upward and downward scapular rotators
with proper scapulohumeral rhythms
as support demands for swimming and sculling.
We’ll finish our strength work with push pulls,
an exercise I use to train the internal and external obliques
for rotational strength through the spine.
And for conditioning, the sled-push will target the lower extremity.
So are you ready to work out?
- Yes, let’s do it. - Let’s do it.
[Lower Body Exercises]
[Split Cable RDL] So the first exercise is the split cable RDL.
Michelle is gonna grab the ropes at a low position
and she’s gonna keep and maintain her posture.
Essentially we’re targeting the adductors,
the inner thighs,
which is important for egg-beating in synchronized swimming.
Here we’re looking for light weights,
it’s kind of a gentle stretch.
Too far of a split is not going to work.
We need the legs to be kind of at a 45° angle.
We do a couple more here.
I’m looking for her hips to kind of drive forward
and basically get her a good stretch in the adductors.
Nice job, Michelle.
[Trap Bar Deadlift] This is our first exercise, a primary strength exercise:
a trap bar deadlift.
We’re gonna do 3 sets of 5 today, so go ahead.
We’ll talk about some of the main points I’m looking for.
The major one: keep your back straight.
I’m always looking for people to keep a good posture—Michelle does a great job—
and then I’m looking for them to drive their hips forward
early in the movement
and really move up as quickly as they can.
Nice, Michelle. Well done.
[Goblet Squat] This exercise is the goblet squat.
It’s a basic squat movement and we use it in our warmup.
I’m gonna have you do a set of 10, okay?
So, in this exercise, they’re holding the kettle ball close to the chest.
It’s out in front, it allows them to get a good stretch in their hips, ankles,
and it’s generally an easy way to teach people the squatting movement.
Here again, I’m looking for a good posture,
looking for them to find a position where their knees
are pointing in the direction that their toes are pointing.
Last one here.
Nice, Michelle.
[Upper Body Exercises]
[Cable Pullover] So now we’re gonna move into our upper body exercises.
This is the cable pullover. I’m gonna have Michelle do 2 sets of 10.
This exercise I find especially useful for swimmers,
and what I’m looking for is for her to keep her abs tight
and allow her lats to stretch as the cable goes up.
This is gonna be a good exercise to target your lats,
the long head of the triceps
and basically the major muscles that are used for swimming.
Michelle is doing a nice job here.
I’m looking for her to stretch it out.
So let that stretch out with the lats,
then we’re pulling the cable towards our hips.
A lot of times some people will start bending their elbow
and we want to keep the elbows pretty locked out in this exercise.
Nice job, Michelle.
[Curl and Press] Here is the curl and press.
We’re gonna do a couple of variations in this set,
so we’ll do a set of 10.
She’s gonna do 2 of them straight.
So we’re just getting a curl and a press and trying to look
for an upward rotation of the scapula here.
And now she’s gonna do a couple with her body.
This is a way for me to add some explosiveness to the movement
and allow people to learn good technique
to get the weight overhead.
You want to do one more.
Nice, Michelle.
[Push Pull] Laurie is gonna join us for this last exercise.
It’s one of my favourite ones, called the push pull.
You guys are gonna do a set of 10, okay? [1 set of 10]
The cue for this one I give is keep your belly button pointing forward,
allow your ribcage to spin.
It’s gonna allow us to train the internal and external obliques
for a pretty high level of strength.
You can put these weights pretty high.
I’m looking for a good posture
and just make sure to do both sides.
Nice job, you two.
Well done.
- Already sore.
[Conditioning]
[Sled Push/Pull] This is our dreaded sled push and drag we use for conditioning.
So Michelle is gonna push this down, back, down and back.
We’re shooting here for about 20 seconds of work
and then I’ll allow full recovery.
There’s plenty of time combinations you can do,
but we’re looking to get a good lower extremity burn
so we’re looking for the glutes, the hamstrings, the quads,
the calves—they’ll all be feeling it at the end of this.
Nice job, Michelle.
Another alternative is, if you have carpet,
you can grab a piece of cardboard
and you can kind of push it along the floor.
That’s another way to provide some horizontal resistance.
[Cooldown]
At the end of the workout,
it’s good to cool down, slow down, get ready for the show.
We like to use some foam rolling and…
- Sorry Lee, I gotta go—it’s showtime!
We’ll see you next time. We hope you enjoyed it—let’s Cirque It Out!
[Cirque It Out A Fitness Series by Cirque du Soleil]
That was quite a workout.
We hope you try it again, and we hope that it helps you
to be the best that you can be.
Don’t forget to get active with Cirque du Soleil on our next episode.
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