Speaker #0Hi and welcome to BioPilates Deep Dive. Today I invite you to dive together into an exercise that subtly combines anatomical precision, energetic intelligence, and movement awareness, the corkscrew. Behind its apparent fluidity hides a constant dialogue between stability and mobility, control and freedom. Two key players have a central role here, the semitendinosus and the semimembranosus, discrete pillars of your posterior chain and at the invisible heart of each contraction, a tiny but essential molecule, a TP, adenosine triphosphate, the true fuel of your movement. Lie down on your back. Take the time to feel your spine in an imprinted position, the pelvis resting, heavy and stable, the posterior ribs in contact with the mat, the neck lengthening backward without tension. The shoulder blades are stable. the arms along the body, palms toward the floor, fingers relaxed. The legs are parallel, pressed together in adduction, extended diagonally as low as you can keep the lower back anchored without it arching. This position is not just a simple starting point, it is your anchor, your reference at every moment of the movement. At the back of your thighs, two muscles are already working to prepare you. The semitendinosus and the semimembranosus. Both are born at the ischial tuberosity, that deep area of the hip bone and end on the inner part of the tibia. The semitendinosus, more superficial, descends in a long ribbon-like tendon to the pes anserinus. The semimembranosus, broader and deeper, also inserts on the tibia but extends its action via the oblique popliteal ligament and the knee joint capsule. Together, they flex the knee, extend the hip, take part in the internal rotation of the tibia when the knee is bent, and above all, they discreetly stabilize your posture at the back of the movement. In the corkscrew, they join forces with the transverse abdominis, the pelvic floor, and the obliques to keep the pelvis stable and transmit force. each contraction you are going to produce, each control you will exercise. Depends on a fundamental chemical phenomenon, ATP, adenosine triphosphate. Imagine it as a small rechargeable battery ready to release energy as soon as a muscle fiber needs it. The moment your brain sends a nerve impulse, acetylcholine is released in the neuromuscular junction, triggering a cascade that releases calcium in the muscle. This calcium allows the myosin heads to attach to actin, but but to slide to generate movement, they must break an ATP molecule into ADP and inorganic phosphate. It is this rupture that releases mechanical energy. Your muscles have several ways to produce or regenerate ATP. At the very beginning of the movement, they use the reserves already present in the fibers and phosphocreatine, an ultra-fast system but limited to a few seconds. That is enough to initiate the ascent of the pelvis to launch the spinal flexion, but very quickly, if the movement lasts, glycolysis takes over, transforming glucose into ATP with production of lactic acid when oxygen is lacking. This system is effective for short to medium duration efforts, like the time needed to chain several repetitions of the corkscrew. If the effort continues, or if you repeat the sequence several times, oxidative metabolism comes into play. In your mitochondria, glucose and fatty acids are completely broken down to provide a large quantity of ATP provided that oxygen flows. This is where your breathing becomes your most direct ally. Each deep and targeted inhale improves oxygen delivery. Each precise exhale helps stabilize and release the right dose of energy at the right moment. Inhale and begin to rotate your legs towards your torso. Feel the femoral heads rolling deep in your hips, not towards your belly, but in the joint, like two spheres seeking their center. Let the coccyx unload then, vertebra by vertebra. Lift your spine off the mat. Sacrum, lumbar vertebrae, thoracic vertebrae, without skipping a segment. The rectus abdominis and obliques curl concentrically. The transverse closes like a zipper from bottom to top. The pelvic floor activates gently without tension. The medial hamstrings, for their part, take part in the hip extension while maintaining the internal alignment of the knees. Extend your legs parallel to the mat above the head. Here, your neck stays free. You do not seek to go higher than the upper thoracic region. Exhale, move the legs away to one side and begin to roll your spine down in a straight line from top to bottom. Your feet draw the outline of a circle. but your spine remains like a solid mast. The contralateral obliques guide the rotation. The transverse maintains the link between pubis and sternum, and your semitendinosus, semimembranosus, ensure the continuity of the internal axis. When the sacrum sets down, extend the legs diagonally, regain your lumbar imprint, inhale, then draw a circle on the other side and roll up in the opposite direction. coccyx sacrum, lumbar vertebrae, thoracic vertebrae. Repeat three to five times in each direction, alternating. Then come back to the center, exhale, and roll your spine down in the middle to return to your initial position. What you are seeking here is the sensation of a spine mobilizing segment by segment with heavy and immobile shoulder blades, a pelvis that does not escape laterally. legs that trace a regular circle without loss of alignment, and breathing that supports the whole mechanic. What you avoid is arching the lower back at the lowest point of the circle, rolling onto the cervical vertebrae, letting the pelvis tilt or losing the axis of the knees. If the exercise is too intense, keep the pelvis on the mat. It is a valuable variation to strengthen the abdominals and improve lumbopelvic stability against the weight of the legs. If, on the contrary, you are looking for more challenge, you can work on the arc barrel, which amplifies the curve and requires even more precise control of the ascent and descent. The medial hamstrings are not mere motor muscles here. The semimembranosus, through its capsular attachments, finely stabilizes the knee, while the semi-tendinosis via the pes anserinus, transmits the internal line of the thigh down to the floor. They prevent parasitic openings, ensure that your legs remain in the axis even at the lowest point of the circle, and break the descent with eccentric control that saves your spine. From a neuromuscular point of view, your nervous system prepares the movement before it even begins. Certain motor units pre-activate to create a base of stability. During the sequence, your proprioceptive sensors, muscle spindles, Golgi tendon organs, send a constant flow of information on the length, tension, and position of the segments. This data allows your central nervous system to adjust in real time the amount of ATP consumed by modulating the force according to needs. If fatigue arrives, it is often visible. Loss of imprint, irregular breathing, tension in the cervical region. In this case, reducing the amplitude, slowing the descent, and narrowing the circle make it possible to preserve quality. To guide your body, use images. Imagine zipping from the pubis to the sternum, screwing your thighs toward the axis, letting your shoulder blades weigh down like two sand-filled pockets. See your spine as a necklace of pearls that you set down or lift one by one. Inhale to prepare. Exhale in the portion where the effort is maximal, often during the moving away of the legs and the start of the rolling down. After the series, take a moment. Bring your knees toward the chest. Breathe into your back. Feel the ribs widen. Mobilize the spine gently in the opposite direction with a small articulated bridge. Hydrate yourself. Water is essential to the regeneration cycle of ATP. just as oxygen is to its mitochondrial production. If you feed your fibers well, you reduce lactic acid accumulation, preserve your coordination, and prepare the ground for the next session. The corkscrew is more than a simple exercise. It is a conversation between your structure, your energy, and your attention. By practicing it with precision and awareness, you refine not only your strength and flexibility but also your capacity to manage your internal fuel, fuel to synchronize breathing and action, to stabilize while mobilizing. ATP is not just a chemical molecule in this context, it becomes a symbol of your physical availability, of your ability to transform potential into action, to repeat a movement with the same quality as the first time. Keep in mind that each repetition is an opportunity to anchor a precise motor pattern, to strengthen a dialogue between muscles and brain, and to optimize the use of your energy. Quality is... born of regularity, and regularity is nourished by conscious gestures. Your goal is not the size of the circle, but the clarity of its shape and the consistency of your control, from the first to the last millimeter. See you soon in a next episode of Biopilates Deep Dive.
