PILATES

What will Pilates do for me?

Pilates taught using the Pilates Reformer under the guidance of a proven trained professional will achieve the following:

• Strength and Flexibility: Target and strengthen core muscles, including the abdominals, back, and hips. Improve flexibility by stretching and lengthening muscles throughout the body.
• Posture and Alignment: Emphasis on proper body alignment and posture, reducing muscle imbalances and improving spinal health.
• Balance and Coordination: Focus on controlled movements and body awareness, enhancing balance and coordination.
• Core Stability: Strengthening the core muscles providing a solid foundation for other movements and improving overall stability.
• Muscle Tone and Definition: Pilates resistance bands challenge muscles and promote muscle tone and definition.
• Stress Reduction: Mindful and controlled Pilates exercises reduce stress and improve mental well-being.
• Injury Prevention: Help prevent injuries related to poor posture and weak core muscles by strengthening core muscles and improving body alignment.
• Other Benefits: Improve bone density, boost metabolism, and enhance overall body awareness.

The History

Pilates founder Joseph Pilates was a sickly child born in German in 1883. He focused on exercise as a means of overcoming rickets (a condition in which bones do not develop properly), asthma, and rheumatic fever. In 1913, he traveled to England as a circus tumbler and when WWIbroke outin 1914 he and his fellow tumblers were incarcerated as enemy aliens on the Isle of Man for the duration of the war. There Pilates devised exercise equipment using bed springs and resistance pulleys and taught fellow prisoners his routines. Spanish Flu plagued the world and European continent. The camps were no exception. Thousands of prisoners of war died, but none of Pilates’ trainees did.

When the war ended in 1918, the German government wanted Pilates to train its new German army. He chose instead to immigrate to the US.

In 1926, Pilates established his studio on 8^th Avenue in New York City where prominent clientsflocked: society’s elite, circus performers, gymnasts, and dance world luminaries. Pilates developed more than 600 specific exercises for both mat and on his unique apparatus.

The Science
Using gravity, breath and spring resistance, the Pilates Reformer targets specific muscle groups to re-educate movement patterns and rebalance the body’s underlying muscular and structural systems.Build long lean muscle mass, balance, core strength and flexibility. It’ssuitable for everybody at all fitness levels.

Today, doctors and therapists use Pilates to help trauma patients, sometimes offering patients an alternative to surgery. Some insurance companies are covering prescription Pilates under physical therapy benefits.

Pilates should be done two to three times a week, alternating with cardio exercises other days for anoptimal physical fitness routine.