Down to the Core
Pilates workout can improve flexibility, core strength, body awareness
By Julia Marino, Getoutzine.com
January 7, 2008
Colin Shelton fully realized the healing power of Pilates a few years after a skiing trip that tore one of the tendons in his knee, resulting in surgery and pain. A dance student at the time and avid climber, he tried physical therapy, but said it didn't help him get back up to the level of ability that he needed.
At the advice of his dance instructor, Shelton started practicing Pilates while recovering from his surgery and got hooked right away. "It's not physical therapy. I would say it is more. It fixed problems that I didn't know I had," says Shelton, who is now a Pilates instructor at the YMCA in downtown Pittsburgh and at the corporate wellness program they run at various University of Pittsburgh Medical Center facilities.
Created in the 1920s by Joseph H. Pilates, the Pilates Method is series of controlled movements focused on improving flexibility and strength, as well as balance and harmony of mind and body. Performed either on an apparatus machine or a mat, Pilates can be practiced by people of all levels of fitness while providing a revitalizing workout, especially on your core abdominal muscles.
"It's great to have people come in and have a problem and then leave better than when they came," Shelton says. "In general I've found Pilates to be a good complement to other training programs, but not a replacement."
Pilates especially helps with muscle imbalances in the lower back, which can develop due to many people's tendency to strain the dominant side of their body during sports such as swimming and rock climbing. Pilates pulls everything back into alignment and focuses on coordinating and balancing your upper and lower body.
Pilates helps the most with full-body activities that require fine motor control.
As for the mental stuff, Shelton says that Pilates or some similar training "should be a requirement for anyone doing intense athletics because it teaches bodily awareness that doesn't always come naturally."
"It's important to think about your body, where you are in space and where you're going ... The more mindful you are of your body, the closer you can push to the edge of your limits, and the less likely you are to get hurt," he says.
Shelton believes that the meditation aspect also carries over from activity to activity. If you can put yourself in that relaxed awareness, then learning complex motor activities that have no connection to Pilates will come more naturally.
As Joseph Pilates once said, "to achieve highest accomplishments within the scope of our capabilities ... we must constantly strive to acquire strong, healthy bodies and develop our minds to the limit of our ability."
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