Are you one of those people who has been hearing about the recent pilates craze? It seems like everyone is doing pilates these days. But what exactly is pilates, why is it so good for you and what are the reasons to start doing pilates?
Pilates consists of muscular endurance/strength and low-impact flexibility movements which is similar to yoga, although emphasizing greatly on your body’s core – the obliques, the abdomen, lower back, butt, outer and inner thigh, and so on.
Because of this, pilates develops more of what exercises really need – flexibility, strength, muscular endurance, balance, good posture, and coordination – with much lower chances of injury compared to other forms of physical exercise.
The discipline favors the correct form then going directly for the burn. With numerous exercise progressions and variations, you may actually find it difficult to get bored with pilates.
A Pilates exercise routine typically involves 30 to 50 repetitive endurance and strength training exercises. Pilates is also similar to calisthenics, with sit-ups and pushups. Some people even call Pilates as the ultimate form and style of calisthenics.
5 Reasons to Start Doing Pilates
1. Build Core Strength and Long, Lean Muscles
For many people, the core is considered as the weakest body part, but it’s the center, where all your strength comes from.
When your core is weak, the entire body is also weak. Pilates constantly focuses on core-engaging exercises, leading to a strong back and flat abs.
2. Prevent Injuries
Injuries can leave you incapacitated for months, even years. But what if you could use exercise in preventing injuries rather than causing them? Pilates focuses more on your core, to strengthen your back muscles and abdominals.
This way, your core is strengthened even without you realizing it. Weak core muscles cause back pain, but if you have a strong core, it can help prevent future injuries and pain
3. You’ll Build Better Bones
Pilates has one excellent piece of pilates equipment called the pilates reformer machine and you can use this for building better bones. A jump board is connected to the machine, and you can jump on it just like jumping on a trampoline but you do that while you lie on your back.
Jumping is actually an effective bone-building, impact exercise but with no pressure being exerted on the spine, reducing injury risk.
4. Your Balance Skills will Improve Drastically
Many Pilates exercises are performed on the reformer while standing with one leg raised. The exercises come in various degrees of difficulty and you might begin with one of your feet on the floor while the other is on the reformer.
As you exercise, your balance skills improve and you advance to other forms of exercise.
5. Improve Flexibility
Generally, the more muscles you have, the less flexible your body becomes. But the focus of Pilates on stretching helps prevents muscle strains and injuries and increases its range of motion.
The main feature of pilates that makes it different from other forms of exercise is its movement principle in core activation. It recognizes the core as the foundation for all sorts of exercise in Pilates.
It is because the core comprises various muscles including those in your pelvic floor. Those muscles incidentally control urine flow from the boy. This means you will be free from adult undergarments when you grow old.
Considering its emphasis on safety and injury-free exercises, pilates is indeed a unique form of workout that’s excellent for men, women, children, especially the elderly or anyone with chronic pain and illness.
If you’re looking for a place to start, I highly recommend checking out my Lindywell Pilates review. This is where I started my pilates journey many years ago and I have never looked back!
Overall, the key reasons to start doing pilates is that pilates builds a stronger core, increases flexibility, betters balance, and promotes stability. Specifically, it improves body awareness, posture, and builds optimal health.
Because you can do pilates anywhere, there’s really no more excuse left not to give this wonderful exercise a try.
About the Author: Jane Hart
Working crazy hours in a high-stress work environment resulted in my body one day telling me, “Enough is enough!”
Navigating this serious health journey was both mentally and physically exhausting. But through some serious mindset work and instilling healthy habits, I was able to rebuild my life one day at a time and come out stronger on the other side!
Now my mission is to empower women like me to prioritize their fitness and well-being in a healthy, sustainable way and build a community of strong, happy and healthy women!