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The Pilates Body: The Ultimate At-Home Guide to Strengthening, Lengthening, and Toning Your Body--Without Machines

Pilates: Your Complete Guide to Mat Work and Apparatus Exercises

The Pilates Body Kit: An Interactive Fitness Program to Strengthen, Streamline, and Tone

Stretch your way to a stronger core.

More than just your run-of-the-mill exercise routine, Pilates combines a rigorous physical workout with techniques designed to keep the mind and spirit in top shape. Prepare to see changes in short order once you get acquainted with:

The benefits and principles of Pilates
Advice on how to choose a class and what supplies to get
Step-by-step instructions on all 32 standard Pilates exercises

Pilates Fundamentals

Named for its founder, Joseph Pilates, Pilates (pronounced puh-lah-teez) is a wellness regime that uses visualization techniques and a series of specific exercises to strengthen the body’s core, balance the physique, and increase body awareness. Rather than just an exercise program, Pilates is a holistic approach to good health that aims to boost the mind, body, and spirit.

The Powerhouse

The main purpose of Pilates is to condition the powerhouse, the central core of the body. The core includes the:

Abdominals
Lower back
Buttocks
Inner thighs

The Benefits of Pilates

Pilates offers a wide range of benefits, including:

Body alignment: Pilates works both sides of the body equally to restore balance and symmetry.
Cardiovascular strength: Pilates exercises raise the heart rate and improve cardiovascular fitness.
Flexibility: Pilates exercises focus on stretching the muscles to promote flexibility and rejuvenate the body.
Improved physique: Pilates streamlines the body by toning and strengthening major muscle groups.
Mental clarity: Pilates students use visualization techniques and breathing methods that help calm and clear the mind.
Posture: Pilates strengthens the powerhouse, which makes proper body posture easier to maintain.
Rehabilitation: Pilates’ balanced approach to strengthening the body is often used in rehabilitation programs and to prevent re-injury to muscles.
Spiritual wholeness: Pilates promotes the idea of mindfulness, or being in the moment, in order to achieve happiness and spiritual fulfillment.
Stress reduction: Pilates shifts the mind’s focus from stressful thoughts to proper breathing and form.

The Principles of Pilates

The Pilates approach to mental, spiritual, and physical fitness is based on ten core principles.

Centering: Pilates requires an intense focus on the powerhouse, the body’s central core. Focusing closely on the powerhouse is known as centering.
Breathing: Pilates breathing involves establishing a rhythm between inhaling and exhaling. To achieve this rhythm, inhale during exercise preparation and recovery, and exhale as you do the actual exercise.
Visualization: Pilates exercises require you to envision performing the motions in your mind before executing them with your body, a process known as visualization.
Control: Pilates trains the mind to control the body’s movements with precision. Muscle control promotes perfect form and helps prevent injuries.
Concentration: Pilates uses deep concentration to train the mind and body to work together seamlessly.
Flow: Pilates exercises are designed to flow from one to the next with little interruption.
Routine: Pilates uses set sequences of exercises to help students improve concentration and perfect form.
Isolation: Each Pilates exercise isolates, or focuses on, certain muscle groups for toning and strengthening.
Stability: Achieving stability in the torso is a main goal in Pilates. To this end, you should work one part of the body at a time, while keeping the rest of the body still.
Range of motion: Pilates movements encourage the body to extend to its fullest length, thereby increasing range of motion, or flexibility, of the limbs.