The Pilates Method is a whole body movement regime which focuses on core stability. Pilates can be beneficial in keeping your body honed for sports or simply for life's daily activities. It can be used as a rehabilitation device or to train the most seasoned athletes and dancers.
Though perfection of the Pilates form is an aspiration, it is only a means to an end. Through practice and training you develop a stronger core, greater flexibility and greater control over your body.
Pilates was originally known as Contrology. Each and every movement is controlled by breath, keeping the pelvis and shoulder girdle stable and constantly using the abdominals. Pilates is comprised of the basic mat work series as well as many exercises which are done on apparatus designed specifically for the Method.
History
Joseph Hubertus Pilates was born near Düsseldorf, Germany in 1880. As a young man he suffered from asthma, rheumatic fever, and rickets. In search of relief and healing he studied both Eastern and Western forms of movement training and exercise techniques including yoga, Zen Meditation and ancient Greek and Roman exercise regimens. At 14 years old, with greatly improved health, he posed for anatomical charts and studied fancy diving, skiing, and gymnastics. In 1912, Joseph went to England to learn to become a boxer. During this time, he had several jobs including one as a circus performer and another as a trainer of self-defense to detectives. During World War 1 he and other German Nationals were interned for a year as "enemy aliens" in Lancaster, England. While in the camp Pilates created his mat work program; a series of exercises that combined physical fitness with breath control and mental acuity. He promised the other interns that, if they followed his program, they would emerge from the camp stronger than they had been before entering. In addition to the promised increase in strength none of his charges succumbed to the deadly influenza epidemic that swept England, killing thousands of people. When working as a nurse's aid in a hospital on the Isle of Man, he devised machines to allow patients to exercise in bed. These machines would evolve into the popular and widely used Pilates Universal Reformer. Joseph's exercise program was gaining international popularity and he returned to Germany to train the Hamburg City Police. After being asked to train the new German army he fled Germany in 1925 and immigrated to the United States in 1926. On the boat to America, he met his future wife Clara. Shortly after their arrival in New York City, he opened a fitness studio. His work caught the attention of the dance community and he trained many famous dancers including Martha Graham, George Balanchine and most of the New York City Ballet. After years of success, Pilates died in 1967. Clara died 10 years later after formalizing the methodology that is used around the world to this very day.
