Pilates for longer, leaner bodies

By Morgan Kelly

"Pilates is more about toning," said Prof. James Huddleston, who teaches physical therapy at Simmons College. "You do lots of repetition so you actually build strength but you also build endurance because your core muscles have to be active all day long."

With little time to spare and the potential boredom that comes with traditional weight lifting, young adults in particular believe that workouts like Pilates are a successful alternative.

"A lot of people are pretty mindless about their exercise and they just kind of go through the motions," said Huddleston. "Pilates takes them out of that mindset and into a mindset where they really are in tune in the moment, specifically with the movement that they are doing."

What it is

Everywhere from college gyms to the Boston Sports Club to the YMCA, Pilates classes are becoming more and more popular every day.

Cheryl DiPietro, who is an instructor at Boston Pilates in Jamaica Plain, explained that the focus of the Pilates practice is posture and strengthening the center, or core, of the body.

"It's all about your spine and the muscles that surround it," said DiPietro, who has been an instructor for 12 years. "The center of your body is your foundation. That's where it starts. You want to strengthen the middle of it to support your upper body and your lower body."

While Classical Pilates, which is performed on machines called Reformers, is still practiced in studios such as Boston Pilates, mat classes are more affordable and more popular for the younger population.

Laura Stevenson, who is a Pilates instructor at Equinox in the Back Bay, said that while the Reformers are extremely popular for her older clients, the mat classes are a great alternative for students and young professionals who don't have the extra money to spend on private sessions.

"One is definitely not better than the other," said Stevenson. "I find that when you work on the Reformer, you then go to a mat class understanding it better. But the mat's great because you can do it in classes, you can do it at home, you can do it anywhere."

For more information on Classical Pilates and to hear more about the techniques involved in the Pilates practice, click below.

Benefits to the Body

While Pilates focuses on working the core, or midsection of the body, trainers and students agree that Pilates is a total body workout.

"You are working from the inside out," said Stevenson, "meaning you're working from the core, the center, all the way out to your outer extremities such as your biceps, your triceps, your calves, your hamstrings, your inner thighs, your outer thighs, it's everything."

Jessica Rosenthal, 25, has been practicing Pilates for two years to supplement her long-distance running. For Rosenthal, one of the key components of Pilates that has kept her going is its ability to lengthen her muscles instead of shortening them, like weightlifting can do.

"After a while, I started noticing that weightlifting was making me too bulky," said Rosenthal. "Pilates can tone and stretch you out without the bulk and heavy weights."

In addition to strength training, Rosenthal said that the most noticeable changes in her body have come in her obliques, her posture and arm toning. 

Huddleston said that another aspect of the Pilates practice that makes it so appealing is its focus on not just the body, but also the mind. "It is a very mind- and body-oriented type of exercise," he said, "and it's not so much the size of the motion that's important but the accurateness and the precision of the motion."

Who's Doing It

For many Pilates students, Pilates is a more intense workout than something like yoga. While many consider the two practices very similar, the Pilates workout attracts more intense and athletic fitness seekers.

"I run a lot and I lift a lot," said Dawn Leaness, 25, "and I wanted something to complement my workouts and improve my flexibility. I always got bored by yoga, so I decided to give Pilates mat classes a shot."

Now a certified instructor, Leaness said that her flexibility, core strength, posture and toning in her abs, arms and legs have improved with the workouts.

While most Pilates students are women, men can also benefit from Pilates but oftentimes, instructors find that men are turned off from the practice because of its slower pace.

"For a guy, they just want to muscle through everything," said DiPietro. "And if they aren't muscling everything they don't think they are doing anything, so a lot of times they won't stick with it because they just don't get it."

Stevenson also said that she finds men feeling that the practice is too difficult, and therefore stay away.

"A lot of times men don't come because they can't do it," said Stevenson with a laugh. "They're in a room full of women and they can't do the exercises so they aren't going to stick around."

Yet those who do stick around with Pilates can turn it into a lifelong practice. Karen Lassiter, 62, who moved to Boston from Texas, has been practicing Pilates for more than a year. In the past two months, after dieting and including spinning to her fitness program, Lassiter said she has lost 10 pounds.

"Nobody would ever have called me an athlete before," she said, "but now, I feel more mobile than most people my age. I'm more flexible now than a lot of my younger friends."

For strength training that can last a lifetime and will target muscles throughout your entire body, Pilates proves to be an effective tool. Unlike traditional weight lifting, Pilates offers an effective alternative that is safe for all ages and levels.