Personal Fitness Professional - March 2008 - (Page 25) • Work the deepest, most intrinsic layers of muscle that act to refine movements and provide necessary joint stability and support the spine. • Work through a series of warm-ups designed to increase blood flow and mobilize the joints. • Perform a sequence of exercises with low load resistance from either the client’s own body weight, a small apparatus or springloaded machines. It is the low load that enhances joint mobility and dynamic stability. You may have heard the phrase that, with Pilates, “you work from the inside out.” That is essentially what we are doing — going from deep to superficial. Pilates could truly be looked at as the foundation for any and all strength or movement training programs. For optimum function, the body benefits from a combination of mobility, dynamic stability and strength. Starting with Pilates may just set the stage for a good all-over resistance training program. In Pilates, very basic biomechanical movement principles are taught: breathing, pelvic placement, rib cage placement, scapula mobility and stabilization as well as head and cervical placement. These principles are not specific to Pilates alone and may be carried over easily in all other movement methods. BREATHING The most important principle is the breath; we encourage a full breathing pattern, a “3-D” breath, allowing for all three lobes of the lungs to expand and release with each inhale and exhale. In doing so, we not only stretch many intrinsic muscles that might otherwise not get stretched but also help to create proper intra-abdominal pressure to support the spine. The transverses abdominus, or TA, is activated on the exhale and co-contracts with other inner core muscles to stabilize the spine. We teach clients to feel how their ribs expand three-dimensionally on the inhale and, on the exhale, how that deepest abdominal layer the TA activates — it will feel like a gentle corset around their midsection. This TA activation is what truly flattens the abdominal wall, and it is the secret to flat abs! This is a simple but extremely beneficial prerequisite for all abdominal work. PELVIC PLACEMENT Pelvic placement is our second basic biomechanical principle in Pilates. We adopt either a neutral pelvis (both the asis and pubis are in the same level plane) or a slight posterior tilt (the asis is lower than the pubis). The neutral pelvis is used for closed chain (both feet on the ground) activities and the posterior tilt is used for open chain (both feet in the air) activities. The reason for neutral being used in closed chain is to avoid unnecessary flexion of the lumbar, which could compress the discs, as neutral is the most shock-absorbing position, with respect to the spine. And the reason we do a slight posterior tilt in open chain is to take the pressure off of the erector spinae, if the abdominals cannot support the spine against the weight of the legs in the air. By adopting these pelvic principles, we ideally avoid compromising the spine and disc space. RIB CAGE PLACEMENT The ribs should lie flush with the torso when relaxed and expand slightly upward and out upon inhalation. The muscles attached to the ribs, the TA and obliques, will help keep them flush when properly activated during all phases of the breath. This principle is often taught when supine (face-up) by inhaling and lifting ➤ MARCH2008 · WWW.FIT-PRO.COM 27 25 http://WWW.FIT-PRO.COM
For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.