Today was a great day...in fact the week has been awesome due to a series of Pilates events and intersections. I was thrilled to receive a course flyer advertising a core stability class, Balls, Bands and Rollers to be held thirty minutes away in Brookfield, Wisconsin. To add to the ball and band excitement, one of the Pilates instructors is a Ph.D in Exercise Science from Auburn University (WDE), my alma mater. The other instructor is a physical therapist from Northwestern University who utilizes her manual therapy skills, biomechanical analysis of movements and Pilates to assist her clients to move well. I handed the brochure to my husband and he commented that our backgrounds were quite similar. What he could not understand was my hysteria (this relates to a prior post regarding the male intellect and the paradox of women.) The point of the matter was, to borrow a phrase from the classic movie "The Hangover," I have often felt like the "lone-man wolf-pack" of Pilates. While other instructors work in studio settings, absorbing information from fellow instructors with varied backgrounds, I typically must travel to expensive, distant courses to obtain the most relevant information and teaching feedback and critique. Thus, knowing that a fellow Auburn grad, making her life traveling the country educating physical and occupational therapists to the Pilates Method was going to be in my frozen tundra's backyard was thrilling. All the above leads into why today was a stellar ending to the week.
This morning I visited the neighboring town of Pewaukee and Pilates on the Lake. Kathleen Morris, a Chicago based Pilates instructor, marathoner, and tri-athlete was presenting a workshop, "Pilates for Runners." Kathleen reports her goal during a race is often more about running happy for 26.2 miles rather than running fast. That being said, she completed her latest marathon at 41 years of age, faster than her original best time from 10 years ago. There is an apparent relationship between feeling well, aging well, running happy and running fast! Kathleen related running happy to our "chi," our life force or energy. One of the reasons running and Pilates are complimentary pursuits is both recognize energy comes from our center. In the case of chi, essentially the pelvic bowl; think low, between the hip bones. When runners "spill their chi" as Kathleen laughingly called it, this implies they are running with a sway back and their abdomen pushed out, disconnected from their chi or center. The same is true when we "muscle-through" a Pilates or core exercise where our pelvis is anteriorly tilted, the back is straining and the ribs jutting out. Mantra: "Keep your chi to yourself ."
There is an interesting relationship as well between the feet, the pelvis, the posture and running ease. Kathleen began the class having us use the foam roller, textured massage balls, and tennis balls to "warm-up" the feet and become aware of our arches. By lifting through the arches of the feet the inner thighs activate as well as the deep abdominals. Simple exercises like rolling the feet on the sensory props helped create connections as well as relax muscle groups that tend to dominate or over-react, like the psoas and low back muscles. Joseph Pilates was well aware of this relationship between the feet and your core, which is why most of the apparatus work begins with the footwork series. Simply standing barefoot on your foam roller, moving your feet back and forth, can help release tension in the rest of your body.
We progressed to a series of exercises using the Pilates chair and reformer for footwork, stomach massage, and standing calf stretches. We did mat work of single leg circles, bridges with the yoga block, hundreds, and prone extension (swimming). She also proved a point that for those of us with overactive spinal extensor muscles, simply an easy side to side pelvis shift seated on the exercise ball can release these annoying muscles, particularly at the end of a long run when they might be screaming. In addition we used the Pilates circle for standing inner thigh work as well as to assess our standing symmetry. And finally, as I have encouraged you all to do, we did ilio-tibial band (ITBand) massage and psoas release with the foam roller, the "poor-man's massage!"
I was the only Pilates certified instructor present besides Kathleen and Rhonda, owner of Pilates on the Lake. The other 12 participants were all avid runners with limited to no Pilates experience. They all left, as did I, with a refreshing sense of freedom in their back and hips and an awareness that a lot of chi makes for a lot of happiness. Pilates on the Lake is establishing a running group on Saturdays to coordinate with their Pilates classes. They will run as a wolf-pack and then do Pilates as a wolf-pack! It appears to me that "chi" is multiplied among other happy runners, Pilates enthusiasts, yoga lovers, music fans, Packer fans, and of course Auburn fans!
In the future I will add to this post with pictures as I know many of my friends and readers are avid runners and/or sports enthusiasts. Just writing this post has helped me recall important points of the workshop and consider new methods to enhance mind-body connections. I'm not nearly as excited about on-line shopping as I am Pilates, however this evening I plan to browse and purchase a few more tools for our Home Training Pilates tool-kit. Simple props can dramatically improve our awareness and performance. Everybody can benefit from being strong and flexible. Thank you for reading. As Kathleen would say, "Run Tall, Run Happy!"
This morning I visited the neighboring town of Pewaukee and Pilates on the Lake. Kathleen Morris, a Chicago based Pilates instructor, marathoner, and tri-athlete was presenting a workshop, "Pilates for Runners." Kathleen reports her goal during a race is often more about running happy for 26.2 miles rather than running fast. That being said, she completed her latest marathon at 41 years of age, faster than her original best time from 10 years ago. There is an apparent relationship between feeling well, aging well, running happy and running fast! Kathleen related running happy to our "chi," our life force or energy. One of the reasons running and Pilates are complimentary pursuits is both recognize energy comes from our center. In the case of chi, essentially the pelvic bowl; think low, between the hip bones. When runners "spill their chi" as Kathleen laughingly called it, this implies they are running with a sway back and their abdomen pushed out, disconnected from their chi or center. The same is true when we "muscle-through" a Pilates or core exercise where our pelvis is anteriorly tilted, the back is straining and the ribs jutting out. Mantra: "Keep your chi to yourself ."
There is an interesting relationship as well between the feet, the pelvis, the posture and running ease. Kathleen began the class having us use the foam roller, textured massage balls, and tennis balls to "warm-up" the feet and become aware of our arches. By lifting through the arches of the feet the inner thighs activate as well as the deep abdominals. Simple exercises like rolling the feet on the sensory props helped create connections as well as relax muscle groups that tend to dominate or over-react, like the psoas and low back muscles. Joseph Pilates was well aware of this relationship between the feet and your core, which is why most of the apparatus work begins with the footwork series. Simply standing barefoot on your foam roller, moving your feet back and forth, can help release tension in the rest of your body.
We progressed to a series of exercises using the Pilates chair and reformer for footwork, stomach massage, and standing calf stretches. We did mat work of single leg circles, bridges with the yoga block, hundreds, and prone extension (swimming). She also proved a point that for those of us with overactive spinal extensor muscles, simply an easy side to side pelvis shift seated on the exercise ball can release these annoying muscles, particularly at the end of a long run when they might be screaming. In addition we used the Pilates circle for standing inner thigh work as well as to assess our standing symmetry. And finally, as I have encouraged you all to do, we did ilio-tibial band (ITBand) massage and psoas release with the foam roller, the "poor-man's massage!"
I was the only Pilates certified instructor present besides Kathleen and Rhonda, owner of Pilates on the Lake. The other 12 participants were all avid runners with limited to no Pilates experience. They all left, as did I, with a refreshing sense of freedom in their back and hips and an awareness that a lot of chi makes for a lot of happiness. Pilates on the Lake is establishing a running group on Saturdays to coordinate with their Pilates classes. They will run as a wolf-pack and then do Pilates as a wolf-pack! It appears to me that "chi" is multiplied among other happy runners, Pilates enthusiasts, yoga lovers, music fans, Packer fans, and of course Auburn fans!
In the future I will add to this post with pictures as I know many of my friends and readers are avid runners and/or sports enthusiasts. Just writing this post has helped me recall important points of the workshop and consider new methods to enhance mind-body connections. I'm not nearly as excited about on-line shopping as I am Pilates, however this evening I plan to browse and purchase a few more tools for our Home Training Pilates tool-kit. Simple props can dramatically improve our awareness and performance. Everybody can benefit from being strong and flexible. Thank you for reading. As Kathleen would say, "Run Tall, Run Happy!"
RSS Feed