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Audience and Benefits of Pilates
Pilates can be studied at any age in life. Whether you have limited physical activity or you are a fitness aficionado, Pilates Republic will adjust the workout to your ability, needs and goals.
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Benefits of Pilates
The benefits of this method are recognized by doctors, physiotherapists and chiropractors. Studying the method can help prevent injury or can help to play an important role in recovery after an injury. Pilates can give you a strong, lean and healthy body while helping you to increase your body control, regardless of your present condition. |
Pilates Apparatus and Principles
Pilates nowadays is most known as a mat workout. Joseph Pilates himself invented many apparatus, such as the reformer, cadillac, barrels, chairs and many others. His inventions rely on springs and resistance.
Mat based exercises involve using your own body weight to enhance resistance, whereas apparatus classes use special equipment in order to create muscle resistance. Ever since Joseph Pilates invented the apparatus, GRATZ has been its sole manufacturer. Their work is of such high quality, that they can guarantee their equipment to be 'defect-free in both material and workmanship for the duration of its lifetime.' |
Centering
This is the very first step and lesson to learn. All movements are performed from your center. Joseph Pilates called this the Powerhouse. It consists of several muscle groups, not just the core. Concentration The mind plays a big role in Pilates. The mind moves the body, nothing is done out of habit, or on autopilot. Control Moving with true concentration from our center means we are in control of what we do. Joseph Pilates was passionate about using his concept of the 'Art of Contrology' in and out of the studio. Precision Every exercise was designed with a clear end goal in mind on form, objective and dynamic of the exercise. Precision on moving in an aligned fashion and with the correct muscles working is key. Breath Breathing plays a big role in Pilates. Some exercises will follow a particular breathing pattern and some will follow a natural breath. Each will focus on deep exhaling to 'wring the lungs out' of all air. Flow Flow equals a particular dynamic to move from one exercise to the next. It does not determine at what speed to move, however, it ensures that attention is paid to moving smoothly. |
Joseph Pilates and His Wife Clara
Pilates was a sickly child and dedicated his entire life to improving his physical strength
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Joseph as a young boy
Joseph H. Pilates was born December 9, 1883 in Mönchengladbach, Germany. His father, Heinrich Friedrich Pilates, was a metal worker and enthusiastic gymnast, and his mother was a housewife. Pilates was a sickly child and dedicated his entire life to improving his physical strength. By the age of 14, he was fit enough to pose for anatomical charts. Pilates came to believe that the "modern" life-style, bad posture, and inefficient breathing lay at the roots of poor health. He ultimately devised a series of exercises and training-techniques and engineered all the equipment, specifications and tuning required to teach his methods properly. |
'Contrology' was born
Pilates was originally a gymnast and bodybuilder. When he moved to England in 1912, he was transferred to an internment camp at Knockaloe on the Isle of Man. He began to intensively develop his concept of an integrated, comprehensive system of physical exercise, which he himself called "Contrology". After World War I, he returned to Germany and emigrated to the United States around 1925. On the ship to America, he met his future wife Clara. The couple founded a studio in New York City and directly taught and supervised their students well into the 1960s. 'Contrology' related to encouraging the use of the mind to control muscles, focusing attention on core postural muscles as well as others that help keep the body balanced and provide support for the spine. Joseph and Clara Pilates soon established a devoted following in the local dance and performing-arts community of New York. His exercise regimen built flexibility, strength and stamina. Joe and Clara had a number of disciples, of which Romana took over Joseph's studio and worked alongside his wife Clara, after Joseph's death in 1967 at the age of 83. |
'Contrology' related to encouraging the use of the mind to control
muscles |
Romana's Pilates
Their main aim is to keep ... the method as pure as possible.
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Romana's, the method
Romana's Pilates has been named after Romana Kryzanowska, who was born in 1923. Initially a ballet dancer, she became Joseph Pilates' main student and later a Pilates instructor. After the death of Joseph Pilates in 1968, Clara Pilates continued the studio for a few more years, and in 1970 Romana Kryzanowska became the director of what was by that time called "The Pilates Studio." Romana, together with her daughter Sari Mejia-Santo developed a training program, called the Romana's ITP (Instructor Training Program). Their main aim is to keep Romana's and Joseph Pilates' dream alive and to keep the method as pure as possible. The UK training center is at Kinetic Pilates. |
Romana Kryzanowska's bio
Romana was born on June 30, 1923. She studied ballet and at age 17, while studying at George Balanchine’s School of American Ballet, she suffered an ankle injury and was taken to Joseph Pilates to see if exercise rather than an operation would resolve the problem. The exercises were a success, and she continued to study with Pilates. "Before I knew it", she said, "I was named a helper, which meant I didn’t have to pay anymore." On July 11, 1944 she married and moved to Peru, where she danced and taught the Pilates technique. Her two children, Paul and Sari, were born in Peru. Returning to the US in 1958, she began working again with Joseph and Clara Pilates at their studio in New York City and also taught ballet. Romana and her daughter continued to operate Joseph Pilates' original studio and developed an instructor training program, which to this day produces handpicked instructors all over the world. |
"Before I knew it ... I was named a helper."
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From the age of nine, Sari studied and performed ... Pilates.
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Sari Mejia-Santo' bio
Sari, Romana's daughter, was born in Peru and emigrated to the United States where she began her career in dance at the School of American Ballet. Her talent for choreography led her to tour with the Goldovsky Opera company as a choreographer and a soloist. From the age of nine, Sari studied and performed the method developed by Joseph Pilates. As a young girl she assisted Joseph pilates in his studio, until she graduated to teaching under Joseph's watchful eye. Currently Sari is the master teacher of the certification seminars in Romana's Pilates which she owns and operates along with her daughter Daria Pace. |