By Dr. Vianini, director of Pilatech Srl
The Pilates method was invented by the German Joseph Hubertus Pilates in the early 20th century.
It is based on some principles with the idea of optimizing the use of one's body to improve physical fitness and maintain balance more efficiently. Pilates is a fusion point between the guiding principles of oriental disciplines (harmony and slowness in the execution of movements) and modern western scientific developments in the field of body re-education, physical fitness, proprioceptive and postural gymnastics.
Pilates is a holistic gymnastics, whose purpose is to make the mind and body work together in each exercise. Pilates teaches to move in harmony and balance, accompanying the movement with fluid and complete inhalations and exhalations, with the result to reduce energy costs.
The Pilates method, through a proprioceptive approach, allows a real neuro-muscular reprogramming.
This "magic" is acquired progressively, within a few dozen sessions, and is perceived with a feeling of well-being, relief from painful muscular tension, associated with a mental pleasure of relaxation. This strange physical and mental sensation pleasantly captures, with a sense of well-being due to the pleasure of the "working muscle" and at the same time the sensation of lightness and stretching.
The body learns a new way to behave, to move, to breathe, to move in space without generating any abnormal muscular hypertonus, without joint overloads, or without creating those factors that are subsequently responsible for the unpleasant musculoskeletal symptoms, so common as to be considered almost normal and "inevitable".
In Pilates, muscle work takes place by kinetic chains and by muscle regions: in this way, in the various exercises, the whole body is involved. with prevalence of the deep-postural musculature of the spine.
The Pilates method is applied today in various fields: from physiotherapy rehabilitation to fitness; recently, even the most advanced world of sport has included its principles in athletic training programs.
One of the fundamental traits of Pilates is that it must be practiced only under the supervision of expert personnel, also and above all when you want to emphasize its therapeutic aspect. It is in fact one of the most complete, structured and reliable methods for rebalancing posture. (so much so that it is used abroad in many hospitals), but entrusting it to those who know little or inadequately in-depth anatomy, physiology, and the technique as a whole, can involve risks for the health of the patient / client. .
Pilates trainers, therefore, must be certified, therefore having completed a complete training process.
Furthermore, they must be able to carry out a scrupulous initial assessment of the client's conditions, to choose the most suitable combination of tools and exercises to be proposed in relation to the various problems.
Pilates must be practiced with the use of adequate and safe equipment: the Reformer, the Cadillac, the Barrel, the Chair are the basic machines. To these you can add a range of accessories to meet specific needs.
The machines currently proposed, while maintaining the essential principles that guided Joseph Pilates in the design of his tools, represent a more modern and efficient evolution.
Tools that do not allow or guarantee perfect symmetry of movement, springs that do not guarantee identical tensions, and low-level technical solutions are absolutely to be avoided when working on the postural structure.
Pilates is offered in many centers only in the free body version or "Mat Work".
This mode certainly allows you to familiarize yourself with the discipline but we must not forget that it represents only a part of the method, and that in any case only with the "use of the equipment it is possible to truly" tailor "this wonderful method and obtain all the benefits that pilates it can potentially give us.
