The Pilates Method
Today, Pilates is offered as a rehabilitation routine, a wellness regimen and a cross-training fitness practice. Encompassing both floor exercise and work on highly specialized Pilates apparatus, the method offers something for everyone; young and old, male and female, from top athletes to clients suffering with injuries or chronic disease.
JOSEPH H. PILATES
Born near Dusseldorf, Germany, in 1880, Young Joe suffered poor health as the result of many childhood ailments. In an effort to improve his own health he emarked on a program of pysical fitness, dilligently studying a wide variety of timeless fitness regiments. By the age of 14 he had achieved such remarkable results that he was posing for anatomical charts, and by his 20’s he was competing in boxing, gymnastics, skiing and diving. Confined to an internment camp in England during WWI, he refined his excercise method and utilized it to rehab many patients. In 1926 he traveled to America and met his wife, Clara, on board the ship. Upon their arrival in New York, they opened their excercise studio and went to work sharing their method with variety of clients from performers.
Pilates Method Alliance
Master Teachers, those who studied directly with Joe and Clara, are alive today and sharing their knowledge with enthusiastic students of Joe’s unique method. The PMA is an umbrella organization that seeks to promote ethics, standards of practice and a continuation of the tradition of excellence in Joe’s original method. We at the Pilates Place have studied with master teachers, as well as those trained by Master Teachers and support the standards put forth by the PMA.
Michele and Pam have been members of the PMA since 2001, just one year after its inception. In 2010, Michele was invited to teach master classes to attendees at the 10th Annual PMA International Educational Conference in Long Beach, California. Only 24 teachers were chosen to present master classes from among 100 applicants to the thousands of Pilates Instructors who attend the conference from all over the world.
The Pilates Method
The Pilates Method is a system of movement and therapeutic exercise developed over a span of 60 years be German born athlete and physical therapy pioneer, Joseph H. Pilates. The primary elements of the Pilates exercise program include dynamic breath work, core strengthening, proper body alignment and increased flexibility. The coordination of these elements serves to promote heightened body awareness, coordination, balance, new neuromuscular patterns and overall sense of well being.
English