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"I just kept hearing about the Pilates method, and as soon as I tried it, I loved it," she says. "It's a method of body conditioning that incorporates Eastern and Western philosophies of fitness, like yoga with deep breathing and focused attention, but also with a strengthening and flexibility program."
Practiced for 70 years, mostly by dancers, the Pilates method strengthens and stabilizes the trunk of the body, based on the idea that a strong core is the foundation of any fitness program. As a physical therapist, Baylis-Baker was so taken with Pilates-based exercise that she launched her own Traverse Movement Studio in Traverse City, with 12 clients ranging from dance students to persons with serious back problems.
FROM SICKLY CHILD TO SUPERMAN
What is Pilates-based exercise?
It was developed more than 80 years ago by German fitness pioneer Josheph Pilates (pi-LAH-teez) in a prisoner of war camp during World War I.
Joseph Pilates was sickly as a child |
growing up in Dusseldorf, Germany in the late 19th century. After a long illness, he began experimenting with the exercise routines of both the East and West in an attempt to rebuild his strength. From the East, he borrowed the flexibility, concentration and deep breathing aspects of zen and yoga. From the West, he took the calesthenics and weight training of ancient Greece and Rome.
A nurse in the German army who was captured during World War I, Pilates used his ideas to create an exercise regimen for his fellow prisoners of war. His idea was for his men to emerge from the prison camp stronger than when they went in; indeed, his workouts resulted in a higher survival rateduring the great influenza epidemic of the era. He was so successful that he went on to develop a fitness program for the Hamburg city police after the war, where he also incorporated the ideas of movement specialist Rudolf Van Laban.
In 1923, Pilates came to New York City to establish an exercise studio catering to the dance companies of Martha Graham and George |
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| Balanchine, to name a few. Through the decades, dancers, and later, Hollywood actors, have used Pilates and its 500 precise movements to strengthen and stretch their muscles without adding bulk.
DEEP STRENGTH
Today, Pilates-based exercise is moving into the mainstream. (Of note, it can't be called simply Pilates, as that is the registered trademark of a fitness organization using the same principles.)
"It combines both strength and flexibility at the same time," Baylis-Baker says.
"Working out intensely can be relaxing and more enjoyable because you're focusing inward."
In her own case, the workout has meant a feeling of deeper strength. |
"It uses many of the same concepts used for back rehabilitation," she notes. "The idea is trunk strength and stabilization, focusing on the core to help the back - what we call the 'powerhouse'."
Some important concepts include breathing, concentration and focus, along with ease of movement when completing an exercise.
"it's not about doing 20 reps or bench presses," Baylis-Baker notes. "It's the quality of the movement that counts."
"Anyone can do it," she adds. "Even my little boys do it at home."
She notes that Joseph Pilates liked to say that he was 50 years ahead of his time. Yet, as we move into a new millenium in which multidisciplines and diversity are highly valued, it seems more correct to say that Pilates was a full century ahead of his peers in terms of his vision of fitness. |
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