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As we enter 2024, we have been thinking about Joseph Pilates’ famous quote about healthy spines:
“If your spine is stiff at 30, you are old; if it’s flexible at 60, you are young!’
We’d go a lot further than that – and we’re sure that some of our more senior clients would agree(!) – to say that regardless of age, if you have a healthy spine, you are young!
With that in mind, the focus of our new Find Your Flow® program is all about rolling – we’re calling it the Rolling Up program. As with all of our programs, you’ll get a full body workout – a healthy spine needs the support of the whole body to help it remain flexible!
However, the main focus of the Rolling Up Program is about rolling out our spine, through all of the movement planes: moving front to back (sagittal plane), moving side to side (coronal plane) and moving in rotation (axial plane).
Why is a healthy spine important? The spine gives our body structure and support and stiffness can result in back or neck ache. However, spinal weakness can also manifest in different areas of the body, such as: rounded shoulders, soreness in hips, knees and/or ankles, headaches. This is because, in order to keep our body upright, if the spine is stiff, it will pull on other muscles, causing stress in those areas too.
Through the course of the six week program, we’ll spend time easing out our spines while draped over arcs, we’ll find spinal extension while lying in prone position, we’ll find hip extension, through Bridging and Scooter, while working into leg muscles! We’ll also be enjoying side bends and taking another look at Climb a Tree – which so many of us enjoyed in previous programs.
If this sounds a bit daunting – particularly after the Christmas break – don’t be disheartened! As with all of our programs, we’ll start gradually, so that you can find the right technique and add complexity and challenge at your own pace, when your body is ready.
As we start the Roll Up program, you may want to think about ‘framing’ your starting point, relevant to your personal goals for the next few weeks. For many of us goals will be about strength and mobility, so for example, you might want to ‘frame’ which spring you used, how many repetitions you achieved, how your body felt moving over the arc and so on. For some of us, goals may be about confidence on the Reformer so we may be thinking about ‘framing’ how we felt in side bend on the box, to what extent we were able to relax into an ‘upside down’ position and so on.
You can then check again at the end of the program to see what progress you’ve made in the areas of most importance to you.
We hope you enjoy the Roll Up Program as much as we enjoyed developing it for you!
If you’d like to experience Reformer Pilates, you can book your place in our Reformer Plus classes, or join our Reformer Fundamentals class, using the link below. We’d love to welcome you to the Studio!
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