Pilates Power

Pilates. If you don't know how to pronounce it, chances are you won't have to look far to find someone who does.

Pilates (Puh-LAH-teez) is the nation's "fastest-growing exercise format," according to surveys taken by IDEA, a national organization of health and fitness professionals.

American Data Inc. found that Pilates participation rose from 2.4 million to 4.7 million participants between January 2002 and January 2003, the latest figures available.

You can find Pilates equipment and videos sold at your drugstore and discount store geared to the at-home exercise crowd. Or look for Pilates instruction at your area Pilates studio. You'll also find classes at YMCAs, health clubs, community centers, hospital-affiliated fitness facilities and yoga studios.

The exercises are low-impact because they don't put force on joints but rather the muscles that support them.

The exercises are far from mindless repetitions of calisthenics. They require concentration. Slight changes in position are critical. So is deep, rhythmic breathing.

Instructor Jodey Johnson says that when she took up Pilates two years ago, it was the first thing she had done that really taught her focus.

Johnson says those learning Pilates need about two months to feel really comfortable with it. The breathing technique alone takes some getting used to. The inhale involves filling the rib cage from side to side. The exhale involves pulling up on the muscles of the abdominal floor while shrinking the waistline in.

There are two forms of Pilates instruction generally available.

There is equipment-based instruction, which involves one-on-one or one-on-two instruction. Clients work out on machines. The equipment uses tensioned springs for resistance to help isolate and develop specific muscle groups. The exerciser uses many muscles, small and large, to maintain proper form.

Other studios focus on Pilates mat classes. This method is a popular and growing segment of Pilates instruction because it is more affordable and can be done with a minimum of small, portable props, such as balls and weighted bars.

Don Vowels, a psychotherapist who took up Pilates 10 months ago, says he wouldn't miss his machine-based workouts. He does mat classes on his own at home to supplement his private sessions with his Pilates instructor.

"Even though I knew the importance of exercise, I never found anything that kept me interested," Vowels says. "This does."

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Yoga or pilates: Deciding which is right for you

Both pilates and yoga can improve strength, flexibility and posture, as well as relieve stress. Both are considered mind-body practices. And both use the breath as a tool to delve into hard-to-reach places.

But while yoga was originally a spiritual, meditative practice based on the Eastern concept of moving energy through the body, pilates has always been about physical conditioning and "functional fitness."

Correctly engaging and working the core muscles of the body - which reach from the lower rib cage to the pelvic floor - is the foundation of pilates.

The main difference between the two is philosophical: Yoga generally adds "spirit" to the mind-body connection.

The best way to figure out which is right for you is to try both, sampling several different teachers.

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Pilates purity watered down by a tidal wave of popularity

The Saturday morning Piloga class began in a way that would please most traditional yogis -- with meditative breathing. But as the cross-legged students exhaled deeply, the experience morphed into pilates.

"Drop your abs towards your spine," instructed Randi Whitman, owner of Chicago's Frog Temple Pilates studio. "Pull your rib cage away from your pelvis."

For the next hour, the Piloga students flowed between the distinct disciplines of pilates and yoga, two of the fastest growing "soft" exercises in the fitness industry.

For Whitman, blending the two mind-body practices has become more than a treasured creative outlet. Yoga and pilates -- a routine of exercises using mats or equipment that strengthens the muscles surrounding and supporting the body's core -- are necessary complements.

But to Chicago's Juanita Lopez, one of the first pilates teachers in the Midwest, the mere concept of "Piloga," which can also be called Yogalates or Yogilates, is a dreadful adaptation of the real thing.

"You can't mix and match," she declared. "One can benefit the other, and they're both classic systems, but if you mix, you don't get the benefit of either one."

More than ever, Americans are trying to get centered through pilates, a body conditioning system developed by Joseph Pilates and his wife, Clara, in the early 20th Century. But the explosive growth of pilates in the last several years -- participation has increased 176 percent between 2000 and 2002 -- and its popularity in health clubs have raised major concerns among pilates purists.

Some fear that the updated, modern adaptations are watering down what Joseph Pilates, a native of Germany, crafted while interned in a London camp during World War I. Meanwhile, as demand has increased, so has the need for new teachers.

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