Winter Wonders at Home Pilates Exercises

With the release of the new winter version of circuit pilates we wanted to give some easy to do at home (or as part of our winter circuit classes) excercises will build up your strength and stability in key areas to help you carve up the slopes this winter and keep you in one piece should you get it wrong... not that pilates-trained skiers ever fall ;-)

Remember not all exercises are right for your body- if your unsure talk to your instructor they’ll know if they’re right for you!

Ball Rising to Stand

Perfect your posture on the mountain whilst strengthening your quads and hamstrings and lengthening your calves. Learning to keep neutral spine during snow sports will increase your efficiency, help absorb the bumps and reduce chances of back injury.

Start Position: Sit tall on your ball, find a position where you have you shoulders sitting on top of your hips and you have good lower limb alignment. Make sure your heels aren’t touching the ball.

Exercise: Take a breath in, engage your deep core, lean forward as if you are getting up from a chair, hold this position as you breathe in, and breathe out as you smoothly return to sitting. Be sure to keep your finger tips on the ball the whole time.

Things to watch for: Tip from your hips when you lean forward- the aim of this exercise is to maintain neutral spine as you rise. Keep god lower limb alignment, be sure you feet stay parrellel and your knees stay in a line with your second toe.

Glut Maximus Stretch
Your glutes play an important role protecting your hip and back joints. If you have any plans to ski, run, or hold yourself upright this winter, then it’s probably worth looking after them. This exercise is a great way to start.

Start Position: Lying on your back first find alignment through your pelvis, torso and shoulders.

The Stretch: Cross your right leg over you left so the side of your ankle is resting just above your knee and bring your left leg towards you. Link your hands around your left thigh. Relax your breathing. To increase the stretch you can either gently pull your arms closer to your torso, or gently rotate your right leg away from you. This stretch can also be done against a wall if your muscles are tight. Hold for 30-60 seconds. Repeat on opposite side.

Things to watch for: Make sure you don’t hitch your stretching hip up towards your rib cage. Keep your pelvis level or in other words equal distance between your ribs and your hips on both sides of your waste. Keep your neck relaxed.

Bridging on the ball with hamstring curl

The ultimate carve turn stabilizer. Strong hamstrings protect you from knee injuries on the mountain. Bridging on an unstable base develops spine articulation, pelvic alignment and of course deep abdominal activation.

Starting position: Lying on your back with your ankles and calves resting on the mat. Firstly do a body check to see that your legs, torso, shoulders and neck are resting equally on the mat. Set your shoulders so that they are gently drawn together at the back and you have a gentle pressure under your elbows.

The exercise: Breathe in, as you breathe out, engage your deep abdominals, flatten your back and slowly and smoothly lift your spine one vertebrae after another off the mat. Take a breath in, as your breathe out bend your knees to roll the ball closer to your pelvis, breathe in as you slowly straighten your legs to roll the ball away from your pelvis. Breathe out as you lower your spine starting from your shoulders back down onto the mat.

Things to watch for: Keep your neck relaxed. Don’t roll up too far- just enough to have your weight through your shoulders not your neck. Be sure to keep your low back in neutral- don’t over arch it..
Keep the rolling movement through your spine as smooth as possible.

This is an advanced exercise and a little wobble or shimmy is expected - identify your instability and focus on using your lower abdominals and breathing to smooth the movement. Keep your pelvis level- imagine a spirit level resting on your pelvis running from one hip to the other. Keep the spirit level parallel to the ground. Observe if you lift or lower one side before the other and focus on correcting this.