dawnmh22
Cathlete
Found this...........
MYTH: PILATES CAN LENGTHEN YOUR MUSCLES
TRUTH: Only growing will make your muscles longer. They may LOOK longer because the workout you're doing is a different type of movement and you're moving different and standing taller, but the muscles aren't actually growing longer.Pilates doesn't lengthen muscles--it tones and stretches them, which doesn't mean the muscles get longer. Pilates does an excellent job of improving core strength and postural awareness,which can make you look longer and leaner. If you stand taller and extend your arms farther, you will have the appearance of longer muscles.
Q My Pilates teacher says traditional weight lifting makes your muscles shorter and tighter, whereas Pilates builds strength while lengthening muscle. I am 31 and take Pilates mat classes twice a week.Do I need to add weight training?
A Your instructor is mistaken. "Pilates doesn't lengthen muscles--it conditions and trains them," says Dawn-Marie Ickes, co-owner of Core Conditioning, two Pilates and physical therapy facilities in the Los Angeles area, and a board member of the Pilates Method Alliance, a Miami-based nonprofit organization dedicated to maintaining standards among Pilates instructors. Pilates does an excellent job of improving core strength and postural awareness, which can make you look longer and leaner. "If you stand taller and extend your arms farther, you will have the appearance of longer muscles," Ickes says. Pilates may have gotten its long-and-lean reputation because so many lithe, leggy dancers gravitate toward it.
It is also a myth that strength training makes muscles shorter and tighter. If you perform your weight-training exercises through the full range of motion, you actually can gain flexibility, although not nearly as much as you can from a Pilates program, which focuses on increasing range of motion.
More significantly, weight training helps maintain bone density--an important benefit that you won't get from Pilates, says Katie Santos,co-owner of ABsolute Center, a Pilates and yoga studio in Lafayette,Calif. Bone density naturally begins to decline in your mid-30s, Santos says, "and the best defense against osteoporosis is resistance training." Weight training is also important for maintaining your muscle mass and helping to discourage fat accumulation.
You can complete a total-body weight-training routine in just 15-20 minutes twice a week, which should still leave you time for your Pilates classes.
MYTH: PILATES CAN LENGTHEN YOUR MUSCLES
TRUTH: Only growing will make your muscles longer. They may LOOK longer because the workout you're doing is a different type of movement and you're moving different and standing taller, but the muscles aren't actually growing longer.Pilates doesn't lengthen muscles--it tones and stretches them, which doesn't mean the muscles get longer. Pilates does an excellent job of improving core strength and postural awareness,which can make you look longer and leaner. If you stand taller and extend your arms farther, you will have the appearance of longer muscles.
Q My Pilates teacher says traditional weight lifting makes your muscles shorter and tighter, whereas Pilates builds strength while lengthening muscle. I am 31 and take Pilates mat classes twice a week.Do I need to add weight training?
A Your instructor is mistaken. "Pilates doesn't lengthen muscles--it conditions and trains them," says Dawn-Marie Ickes, co-owner of Core Conditioning, two Pilates and physical therapy facilities in the Los Angeles area, and a board member of the Pilates Method Alliance, a Miami-based nonprofit organization dedicated to maintaining standards among Pilates instructors. Pilates does an excellent job of improving core strength and postural awareness, which can make you look longer and leaner. "If you stand taller and extend your arms farther, you will have the appearance of longer muscles," Ickes says. Pilates may have gotten its long-and-lean reputation because so many lithe, leggy dancers gravitate toward it.
It is also a myth that strength training makes muscles shorter and tighter. If you perform your weight-training exercises through the full range of motion, you actually can gain flexibility, although not nearly as much as you can from a Pilates program, which focuses on increasing range of motion.
More significantly, weight training helps maintain bone density--an important benefit that you won't get from Pilates, says Katie Santos,co-owner of ABsolute Center, a Pilates and yoga studio in Lafayette,Calif. Bone density naturally begins to decline in your mid-30s, Santos says, "and the best defense against osteoporosis is resistance training." Weight training is also important for maintaining your muscle mass and helping to discourage fat accumulation.
You can complete a total-body weight-training routine in just 15-20 minutes twice a week, which should still leave you time for your Pilates classes.