Does advancing your workout always mean using more equipment or heavier weights?
The truth is, there are simple ways to challenge yourself as you move from Starter to Seasoned, using nothing more than your own body vs gravity!
Want to feel what we mean in your body? Check out Alicia’s Power Pilates series FREE on the Aleenta Health Club YouTube, and discover how easy it is to take your workout to the next level.
No equipment required advanced Mat Pilates
Simple doesn't mean easy! Here are some ways to get that sweet burn to take your strength and endurance to the next level anywhere, anytime without fancy equipment.
1. Increase your exercise repetitions and duration
This is a great way even for beginners to start advancing in not just Pilates, but any workout! The more repetitions you do on an exercise, the longer those muscles have to work, which is the simplest way to start increasing your endurance.
Increasing your workout from, for example, 45 minutes to 60 minutes will help you build stamina and endurance. It will – and should! – feel difficult at first, but with consistent practice you will notice gains in no time!
2. Hold traditional exercises and add movement
Once you’ve mastered the foundational exercises of Pilates, level-up your workout by pausing in a shape to hold it, rather than moving dynamically in and out of the exercise. Your muscles are under tension for longer, causing them to fatigue faster.
A great example in Alicia’s Advanced Power Pilates series is the c-curve hold. She starts with a simple lower/and lift as you would in a Starter Pilates class, then adds a challenge by holding in your c-curve and adding movement of the arms as well as spinal/oblique twists. You could take this one step further by holding hand weights if you want!
Long holds are more suited to a Seasoned workout because it is important that you can maintain your form as you fatigue. Starters tend to compensate for the extra burn by sacrificing alignment or recruiting other muscles to rescue the is supposed to target, which can lead to injury – but when you feel ready to try it, there are always modifications to help you build strength along the way.
3. Try an exercise unilaterally
It may look like a scary word, but all unilateral means is that you are working one side of your body at a time, for example, single-leg bridges or standing balances.
Unilateral exercises are more challenging because your weight is transferred to one side, increasing the amount of resistance for the target muscles. So, if you’ve mastered a simple Pilates bridge, try taking it to the next level by working with one leg hovering at tabletop in the air.
4. Decrease surface area
Flowing on from #3, decreasing the surface area supporting your body in an exercise is a simple but fiery way to advance an exercise. Examples of this include balancing on the balls of your feet instead of flat soles during standing leg work, or hovering your knees and one arm (alternating sides) off the ground in quadruped, leaving only the surface area of one hand and your supporting toes to hold you.
Talk about a challenge!
5. Combine exercises
In a Starter class, it is unlikely you'll see multiple exercises flowing together due to the complexity of movement. When you’re new to Pilates, it is important you first understand each exercise on its own. But once you’ve mastered the basics, you will likely find more advanced Pilates classes fuse multiple movements together for a longer, more challenging flow.
In the video, Alicia’s Rollover to Tipping Teaser combo, which combines the backward movement of a Rollover with the forward momentum of the Teaser. Rather than simply working into one or two sections of the abdominals, this combination works the upper abs, lower abs and transverse abdominals, in addition to requiring shoulder, glute and inner-thigh activation for stability.
This is TOUGH, especially because the exercise requires you to go slow so you don’t cheat by using your momentum, making for the perfect, advanced ab workout!
Do you love following along with Alicia? You can check out more classes in her Power Pilates series on our Youtube channel.
Want more workout hacks? Check out these 5 technique tips for Barre beginners.
