Aerial Pilates: Everything you need to know
What is Aerial Pilates?
Aerial Pilates has many common characteristics with Aerial Yoga. With the help of our special fabric for Aerial Yoga (100% NYLON 40 DENIER TRICOT), someone can conduct various exercises inspired by Pilates method, while floating in the air. The greatest challenge of this specific method is the even control and coordination of our movement. The most important requirement, in order to balance on the hammock, is concentration. That means that someone should completely focus on the lesson while their mind eliminates any unnecessary thoughts. In this kind of practice, our worst enemy is fear and our greatest ally is consciousness and awareness.
Which are the benefits of Aerial Pilates?
One of the main advantages is the fact that someone is hovered over the floor, as well as the fact that most exercises are reversed: our head tilts towards the floor while our feet look up the ceiling. This position has many benefits, such as:
● Full extent stretching and decompressing of the vertebra.
● Body alignment and better posture.
● Significant relief from musculoskeletal pain.
● Muscle strengthening, mainly of the abdomen area, since all positions on the Hammock stimulate our core.
● All reversed positions (when the head tilts towards the floor) transfer oxygen to our brain, nourish our cells, rest our heart and promote the proper function of the lymph nodes, as well as blood cleansing.
Is this workout suitable for me?
Everyone can join an Aerial Pilates class, since there are beginner level classes in most studios and gyms. Moreover, it is a therapeutic workout method.
A few words from the Expert…
Pilates is a holistic method, which in its incomparable and unique way stimulates both our body and mind creating a sense of harmony from the very beginning. Within a short period of practising Pilates, our body acquires a whole new sense. Our joints become more flexible, any back and pelvic pain is significantly reduced, our core muscles are strengthened, and as a result, our posture is improved.
As Joseph Pilates (founder of the method) used to say:
“In 10 sessions you’ll feel the difference, in 20 sessions you’ll see the difference, and in 30 sessions you’ll have a whole new body”
Aerial Pilates method is an innovative practice that combines free swinging with the traditional exercises from Pilates method, Body Conditioning and acrobatic exercises of Aerial Arts. It stimulates and challenges our core (Powerhouse), offers muscle strengthening, aligns our spinal bones and decompresses our joints. This is achieved with the help of the Aerial Yoga fabric (hammock) which is both soft and durable, and is usually hanged from the ceiling, from a small height above the floor.
Thanks to the variety of exercises, Aerial Pilates practice can be adjusted to both beginners and advanced practitioners, even to athletes. As a result, an Aerial Pilates lesson can vary from mild, calm and therapeutic to very demanding, even to those in perfect physical condition.
Aerial Pilates offers all the benefits of traditional Pilates workout in a unique combination, with the advantages of Aerial Arts:
● A strong and in perfect condition body
● Longer muscles
● Perfect balance between strength and flexibility
● Muscle strengthening
● Better posture
● Better breathing
● Good blood circulation
● Increased bone density
● Body and mind alignment
● Joint motility
● Muscle splicing
● Better daily life
● Deep muscle stretching
As far as mental health benefits are concerned, apart from the ones that classic Pilates offers, the greatest reward is liveliness thanks to the reversed positions which regulate our endocrine system. Of course, someone overcomes his/her fears and becomes more confident by practising Aerial Pilates.