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Positively Pilates

By Brooke Edge
For The Prague Post
November 21st, 2007 issue

A booming American voice with a hint of Southern twang shouted, “Straighten your arms! Straighten your arms! Straighten your ARMS! Ah, YES!”   

But the voice echoing through the first-floor hall of the stately Prague Conservatory on Nov. 18 wasn’t from one of the ballet masters who typically inhabit the building. Instead, ballet was replaced for the weekend with Pilates exercise, and two energetic, enthusiastic American teachers.
Local Pilates instructor, former dancer and sometime performing arts promoter Renata Sabongui organized the event, the first Pilates conference in the Czech Republic.
About 50 Pilates enthusiasts — most of them other Pilates instructors — forked over 5,000 Kč ($275) each for eight seminars over two days covering topics from teaching basics to beginners to more advanced work with equipment, plus specialized workshops on Pilates benefits for athletes and aging.
Pilates takes its cues from dance training, a method of carefully controlling “core” muscles and other muscles that support the spine to maintain good posture and balance. Through regular practice, the Pilates technique increases strength and flexibility without building muscle mass. It was developed in New York by German immigrant and fitness trainer Joseph Pilates.
“What we are learning about are the inside muscles, not the outside muscles,” shouted California-based master teacher Kathy Corey in her Sunday seminar.
From looking around the room, the result of inside muscle work is hard bodies camouflaged as relatively normal shapes. Corey is middle-aged, obviously very strong, but still more roly-poly than gym rat as far as shape goes.
Pilates took off in the United States in the 1990s and continues to be popular in private studios and gyms, with approximately 14,000 instructors. It caught on in large part because it’s a low-impact, slow-paced workout that’s less hippy-dippy than yoga (particularly classes I have taken where we laid on the floor concentrating on our “glowing golden centers” for an hour), and a major step down from the manic intensity of aerobics.
As with most trends, Pilates has gradually made inroads within Czech exercise circles. It’s now catching on in Prague, with many of the city’s fitness centers featuring classes, according to attendee Marsha Kocáb. A native of North Carolina, Kocáb has lived in Prague for 24 years and is a student of Sabongui.
Sabongui brought Pilates to Prague with her after years of teaching ballet in the United States. From 1998 to about 2003 she started off with a group of “intense” Pilates fans. Now the numbers have grown, with a waiting list for classes at the conservatory and local gyms.
Holding the conference came as a natural step in that growing popularity, to update teachers from across the Czech Republic (and a few from Slovakia) on the latest techniques.
“The point was to show what Pilates really is and how versatile it is,” Sabongui said.
For 16 hours over two days, Corey and her fellow American teacher Cecile LeMoine Bankston led instructional seminars for devotees.
As I looked around and saw the wide range of ages and body types — from more than a few gray hairs and post-baby paunches to compact twentysomethings — Corey explained that Pilates methods work for all ages and fitness levels.
The students (vastly women, with two men thrown in for good measure) took notes, photos and videos during the instructors’ demonstrations, then chatted and helped each other try the moves themselves.
 “You know this is a journey, that you will never stop learning Pilates,” Corey said at the weekend’s closing workshop. “We’ve had a very wonderful journey for two days.”

Brooke Edge can be reached at tempo@praguepost.com


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