The Ways Pilates Strengthens Your Core

It’s well-known that Pilates strengthens your core. A strong core is essential in everything you do because it stabilizes your whole body from your head to your toes. When you have a strong, stable core you stand taller, are less prone to injuries, and even breathe better (seriously!). Every single exercise in Pilates strengthens and engages your core, though in different ways. 

The Hundred

A Pilates workout most often starts off with the exercise called the Hundred. This involves curling up the upper part of your body, to about the tips of your shoulder blades, while also lifting your straight legs up off the mat (or reformer) to a level that you can maintain for the exercise. Your arms lengthen alongside your body and lift off the mat about 6”. While maintaining this position, you pump your arms up and down, breathing out for 5 and in for 5, repeating this up to 10 times. 

This exercise really warms you up from the inside, and it’s common to feel like your abs are on fire! The Pilates world describes this warming as an “internal shower”.  

The spine shape that you create in the Hundred is called a “C curve”. You are trying to find a uniform curl of the spine from the top of the head to the tailbone. This spine shape shows up over and over again in the Pilates method. You’ll most feel your “6-pack” abs when you’re in spinal flexion like the C curve, but Pilates also works your abs in exercises that include a tall spine, extended spine, and side bend. 

Series of Five

There is a group of exercises called the stomach series or the series of five. It has you back into the same body position as the Hundred. The five exercises are single leg stretch, double leg stretch, single straight leg stretch, double straight leg stretch, and criss-cross. It’s definitely fun to work through the full series of five without any breaks and really feel the burn.  

While the exercises are all very similar, they each challenge your core in a slightly different way. The differences in the arm and leg movements can put you off balance, requiring you to use your core to stabilize. Your coordination is also challenged, engaging both your body and your mind. This is how Pilates strengthens your core in many exercises! Small changes challenge your body in different ways. 

An interesting fact about the series of five is that it was originally only two exercises, the single and double leg stretches. It was Romana, one of Joseph Pilates’ only certified Pilates teachers, who added three more exercises to the series.

Tall Spine Exercises

Some exercises in Pilates involve maintaining a tall spine. This could be while standing, kneeling, sitting, or in a plank position. A correct tall posture means being aware of your posture and not being hunched over, ribs popped out, or your chin too high or low. When you find this posture, your core automatically turns on. I love this feeling of the corset of muscles working to pull my body up. I find I get the same feeling when doing rotational exercises in Pilates. It naturally lifts your body up, engaging the core without having to “crunch” any muscles. 

Spinal Extension Exercises

In contrast to flexion exercises like those that put you into a C spine, there are spinal extension exercises, like a backbend. You might not think that bending backwards works your core, but the truth is that your core is made up of much more than just your abs. To the same point, your abdominal muscles aren’t just found at the front of your body. Some abdominal muscles wrap around the sides of your body, and your core also includes your glutes and back muscles. Extension exercises really work this back line of your body.

Pilates Strengthens Your Core The Whole Time

The exercises above aren’t an extensive list of ones that will work your core during your Pilates practice. There are lots of other exercises, variations of these exercises, and variations on the different apparatuses. Quite literally, Pilates strengthens your core no matter what exercise you’re doing! 

Pilates also helps to build your full body strength and improve your mobility, balance, flexibility, and awareness of how you move and breathe. All of these bits and pieces will take time to come together as one. But over time, you’ll see improvements like all those I described.