Chicken or Egg, Part 2: Strength or Flexibility?
If your spine is inflexibly stiff at 30, you are old. If it is completely flexible at 60, you are young. ~ Joseph Pilates
Last month, I had a deep dive on the chicken/egg analogy of Stability or Mobility – which do you focus on first? There’s another chicken/egg analogy to discuss, and that’s Strength or Flexibility. Which do you focus on first?
Going back to my definition of Pilates that I shared last month:
It is a mind-body connection that engages a full body workout. It’s stability and mobility. It’s strength and stretch/flexibility with control. It strengthens what’s weak, stretches what’s tight, tightens what’s loose (hypermobility), loosens what’s rigid (hypomobility), and balances what’s strong.
Although all Pilates exercises are focused on both stability and mobility aspects, the same applies to focusing on both strength and flexibility aspects as well. I think you need both to have a safe, balanced, and effective practice which translates into having a balanced and efficient body. However, if you think of strength as building stability, and flexibility building mobility and adaptability, then based on what I wrote in last month’s blog should tell you that I think Strength has a slight lead over Flexibility.
Here’s why. A body needs a strong foundation to move from your center so that it moves well. It moves properly. It moves safely. Every body has movement patterning and imbalances that left untreated may eventually lead to aches and pains, or worse, injuries. It’s the weakest link(s) that under duress or stress will break because of the lack of “glue”.
Here are some quotes that are simple and to the point without a lot of flourish.
From Jay Grimes:
“Weak – strong – weak” – This quote applies to unilateral exercises. By working the weaker side twice, you give it a chance to try to catch up to the stronger side. This helps strengthen your center.
From Romana Kryzanowska quoting Joseph Pilates:
“What you don’t like you do twice.” – This quote applies to any Pilates exercise. The exercise you dislike is the one your body really needs. The ones you love are because you’re already good at them. Now guess what your homework is?
For most people and most situations, usually what’s tight in a body tends to be what’s weak. Because of the tight feeling in the body, usually our first thought is to stretch it, or get a massage. This is great for the body to return to its usual state. However, to change the tightness and/or weakness long-term is to change it via strength to go after the root of the problem. Increased strength leads to increased flexibility. I should pause here for a second, and clarify that the stretch you get in Pilates is not passive like a massage. It’s dynamic. You are working/strengthening your center and some extremities to get the stretch for yourself, to increase your ROM (range of motion).
What’s awesome about Pilates is the use of springs to help build strength and flexibility because you’re working the muscles in both directions – in a lengthened state (eccentric), and in a contracted state (concentric). In a lengthened state (eccentric), we’re stretching the muscle to its natural limit. In a contracted state (concentric), we’re shortening/strengthening the muscle to its natural limit.
Another way of thinking about the springs is to think of opening or closing the springs as the strength portion of each exercise, and the end ranges (fully open springs or fully closed springs) as the stretched portion (flexibility) of each exercise. Especially with long-neck springs that I have in my studio – fully closing the springs is NOT EASY. This is where you can assess someone’s strength and flexibility, what muscles are working or not working, because it’s reflected in the sounds the springs make.
Pilates is a full body workout as it forces you to work strength in the body, so something opens up/gets stretched/becomes more flexible in the body. Let’s review this through the lens of the 5 spine shapes we make in Pilates: flexion, extension, tall, side bend, and twist.
- Flexion (the longest round shape) – we’re strengthening through our abdominals, thutts, squgs, to stretch the length of the spine
- Extension (the longest arch shape) – we’re strengthening through the entire back side of our body and our abdominals to stretch the front of the torso, across the chest and shoulders
- Tall (the longest spine shape) – we’re strengthening through the abdominals and lower half of the body to stretch the spine from the tailbone through the crown of the head
- Side Bend (both sides are long as they bend) – as we side bend to the right, we’re strengthening the right side to stretch the left side, and vice versa
- Twist (rotation) – we’re strengthening the obliques and finding flexibility through our spinal rotation as we twist the torso, and aim to keep the hips and legs stable
Notice for each of the spine shapes listed above, the focus is on strengthening something before we move to find flexibility. With this focus, we build safety first for the exercise and for the body before it moves.
What’s important to know is that moving consistently is what’s most important. Be sure to get some strength training, some stretching, and some balance work in your workouts to remain mobile. Guess what – BONUS – Pilates has all 3 covered! An effective and efficient workout!