“What about ankles? My friend has old ankle injuries and has had little luck fixing them via surgery. I know alignment and muscle use can make a huge difference. Would it help him? Where should he start? “

Yes alignment and muscle balance can make a difference. Sometimes when there is an injury, you need to look above or below the problem. For instance, knocked-knees (valgus) usually puts the weight on the inside of the ankle. The ankle, knee and hips have to organize around this disfunction.

I have a Pilates client who has a pin in her ankle from a terrible fall. Because of the pin, she no longer has much range of motion in the ankle. I still train her feet, legs and work on alignment. Her gaining strength has made a big difference in her posture. When the foundation is weak, the entire body compensates.

A lot of bunion surgery is unsuccessful. What was not addressed is the movement patterns that caused the bunions. I highly recommend training like Pilates, yoga especially the standing poses to help build strength in the legs and torso to help with standing and walking. A good teacher can work with the limitations of an injury and help a client gain the necessary support for better function. Of course, certain injuries, such as my client with the ankle pin, will never return back to normal function. By improving overall tone, alignment and flexibility, my client has made incredible changes in function.

Some great reading about foot strengthening are:

The Wharton Stretch Book by Jim & Phil Wharton
See the section on the foot

“One of the dirty secrets of the fitness world is that for all the talk about the importance of stretching, many athletes and other fit people don’t bother with it. It’s hard to gauge the benefits, and it seems as if the time could be better spent running, lifting weights, or perfecting sports skills. This sentiment is expressed by Dr. Bob Arnot in the foreword to “The Whartons’ Stretch Book,” and he says that the Whartons changed his mind. He went to them with a stiffened hip that he thought needed surgery, but after a regimen using the active-isolated stretching technique, his flexibility in that hip had increased 40 percent.

Active-isolated stretching is very different from what your high-school gym teacher made you do. Rather than holding a stretch for a half-minute, you hold it for just two seconds. This prevents the muscle from activating an instinctual braking device to keep itself from overstretching. Traditional stretching forces that braking to occur, and the Whartons think that’s not only counterproductive, but dangerous. If you force too deep a stretch while the muscle is doing all it can to keep itself from being stretched, something’s got to give. And a torn muscle will repair itself with scar tissue, ultimately making that muscle less flexible.”

Conditioning for Dance by Eric Franklin

This book has a great section on the foot. Even though it is written for dancers, there is great information how the foot works and how to train it.

by Lesley Powell, Director of Movements Afoot

This is a series that I learned when I was doing the Franklin Method training. Eric Franklin’s Books

Rolling on the balls is like giving yourself a massage. Tight muscles are poorly functioning muscles. Tight muscles hold the bones in positions that are not always the design of how the body works. Getting bones to move in their normal range is another way to release tight muscles.

Foot Release

Pelvic floor Exercises

Psoas Release

Pelvic Tilts

by Lesley Powell, Director of Movements Afoot

They’re back… two December workshops with two great teachers.

John Chanik & Lisa Love return to teach at Movements Afoot this December.

Lisa Love returns with a workshop about assessment. Learning how to assess is about the art of seeing. Lisa Love, Ed.M., R.M.T., has an Advanced Master of Education in Motor Learning from the Department of Movement Sciences & Education, Teachers College, Columbia University with additional graduate studies in biomechanics and clinical
kinesiology at NYU. She has taught movement reeducation for over 20 years, and maintains a private practice in Pilates in NYC. She has been researching and working with MS clients for 15 years.

John taught this wonderful workshop 2 years ago about the spine. John brings his expertise as a trainer and a personal injury to his back lifting a dancer in his dance career. The Spine workshop this 12/18 is about understanding the function of the spine and the newest research about stabilization. 2 years ago we had a variety of students from those with back problems and teachers. I still use the material in all of my sessions with my clients.

by Lesley Powell, Director of Movements Afoot

When teaching clients with hip replacements, it is important to find out what kind of hip replacement did they have. At the moment, there are 2 different type of surgeries: the incisions are in front of the hip or in the back. Because of the incisions, this leaves the hip vulnerable to displacement due to weakness and the incision. I highly recommend that you and the client talk with their Doctor about their surgery and contraindications for training. With new advances in hip replacement, things are changing.

For instance, surgery from the back, movements of deep hip flexion is contraindicated. That means not to push hamstring flexibility by trying to bring the leg close to the body. Training the posterior hip is very important. Building strength of all the muscles of the hip and legs is important. In Pilates, diminished range of leg circles are great. Full short spine is not recommended. (Some of range of motion depends on their fitness before the surgery. Dancers have a unique range of motion.)

The most important thing to remember with hip replacements is not to push extreme range in the hip. Building dynamic strength is essential. Some clients, who tried to avoid surgery, developed compensation habits around the painful hip. Part of your teaching might be teaching your clients better function of using their legs.

by Lesley Powell, Director of Movements Afoot

One of my top teachers, Doris Pasteleur Hall, had gone through many surgeries for her breast cancer. Doris is very articulate about how her body changed and the process of getting back to shape. I had a woman client with similar surgeries, to the breast and abdominals. She kept getting injured with back, hip and foot pain. I learned a lot from Doris’ experience in how to train clients with similar issues.

Scar tissue and the affects of the drugs, chemo and radiation has affects on the body’s movement. I went back to basics, retraining of the pelvic floor, multifidus and abdominals. I also worked on a gentle range of motion, but I didn’t push range. Remember, when a muscles thinks that it is going to be overstretch, it will contract to protect itself. Scar tissues brings a different quality of tone/flexibility.

Also Doris and those women, who work with a massage therapist specializing in scar tissue, made more progress in fitness and relief from discomfort.

by Judith Zimmer, Senior Pilates Teacher at Movements Afoot

Without being dramatic, I can honestly say that Pilates has changed my life, both literally and figuratively. Nine years ago I had a very serious accident. As a result, I incurred three injuries to my cervical spine, four injuries to my lumbar spin, carpal tunnel, cubical tunnel and fibromyalgia. I received, acupuncture, physical therapy and chiropractic care for seven years to manage the pain. I felt my condition was hopeless, until my doctor found a therapy center that offered pilates sessions twice a week.

After six months, I had gained flexibility, strength and endurance. In fact, there was such a marked improvement in my physical condition through out that year, that it was clear, Pilates was going to be a life practice for me. I gained a fuller range of motion and learned how my body had compensated for my injury. Then as my stability and strength grew, I learned how to correct my balance and work on improving my alignment. With the new knowledge of my body mechanics and the consistency of my practice, I regained movement that I thought I’d lost forever. My doctor was so impressed with my results that he began prescribing pilates to all his injured patients. He also began practicing pilates as part of his health maintainence routine.

My injury humbled me and pilates has helped me to heal. It has given me a greater sense of control and respect for my body. My practice has developed and with it came a greater understanding of the necessity of self knowledge and individual responsibility for good health practices.

After three years of practice I became certified as a teacher. Having been a teacher all my life, I love learning. Therefore, it was a natural next step to bring my passion and profession to a new level. My intention was to learn even more and I have. I have learned to care for and respect this unique body that each of us is given for this lifetime. I continue to learn and love sharing that knowledge.

Lesley Powell, CMA, Director of
Movements Afoot

My teaching Bartenieff Fundamentals™(BF) led me to Pilates. I was teaching classes and private sessions based on BF and conditioning to injured clients at Dr. Backrach’s Center for Osteopathic Medicine in 1987. Teaching Bartenieff Fundamentals™ to an injured population taught me the power of this work. My colleagues in my certificate Laban/ Bartenieff program were such great movers that I did not understand the importance of BF. Working with clients led me deeper into the concepts of BF and their potential in assisting neurological repatterning.

Because of my success with working with clients, I was invited and paid to learn how to teach Pilates at JRW Physical Therapy in 1990. The physical therapists at that time were having difficulties with traditional Pilates teachers working with an injured population.

A majority of the cases of the clientele of the physical therapy practice were suffering from repetitive stress disorder. Most were journalists who spent long hours in front of the computer. Because their arms/hands were in trauma, a lot of the Pilates exercises were contraindicated. Bearing weight on their hands especially on the footbar was painful.

Within my Pilates sessions, I would work with the clients on the fundamentals of the hand-scapula relationship. First goal was to get ease of motion of the scapula and then slowly adding resistance. The beauty of the Pilates machines is the feedback proprioceptively that they can give the client. I would keep the load light with springs until the client could work pain free.

Video of pre-thigh and thigh lift

I am going to take the thigh lift and how it can change the Pilates workout. The thigh lift is an important action of all movement: gait and dance/sports activities. It is the dancer’s passé, the initiation of the kick in sports, yoga, fitness and most importantly our walking. The ability to move our legs and move us through space is essential for everyday activities. The freedom of the thighbone in the hip socket with the strength of the leg and torso muscles take us into standing, walking and more complex movement actions. A lot of problems of back, hip and knee pain can be a cause of poor patterning how the thighbone moves in the hip socket, pelvic stability and lifted to propel us in space.

A poor thigh lift disconnects to the deep use of the abdominals and the psoas will be lost. Other muscles will have to take over for the lack of this connection. In the Pilates repertory, the thigh lift fundamental will teach the differential of the thighbone from the pelvis.

Teaching the principles of the pre and thigh lift is a wonderful link to the single leg stretch of the Pilates mat. The thigh lift is an important principle to understand for all abdominal training and the Pilates mat. One must stabilize the pelvis to connect to the correct mobility of the femur. The psoas alone will flex the hip. Without the counterbalance of the abdominals, the pelvis is pulled to an anterior tilt and/or unleveling. A short psoas will also bring the pelvis in an anterior tilt. A tucked pelvis will make the psoas lax. Stabilization is about finding quietness in the spine with length as you mobilize the legs.

Let’s now look at footwork and the relationship to the thigh lift on the reformer. In Footwork, one lies supine on the carriage with the feet pressing on the foot bar. The carriage glides in and out with flexion and extension of the legs. Footwork taught well is a wonderful link to gait. In traditional Pilates, the tucked pelvis can kick out the hip extensors when the legs are extended.

With teaching of the thigh lift fundamental with footwork, the client gets a better connection to the legs. The femoral fold is soft while the correct sequencing of the quadriceps and hamstrings come into play to move the carriage with the legs. If there is a contraction around this fold, one could be overusing other muscles such as rectus femoris, some certain fibers of the adductors and even the back muscles. When the back becomes involved, this gives the appearance of the hips hiking, anterior/posterior tilt (depends on the client) and/or rotating.

Leg springs or modified short spine takes the pre- and thigh lift to a fuller range of motion. The springs or straps give a wonderful spatial intent in counter balance to the hollowing and the spine lengthening in the opposite direction. With pelvic stability and this counter tension, the legs mobilize with a different connection in the hip sockets.

New research is coming out now of the importance of the pelvic floor, transverse abdominus and multifidus. Irmgard Bartenieff was revolutionary. In the section about the fundamentals in her book, Coping with The Environment, she was already addressing these concepts. This book was published in 1972. It is possible to have ease of motion and dynamic strength in the Pilates repertory.

BF and Pilates is about connections. BF can enrich Pilates not only in biomechanical principles but taking the repertory in new spatial demands.

Lesley Powell, direcor of Movements Afoot

I AM WALKING YESSIREE…ABOUT YOU AND ME.

Your walk is a reflection of how well or poorly your fitness is. A great gait has gentle movement of your entire body in a balance and coordinated fashion. If one body part is tight/rigid, it will affect the entire body. Tightness is many times a reflection of weakness.

Dr. Eric Cobb, Director of Zhealth, www.zhealth.net, spoke that the transfer of weight on the step forward equals 500 lbs on a healthy walk. When the body is not moving correctly, the forces increase and exacerbate with speed.

A healthy gait is a reflection of trunk (core) control, coordination of your spine with your extremities especially your knee and ankle and good expenditure of energy so that you are not fatigued after just a half-mile walk. Faulty movement patterns in walking can lead to fatigue and injury. Improve your gait will enhance your balance, strength and injury prevention.

As a teacher, I observe my client’s gait to get an idea of how they move their bodies. Especially with injuries, my client’s walking can tell me a lot how they use their bodies. When a client has a knee injury, there are faculty patterns of movement in their walk. Their walking pattern can be making the knee injury worse. By teaching better movement patterns, the client can find better function, strength and mobility.

In June, I will be teaching a course on Gait for teachers 6/22-23. Laura Gates will be teaching Hanna workshops for all with the themes of improving your gait. Go to www.movementsafoot.com for more information.

Lesley Powell