Now that the Pilates system of training has undergone a huge rebirth in the 
USA and started to attain the status of culthood, its latter day 
practitioners are now reviving some of the myths of strength training. Here 
are a few that are now doing the rounds, taken directly from the advertising 
blurb that is promoting Pilates in the media:

Myth 1.  Weight training tends to shorten the muscles, but Pilates lengthens 
them.  All that lifting bunches up the muscles and makes one tight and stiff.

Fact:  All muscles contract and shorten when they are activated. All muscle 
lengthen when they relax.  If muscles appear to lengthen and flatten with 
training, then this would imply that one is losing muscle bulk, which is not 
a highly desirable state for anyone. This Pilates belief is total nonsense 
and betrays a sorry knowledge of muscle physiology. It would also seem to 
suggest that the more Pilates work you do, the longer your muscles become.  
That, of course, would mean that your muscles would develop slack and you even
tually would not be able to move your joints!

2.   Pilates offers much more variety than weight training.  It now has over 
2000 exercises.

Fact: The field of weight training, which includes free barbell and dumbbell 
weights and machines, offers at least ten times that number of exercises and 
exercise variations.  Pilates does not even come close.  

Pilates practitioners, of course, should note that the well-known Pilates 
machine, the Reformer (a type of lying sled device), the Cadillac, the Spine 
Corrector and various other machines were developed by Joseph Pilates from a 
host of earlier weird and wonderful machines that were on the fitness market 
of Europe and Russia during the late 19th and early 20th century.  If one 
examines some early patents from Germany, for example, even some weight 
training devices like some made by Nautilus were derived from these earlier 
innovations.  

One might even state that "Pilates training" constitutes just another man's 
own range of strength training routines and machines, someone like Arthur 
Jones, Bob Hoffman, Eugene Sandow, Professor Attila or Joe Weider.  Those who 
are "doing Pilates" thus are simply doing another type of strength training 
program and they don't even recognise that fact.  If any of their instructors 
think that old Joe Pilates had a totally unique approach or philosophy, then 
they would do well to learn that several of the strengthening trend setters 
of the past 100 years all had some fascinating philosophies and methodologies 
that are not dramatically different from that of Pilates.  Reading through a 
book such as Webster's "The Iron Game" or talking to Dr Terry Todd and his 
wife will fill in some of the gaps in their education if anyone is unaware of 
that fact.

Myth 3.  Pilates realigns the body, corrects muscle imbalances and helps to 
heal injured backs.  Weight training usually causes imbalances and 
overstresses the back.

Fact:  Suitably individualised Pilates and progressive weight training 
programs both can be used to "correct imbalances" and improve postural 
alignment, which actually have a lot more to do with motor education than 
what means is used to achieve those ends.  Conversely, poorly taught Pilates 
and weight training both can be injurious.   There are very few other methods 
that can develop such spinal strength, power and stability than a 
well-designed heavy weight training program.

The bottom line?  Why don't modern Pilates teachers and enthusiasts simply 
state that they really prefer Pilates training to any other methods at the 
moment and that other forms of training may well be more enjoyable and 
productive for others?    There is no scientific or clinical evidence that 
Pilates is any better or worse than any other form of training for the 
average population, so let it be marketed as such. 

Of course, anyone who is a student of international sport knows that Pilates 
training done as the sole form of conditioning has produced very few or none 
of the world champions in sport, nor has it been shown to offer superior 
musculoskeletal healing to any other form of therapy.  That does not make it 
any the less enjoyable or effective for those who feel justified in spending 
thousands of dollars a year to learn it.  Those people simply enjoy it 
because they have found that it suits them, nothing more, nothing less.  

Fortunately, when I was being taught Pilates methods more than 15 years ago 
by some Pilates teachers in return for my teaching them modified forms of PNF 
training which Pilates did not specifically address, we discovered that we 
all had something to teach and learn from one another's training -- though we 
agreed that Pilates methods of pelvic stabilisation were not intended for 
lifting heavy loads in weightlifting and powerlifting.  Once again, a case of 
live and let live!  Pilates teachers and weight trainers were getting along 
just fine until the commercial marketeers came along to distort the facts 
with their comparative advertising.

Dr Mel C Siff
Denver, USA
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