Pilates isn’t new—actually, it’s almost 100 years previous!—however recently, increasingly more of us are turning to this type of low-impact train. Living proof: Pilates nabbed the title as the hottest exercise of 2023, in line with ClassPass’s annual report, beating different fan-favorites together with yoga, biking, and barre.

For those who’re excited about giving it a shot, you may be questioning: What type of exercise is it, precisely? Is all of it about flexibility and steadiness, or does Pilates “depend” as energy coaching, too? (In any case, in the event you’ve ever seen the core-centric “100” transfer, as an illustration, it definitely looks like it does a quantity in your abs.) We touched base with some Pilates specialists to assist us break down which bins it ticks—and how one can match it into your train routine.

So is Pilates thought-about a energy exercise?

Initially developed as a rehab instrument for World Conflict I troopers, Pilates locations a strict emphasis on mobility, stability, correct kind, physique alignment, and mind-muscle connection. This makes it an important exercise “for anybody who desires to enhance their on a regular basis purposeful motion habits or their sport,” Lynda Gehrman, proprietor and director of BASI Pilates Academy in New York Metropolis and a Pilates trainer coach, tells SELF. You are able to do this by way of specialised resistance machines, just like the Reformer, or on a mat utilizing simply your individual body weight (and possibly a prop or two, like gentle weights, rings, or train balls).

For those who energy prepare, you’re in all probability already acquainted with some widespread Pilates strikes, which embody planks, squats, lunges, glute bridges, arm circles, leg circles, and crunch variations. So it holds to purpose that Pilates is a type of energy coaching…proper?

Sure, however with an asterisk. Whereas analysis has discovered Pilates to be efficient for constructing each energy and muscle—two outcomes we typically consider with energy coaching—it’s in all probability useful to dig a bit deeper.

For one, within the broadest phrases, energy coaching will be outlined as something that merely makes your physique stronger—mainly, something that enables your muscle tissue to finish duties at hand just a bit bit simpler, Pilates teacher Laurence Agénor, DPT, co-founder and scientific director at The Wellness Den by Cynergy Bodily Remedy, tells SELF. That is the place Pilates, in addition to different actions like yoga, barre, and basic weight lifting, all qualify, Dr. Agénor explains.

Pilates locations a selected emphasis on eccentric muscle contractions (when they’re lengthened beneath load, like decreasing right into a squat) to construct energy, Gerhman says—assume: strikes like leg circles and the elephant, which hit your hamstrings whereas they’re stretched. However as a result of Pilates workouts additionally require a variety of stability, both your core or your limbs are just about additionally working isometrically (when the muscle holds nonetheless beneath load, like hanging out within the backside of a squat) once you’re performing any motion. Lastly, Pilates additionally makes use of concentric contractions (when your muscle shortens beneath load, like once you get up from a squat), so it encompasses the entire three main contractions crucial to assist your muscle tissue get stronger.