The blend of barre, mat Pilates, and reformer classes is unlike any class you’ve tried before.
When you have a busy schedule with little space for workout classes, every 45-hour slot in your week is precious. Even choosing between the micromovements of a barre class or the slow but deadly flow of reformer Pilates can be tough. Enter: Pilates at the Barre, a new addition to Equinox’s group fitness classes that’s a marriage of the two.
The class is an evolution of Equinox’s Trilogy Barre class, but with a deeper integration of Pilates principles. “It's as if a Pilates mat class and a Pilates reformer class had a baby,” as Karla Beltchenko, Group Fitness Instructor at Equinox, describes it. “I would say about 20 percent of the class includes barre elements. So it's really this amazing blend of different perspectives.” You can expect to reap benefits of all three modalities, including muscular strength and endurance, postural alignment, and a mind-body connection to your core muscles, she says.
Every Pilates at the Barre class will begin with ground work that incorporates classic and contemporary mat Pilates exercises to warm up your body, improve your spinal mobility, and allow you to tune into your core muscles.
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Post warm-up, the class moves to the triple barre, an apparatus that’s unique to Equinox and is similar to a standard ballet barre but has a third additional tier. “You can essentially clip resistance bands to each bar, offering a different anchor point and a different amount of resistance, depending on what exercise you're doing and how far or close to the bar you are,” says Beltchenko. The resistance bands, as well as sliders on the ground, make it possible to mirror the effects of reformer Pilates, she explains.
The main portion of the class offers a full-body workout. It starts with exercises that target your glutes, hamstrings, inner and outer thighs, and obliques. Then, expect an upper body block with moves that strengthen the biceps, triceps, shoulders, back, chest, and additional core work.
Both sequences include unilateral exercises (exercises that focus on one side of your body), so you’ll perform them once through then repeat on the opposite side. “This allows you to identify different imbalances in the body — oftentimes we have one side that’s stronger than the other,” Beltchenko says. “So you can start working on those muscle imbalances, really allowing you to prevent injuries and to build core stability.” At the end of class, dimmed lights and a slower music tempo will signal that it’s time for a cool down with barre-assisted stretches.
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Pilates at the Barre is now available at select Equinox locations that are equipped with the triple barre system. Beltchenko believes the class will appeal to those who love reformer Pilates but are deterred by the cost or booked-up classes, as well as those who want to experience the benefits but feel intimidated to hop on one of the machines: “I think it offers this really lovely blend of reformer-inspired resistance work without actually having to be on a reformer.”