There is no real mystery behind staying at least moderately healthy. Doctors offer very standard recommendations, such as weekly goals of 150 minutes of aerobic exercise and twice-weekly strength training.
Of course, that represents a baseline of activity for maintaining a decent level of health. Many people meet these requirements through a combination of basics, such as walking and jogging. Maybe they work with free weights a couple of times a week.
What if you’re a serious participant in an athletic activity like pilates, though? Can you do pilates every day safely? Keep reading to find out.
What Is Pilates?
Pilates is something of a middle ground between aerobic exercise and resistance training with weights. On one level, it aims at boosting your overall flexibility and improving posture. These are outcomes more in line with aerobic exercise than strength training.
On a different level, though, a pilates routine will help strengthen your muscles. Emphasis can differ based on the workout routine, but core strength is often a focus.
Basic pilates routines emphasize precise controlled movements, generally done in a particular order. The order helps ensure you engage multiple muscle groups in your core or trunk.
While a pilates workout can include a variety of equipment, basic pilates routines typically only need a mat and somewhere to open the mat.
You can try out pilates in a formal class somewhere like sg.pilatique.com.
Pilates Benefits
While pilates aims at some similar goals as aerobic exercises, it’s not cardio exercise. Even so, it does offer several important benefits.
The primary benefit of pilates is that you see improved core strength. Good core strength helps you avoid things like back pain.
You can also see improvements in your overall mobility and flexibility. Pilates can also help improve your overall functional movements.
If you’re not familiar with functional movements, you can think of them as types of movements you see or perform in the real world. They typically involve several muscle groups in your core.
Can You Do Pilates Every Day?
When people ask the above question, they often mean, “Is it safe to do pilates every day?” The short version of the answer is, “Yes, with caveats.”
Any kind of strength training relies on breaking down muscle fiber so it can grow back thicker or stronger. So, while you can do pilates safely every day, you should adjust the overall intensity. If you’re worried you’ll overdo it, consider doing pilates every other day.
Daily Pilates and You
The question of can you do pilates every day almost takes second place to the question of should you do pilates every day. While you can do pilates every day for a month or a year, you will likely hit a plateau in your progress.
If you’re comfortable with that plateau you hit, then doing pilates every day makes sense. If you want additional progress, you’ll likely need to mix in other kinds of exercise.
Looking for more workout tips? Check out the posts in our Fitness section.
