Tune into Your Body
Fit Magazine Article, February 2007 by Donna Olmstead
Tune Into Your Body
Yoga, Pilates, and other techniques that can keep you in balance
By Donna Olmstead
Excerpt:
At Momentum Studio on Menaul NE, Aline and Bryan Alexander help clients build strength and flexibility through
ranges of motion. They teach and train clients and teachers in several movement exercise systems — Pilates, Gyrotonic and Feldenkrais. Tennis players and golfers come because they want to add a competitive edge to heir game, Aline Alexander says.
Ballet dancers come to improve flexibility and prevent injuries.
Clients of all ages with acute and chronic injuries come to regain mobility and alleviate pain, she says. “We have clients whose compensatory patterns rom injuries when they were 20 are catching up with them.” People with knee injuries usually have lower back problems, she says. “We look above and below the injury to find out what’s going on in the body.”
Correcting adaptations that cause pain takes time, she says. “A pattern of 20 years isn’t going to go away in six weeks. But we do know that people see differences and feel better right away.”
Thelma Domenici, president of a company that teaches social and corporate etiquette, says, “I’ve tried everything to stay strong and flexible. With Momentum, I am ever so much stronger.” Domenici says she has worked but in private Gyrotonic sessions three times a week for about a year. “I have a bad back. There were exercises I could not do when I started and now I can.” Nine years ago Domenici had surgery in which doctors inserted metal rods in her back. She walked, biked, swam and did water aerobics to maintain her physical abilities, but after finding Gyrotonic exercises, she says she felt much better and has increased mobility, balance and strength in all of her daily activities. She keeps up with her workout schedule because after each session, “I feel a sense of celebration of getting stronger. I have such a sense of accomplishment.”
Aline Alexander, trained as a ballet dancer, has been teaching movement for 20 years and has advanced training and
teaching certificates. Bryan Alexander has a doctorate degree in biomedical research.
Together they help clients discover what system or blend of systems will best serve their physical goals. For
example, one tennis player wanted to work on the trapezelike Gyrotonic equipment to improve the power in her swing
and her range of motion. The Alexanders added Pilates core work to improve abdominal strength to use the Gyrotonic
equipment more effectively.
“People develop superficial muscles, but they aren’t really strong on the inside,” she explains. “We work to develop
the intrinsic muscles that allow precision movement so people can be more comfortable in their bodies.”
Filed Under: Momentum in the News
|
|
