Pilates Intel Online Newsletter for the Pilates Teaching Community

August 22, 2018

Changes Romana Made to Pilates: Brett Interviews the ‘Great’ Bob Liekens

Interview with Bob

Brett: You know Bob, since I started taking your LEAP program, I have been impressed by how much you talk about how Romana changed and adapted things, allowing her to teach Pilates as she saw fit. This is not generally what one hears in the Pilates world. Can you tell us a little more about this?

Bob: Sure. Romana made changes to Pilates to make it safer.  She also created steps to introduce the exercise, to develop the understanding of what the exercise entailed. Romana responded to the needs of the apprentices and clients differently by developing steps to safely move forward to the ideal full expression of the exercise as Joe intended. Romana also, at times, added components to Joe’s original exercises, making them more challenging.

Brett: Let’s look at some concrete examples.

Side-To-Side is an exercise created by Romana

Brett: I understand that as part of Short Box on the Reformer, after the Flat Back, we do an exercise called Side-To-Side.

Bob: Yes, Side-To-Side is one exercise that Romana created, it is not in Joe’s repertoire. The original order moves directly from Flat Back to Twist-and-Reach. Romana made Side-To-Side because, in Twist-and-Reach, clients would reach far out and down, and on their way back up would go into their back muscles rather than their abdominals, which could result in injury.

Thus, Side-To-Side was a way to give the understanding that you must work from the abdominals – which is why we have the phrase “collar bones in front of hip bones” – because then you are using your abdominals as opposed to hanging in your back. So essentially, Side-To-Side is Twist-and-Reach minus the twist. When the student has a firm understanding of this idea of using the abdominals, he or she can then twist to one side before reaching out, always keeping the collar bones forward of the hip bones.

And when you have that reach mastered, still using the abdominals, then you can go to the full expression of the exercise as Joe taught it, which is to reach and then flex laterally all the way to the floor – returning up – still using the abdominals.

Romana created Side-To-Side mainly for the apprentices because they were learning, and teaching, exercises way too fast without months and years of practice.

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Bob Liekens has been teaching the Pilates Method, and keeping it classical, for over thirty years.
Born and raised in Belgium, Bob received his degree in dance from the Rotterdam Academy of Dance in The Netherlands in 1981. He relocated to New York City to further his dance career in 1983 and that same year was introduced to classical Pilates Method at Romana Kryzanowska´s Pilates Studio.