05/11/2025
When was the last time someone suggested you “gotta speed it up and then you gotta slow it down”?
And “if you believe that our love can hit the top, you gotta play around”?
And claimed that this is necessary because “soon you will find that there comes a time for making your mind up”?
Was it in a Pilates class?
(Well, maybe not the ‘love can hit the top/play around’ bit…though we could substitute love for core could we not…?)
Moving on…
Regular readers of our Vita blog will surely remember my missive citing fave 80s boyband A-ha, (The Link between progression in Pilates and Morten Harket), so I return here once again to some musical inspiration through the glory of the bubbly 80’s band Bucks Fizz and, of course you all recognised, their Eurovision winning song “Making your Mind Up”.
And this links to Pilates how?
Well, today dear reader, I’m thinking about Zones. Obvs.
In The World of Exercise, there are Heart Rate Zones and also Psychological Zones. In terms of heart rate zones, traditional Pilates should usually put you in zone 1 to zone 2. We don’t intend to get our heart rates up to tax our cardiovascular system, we intend to keep movements quite slow and thus controlled to improve body awareness, flexibility and core stability. Some people find this actually really hard. But we don’t want to work up much of a sweat, really more a little gentle radiating. What we really need to do is get a little more in a psychological zone, that state of flow that Mr Pilates cited as a key principle of his Contrology method. And try to really be in the moment, often called ‘the zone of optimal functioning’. To basically just give your body and movement some attention and think about your speed….
For the full blog head to our website https://www.vitapilates.co.uk/2025/11/02/the-link-between-bucks-fizz-and-pilates-flow/
