How to Improve Flexibility with Pilates


Enhance flexibility with Lesley Logan's Pilates tips! Balance strength and flexibility with home exercises designed to improve mobility and maintain overall health. Join Lesley’s community for more expert guidance.

How Often Should You Practice Pilates for Flexibility?

Alright, if you’re looking for more flexibility in your life, Pilates can absolutely help, and today I’m going to give you a list of exercises you can do at home to improve your flexibility.

Hi, I’m Lesley Logan, co-founder of onlinepilatesclasses.com and I’ve been teaching Pilates since 2008 but I’ve been doing it since 2005 and what is so cool is, even as a hypermobile body, I honestly got stronger doing Pilates because Pilates is a strength-based practice that is designed to balance your imbalances. My imbalance is actually being too flexible. As I got stronger with it, I still utilized the stretch aspects that happened in the exercises to maintain my flexibility. Because why is flexibility even important? Well, it is the key thing you need towards your mobility, and mobility is the key thing you need in longevity. So if we’re all here to live an awesome, long life where we can stay out of, you know, old folks homes, which should be everyone’s goal, then we need both strength and flexibility. And Pilates has stretching in it as part of its strength and flexibility practice, but you should know that there are going to be some differences because it is a workout and not a stretch session. If you want to know more about the strength and all the benefits of Pilates, you should definitely check out my video on why you should be doing Pilates, because I go over all of that in there.

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Why Flexibility Is an Important of Pilates Exercise?

Okay, so why is flexibility really that important? Well, let’s be honest, you should know why, and that is, it improves your posture. I know you don’t really always care about that, but it’s an important thing to have. It also is going to improve your mobility. So being able to your range of motion, the things you’re able to do, imagine, be able to tie your shoe if you can’t reach your foot, it’s not so fun. And it also, more importantly, prevents injury. And this is the key thing: we all know what it’s like to be sick or have an ache or a pain. It’s almost like, “Am I ever going to be well again? Is this ever not going to bother me again?” And the truth is, a lot of times, injuries can be prevented if flexibility is balanced with strength.

What is the Main Purpose of Flexibility?

1. Static Stretching

So I’m going to cover a few types of stretching that are out there, and I’m sure there are many others. I’m sure experts in stretching will want to just go and nerd out for hours with you on these. But the few that I’m going to talk about are the ones that you probably have seen and or done, which is the static stretching, this is the one you probably did in school. You probably still kind of do, where you kind of sit on the ground and you hang over your legs to stretch your hamstrings, or you grab the back of your foot and you hold on to your leg to stretch your quad. That is a static stretch, where you just kind of like hang out so you can lengthen the muscle. There’s also a lot of information about what is actually lengthening. And got to listen to a woman and say, you’re really kind of letting the brain say it’s okay for me to do this, but you’re trying to open up what the muscle is able to do, okay? And the thing about static stretching is it’s actually very beneficial. The truth is, is that is it increasing your flexibility, if you do it regularly, a lot, all the time. But you actually will find that active-static stretching.

2. Active Static Stretching (Dynamic)

The second type, that is the one I love. It’s the one that happens during Pilates, and we’ll dive into this later, is where you activate the muscle and then you pull on it. And so this kind is also called dynamic stretching. It is really beneficial in that it allows your muscle to turn on. So you’re actually, like, for the exercise I’ll talk about later, like Single Straight Leg Stretch. You’re gonna turn on that hamstring, and then you’re going to pull on it, and so then the muscle is working, and it’s activated while it gets a stretch, and that is actually going to increase flexibility over time a little bit quicker than I would say, I’ve experienced with the static stretching.

3. Ballistic Stretching (Pulsing/Bouncing)

The third type is called ballistic, and ballistic has a lot of that bouncing and pulses. Dancers do it. I’ve seen a lot of athletes do it. I think the thing about ballistic stretching is, that if you’re going to incorporate it into your life, you want to make sure you’re doing it correctly. So I would probably do it supervised in the beginning, to make sure that you’re doing one, the right stretches for you, and two, doing it correctly for your body so you get the most benefits out of doing it.

Two Extremes of Flexibility

1. Hyper Flexibility

So there are a couple of extremes in the flexibility world. You have your hypermobility. In the hypermobility area, you’ve got your hypermobile people who just have, like, their joints can go beyond straight, or you have something called EDS (Ehlers-Danlos syndrome), and that’s actually quite painful. That type of hypermobility is quite extreme, and it does have pain and injuries that can go along with it. There are experts in that. So if that is something you have been diagnosed with, I highly recommend you find a Pilates expert in that area. But hypermobility in general is something where, like, you don’t even stretch, and you’re just super flexible in your joints. And the reality is, is that when you activate the muscles around those joints, you can actually control that hypermobility. So strength building is key, but we don’t want to make you so tight, right? So that’s why you want to keep that movement practice going.

2. Total Inflexibility

The other extreme would be the complete inflexibility. And so my yoga teacher is actually one of those people. He was in the military, he was a bodybuilder, and he couldn’t even sit cross legged, not at all. Like he would sit cross and he’d like fall backwards. I had this one client who also could not sit like that, super, super inflexible in his back and his hips and his knees and his ankles. And the thing is, is that over time, flexibility does find its way to people who have inflexibility. And inflexibility can come from a lot of different things, right? There are so many different factors that come in. You don’t have to be a bodybuilder to be inflexible. So I don’t want anyone getting mad at me, like “I’m a bodybuilder and I’m not inflexible”, you’re probably accurate. You could be inflexible just by not moving enough, right? People who sit at a desk all day have loss of mobility, people who sit at chairs and car, drivers. So inflexibility can happen just because you’re not actually moving the body as well. That is where aches, pains, injuries, tightnesses are going to occur. So we want to make sure, with both extremes, that we’re finding some happy medium in the middle.

Ultimate Goal: Balancing Strength and Flexibility

So the ultimate goal, of course, would be this wonderful moderation of balancing your strength and your flexibility. And that’s, of course, what we do with Pilates at onlinepilatesclasses.com and of course, that is not the easiest thing to do, because depending on where you are on the spectrum, you might have to focus on one thing more than the other thing. But here’s what’s really, really cool. It is attainable, especially if you incorporate Pilates into things you’re already doing. So if you are weight training, you are running, if you are dancing, if you are doing yoga. When you incorporate Pilates into your practice, it is going to help you find that happy medium that does balance your strength and your stretch. If I’ve already convinced you to start a Pilates practice, and you’re going to take a Pilates class. Make sure you watch our video on How to Avoid Mistakes in your First Pilates Class, I want to make sure you find the best place for yourself to go.

Key Pilates Exercises for Flexibility

Alright, you’ve been waiting for it. The list of exercises, and I promise you could do these at home. I’m going to go over a bunch you can do at home, hitting all different parts of your body, your neck, your shoulders, your back, your waist, your hips, your hamstrings, your quads, even your feet. Some of these exercises may include Pilates equipment, and if you don’t have equipment, and you want to know what you can do for that, instead, feel free to comment below.

Back Exercises:

Let’s do the back first. Because let’s just be really honest, most people feel really tight in your back. And why are you tight in your back? It could because your back. It could because of your hamstrings. But don’t have any fear here, because I’ve got some exercises for you. The first one is going to be the Roll Up. So the Roll Up I chose for your back because it is actually about stretching the whole back body or using your whole front side to do it. It has pulses in it the way that I teach the roll up, and those pulses are a little bit like the ballistic but more more aligned with the dynamic-static stretching, the active-static stretching, where you are reaching as far as you can, pulling your waist back and then doing it a couple more times. Spine Stretch Forward is going to be your next one. Spine Stretch Forward, you actually separate the legs a little bit, which is a little bit easier for some of you who are more tighter in the hips. And again, you’re rounding forward, using your front body to stretch your back body. You’ve got those pulses there to help open at the back and in just in case, just in case your tight back is coming from those hamstrings, like the Roll Up, the Spine Stretch Forward is touching the back as well. Alrightright, so we’re diving into the hamstrings, and really quick I just want to say, like, if you’re like “justust two Leslie?”, there are over 500 Pilates exercises, so there are tons more, but I want you to get started with what you have access to.

Hamstrings Exercises:

So the hamstrings, we have our Roll Up, yes. The Spine Stretch Forward is back again. And one of my personal favorites for stretching your hamstrings is Single Straight Leg Stretch. This one is awesome. Again, where that active-static stretch is coming back towards us. You are pulling on that leg while is pushing into your hands. And if you can’t grab your ankle like I am grabbing, you can grab anywhere on your leg that you can reach, but not the knee. So try to get above that knee and really try to push that leg into your hands, not from the knee, but from that hamstring. And I promise you, you’ll have that dynamic switching as you’re giving that muscle a break then bringing it back in. You are going to see flexibility over time. It’s going to wow you.

Quads and Hip Flexors Exercises:

Alright, so let’s talk about those hip flexors and quads. So this I like to think as the front of your body, okay? We’ve got a few more Mat exercise for you. Again, there are tons more with the equipment, but it’s really important to me that people feel like they have accessibility to Pilates. That’s why we created OPC. That’s why the Mat work is so freaking amazing. So we have Single Leg Kick. What does this one do? You get to do one leg at a time, because some of us just have a tighter side. So you can go left side, right side, left side, back and forth, evenly. Or if you do find that one side is needing more, then you can actually do that side extra. But I would still alternate and just do extra on that one side. Here is the other like, really fun thing about the Single Leg Kick, it is strengthening your hamstring, because sometimes our hamstrings are weak and tight, and so if you strengthen them, you actually get that flexibility too. I know it’s crazy. So Single Leg Kick.

Double Leg Kick is going to challenge a lot of things. If you can’t do the extension with what’s going on with your body, you will just do the kick part, but it should feel like a hamstring curl, so make sure your knees don’t drop on the floor. You’re also going to feel your glutes work. And if you can keep this is the hard part, this a little more advanced. You can keep your frontal hip points pulling up in the Single Leg Kick and the Double Leg Kick, you are going to get even more stretch the front of your hip flexors, and you’re gonna get more quad stretch, which means you’re gonna get more hamstring strength, and that is going to benefit your overall balance and your flexibility and strength.

Lastly, I’ve got the Thigh Stretch. This one I love. If you can’t be on your knees, then obviously stay with a Single Leg Kick and Double Leg Kick. Shoulder Bridge could be an option for you. However, it’s easy to push your lower back up and not get the stretch I want you to have. So Thigh Stretch is really awesome. What I want you to also think about is that those knees are reaching down and towards each other. Because here is the thing about tightness, especially if it’s your quads, and we’re like, I don’t actually want you to stretch me. That’s a lot of work. I want to avoid that. So what the knees will do is they’ll splay out as you lean back, avoiding the stretch. Do you want to hug them towards each other, even though they’re apart. That’s gonna get you even more stretch of those quads and hip flexors. You’re welcome, and it’s a lot of fun while you do it.

Shoulders Exercises:

So let’s talk about these shoulders. Some people, your shoulders can do some crazy mobile things. And if you are that person who needs more strength in your shoulders and your upper back, I highly recommend you check out all of my arm back connection stuff. And let’s talk about, because there’s so much strength that you can actually do. Oh my god, I could like list off 15, but I’m gonna stay with the flexibility part, because that’s why you’re here. So if you have tightness in your shoulders, they like to do this kind of a thing. Then I really, highly recommend the Double Leg Kick. I know it’s back. It’s really amazing. But here’s the thing, it’s really easy for the Double Leg Kick to be this over rotating of the shoulder and pinching the shoulder blades together. And so you think you’re flexible, but you’re really kind of a knot. So I want you, when you watch that tutorial, I want you to really be thinking up with those arms and not straight with those arms, so the arms are not reaching to the feet. They’re reaching up to the ceiling. You might feel really stuck. 

And if you are like, uh, I’m the tightest shoulder you’ve ever heard of in your entire life, grab a dish towel and hold the towel behind your back, because that’s going to give you more space to still work on the strength of the upper back and then the stretch of the front, because, again, sometimes you are tight somewhere because you’re weak somewhere else. And so the balance isn’t there to hold everything in place. We want to balance the imbalances. So that’s the cool thing about Pilates. If you’re tight in the front, you might be weak in the back, we can strengthen the back while stretching in the front. You are welcome. The Leg Pull Back. Okay, this one? Super challenging. It is going to put those hands behind your back with weight on them. So if that is too much stretch for you at this time in your practice, I want you to bend the knees but do the same exercise. So I’ll lift your hips up. It looks more like you’re a table, and then you’ve got weight with your hands behind you, opening this front but standing on your upper back muscles. So you shouldn’t be hanging out in those wrists and elbows. Here’s the thing, if you are feeling your wrists and elbows, you are hanging out in them, and that means you’re not using your upper back muscles. So let me know in the comments below.

Neck Exercise:

Let’s talk about the neck. Alright. So again, I chose another Mat exercise for you. It’s called the Neck Pull. And here’s the thing about the Pilates exercises, they have such interesting names. So you might be thinking like, Okay, if you’re looking at this exercise, you’re looking at me, pull forward. And you might look like, that’s the stretch of the neck? The stretch on the neck is on the way down, because you have the hands, this is super, super key, interlaced. You’re pushing your head into your hands, your hands into your head. And as you roll down that neck pull you are pulling traction on that neck and is stretching it out. Now, I didn’t put this in here because we don’t have the tutorials on it, but there is a lovely towel exercise that I teach people who are in my mentorship program that does do wonders for flexibility of the neck, and also, if you do have access to equipment, the neck stretcher is an interesting tool to use, although it’s a more of a neck strengthener than a stretcher. I know, the weird names again. But here is the thing, like I said earlier, sometimes we are tight because we are weak, and we actually have to strengthen the muscles so that we are not letting them get pulled out of alignment.

Feet Exercises:

Alright, let’s talk about your feet. These are like, what do you call it? Shocks on your car? I clearly am a car girl, right? So here’s the deal. It’s also like the tires of your car. People are so good at making sure their tires are balanced and that their shocks, the alignment of their car is awesome. And then they put terrible shoes on their feet, and so their feet are really, really tight. And if you are someone who has had feet issues, or you are losing your arch, or you have had plantar fasciitis, it is so important not just to strengthen your feet, but to stretch your feet. And so the Push Ups on the Mat are really awesome because in Pilates, Push Ups, which are much different, I know they look the same, they are different than fitness push ups. You actually do want to be on the balls of your feet. You do want to stretch your feet, because you’re actually using your legs in the push ups. So that is an excellent at home way to stretch your feet. However, there are actually some ways on the reformer that I’m going to list out. And then while I’m on it, there’s so many more. The Two by Four is also really awesome. The Towel exercises are really great. The Toe Corrector is really great.

But here we go, on the reformer, I want you to focus on your Down Stretch, and your Knee Stretches the way that you have to stretch your foot to be on the carriage. And then they get the rest of the foot on the shoulder block. Here’s the thing, a lot of people let the heels be off because their ankles are tight. I want you to be reaching those heels back. And if you need to put something between that heel and that shoulder block so you can get that connection, we’ve got to stretch the whole toe box and the bottoms of our feet. It really does help prevent that plantar fasciitis stuff. And if you are struggling with that ankle mobility, because you need some flexibility there, then you are going to want to work on that Two by Four, and also just trying to go down from standing to sitting and sitting to standing, is going to help you work that mobility of your ankles. It will take time, so don’t try to do 15 reps in a day and then go “it didn’t work”. It can take time over many, many years, but it will actually increase your mobility, which will increase your longevity.

Bonus Stretches:

Alright, I got some bonus ones for you, because, let me just say, like, I can’t leave you with just a few things. The spine has five spine shapes it makes in your life. You’ve got tall, okay, you’ve also got flexion, that’s running forward, extension, that’s leaning back, and then you have side bending and twisting. And here is the thing, the twisting is the first spine shape that we actually lose in our life, because we lose that mobility, which means the loss of flexibility, right? And then side bending is the next one we lose. And it’s often the one where we hurt ourselves, and then it goes downhill from there. So here they are. We have Saw. I didn’t give this to you on the back and hamstring stretch, because here’s why, if your hip flexors are really tight, this exercise is really, truly going to be more advanced for you. But I do want you to add Saw into your practice if you’ve been doing your Single Leg Kick and your Double Leg Kick for a while, and you can sit on your tush because that twist with the bend, if you can really, truly anchor that opposite hip is going to stretch so much in your lower back, and it’s going to give you a lot of spinal mobility.

Spine twist. This one again, you definitely have to have flexibility in your hip flexors, because sitting in this position is not going to feel awesome if those are tight, but it is going to help really train the mobility and flexibility of your spine. It’s phenomenal. And my favorite twist on most days. And finally, Mermaid. Now, Mermaid isn’t my favorite. I prefer to side bend with the exercise Side Bend. But let’s be real, not all of us can actually stand on one arm if you don’t have that shoulder mobility. So the thing about Mermaid is this an excellent bonus that many people can do today to stretch your side body. Here’s the thing about Mermaid, though, you are not showing me how low you can go, you’re showing me how long you can be, and that is going to stretch your whole side body in an amazing way. For my advanced people, go ahead, knock yourself out with that Side Bend. Alright. If you are like, “this is great, Leslie, but I’m new and thank you, but I have no idea how to repeat those things”. You can check out my video on five Pilates workouts that are great for beginners. All these exercises are going to be included.

Tips for Improving Flexibility with Pilates

Regular Practice and Consistency

Alright, so let’s talk about some tips in improving your Pilates flexibility. So first of all, consistency is going to be key. I hate to break it to you, but if you only do your Pilates practice exercises once a week, and you’re going, Lesley, I did this and I have no improvement, I’m going to tell you. How is your Spanish going if you practice it for one time a week? Probably not great. Eventually things become recognizable, but like it’s not. There are scientific studies that show you really need to be hitting things three to four times a week if you’re wanting to see an improvement and take things on. And if you are more on the inflexible side, then you definitely be on that three to four times a week. Now, I know you’re busy and you’ve got a lot going on, so if you just do some of these exercises three to four times a week, as opposed to a full class, I’m totally okay with that.

Maximizing Pilates: Warm-Up and Cool-Down

Other tips I want you to think about is you may need to be considering warming up. So if you are someone who weight trains, you can use my Pilates class before your weight training session or after weight training session. So before will be a great warm up, after will be a great cool down. Because I know that a lot of people, when they go to the gym, like me and Brad, sometimes we don’t want to cool down. We warm up, but we don’t always cool down. So you can use Pilates to be a warm up or cool down.

If you are also using Pilates specifically, this is a thing that you’re adding in and you find yourself needing more warm up time, I highly recommend giving yourself that maybe doing some extra stretches that are not necessarily active-dynamic, but maybe are more static to warm your body up before you get into your Pilates practice, but always giving yourself permission to a cool down. I know you’re busy. I know you have a lot going on, but this is your one body you get. And we need to remember that when you’re 80 and trying to get out of a chair on your own, you’re not gonna be like, “Gosh darn it. I was just too busy at 20 to figure this out”, so really take some time to do warming up and cooling down. So here’s the thing, you can actually combine Pilates to other flexibility practices. So I do yoga, Brad, and I do it a couple times a week, and it’s really key. I find that it actually, really does help improve my practice. In fact, I’ve talked about that here on this channel about Pilates and yoga. You’re gonna never hear me say Pilates versus anything. It’s always going to be Pilates and. And so my goal here is always to help you have accessibility to Pilates and whatever you’re already doing.

Listening to Your Body: Avoid Overstretching

And lastly, if all those things was like “Okay, thanks”, this is the most important one: you have to listen to your body. It is really easy to overstretch something. And also sometimes we feel like something is pulled and we’re stretching it. And really we need to be getting it looked at, because it could be a nerve thing. So please, please, please, always listen to your body and all the things that you’re doing, whether it’s strength based or flexibility based. And if you are not practiced at listening to your body, Pilates is a great way to help you go inward, at least with us at OPC, we really do want you to focus on how are you feeling in your body, what are you feeling where and what is your body telling you to do? Because we believe it’s brave and courageous to take care of yourself.

Flexibility Made Easy with Pilates

I hope this really helps you understand that having flexibility in your life is possible. It’s doable, and it doesn’t have to take up a lot of your time. You can actually incorporate it into your strength-based practice with Pilates. And if you don’t have a Pilates access where you are or you’re wanting more access, something that I love about onlinepilatesclasses.com is that it doesn’t have to be us versus something else, you can actually do it in addition to, and we really do pride ourselves on making sure our classes, the weekly ones, are only 2% of your day, right? And so imagine giving 2% of your day to you and your movement so you had that longevity, that mobility, that you need to take yourself wherever you want to go. So if you go to onlinepilatesclass.com, YouTube, actually check out OPC. You can try us out. You can try out our amazing community. You can get feedback on your form. Because here’s the thing, I know when you’re new to doing some of these exercises, you’re wondering if you’re doing it right, you might not feel the stretch right away. And so us getting eyes on your body is going to be able to give you the exactly what you need to do the exercise to get the most mobility and flexibility out of it. So onlinepilatesclass.com/youtube, to check us out. If you have any questions on this, feel free to put in the comments below. We love answering your questions on Sundays at 9am Pacific Time. Thank you so much. Have a great day.