Anybody do reformer pilates?

[allthelinterdit]

Do any of you do reformer pilates and can share your thoughts?
I'm looking to join a class (I already weight train, run and do mat pilates) but am interested to hear the benefits from real people before I fork out. Is it worth it?

I did it for 3 years before returning to UK. It’s very good.

Thanks for that explanation @Peekingovertheparapet
I think this is exactly what I needed to understand

No problem. Ideally I think people should do mat work alongside reformer, as (I think) the reformer set makes more sense if you have a good grasp of the mat repertoire. But that doesn’t mean you couldn’t start with reformer.

The interesting thing is that there are two broad ways to make any exercise harder on the reformer. The first is, rather intuitively, to add resistance on the springs - this makes the carriage harder to move and your big muscles work harder. The other is to opt for very very light resistance which makes the carriage harder to control, and that’s when you start working the smaller accessory muscles really hard. I think that is the main advantage of the reformer over almost anything else.

Joseph Pilates actually called his regime ‘contrology’ which again I think adds to understanding of the discipline. It literally is about fine control of movement. He’s a particularly interesting character, not least because he developed Pilates whilst incarcerated by the British simply for being of German descent. Early exercises used bed springs for resistance.