Pilates in Beech Grove

Kristen Abbott and her troupe of passionate instructors motivate guests through TRX Suspension classes—a rigorous total-body toning system designed by a Navy SEAL—and equipment-based Pilates classes. Upon entering the studio, guests step onto bamboo flooring, which stretches out beneath airy vaulted ceilings, all painted with extra-buff versions of Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel ceiling. The studio—which earned the CityVoter award for Best Pilates Studio from 2008 to 2011—hosts small group classes, leading students through moves that challenge them to use their body weight as resistance in functional exercises. With continued practice, students can evenly tone and develop muscle groups across the entire body, with an emphasis on the posture-supporting core muscles.

Though this serene studio was named after Pilates, it was actually parented by Pilates' neighbor, yoga. During yoga classes, which are small, intimate affairs, Pilates of Carmel’s friendly, enthusiastic instructors guide beginners through the basics of each plank, downward dog, and upward orangutan while helping experienced yogis strengthen their stretches and reach leveler levels of mind-body alignment. The accredited massage therapists at Pilates of Carmel can knead relief into your muscles with soothing Swedish strokes. Your indulgent 30-minute session will take your consciousness to a blissfully whited-out plane where your mind can bob up and down like a Q-tip buoy in a sea of cotton balls. Once your mind flutters back down into your corpus, you can apply your newly accumulated mental powers to help you complete such physical activities as opening stubborn pickle jars, practicing more yoga, and chasing ostriches.

With two local locations, more than 50 classes each week, and an expert squad of certified instructors, it makes sense that Nuvo magazine named Invoke Studio the best source for yoga and Pilates five years in a row. While maintaining the old Buschman Building's original 19th-century charm in her downtown studio, Invoke owner Amy Peddycord has created a 4,000-square-foot modern oasis for mind-body workouts with calming hues, exposed ducts, and hardwood floors that gleam like an upside-down CD under the light of a cassette player’s display. Wall-spanning windows let in floods of natural light and give Vinyasa practitioners something to salute during their strengthening flow. Pilates classes strengthen cores and help to increase range of motion with exercises performed on simple sticky mats. A ballet barre stretches across the wall of the large practice room, where students perform dance-inspired moves.

Director Kara Reibel helms a staff of instructors who help students tone core muscles with an arsenal of more than 500 mat and Pilates-machine techniques. Certified in Pilates by the PhysicalMind Institute, Kara and her instructors lead private, semiprivate, and small-group classes in a variety of Pilates methods, including reformer, Cadillac, Wunda Chair, and ladder-barrel training. To ensure that each individual gets personalized instruction during reformer sessions, Kara caps these classes at four students or one fitness-conscious octopus, and teaches students to use their body weight as resistance during mat classes that lengthen and tone core muscles.

As a ballet dancer, David Gensheimer didn't need much help becoming lean, limber, and lithe. But when he found himself recovering from knee surgery, he knew he needed to find something that would keep him strong without compromising his healing process. In addition to physical therapy, he turned to Pilates and was won over by the sport's ability to strengthen core muscles and enhance flexibility. Though he was back to pirouetting in no time, David never lost the Pilates bug and went on to complete his Pilates training while serving as a company member with Ballet Austin and Nashville Ballet and dancing with the Houston Metropolitan Dance Company and Stillpoint.

Today, when he's not busy dancing his way through guest performances around the country, David helms Simply Balanced where he helps others strengthen, rehabilitate, and challenge their bodies through Pilates and yoga classes. Students can also try Gyrotonic classes, which blend elements of gymnastics, yoga, dance, and tai chi, performed on a weight and pulley machine that engages the entire body. Beyond transforming the way visitors look, move, and feel about spandex shorts, the Simply Balanced studio also showers them with feel-good perks such as complimentary beverages, free parking, and access to a team of highly trained massage therapists.

How many times have you wound up to whack a golf ball only to completely miss because your rotational mobility isn't up to par? If you answered "often," get today's Groupon, a 50-minute one-on-one Pilates or GYROTONIC session from CORE for $37 (51% off a $75 value). While most people think about Pilates in the broader sense of improved fitness and flexibility, CORE knows that both Pilates and GYROTONIC can be applied to improve your golf game; GYROTONIC improves the range of motion in your swing and Pilates helps improve balance and strengthen core muscles.