Pilates Exercises: The Abdominal Scoop

The traditional "navel to spine" cue used in fitness classes has benefits, but it is not the most functional way to engage your deeper core muscles. The Pilates scoop integrates abdominal contraction with spinal alignment, so the abdominal muscles pull upward and inward. Its use is based on the Pilates powerhouse principle, which says that the deeper core muscles empower all movements.

Scooping the Benefits

Pilates instructors often joke that while Pilates is not a weight-loss technique, it makes you taller, so you weigh less for height. More accurately, the spinal realignment associated with Pilates exercise makes you look taller and appear slimmer. Tension causes some people to elevate their upper-back muscles so their shoulders reach their ears. Improper sitting and walking habits may cause weight to sink into the lower body, creating a lower abdominal paunch. Pilates instructors use the cue "pull up in the front and down in the back" to correct this misalignment. The scoop exercise uses the deep abdominal muscles to move the spine into the correct position.

Scoop Anatomy

The Pilates scoop is a group effort, involving the pelvic floor, which supports your internal organs, the transverse abdominal muscle, a spinal stabilizer that compresses the diaphragm during exhalation, and the multifidus, a deep-layer back muscle that also stabilizes the spine. It's the integrated teamwork of these muscles, as well the breathing methods that distinguishes the Pilates scoop from merely pulling in your belly.

Basic Scooping Sequence

The Pilates abdominal scoop begins in the pelvic floor. Sit in an upright position and sense the two sitz bones in your buttocks. Imagine a drawstring that pulls your sitz bones and pubic bones toward the center of your body. Maintain this position and take in a breath. As you exhale, your transverse abdominal muscle will compress the diaphragm's air and hollow your belly, creating a deep abdominal contraction. Once you belly is drawn in, imagine that it is a zipper pulling upward toward your chest. Master the scoop without movement before applying it to the Pilates exercises.

Scooping with Movement

The cat and the half roll-back exercises provide easy vehicles for learning to use the Pilates scoop with movement. Kneel on all fours for the cat exercise. Breathe in and then exhale, draw your belly in, tilt your pelvis and round your upper back until you look like an angry cat. Pause in the rounded position and inhale, without letting your belly protrude. Unlike yoga, Pilates exercises do not involve belly protrusion on the inhalation. Exhale and return to the starting position. Eight repetitions of the cat exercise will mobilize your spine for the half roll-back. Sit in an upright position and engage your pelvic floor by drawing your sitz bones and pubic bones toward each other. Extend your arms in front of your body at chest height. Take in a breath, and as you exhale, zip your belly up and in and round your back until the back of your pelvis and lower back are against the mat. Your spine should be in a C-curve position. Inhale, keep your core muscles engaged as you hold the C-curve, exhale and return to the starting position.