The exercise ball, also called the Swiss ball, the stability ball and the Resist-a-Ball, rolled into mainstream fitness centers in the early 1990s. While some instructors dismissed them as a temporary fad, most health clubs now have at least a few balls on their gym floors and in their group exercise classrooms.
Hoppity Hops
In Italy in the 1960s, Aquilino Cosani was a toymaker who invented a jumping ball for play and exercise. He created this ball, called the Pon Pon, Hoppity Hop or Kangaroo Ball, for children, not realizing that it would one day become an exercise trend. The ball had a rigid handle on top and a painted, smiling face on the surface. A child would sit on the ball and hold the handles as he hopped around the room. This type of play enhanced agility, which later became an essential function of stability ball training.
Emergence of the Swiss Ball
During the 1950s, Swiss pediatrician Elsbeth Kong and British physical therapist Mary Quinton used exercise balls in a physical therapy method called the Bobath technique. The Bobaths, who developed this method of treating childhood neurological disorders, believed that postural correction and movement awareness and coordination are essential for treating diseases such as cerebral palsy. Interestingly, modern exercise programs that use the Swiss ball also emphasize these aspects of fitness.
Later Developments
Dr. Susanne Klein-Vogelbach, born in 1909 in Basel, Switzerland, began her career as an actress and rhythmic gymnastics teacher. She cared for children with polio during a 6-year stint in Japan and switched her career focus to physical therapy. She returned to Basel in 1955 and worked at a physical therapy clinic. Vogelbach developed a method called functional kinetics, which involved systematic observation of movement disorders and exercises to correct them. Exercise balls played a key role in her method.
American Fitness Evolution
During the 1970s, Colorado physical therapist Joanne Posner-Mayer went to Switzerland to study the Bobath method with Elsbeth Kong and May Quinton. She also studied stability ball exercise with physical therapists trained in Dr. Klein-Vogelbach's methods. In 1980, while working at the University Orthopedic Hospital in Copenhagen, Denmark, Posner-Mayer began lecturing on the therapeutic uses of the exercise ball. In 1991, she returned to America and opened Ball Dynamics in Colorado. The fitness industry was ready for something new. Core stability and functional training were buzzwords, and the ball provided a perfect vehicle for developing these aspects of fitness.
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