Jake Ferguson must be in peak physical shape to play tight end in the NFL. His fiancée, Haley Cavinder, proved that Pilates is way harder than it looks.
He struggled to stay upright on the reformer.
This is not the first time that a group of male athletes were humbled by a workout that is so far outside of their comfort zone, nor will it be the last. Even NFL players struggle with Pilates!
Why is Pilates more challenging for men?
It is not that a Pilates workout is inherently harder for men than women. That is not true. Gender does not have anything to do with it. The difficulty discrepancy stems from six main factors.
- Flexibility gap
- Most men are tighter in their hamstrings, hips and lower backs than women. Pilates demands a very specific controlled range of motion and the aforementioned tightness makes even the most basic of moments feel more intense.
- Different strength focus
- Men, especially NFL players like Jake Ferguson, often train the big, visible muscles like chest, arms, quads, glutes and calves. Pilates targets a different set of muscles, known as stabilizing muscles. That includes the deep core and smaller postural muscles that are frequently undertrained.
- Control over momentum
- Football-style gym workouts are largely rooted in momentum and/or brute force. How much weight can you lift at one time or how many reps can you bang out. Pilates removes that. Every movement on the reformer is slow, controlled and precise. There is no way to cheat a rep.
- Endurance vs. strength
- Pilates is not about lifting heavy. The goal is to instead hold muscle tension for longer periods of time. It is a completely different feeling from, say, a bench press. You have to stay locked in a specific position, which can be surprisingly difficult— even for “strong” and “fit” athletes.
- Body awareness
- Pilates forces you to coordinate your posture with your breathing and with your movement at the same time in a way that traditional weightlifting does not. People who are not used to that level of awareness often struggle to connect those three elements together in one fluid motion.
- Ego
- If we’re being honest, a lot of men go into a Pilates workout thinking it will be easy. A group of Mississippi college baseball players learned first hand that it is not. They, as well as a group of Ole Miss football players, were immediately humbled. Reality was not on par with expectations.
Even if the initial workout presents a serious challenge, men who stick with Pilates for an extended period of time see big improvements in core strength and mobility. They also see increased performance in other workouts, like weightlifting or on-field agility drills, and are better equipped to avoid injury. It can also helps with weight loss! Just ask Brian Daboll, who underwent a massive body transformation.
Haley Cavinder humbled Jake Ferguson.
Jake Ferguson weighs 244 pounds at 6-foot-5 inches tall. He ran a time of 4.81 seconds in the 40-yard dash with a vertical of 31.5 inches. He is in great shape. His tape speaks for itself.
Despite his peak physical fitness, Pilates kicked his butt. Jake Ferguson got engaged to Haley Cavinder last year. She is just as fit in her own right. Just different.
Cavinder recently forced Ferguson to get on a Pilates reformer for the first time. To say that he was struggling would be an understatement.
To be fair to Ferguson, he did better than I would. I think that is probably true for most first-timers. And yet, it was still a big shot to the ego. Pilates is not as easy as it looks!