Getting to the core of why NFL players love Pilates

Dexter Lawrence’s ability to make an entrance on opposing offenses often grants the New York Giants defensive lineman the final say.

Just go back to when he effectively ended the Giants’ wild-card win over the Minnesota Vikings by hitting quarterback Kirk Cousins on New York’s final defensive play of the game. Feeling the pressure of an onrushing lineman, Cousins threw the ball well short of a first down. Lawrence’s seven pressures, four QB hits, three hurries and six tackles (one for loss) helped the Giants to their first playoff win since 2012.  But it was one of Lawrence’s numerous midgame quips that pointed to what was aiding the monstrous season and upcoming payday for the now two-time Pro Bowler.

“That Pilates be getting me right,” shouted Lawrence to teammate Leonard Williams.

“For real?” Wiliams responded in high-pitched disbelief.

Is the 6-foot-4, 340-pound All-Pro QB hunter seriously contorting his body in classes that evolved into a workout favored by New York City ballerinas?

“A lot of core work so that helps with my lower back,” Lawrence says. “Just flexibility and strengthening different areas.”

You may laugh, but NFL players of all shapes and sizes will do whatever it takes to be the best. The NFL has a long history of players using ballet and other forms of dance to differentiate their workouts from what goes on in the weight room and on the football field.

Pilates, which players have utilized for years now, is gaining devoted practitioners in part because of an explosion of social media video posts featuring their sweating and shaking workouts.

“I voluntarily go to go shake like a leaf and hold myself in these extremely challenging tough positions,” Dolphins linebacker Jaelan Phillips says. “It makes your body stronger but also makes your mind and soul and spirit stronger. I really leave Pilates with a glow.”

One of those glowing days comes during a June one-on-one session at Fuerza Pilates in Studio City, Calif. For mere seconds, Phillips lies on his back. Those clock ticks aren’t a respite. Instead, they’re the in-between for Phillips’ next action.

Arms extended above his shoulders, Phillips grips one of the bars of the Cadillac — a trapeze table and to some a medieval torture-like bench overflowing with springs and straps hanging from a steel canopy. But for those in Pilates, it’s just another piece of equipment that can offer teachers, like Fuerza’s founder Nicky Lal, more variety.

As Phillips bends his knees into a tabletop position, Lal directs the 6-foot-5, 263-pounder to roll himself up and extend his legs out. Phillips then performs the task backward, slowly inching his lower back toward the table until his head briefly touches.

Again.

Phillips rolls up with Lal once more offering support for his feet as she directs him to sink his waist and pull his chest higher. All through the movements, Phillips maintains a steady inhale and exhale necessary for the practice.

“If you take that to the field, if you take that to really anything, (such as) anxiety, breathing can alleviate that,” Phillips says. “So Pilates is just like a microcosm of a lot of things that you can apply to real life that are beneficial for your health and wellness.”

Phillips suffered a groin injury in his first NFL training camp and hip flexor injuries throughout his 2021 rookie season. But his confidence in Pilates has blossomed since he started incorporating it into his workout regimen. The Dolphins bring in Jackie Bachor, who offers in-house Pilates sessions on Tuesdays during the season (player off days). Looking for ways to optimize his performance, Phillips started going weekly and he estimates about 10 of his teammates participate as well.

“As a football player, we’re so used to being big and strong and dominating in what we do,” Phillips says. “So … stepping out of your comfort zone to do something you’re not good at can be kind of daunting. And so doing Pilates the first time, it’s kind of embarrassing, right? You’re sitting there shaking, you’re trying to hold yourself.”

Phillips hasn’t dealt with hip flexor or groin issues since his rookie season, and he credits the deep core muscle work of Pilates for injury prevention. It has also given him a competitive edge — not only by productively utilizing his Tuesdays, but also by exposing his physical deficiencies.

“When you do something like Pilates, you can’t hide,” Phillips says.

But this offseason was different. Phillips suffered a torn Achilles tendon in late November. It’s the first lower-body injury that’s kept him out an extended period of time. After surgery, he couldn’t walk for three months. He calls rehab a “learning experience.”

Part of that process, before rejoining the Dolphins on the Physically Unable to Perform list to start training camp, included spending a month this summer in Los Angeles. He underwent physical therapy, chiropractic work, soft-tissue massage along with his usual workouts. He also incorporated Pilates for the first time during an offseason and connected with Lal through former UCLA teammates.

On the June afternoon that Phillips walked into Lal’s studio, Packers defensive tackle Kenny Clark had just finished a session. Clark, entering his ninth NFL season, would sign his third Packers contract valued at $64 million this summer. The three-time Pro Bowler has missed just one game over the past three seasons.

“You don’t really see a lot of men or bigger guys doing Pilates,” says Clark, who was initially skeptical of the exercise after being introduced by former Titans and Raiders linebacker Jayon Brown. “It was one of those things, like ‘I ain’t going to do it.’

“And then here I am.”

Clark has been working with Lal — who trains between 50-65 athlete clients, including NBA players — for three years. The Packers have had a reformer machine available to players for a number of years, and Lal works with Clark on his in-season off-days. There’s a mix of virtual sessions and a packed schedule during offseasons as her new studio (with high ceilings and longer reformers for taller, broader bodies) fills with visiting clients. Each session is customized, and often starts with a series of questions: Did a player just get off a plane? What workout are they on? How are they feeling?

Longtime NFL linebacker Anthony Barr works with Pilates instructor Nicky Lal. (Charlotte Carroll / The Athletic)

The morning Phillips arrives, he’s already completed physical therapy and conditioning, so their session is focused on active stretching. Phillips spends most of the class on the Cadillac apparatus, receiving hands-on instruction and frequent check-ins from Lal.

“I’m not trying to make my clients shake,” Lal says. “I’m not trying to push them to a limit that they’re going to break. My goal is to make them feel better and rejuvenated once they leave.

“I try to create a lot of different movements that they don’t get in the gym and in their workouts with their teams.”

As Phillips’ class winds down, he’s stretching out over a barrel — another piece of equipment — when the studio door opens and Chicago Bears center Coleman Shelton walks in.

While Lal specializes in athlete clients, she’s not the only instructor who’s taken on professional football players.

One of the first players Kristen Wolf trained at her Chicago studio was former Bears and Jets running back Matt Forte. Wolf has since moved her Superior Pilates studio up to Lake Forest, Ill., just a quick drive from Bears headquarters. Word of mouth did the rest.

“When they do it, they’re like, ‘Oh my gosh, I need this,’” Wolf says.

Sessions are tailored to each person and she currently trains around 10 to 15 players, including current Bears like offensive lineman Teven Jenkins, running back Khalil Herbert, defensive back Josh Blackwell and defensive back Elijah Hicks.

“Because they’re athletes, they really get it, the importance of it and yet they have the best attitudes and discipline and sense of humor,” Wolf says. “It’s great for recovery, mobility, prevention, and obviously, the core. A lot of them think they have strong core muscles but in Pilates, it teaches you to work those muscles around your spine, so it strengthens their backs, and then it helps them to be stronger all over.”

Players across the league, from San Francisco 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey, who trains with Lal, to the Giants’ stalwart left tackle Andrew Thomas, have tried it. The 6-foot-5, 315-pound Thomas did Pilates for the first time this offseason. “A lot of times we get put in compromised positions just because of the nature of going backwards (as an offensive lineman),” he says. “So I think Pilates just helps with your flexibility and your core strength and it helps you sit down rushers and be athletic on the field.”

Even Thomas’ coach, Brian Daboll, has discovered the benefits. Daboll started this summer because of a conversation over dinner with a friend who owns a Pilates studio in Wyckoff, N.J. Twenty sessions later, Daboll says, “I’m more flexible. I am stronger and I just generally feel better.”

When it comes to the perception of Pilates and the evolution of its birth as an exercise for men created by Joseph Pilates, Wolf and Kansas City area instructor Kahley Schiller are excited to see it back to including men.

“It has that perception, that it’s a girl thing or that it’s (for) dancers,” Schiller says. But players that she trains, like Kansas City Chiefs defensive tackle Tershawn Wharton and defensive ends George Karlaftis and Charles Omenihu, are embracing it and changing perceptions, she says.

And Phillips is more than happy to spread the gospel.

“I feel like … people are starting to understand that it’s like a hard workout,” Phillips says. “It’s more normalized for NFL guys and guys in general to be doing it. But a lot of people would rather just lift and stretch than do Pilates. I try to put everyone on Pilates if I can.”

Five-time Pro Bowl guard Trai Turner is one of those people who listened. After trying Pilates with the Dolphins linebacker just the week prior, Turner is back for his third class, a private session with Lal. Since Turner is working his way back from a torn quad suffered last training camp and is new to the exercise, there’s careful attention to how his 6-foot-3, 320-pound body responds. In one sequence on the Cadillac, Turner started with both feet in straps but he took one foot out to ease the strain. But Lal said that will change over time as he acclimates to the movements. In these early sessions, it’s about making clients comfortable.

Trai Turner is new to Pilates, but he’s quickly becoming a convert. (Charlotte Carroll / The Athletic)

Like those that have come before him, Turner expected a good stretching session, but: “It’s like, damn, I didn’t lift 1,000 pounds. I didn’t run a million sprints, but she put me on this table and made me hold this pose for three seconds, and I’m feeling it three days later.”

For the 31-year-old, the sessions have been a “good introduction back into (his) body being nimble and able to take the beating that comes with football.” It’s also something he wished he’d discovered earlier in his career.

“I’m doing this to help aid me in football, but I’m also doing this to help aid me in life in general,” Turner says. “So that when I wake up in the morning, my knees don’t hurt. ’Cause now if my knees hurt, that messes with my physical. My physical bothering me in turn messes with my mental. Now my emotions are messed up. It can turn into a downward spiral.

“I’m just an advocate for myself, older guys and younger guys that even though we are taking care of the physical, make sure you take care of the mental. And this is part of taking care of the mental.”

The mental. The physical. Injury rehab. Core strengthening. There are lots of reasons players are drawn to Pilates … and then keep coming back for more.

And sure enough, just before Turner heads out the door and strides into the Los Angeles sunshine, he schedules another session.

(Illustration: Dan Goldfarb / The Athletic. Photos: Charlotte Carroll / The Athletic)