It was only last month when, approximately twenty minutes into scrolling a Reddit thread on the least loved Pilates exercises, I began to think about my love-hate relationship with the Pilates Swan Dive.
As contributors to the thread pointed out, it’s not so much the burn of the Swan Dive that makes us dread it - it’s the challenge of actually doing it. Requiring control, coordination and rhythm, I often find myself feeling less swan-like and more like a fish out of water. Add to that the uncomfortable compression on my stomach and hips, which many Reddit contributors also mentioned, and I couldn’t help but wonder whether I was doing something technically wrong to make the Swan Dive so problematic.
