How To Avoid Wrist Pain in Pilates

When I first began building upper body strength I practiced all weight bearing exercises, such as plank, leg pull, push ups etc. with the wedge. Now that my arms and shoulders are strong enough, they hold my body weight up and there is less weight and pressure on my wrists. I don’t necessarily need a wedge anymore, unless I perform many different weight bearing exercises back to back or I try to increase the number of repetitions, which of course increases the time spent on my wrists.

A quick tip: If your wrists tend to get tired after a while - maybe throughout a mat class - use the wedge from the very beginning. If you only start using the wedge once your wrists hurt, it won’t make such a difference anymore. If you use it right from the start, you might not even get to the point of pain.

The cork wedge I'm using in this video was made by Hugger Mugger.

If you don't have a wedge available or you're working mostly on equipment, there is another way to reduce wrist pain by using "Ghosts".

A ghost is what we call a small square of shelf liner that can be used to create more space in the wrist when weight bearing on equipment and also on the mat.

Looking for more modifications and exercise ideas for your students with wrist pain? In the Pilates Protocols chapter of the Pilates Encyclopedia member library, we have a whole list of ideas for preventing and improving wrist pain, as well as modifying exercises. Learn more...

I'd love to hear from you: What do you do with your clients with wrist pain? Shoot me an email.