Sebastien Lagree want to make one factor clear: “This. Is. Not. Pilates.”
Signage on the West Hollywood location of the Megaformer Studio.
(Stella Kalinina / For The Instances)
The worldwide health entrepreneur is speaking in regards to the Lagree Technique, his patented exercise. Chances are you’ll be acquainted with it: About 50 SoCal studios at present license rights to make use of Lagree gear, a lot of them in Los Angeles. Their door shingles boast his identify: There’s Lagree 213 in downtown L.A., Lab Lagree in Glendale and Dwell Lagree in Brentwood, to call a couple of. Peer into their home windows and also you’ll see machines that appear like hulking, extra-large Pilates Reformers — so-called Megaformers — atop which L.A.’s fittest are shifting between platforms on a modular, sliding carriage, positioning their physique components simply so to execute sluggish however extra-strenuous squats, rows and lunges.
So, like, tougher Pilates, sure? No.
“It’s completely completely different,” Lagree says on the telephone from Shanghai, the place he’s assembly with health studios and producers of his machines. “Not Pilates. That’s a false impression I’ve been making an attempt to struggle for the previous 25 years.”
To set the file straight, Lagree is raring to return to the start.
Along with his chiseled jaw, sonorous voice and bodybuilder’s body, Lagree may very well be the love youngster of Arnold Schwarzenegger and Fabio Lanzoni. He grew up in Paris and, after incomes an MBA from Seattle College, he moved to Los Angeles in 1998 to develop into — what else? — an actor. To assist himself, he labored as — what else? — a private coach at a West Hollywood fitness center. His most well-liked mode of train was bodybuilding, however his work had him instructing Pilates on the Reformer, an train that was new to him.
Grasp coach Heather Perren demonstrates the Mega Professional at Lagree Health HQ in Chatsworth.
(Stella Kalinina / For The Instances)
After periods, he says, shoppers would usually wish to do extra cardio. “As a result of they didn’t really feel like they obtained a exercise doing Pilates. I mentioned, ‘Is it OK if I modify the tactic? As a result of they’re not feeling something.’”
Lagree added hand weights and integrated compound fitness center actions like push-ups, squats, lunges and planks on the Reformer. Ultimately, he purchased 4 Pilates Reformers and started instructing out of his front room. He’d been in L.A. simply three years at this level, however a lot of his college students have been Hollywood make-up artists, stylists and personal cooks to the celebs, and phrase obtained out. Quickly celebrities have been displaying as much as his house studio. David Schwimmer, Gabrielle Reece, Molly Sims and Elizabeth Hurley all visited his West Hollywood condominium earlier than he obtained kicked out.
“I didn’t have a license. It was all underground,” Lagree says.
In 2003, he opened his first business studio on Melrose Avenue — he known as it Pilates Plus — however says the Pilates machines “couldn’t deal with the exercise I educate.” He determined to design his personal supersized model of a Pilates Reformer; in 2005, the Proformer was born. It had added cables in addition to platforms and foot bars on both finish, permitting customers to focus on completely different muscle teams such because the chest, triceps and shoulders.
“Folks simply liked the Proformer,” Lagree says. “We obtained inquires to open studios, so I made a decision to license out the system. And it took off from there.”
However Lagree quickly felt the necessity to distance himself altogether from any affiliation with Pilates.
“In 2008 I modified the identify as a result of ‘Pilates’ was deceptive — it wasn’t that,” he says.
The Megaformer debuted in 2010. Whereas the Proformer was a hunk of metal that weighed almost 500 kilos, the unique Megaformer was 200 kilos lighter and got here shipped in two components, so it traveled extra simply. The design was simplified too, with a narrower carriage that had holes on the rear edge, offering higher stability in addition to various grip factors. The foot bar was redesigned into cut up deal with bars, permitting for much more versatile train.
Mega Professional machines at Lagree Health HQ in Chatsworth.
(Stella Kalinina / For The Instances)
“The cut up deal with bars, it permits you to take action many extra actions,” Lagree says. “It modified the sport.”
Over the subsequent decade, demand for the Megaformer turned so intense that the only California producer couldn’t make the machines quick sufficient. In 2019, the Lagree Technique was named the fastest-growing health pattern within the U.S. by the exercise-booking app ClassPass. By 2023, exacerbated by post-pandemic provide chain points, there was an 18-month wait to obtain a machine. Lagree has since moved the manufacturing operations to China and Vietnam, lowering the back-ordering home windows.
All through all of it, the Megaformer has remained the star of the enterprise, a behemoth on the heart of probably the most intense non-Pilates, Pilates-adjacent train on the market.
Sebastien Lagree and grasp coach Heather Perren display the Mega Professional.
(Stella Kalinina / For The Instances)
Lagree experiments continuously, tweaking his train methodology and machines. He says he has amassed 200 patents. Along with the unique Proformer, there’s additionally been the EVO and EVO II, the Supra, the Miniformer and Miniformer Professional, the Microformer and Microformer Professional — the final 4 meant to maximise area.
The Megaformer, too, has gone via a few dozen iterations, a dizzying alphabet scramble that features the M1, M2, M2S, M3, M3S, M3K, M3K+, M3X, M3E, M3. Every options design tweaks. A change in spring location in a single mannequin, for instance, permits customers to transition between workouts sooner; extra holes within the platform or carriage of one other mannequin permit customers extra anchor factors to grip whereas exercising.
“The machines evolve with the tactic to additional distinguish us from Pilates,” says the corporate’s neighborhood relations director and senior grasp coach, Heather Perren. “Lagree is a science-backed methodology, a stay methodology.”
By all of it, the Megaformer has remained the star of the enterprise, a behemoth on the heart of probably the most intense non-Pilates, Pilates-adjacent train on the market. How completely different, actually, is it from a Pilates Reformer?
Each machines use carriages and spring stress — the springs are simpler on the physique’s connective tissue, making train low-impact. However that’s largely the place the similarities finish. Pilates, which was invented for rehabilitative functions and focuses on core power, flexibility and stability, is mostly low-intensity; the Lagree Technique is high-intensity. It combines power coaching, cardiovascular train and muscular endurance, with workouts carried out at a really sluggish tempo, so muscle tissues expertise extra time beneath stress. Most of the workouts are achieved kneeling or standing up. It’s common to see contributors sweating and huffing, their limbs trembling, on the finish of a set.
Springs on the Mega Professional.
(Stella Kalinina/For The Instances)
“It’s like if Pilates and bodybuilding had a child,” says Natalie Grimsley, proprietor of Plankhaus in Santa Monica, which teaches the Lagree methodology in addition to mindfulness workshops.
I finished by Lagree’s West Hollywood studio on a current afternoon and was struck by the dimensions of the Megaformer. It’s a large contraption, like a Pilates Reformer on steroids. It’s greater than 10 toes lengthy and weighs 395 kilos (by comparability, the extra petite Pilates Reformer typically weighs as much as 150 kilos). The carriage’s panels are numbered, so you’ll be able to exactly place your toes and arms to execute workouts appropriately. Place your knees on 0 and your arms on 1 and three, for instance. Now you’re within the correct alignment to do a modified plank.
A bit intimidating? Sure. However I gave the exercise my finest shot. Nonetheless, it was so intense at factors, I didn’t make it via your complete 50-minute session. Deep home music stuffed the room, which was dimly lit and bathed in lavender mild. About 20 girls, a lot of whom seemed like aspiring actors, knelt on the numbered panels whereas hinging on the waist and pulling a cable to execute a tricep press. They moved surprisingly slowly and intentionally, and the train obtained more and more tough. We’d been forewarned: A purple neon signal by the toilet glowed “It’s Not Pilates It’s Lagree.”
“Sliiiiide, ignite your core, use your butt cheeks,” teacher Sam Rabon mentioned. “Slower, deeper, a bit of extra intention!”
“It’s a complete bundle, very efficient,” Rabon informed me after class. “We have been standing up loads — positively not Pilates.”
Two days later, my thighs and glutes nonetheless ached.
Lagree now has 4 of his personal studios in L.A., in West Hollywood, Brentwood, Studio Metropolis and Santa Monica, and one in Miami. Seven hundred licensed studios — in 45 international locations — pay $3,990 yearly to make use of the Megaformer and educate the tactic (and that doesn’t embody the price of shopping for or leasing the machine).
“However there are such a lot of copycats on the market who don’t wish to pay for the license,” Lagree says. “They purchase copycat machines that don’t work as effectively and name it Pilates. ‘Oh, it’s Pilates, however extra intense.’ That’s the place the confusion is coming from, the individuals within the grey space.”
It’s not like Lagree hates the P-word — he thinks Pilates is efficacious, particularly for restorative functions.
“I’ve all the time promoted the advantages of Pilates,” he says. “I inform individuals you’ll get the very best outcomes for those who combine and match Pilates and Lagree.”
Then he sighs closely, including: “They’re simply completely different — we’re not Pilates.”
