A ladder barrel's journey

When finalizing plans to move to the current studio on Forum in 2017, I wanted to add a ladder barrel to the equipment list at Limitless Pilates, a step closer to a fully equipped Pilates studio. But I couldn’t justify the cost at the time. Moving to a larger space and almost tripling the monthly costs/overhead already made me a little nervous. It wasn’t the time to dip into the old savings for more equipment. Very few clients were beating down the door to get some time on the barrel or even knew that the barrel existed. Adding a ladder barrel wasn’t going to bring in more clients or revenue, so I put those plans aside for the time being.

Shelley joined me in the fall of 2018 and brought with her a trapeze table (technically a trap/reformer combo, which is even better). The business was in a financially stable place to add some equipment. At this point, I wasn’t sure where to put the ladder barrel. Studio was already pretty full with four reformers and a combo chair in the larger room and a trap table and another chair in the private room. Not the time to add a 2ft X 4ft X 3ft piece of equipment. I could now afford a barrel, but couldn’t find space for it.

Spring of 2022, my good buddy Lisa is looking to scale back her Pilates equipment collection. She was looking to sell a MOTR, orbit, an arc, aaaaaaaand a ladder barrel! I was happy to take the equipment off her hands. The barrel is from 2009 or before (probably, I forgot to ask and haven’t called in the serial number yet). She’s still in great shape despite her somewhat lengthy journey to get to mid-Missouri.

Lisa bought the barrel when she was living in Denver and took it with her when she transplanted to Missoula. Lisa was kind enough to bring the barrel back to Denver spring of 2022 for me. It sat in Uncle Joe’s garage for a few months, guarded by the three wise men (and their sledge hammer? The wise men took really good care of the Pilates equipment. Looks like a thief got to that bike tire though, must be impervious to frankincense) until the Morgans made a trip to Colorado to pick it up.

If you’re wondering, the ladder barrel (and orbit, and MOTR and arc) and four Morgans with a week's worth stuff fit in/on the Durango for the trip back to Columbia. The barrel lived in the kitchen for a few weeks. Most of the equipment at Limitless Pilates has taken a pass through the kitchen bump out before arriving at its final destination in the studio.

So far client feedback has been enthusiastic. The hamstring, quad, piriformis stretches are by far the favorites, as well as the short box variations. A few clients nailed the walkover, too! We had to move one of the chairs out to make room for the barrel. There’s a chance she might not stay if it feels too crowded or I get sick of moving it around.

I’ve really enjoyed visiting some hand stand/upside down stuff that had been missing from my life these days. Here's a time lapse of a few exercises and an accidental slo-mo of the walkover. Showing my age, I hit slo mo instead of time lapse when recording the first time. After re-recording, I got a little light-headed and dizzy from all the upside down/flippy-dos that this 45 year old bod wasn't quite used to (and I was a couple weeks out from Covid, too).

Unrelated, I made a ped-o-pull as well. More to come on that. Still figuring out how to use it. No formal training, more of a self-taught, no lessons situation.

Unrelated again, MOTR teacher training August 26-28. Click here for more details and to register.