Yogis come in all shapes and sizes, but the one thing they all have in common is that they swear by the benefits of a Yoga practice. If you’re toying with the idea of trying a Yoga class at your club or have seen one of our online workouts, you might be interested in a few of the benefits of Yoga.
Get bendy: Improved flexibility is one of the most obvious benefits of a Yoga practice. You won’t be able to wrap your leg around your head while standing when starting out. Let’s face it, touching your toes is also going to be a challenge for most of us. BUT, over time with each session and pose your overall flexibility will improve. Trust the process.
Get stronger: Yoga helps you build muscle strength throughout the body. You will use your own body weight in this practise and you will get stronger over time. It’s also a great complementary exercise for those who like a bit of heavy lifting in our strength training zones because Yoga doesn’t isolate muscles like you would tend to on leg day, arm day etc. It offers a lower impact total body workout.
Improve your posture: We all spend far too much time slumped over our keyboards. The conversation around being seated all day isn’t a new one, so we know that it can have a negative effect on our posture. This often leads to back, neck and other muscle and joint pains. Research has shown that regular practice of Yoga can help with this. It’’s not going to happen over night, but if you are committed to including Yoga into your workout schedule, it won’t be long before you feel like you are walking taller.
Improve your health: Yoga, like all exercise, has amazing health benefits when practiced regularly. Yoga can help lower your resting heart rate as well as increase endurance. This, along with deeper breathing, helps to improve the oxygen levels within the body. Studies have also shown that improved deeper sleep is another great by-product of Yoga. Improved sleep obviously means happier you! This in turn will decrease your stress levels.
Improve your performance: Marathon runner? Cyclist? Long-distance swimmer? Average Joe? Yoga is for you. Ask any performance athlete that regularly practises Yoga about its benefits for their particular sport and you’ll hear things like it targets parts of my body neglected by my training regime, it reduces the propensity for injury, aids in recovery time, really works the mind-body connection needed for endurance. The list goes on. Yoga is an excellent ingredient to any athlete’s exercise mix.
We could go on and on about the benefits of a Yoga practice, but you’ve got Asanas to get to! Book a class or go and try one of our online classes now.
📷Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash