Hot Yoga
by Kapi Mana News, 18 January 2012
Several days after my first hot yoga class, I’m still hearing all about it from my body – and more unexpectedly, I still feel refreshed from it. The good aches remind me I’ve stretched and worked my body in ways it feels it should be stretched and worked out.
Hot yoga is a relatively recent American addition to the ancient practice of yoga and refers to the temperature it’s practised in – not the hotness of the practitioners. Though if this class was anything to judge by, hot yoga seems to be very good for the physique. Instructor Gabrielle Harris agrees, and says while her practice, at the Abundance studios at Cityfitness in Porirua and Thorndon Quay, Wellington, is a natural progression for people already attending the gym who are usually reasonably fit, the hot power vinyasa yoga she teaches is suitable for any age or level and particularly good for developing long lean limbs. "It’s quite active, it’s quite a strong practice, and does include some long deep-held poses, but it’s quite a safe practice," she says. The theory is that higher temperatures of up to 36 degrees stimulate the body to sweat and eliminate toxins, and help your joints to ease deeper into poses. Within 10 minutes of starting the 90-minute class, I can vouch for the amount of wet stuff being eliminated and running down my face. The ladies at the counter checked as I came in that I had water with me, and I am grateful that I do. I should disclose that I didn’t make it all the way through the marathon class. Ms Harris says it’s not uncommon for new students to feel they need to keep up with the rest of the class, and push themselves too far, but she encourages all students to work intelligently to their own limits. "We encourage people to just work at their own pace and to make modifications if it suits their body, because it is a strenuous practice and they need their body to adjust to it – everyone’s just doing their own thing."
The class works smoothly through sequences of asanas, or poses, called aloud by Ms Harris. Each pose requires concentrated effort to hold it, but not strain. Ms Harris gently works her way around the class while calling the routines, guiding students into the right postures, which require every part of the body to be engaged; shoulders held back and open, neck tall, back extended. Talking to her afterwards she compares the intensity of the class to a spin workout, saying that while it is gentle it is a very strong practice, and can burn up to 700 calories in a class. But she is also enthusiastic about the mental and emotional benefits yoga offers. "When people first come in here it’s just the physical body moving, and later they realise there’s other layers and levels they can go to, even being aware of their breathing or seeing other things – having questions in their life.
Yoga practitioners believe that when you have an emotional or a mental issue it gets stored in the body... like you store tension in your neck, so through yoga you can release some of that physical tension and hopefully we can translate that to some mental and emotional areas of our life; we should just feel like there’s some little shift, some way of transforming us." I left feeling refreshed and thinking of ways to do more good things like this for my body and soul in the new year.
