Thursday, April 10, 2014

Exercise Diary: Surrendered to Yoga

Today was yoga day.  I almost didn't make it.  It was a long ass day of talks, experiments, more talks, more experiments, and annoying logistics with my PI.  I didn't eat well either.  Had a big breakfast of chicken pot pie because after waking up I was just absolutely starved.  Then they served coffee and cookies at every talk, so I didn't eat lunch until 3pm.  And I couldn't eat too much for the fear of doing yoga on a full stomach (I had that happen once, it was so terrible.  My goal for that day was to not throw up on my mat).

Anyways, I did make to yoga, and happily found the class only half full, which meant more space for the rest of us.

The class itself today was... brutal.  It's only been less than a week since my last class, and theoretically the gap wouldn't affect my performance.  But I was just tired today.  There were a lot of crescent lunges that were really hard on my legs, and after keeping the lunge pose until I almost gave out the instructor made us move to a warrior III, which is like warrior I, but with only one leg on the mat.  It was just too much.  My balance today was terrible too.  I couldn't keep a good dance pose, and I couldn't do a good tree pose.  Oh well, we all have terrible days.

My biggest realization today was that in order to keep high and low push-up poses more effortlessly, you must engage your legs and core more.  Which made sense since a lot of the core strengthening work-outs are push-up variations, like the plank.  When you engage your core as you attempt to keep a high or low push-up pose, it's so much easier and less tiring and less pressure on the wrists.  See, this is why I go to yoga classes instead of just messing around on my own at home.


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