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| Hi everyone!
I have been practicing Hatha Yoga for about 2 years now. For the first 1.5 years I attended a class. Over the past 6 months I have been really interested in developing a personal practice and have been doing the yoga at home. I'm starting to make some real progress with this. I'm now doing yoga 5 to 6 days a week and experimenting with different kinds of routines depending on what other physical exercise I did that day.
During the past 1.5 years I have also been doing twice a week strength training. Of course this helped my yoga tremendously as I gained the strength to do things like very slow Chaturangas and one-armed plank, etc. Yoga was also a good restorative for the strength training.
Now I am coming to believe that I should be able to use yoga to maintain and even to continue to build my muscles without needing the gym training or free weights. In a few months we will be traveling on a permanent basis, and I won't have access to my personal trainer or the gym anymore. I'm now thinking of relying on yoga to fulfill the strength training need.
I recently got the Yoga Step-by-Step DVDs from Yoga Journal - and I cannot believe the arms and shoulders on the instructor Natasha Rizopoulis. She is amazingly strong! Do you think she got that upper body strength from yoga? This is part of what is convincing me that yoga may be the way to go for me.
What to you all think?
Audrey |
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| Wonderful Audrey. Best Luck to you.
Neel Kulkarni
www.authenticyoga.org |
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| Hi Neel, thanks for the welcome. Do you think it's possible to use Yoga to maintain muscle and even to continue to build it?
Audrey |
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| audreyh1 - 2005-01-21 10:23 AM
Hi Neel, thanks for the welcome. Do you think it's possible to use Yoga to maintain muscle and even to continue to build it?
Audrey
Welcome, Audrey.
Bodyweight resistance training is extremely effective in building and maintaining muscle (look at yogis and gymnasts). Yoga is an extremely safe and healthy form of bodyweight training. If your goal is to have a body like Natasha Rizopoulos, consider eating properly, doing a lot of yoga and play!
By "play" I mean go out and dance, run, jump around and have fun. Learn and play new sports or activities. Exposing your body to fun activities and NEW activities is a great stimulus and essential for your wellbeing.
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| Dear Audrey: Yes, definitely. If you do the Yoga to the extent of the capcity of a particular part, the muscles related to that activity will be maintained as long as you take good diet and rest. And, if you want to build them, you should exceed that capacity by small amount. There is NO end to this building if you follow it regularly.
Neel Kulkarni
www.authenticyoga.org |
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| Thanks! Good comments about diet and rest needed too - of course! Fortunately I am in good places on both. I know not to push myself too far and allow rest for the body to heal after it is challenged.
Play - haha! That was fun. My poor knees can't handle the impact of jogging, running, jumping, but my favorite form of play is long hikes in the wild as I am a major nature enthusiast. At times I also carry heavy camera equipment. I am 45 years old. I plan on doing long hikes until I am ancient, and building and maintaining fitness now is the foundation I am trying to create so that I can enjoy the wild outdoors until I am very old.
Thanks for all the great responses! I will continue to build on my yoga repertoire to challenge all those muscles.
Audrey |
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| As an older yogi, I've found that while I can build good muscle with yoga, especially in my legs, it's not the same way as you build them doing weights. I've hand knee and shoulder injuries, and the only way I can maintain them is to do the specific band and weight exercises recommended by my physical therapist. Yoga's great, and it's my primay exercise, but I find I have to do at least some weight lifting to maintain the muscles that I built up by lifting. Yoga builds muscle long and strong, weight lifting builds the muscles short and strong.
I gave up bench presses for a few months to see if yoga would build enough strength. Oh, Man when I tred to bench press the same weight I was really sore the first few times. It built back up up quickly but it was enough to convince me not to abandon weight lifting entirely.
So for me a balance of both yoga and some weights is necessary.
Edited by MrD 2005-01-24 4:35 PM
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| MrD - 2005-01-24 4:28 PM
Yoga builds muscle long and strong, weight lifting builds the muscles short and strong.
That's a myth! Muscle shape (long or short) is determined primarily by genetics.
Weight training is good, but it doesn't necessarily equate with bigger or stronger muscles than bodyweight exercises. Most gymnasts do NO weight training and have extremely big, strong and flexible muscles.
There are many other variables that determine size and strength of muscles such as protein intake and type, speed and intensity of training.
In exercises that have similar functions such as benchpress vs. pushups, you are probably going to find greater strength gains with pushups until your benchpress exceeds your bodyweight. Nonetheless, pushups have a greater neurological stimulus on the body because more muscles are recruited in the legs and core. Therefore, the pushups have a better crossover to athletic activities because athletics involve coordination of major muscle groups as opposed to isolation of prime movers.
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| Good points, YogaGuy! I would have to especially agree with the genetics part. Some people just aren't built to be the next Mr. Olympia. To elaborate on this point, just look at all the different body types that exist. For example, if one's body type is an ectomorph (if you don't know what an ectomorph is, it's generally someone who has a long slender body--think beanpole), it's going to be a lot harder for that person to build Arnold Schwarzenegger-ish muscles than a mesomorph (a naturally muscular body type). I'm not saying it's not impossible for an ectomorph to gain large, bulky muscles, it's just probably going to be harder for that person than a mesomorph. Another example along these lines of genetics: Why do you think some people can eat whatever they want and never gain an ounce, while other people can just look at a pie and practically gain 10 pounds? Genetics--well not totally, but it plays a big part in the whole picture. |
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New poster - Yoga for Strength
