Hi guys, It’s Angelina here with a agues post on Yoga and Strength!
To follow up on the post Tim did on Yoga and Strength Training, I am going to offer my own perspective on how Yoga and Strength Training complements each other.
Why Yoga and Strength Training work so well together
I’ve been practising yoga for many years now, and am about to embark on my 500 hour Yoga Teacher Training, so today I’m going to list six ways in which Yoga and Strength Training complement each other perfectly.
Get Deeper into your Yoga Practice
I practised Yoga long before I did any strength training on a regular basis, but my physical practise improved significantly once I added in strength training. This makes sense: starting to incorporate deadlifts into my workout meant that my legs are stronger for warrior one and two, and doing a bit of bench press is bringing my chaturanga dandasana ever closer.
Keep injuries at bay
Yoga supports and strengthens our joints, which can help prevent injuries and imbalances that may arise from strength training alone.
If your goal is to stay youthful and vital, with a strong and supple body, yoga and strength training is the way to go. Yoga strengthens joints and connective tissues that can’t always keep up with increased strength in our muscles. Lifting progressively heavier weights puts extra strain on our joints (elbows and knees spring to mind here), but practising yoga gently and supportively strengthens these joints, so that we are more resilient to our weights workout.
A balanced approach
Something I often take for granted is having good balance, I’ve been practising balance poses for years and while I still fall sometimes (hey, no one’s perfect) I forget sometimes how far I’ve come. Starting out with a yoga class may challenge your balance for the first time in a while, but having better balance means that you fall less, and as we get older, this is a big consideration.
Yoga helps you deal with life
Health is not just how we look, and yoga benefits our mental health as well – especially if you find a good class that incorporates Pranayama (breath control practices) and Meditation as well as asana (the physical poses).
To only practice the physical asana is only scratching the surface of all the benefits yoga can bring. A good yoga practice will clear the mind and refresh us to tackle what’s going on in our lives off the mat.
Yoga can help calm an anxious mind and that is something I think most of us will benefit from.
Fill in the gaps
Weight training is great but can’t help with everything. It can lead to imbalances, injuries and doesn’t do much for joint mobility or flexibility. One could argue that isolated weights exercises don’t build functional strength.
A yoga practice can be strengthening in a functional way, however, it’s difficult to train our pulling muscles as effectively as we can in the gym, and if you’re looking to put on a lot of muscle, yoga alone probably won’t get you where you want to be.
Strength training often trains muscles while they are contracting, which is fine as long as we’re taking some time to stretch those muscles out at some point too. Yoga involves stretching but it
also strengthens our muscles in a different way. While holding an asana for an extended period of time, our muscles are in isometric contraction, meaning that they are working and strengthening while staying still. One is not necessarily better or more important to the other, but it does bring a balanced approach to the way we exercise and move our bodies.
As someone who is about to embark on Yoga Teacher Training, Tim has kindly been my guinea pig for some yoga sessions and I’ve seen how much benefit a yoga practice can bring to individuals who have been mainly training with weights for an extended period of time.
The beauty of practising yoga and strength training is that you get the benefits of both, while hopefully negating the short-comings of both.
Do you incorporate yoga and strength training into your weekly exercise routine? How have you found the combination of the two? Let us know.
More info on Yoga and Strength Training
If you desire more information on Yoga, please contact us and we can put you in touch with Angelina. There are two ways in which you can get in touch:
- Send an enquiry through the website contact form at the bottom of the homepage (https://www.foxwoodpersonaltraining.co.uk)
- Send us a DM on the Foxwood Personal Training Instagram page
If you desire more information on Strength Training, you should check out the personal training page on this website.
Yoga and Strength
Please do bear in mind that Yoga is no longer a service we formally provide here at Foxwood Personal Training. The three primary services are: Personal Training, Sports Massage and Running Coaching. All services are either delivered in York or Online.