Yin Yoga – a type of yoga practice that all athletes should do - PN JONE | Premier Fitness Apparel
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Yin Yoga – a type of yoga practice that all athletes should do

Yin Yoga – a type of yoga practice that all athletes should do

As an athlete, sore muscles is no stranger to you.  Injuries and over extension could also be issues, whether you are doing endurance training all the way to weight lifting.  As a new or veteran athlete, most likely we all have experienced one of these things.  There is something we can do that would minimize our prone to injury – and that is yin yoga.

Yin yoga is a type of yoga that is gentle, yet challenging.  It allows us to drop into our own bodies, and be present and in the moment with everything that arises, both mentally and physically.  Yin yoga is a seated, grounding practice where we hold poses for three to five minutes in order to mobilize our joints and ligaments.  This type of yoga will allow us as athletes to work deeper into our muscles and transform the way our bodies move.

Western yoga has students working their power muscles, also known as their yang muscles.  This is very similar to what an athlete could be training regularly with.  When practicing yin yoga, we relax into our postures and the routine is more passive rather than active.  This allows us to work through deep connective tissue and fascia in our bodies.  Fascia is what holds us together – a thin sheath of fibrous tissue enclosing a muscle or other organ.

Practicing yin yoga allows us as athletes to find stillness in our minds and bodies.  Because the poses are held much longer than a yang (power muscle) class, we will begin to notice more things in our minds and bodies.  This could be new sensations in our hips all the way to thoughts about experiences in our lives.  Yin lets our physical as well as our mental emotions rise up and release through these passive movements.

Yin yoga can be practiced anywhere – at home or in a structured class environment.  However, we recommend starting in a class to get the basics down.  A teacher can help us hold poses and notice things in them that we might not notice at home, alone.  When you get to practice at home, there are some postures in particular that will help:

 

Reclining Twist

This could also be called the supine twist.  It restores our back muscles, spine and abdominal muscles.  Make sure both shoulders are firmly on the ground, so you are not twisting from your lower back.

Square

This is a seated pose that will deeply open and stretch your outer hips.  The shins stacked on top of one another allows us to stretch even deeper by folding forward.

Saddle

This is a great stretch for getting into the quadriceps.  We open our sacrum-lumbar arch which is beneficial for athletes and those of us that stand and/or walk a lot.

Melting Heart

This is a great pose for after weight training – it will relieve the tightness in our shoulders and strengthen the spine as well.  It will also bring more flexibility to our upper and mid-back.

After working these routines into your daily yoga exercises you will enjoy the boost they give you to your body and mind!

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