Controversial article
I don’t read the Ashtanga News blog as much as I’d like to, but this article caught my attention because of my interest with fitness. The Mild to Moderate Physiological Benefit of Asana article caused a little controversy as you can see in the comments, 8 comments so far, ok, so that’s not so many compared to some 100+ comments I’ve read in other blogs I frequent (non-Ashtanga blogs), but definitely more than I get for one of my uninteresting, whinging posts about “oh poor me, I can’t do [insert asana name] because bla-bla-bla…”.
Anyway, back to the topic on hand.
The main study discussed used Iyengar yoga, which I believe everyone would agree, is a whole different ball park than Ashtanga yoga. The only results of any interest to me was Tracy’s own results of her Mysore-style practice:
“My heart rate averaged 104 beats per minute and I was in my heart rate zone for only 14 minutes in a 75 minute practice (through Navasana). I burned 104 calories.”
Not saying I’m dismissing the Iyengar yoga study results, but as Susan said, apples and oranges. Whether one should/needs to/wants to add cardiovascular exercise to their existing “fitness” kind of all depends on what yoga is to them. Everyone’s an individual, and we all take different things from yoga at different times of our lives. Personally, I’m not much of a mathead in the sense of “steadfastly refuses to “do” cardio and weight training”, but to each his (or her) own.
The article got me thinking about whether I should be adding in some cardiovascular exercise in addition to my yoga. I think to only way to know is for me is to measure my own heart rate statistics, and this is what I plan to do.
I’m going to need a heart rate monitor. Those things aren’t exactly a dime a dozen, a.k.a cheap. So I’m looking on eBay (Yes, I’m an “eBay queen”, or so says my siblings) to see if I can get a decent one at a more “reasonable” price.
I’m kind of excited about this experiment now, but I’ll have to wait about a week to get started.
Sue…don’t get sucked in….my own teacher tells me that he discourges newer students from participating regularly in activities that tighten up the leg joints and leg muscles (running, blading, biking, for example) because they undo the work that is being done by Ashtanga. I am quite sure that he wouldn’t suggest something that would be bad for his students’ health - i.e., eliminating cardio. I don’t know about you, but my practice is VERY vigorous and I am way more “in” an exercising heart rate than when I used to jog/run. The only way I could run/jog continuously was to go slow enough to keep the heart rate down. I find myself perplexed by what Tracy wrote. And I want to remind you (and me) that she is one person, and she recorded her results on ONE DAY. Talk about anecdotal evidence!!
Lauren
I did the same test and came to the same conclusions - But I bet doing lots of good paced sun salutations would raise your heart rate a lot more!
My practice is very vigorous, but I don’t know if I’m “in” that exercising heart rate or not. That would be why I want to test myself. I’ll only be adding in the cardio work if the test results show that me, my body, my particular circumstance, suggests it’s *severely* lacking. Honestly, I’m not much of a cardio freak (it was my least favourite activity at the gym), but I do like to keep fit enough to keep up with my partner when we go on our “adventure” holidays.
As for the tightening up of the leg joints… I think it won’t be so bad if I continue to practice Ashtanga every day, and “do” cardio exercises a couple of times a week. Again, this would be an experiment for me. I hear so much about tight runner’s hips etc, what if the runner already does Ashtanga, but then continues to go running at the same time? Would their hips continue to get tight regardless of the “opening” they get from Ashtanga practice? I would imagine, if anything, their progress with hip opening would be slower, but I can’t imagine it would go backwards?
I’ve got naturally open hips (so I’ve been told, I’m hypermobile, my physio calls it) and I’m not too worried about losing poses because I’ve lost all of the lotus position asanas already.
CJ, that’s a good idea actually, instead of traditional cardio exercises like jogging (or in my case, it would by biking), I could do lots of sun salutations, I do love them after all. Again, we’ll see how I go once I get the heart rate monitor and some numbers together.
As I said, this experiment is really solely for me, myself, and I. The results aren’t really meant for anyone else to act upon.
Thanks for your thoughts, Lauren and CJ.