A little yoga

Tonight I decided I wanted a little stretching.  My arms and legs were a little sore from yesterday's Turbo Sculpt.  I opted to try my new yoga video by my favorite trainer, Tony Horton.  The video was Ho' Ala ke Kino, "Awaken the Body".

This was a short, 30 minute yoga routine with Tony on the beach in Hawaii.  So, initially, the peaceful ocean and Hawaiian mountains put me in a nice relaxed mood to get me to focus on the workout ahead.

The first 10 minutes or so of the workout included stretching.  I know my arms were thanking me for this.  You just stretch and breath, setting a nice relaxed pace to keep you relaxed.  The muscles really start to open up.

The next few minutes are a warm up.  Here my heart rate starts to increase.  The warm up consisted of some really light cross punches and squat kicks.  You really focus on the legs during the warm up.   I was actually starting to feel a little burn in the legs.   The warm up is 4 moves that start to loosen your joints and start to increase your heart rate.

Now we move into the real yoga section of the workout.  This is very good for beginners.  The main moves consist of a few "push-ups" between downward dog and plank and cobra.  From these basic positions you move continuously into warrior pose 1, warrior pose 2, and triangle.   This starts slow then becomes more of a power yoga segment.  He really ups the pace of the moves.  I know as I went into the final stretching section I was dripping with sweat!  I was not expecting that considering its yoga and only a half hour.

The final few minutes were stretching and a cool down.  Again, my legs really thanked me for the stretch after a nice week of jamming!  

I would recommend this yoga video to any beginner.  Its all basic moves and none of them require a ton of balance.  It definitely can help improve your flexibility and will increase your balance.  It offers a good stretch while keeping your heart rate up!  I think if you are a more advanced yoga person, you may end up looking for more.  But, for a quick half hour yoga, this has my vote!  I will use this as my stepping stone to get to the YogaX in P90X.  That workout requires a lot more balance, focus, and strength.  YogaX is an hour and a half and takes a lot more patience to get through.