04 Mar 7 Tips For Cross-Training Your Yoga Practice
When starting a new activity (or picking up an old one), mindfulness is key, as new muscle groups are being worked.
Here are 7 tips to consider when cross-training your yoga practice:
1. After two weeks, your body starts to lose previous ability you had.
2. During the first week after stopping a sport without injury, your body is improving and recovering from the training you had done.
3. If you are within the first two weeks of rest or just decided to take a short hiatus, you can go right back into your previous training schedule that worked for you if you weren’t getting injured. (Namaste)
4. If the activity is brand new, I always err on the side of caution. If the activity is Running or any other high impact sport, I err on the side of caution times 100! In other words: you need more rest to recover than you think.
5. My guidelines for my clients: If you are new to running, you get to run for up to 4 minutes the first day and then rest for 4 days with any strength training or Yoga you like that your body is accustomed.
a. The next time you run, you get to run for as much as 6 minutes and then (you guessed it) rest to recover again for 4 days while training.
b. Once you have done this for about a month, you can increase your time by up to five minutes per run and decrease to 3 days of recovery time.
c. After 6 months of 2 days of running per week and you have been doing this consistently and have NO pain at all, you can increase to 3 days per week of running but not in a row.
d. Time, distance, terrain, speed or type of running cannot be changed without decreasing the “dosage” of the run. Any change to the above four variables calls for a decrease in the other three.
6. When adding strength training to an existing Yoga practice, my guideline is simple: Don’t do yoga before using weights or resistance. Stretching, as it has been shown, diminishes your muscles ability to contract fully for up to 24 hours. So I always ask: “Can you stop stretching your body before training please?”
7. Expect changes to your practice. You may not be able to achieve mobility like you had before. You might lose balance or have less endurance in postures. This is normal, okay, not a problem and expected. Just respect your body and the new limitations and understand that any new type of exercise will increase soreness and will resolve with time and you will be back to your previous ability in Yoga in 3 to 6 months as long as you don’t push past your new limits.
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- 7 Things To Consider When Revisiting a Sport - May 1, 2017
- What pain should I get checked out? - April 5, 2017
- 7 Tips For Cross-Training Your Yoga Practice - March 4, 2017
Jenny Harkleroad
Posted at 19:58h, 07 MarchFor a Type A those are hard words to hear. Even after a major injury, it’s hard to proceed with that much caution but I do see the importance. Thanks for the reminder.