IS IT REALLY A STRETCH TO CONSIDER YOGA A WORKOUT?
What yoga does do is offer a chance to disconnect from the hard pace of everyday life and connect to something in short supply.
Many happy practitioners credit yoga with improving their health and fitness. And a growing number of studies suggest there’s some science behind their satisfaction. But while yoga may offer some hope for improved joint health, there’s still plenty of debate about its ability to improve fitness.
Among experts, it’s generally accepted that it takes 150 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise or 75 minutes of vigorous exercise a week to realize fitness and health benefits. So yoga fanatics must ask themselves whether they’re performing at moderate or vigorous intensity.
Admittedly, yoga is rooted in mindful practice rather than focusing solely on putting the body through its paces. But over the last couple of decades, yoga has crossed over into the fitness realm, with adherents claiming it to be a viable exercise option.
To determine if yoga is a workout worthy of exercise status, Enette Larson-Meyer from the department of family and consumer sciences at the University of Wyoming, reviewed 17 studies on the energy cost of yoga.
She concluded that “yoga is not typically practised at an intensity that meets the (American College of Sports Medicine/ American Heart Association) recommendations for moderateintensity aerobic exercise and it is on average less aerobically intense than brisk walking.”
She also revealed that performing yoga in a hot room doesn’t result in a boost in intensity, contrary to the suggestion that practices like Bikram and Moksha are better calorie burners than yoga performed in more temperate conditions. In fact, LarsonMeyer suggests that heart rate is “disproportionately higher” during yoga and shouldn’t be considered a valuable measure of exercise intensity.
Before these findings spark outrage among hard-core yogis, Larson-Meyer also noted several studies which suggested boosting the pace of the practice and adding more challenging poses can raise its intensity to the moderate zone. Jumping, instead of stepping, from pose to pose and performing a full pushup when moving in and out of the plank position during the sun salutation sequence (a continuous flow of 12 standing and balancing poses that call upon most of the body’s major muscle groups) transforms yoga into a workout. Other poses like standing head to knee, standing bow, triangle and balancing stick also increased the intensity from light to moderate.
“These findings highlight that Surya Namaskar (the sun salutation sequence) can be practised in such a way to achieve an aerobically intense effort but also slowed to result in a light- to moderate-intensity effort,” said Larson-Meyer.
It’s possible experienced yogis may practise at a greater intensity than novices, as they are able to take poses through a larger range of motion that demands more energy. It could also be argued that their expertise affords greater flexibility, which makes it less demanding to fully express the more challenging yoga poses.
The results of Larson-Meyer’s review shouldn’t be of concern to those who consider yoga their “anti-workout.” For many, it’s the lack of intensity that makes yoga such a valuable tool in buffering the physical effects of an active lifestyle. Add the studies showing yoga can improve athletic performance in runners and other athletes who include it in their training regimen, and there’s reason to believe intensity isn’t the best measure of yoga’s value.
Those who spend more time sitting than sweating also count on yoga to beat back some of the ill effects of day after day spent in a chair. A light-intensity workout that improves muscular strength and endurance and balance in those unaccustomed to physical activity has its place on the exercise spectrum. And when it comes to juggling the responsibilities of work, home and relationships, yoga has shown potential to reduce stress.
But for those who claim yoga can be all things to all people, Larson-Meyer’s review is a reminder that no one workout does it all. Yoga won’t improve your aerobic fitness, and hot yoga doesn’t ramp up a normal practice. What yoga does do is offer a chance to disconnect from the hard pace of everyday life and connect to something in short supply: an inner peace that comes with allowing the mind and body to flow seamlessly from movement to movement without the need to compete, challenge yourself or strive for perfection.