Round 7: Day 26: Yoga

Yogapalooza continues this week, with Patience "Hummingbird" yoga, courtesy of Tony Horton. I didn't get enough sleep last night (Yankees vs. Twins!), and woke up a bit on the late side this morning. Not wanting to miss my daily stretch, I decided to select the shortest yoga DVD in my collection. Short it may be (who's talking here, Yoda?), but it still gets the job done.

In contrast to Yoga X, which moves at a fairly quick pace by comparison, this practice minimizes the number of poses, but requires you to hold each pose for rather a long time. I wouldn't say that it taxes your patience; rather, it gives you the opportunity to really give your body a great stretch, the chance to synchronize your breath with the movements, and plenty of time to clear your mind, focus on the present, and calm yourself. I was a little stiff this morning from some of the balance postures of yesterday, and holding my poses for extended periods of time allowed me to work out those kinks.

Hopefully, playoff baseball won't impart so much bodily strain and mental distress, but I'm not counting on that. At least there's yoga to help counter the impact of seeing your favourite teams go down the drain.

Round 7: Day 25: Yoga

Continuing with my week of stretching, I took up the second half of Yoga X, having done the first half yesterday. This is the first time I've done this, although I've seen on the web that many others have tried before, usually due to lack of time or lack of patience. My excuse today was lack of time.

It's not the best idea to do just the 2nd half of Yoga X. A better idea would be to to the first half, which involves stretches and moving options. The second half, consisting of balance postures, some stretches, and Yoga Belly 7 (abdominal exercises) is best pursued having first seriously warmed up your body. Entering into this venture cold could result in injury by overstretching. Conscious of that possibility, I made sure not to push my body past the point of no return. When I felt resistance, I stopped, breathed, and tried to go a few millimetres farther, but without risking injury.

Similar to yesterday, I found the second half of this DVD fairly easy to get through, in spite of the fact that I hadn't done it in quite some time. I think that the other yoga DVDs in my collection have proven to be adequate substitutes for Yoga X and, although they lack the length of Yoga X and in some cases, some of the intensity, regular practice has made me sufficiently supple and flexible to pick up Yoga X and complete it with relative ease. The exception might be Wheel pose, which has always been difficult as my spine doesn't seem to want to bend into a reverse-U form, and the Warrior pose with the hand grab behind the back. While I can still do this pose, I always find it difficult to grab my hand, one side presenting more problems than the other. Similarly, seated spinal stretch is tough. It goes to show you that taking care of your spine is really important.

Having had so much fun, I think I'll return to Yoga X on a more frequent basis. It's nice to remember that it's there to add variety.

Round 7: Day 24: Yoga

Following eye surgery yesterday, the doctor advised that I should avoid working out aggressively for about a week; thankfully, this is Recovery Week, so workouts tend to be lighter than normal anyway. I've decided that I'll dedicate the remainder of the week to stretching and yoga, and dispense with core work or anything strenuous which might cause my eyeballs to pop out of my pointy little head.

I picked up Yoga X (from P90X) today, not having done it in recent memory. Unfortunately, I didn't have time for the full 1.5h practice, so I did the moving options which last for about 48 minutes. It seems to me that compared to the One on One DVDs, Yoga X moves along at quite a rapid clip. I prefer to take my time with the vinyasas, engaging in a full stretch and lingering in its benefits. Also, taking longer in downward dog gives you a bit of a breather and offers an opportunity to stretch out your calves and achilles tendons.

Having said that, I do feel that Yoga X isn't as hard as I recalled it to be. I realize that I only did half the practice, but I find that the first half is more difficult than the second half. I used to huff and puff and sweat profusely through the first half; now, no longer. I'll take that as a sign of improvement.

I'm looking forward to continuing my stretches over the course of the week.

Round 7: Day 23: Run

My posts are a little out of joint, as I'm playing catch-up by posting a few days at a time. I talked about yoga, yesterday's exercise, but included some of today's news. I'm just out of it a bit.

Anyhow, I forgot to mention that today's exercise was a good, stiff run, prior to having my eye procedure. I was really nervous all week in anticipation of the procedure, and didn't sleep well last night due to stress. I thought that a solid run would really help to relax my body and mind. My body was a bit tight this morning, and I didn't feel as though my running motion was particularly fluid. I could see my shadow cast by the streetlights, and it seemed to me that my upper body had more motion than it probably should have had. It was an interesting feeling, running in the darkness a few moments before daylight. I find that time to be particularly calming, as the stresses of the day (read: eye surgery) haven't yet kicked in. My mind wandered all over the place, picking up remnants of tunes from I don't know where, and thinking about emails and telephone calls. I wasn't able to clear it of thought and stay in the moment, yoga-style, but I was certainly distracted mentally during the duration of the run. Before I knew it, the run was over, although I was about 30 seconds longer than I would have liked to have been. I guess the distractions resulted in the additional time.

On the other hand, the run served me well, helping to dissipate the pent-up energy I'd been holding in for the past few days. When it came time for the eye procedure, I was nervous, but I had an idea about how to control my body's stress. I don't panic at an elevated heart rate, because I know it's been much higher than it was during the procedure, and I know that won't last forever. A little deep breathing, a relaxing of the body overall, and allowing the mind to drift was all I needed to get by. There are certainly benefits to regular exercise.

Round 7: Day 22: Yoga

It's been tough gaining access to a computer over the past few days, so I've missed a few posts. In that time, I've completed a few runs. The weather is still cooperating for now, so I'm trying to stay outside as much as possible.

Commencing the Phase 1 Recovery Week, I engaged in yoga. To be honest, I wasn't particularly keen on yoga, so I picked the short disc (Patience, Hummingbird). I guess I'll have to work on the "Patience" portion a little harder. The practice does move quickly; actually, the practice moves slowly, but the time passes quickly, so by the time I finished, I was really happy that I decided to do something, rather than nothing at all. It does sometimes amaze me at how well I feel after a workout, in spite of the fact that I didn't feel motivated to work out at all. The important thing is to put in a DVD and hit the Play button, regardless of how you feel.

I'm still working out some kinks in my neck, left over from a slight strain from the last time I did Diamond Delts. These little strains, aches and pains are really starting to become a nuisance. I'm looking forward to just feeling really fit and ready to tackle the challenges of the day. It's been about 5 weeks since I last felt that way.

The other day, I bumped into an old friend who told me that he's still playing touch football on the weekends. I gave up football about 15 years ago, and have had regrets since. I also gave up playing baseball about 3 years ago when I was experiencing pain in my hip flexors and couldn't effectively field a ground ball anymore. Since then, I've done numerous rounds of P90X and similar high-intensity exercises, coupled with a lot of stretching. My hips now have full mobility, although my baseball playing is limited to catch with my son in the local park. Football, however, really intrigued me. With all the running I've been doing over the last few months and the strength training I've undertaken with Plyometrics and Insanity, I think I could take on football again. I'll find out in a couple of weeks, when I attend my first game. With some trepidation, I'm really looking forward to it. At least I know that I'm in better shape than my friend, so I'm optimistic that I'll be able to keep up with the group. Another side benefit of doing the X.

Yoga has taught me to calm myself and to de-stress. Today, I had a minor surgical procedure on my eye which, for some, is no big deal, but I'm ridiculously squeamish about anything having to do with eyes. I can't even subject myself to eyedrops. I don't even want to talk about eyes. Anyhow, I had a procedure on my eye and was in the process of completely freaking out when, I thought of yoga. I was able to calm myself by taking deep, cleansing breaths, got my heart rate to normal, relaxed my entire body, and just cleared out my mind. Before I knew it, the procedure was over, and I'm in the process of recovering. Yoga really helped.

As a result of that procedure, I'll be taking it really easy this week, as I've been warned to stay away from heavy, aggressive lifting. So, being Recovery Week anyway, I'll spend extra time stretching and doing yoga. My hamstrings could use some love and attention.