Pro-Sports

On Sunday, I managed to squeeze in half and hour of Rodney Yee’s “Flexibility” workout from the Strength and Flexibility DVD.  Once again, the constrast between the level of difficulty between Rodney Yee’s beginner workouts compared to those from Yoga Zone is quite plainly obvious.  Or perhaps it was more challenging because it falls under the category of “Power Yoga”.

You may wonder what flexibility has to do with power and Yee explains it all on his DVD.  Effectively what he believes is that power on its own has limited use if the range of movements you can utilise it is also restricted.  Therefore if you combine flexibility with power, you have more power?  I suppose I can see how that works from a climbing perspective.  If you’re just strong but not flexible enough to reach the next hold then all your strength is pretty much useless isn’t it?

Anyway, I digress… For a flexibility workout, I was expecting it to be light and easy.  I guess I should realise by now that nothing from Rodney Yee is “light and easy”.  It was certainly a lot less strenuous compared with his other workouts, however.

Last week I managed to complete 5 workout sessions which is still in keeping with my goals at Go Workout Mom.  My real challenge begins this week when I fly down to Melbourne tomorrow.  Already I’ve missed my workout today because I’ve been busy running last minute errands and packing and tomorrow’s pretty much gone because I’ll be on the plane (plus, I’ll have lost another three hours from the time difference).  And, well, let’s not kid ourselves here - holiday trips are notorious for throwing a spanner in the works when trying to maintain a regular workout schedule. 

I might have brought along a couple of yoga DVDs and made plans to use my Dad’s rowing machine, but I’m not fool enough to promise anything.  I’ll let you know in two weeks how I go.  My parents have dial-up (which is so weird considering my Dad’s is a computer nut) so I don’t think I’ll be doing too much blogging over the next two weeks either.

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It’s that time of the month so I decided to take it easy yesterday with a lighter workout. There are some recommendations on poses you should avoid when menstruating and specific poses which are designed to ease cramps but I’m not sure which ones. Something to look into there…

The theory behind abstaining from practicing certain yoga poses is because your body is already under stress and applying yourself to the tougher poses adds more strain to a system that is already under tension. There is nothing to say that you can’t continue to practice those poses, however, the decision is an individual one that should be made based on personal well-being. If you feel up to it, by all means, go for it. Just remember to listen to your body.

Yoga Zone’s Conditioning and Stress Release sounded like the perfect workout for an easy day and indeed it was. It was more like a yoga stretching exercise that ran for nearly 55 minutes. Intended for beginners, this workout really is a stark contrast to Rodney Yee’s beginner workouts. It was so slow I found myself yawning through it a couple of times and was starting to feel sleepy. I don’t think I’ll be trying this one again unless I’ve been doing a really tough workout the day before and need an easy day.

This DVD is great if you have no idea about Yoga and want an easy introduction into the moves. I had to play the whole DVD in silence because Gavin was sleeping so I honestly can’t comment, but it does seem like the instructor gives a detailed explanation for each movement which I am sure will be beneficial to a yoga newby.

Personally, though, I prefer a more challenging workout. If it weren’t for the time constraints and being at that time of the month, I probably would have continued with another workout.

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Yesterday, I decided to continue the strength training and did about 30 minutes of Power Yoga - Strength and Flexibility.  I decided to try a new workout just to get a taste for Rodney Yee’s teaching style.

The Power Yoga - Strength and Flexibility DVD by Rodney Yee runs for about an hour and is divided into two parts - Power Yoga for Strength and Power Yoga for Flexibility (each workout running slightly under half an hour).  I only did the workout for strength so I can’t comment on the flexibility workout.  I will do a follow-up once I’ve tried the second part of the the workout.

I managed to squeeze in half an hour of yoga after dinner (admitedly not exactly the ideal time to do yoga, but hey, when you’ve got a toddler, “ideal timing” doesn’t really factor).  I’ve heard somewhere (probably at the start of one of the yoga DVDs I have) that you shouldn’t practice yoga until at least 3 hours after a meal and that it is best done on an empty stomach.  Yes, well, I would if only there were more hours in the day…

Labelled “for Beginners”, this yoga workout is seriously a LOT more challenging than the beginner workouts by Yoga Zone.  If you are a complete beginner who has never practiced yoga before, chances are you’re going to struggle with this one - I did.  There were even some yoga poses which I saw for the first time doing this DVD, and quite frankly, I had no hope of achieving them because they were simply well beyond my abilities.

Aside from that, the series of movements on this DVD runs a lot faster than any of the other yoga workouts I have done.  I got caught out at the start when I was moving at a slower pace.  Sometimes I find myself a step or two behind and I’m not even sure I do all the poses correctly because I’m trying to keep up.  Most of the time, I find myself following the audio instructions rather observing the TV to see what to do next.  The occasional glance at the TV was more to double check that what I think I’m supposed to do is really what I am supposed to do.

Intended for building upper body strength, I think the first workout on this DVD achieves that goal.  If you want an alternative training program for climbing, this DVD will help.

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The Strength Building Yoga DVD by Rodney Yee is a 60 minute workout that is split up into segments focussed on different poses.  Although I only did 16 minutes of it today - completing the first segment - I think I’m going to enjoy the rest of the DVD.  I like the flow of movements and the pace of the workout.  Yee tells you what to do and exactly when to take each breath in and out.  I worked harder in this 16 minutes than I did in the entire 36 minutes from the Yoga Zone - Yoga for Abs workout. 

The DVD starts off with a short opening sequence of Yee going through some very advanced yoga poses which were initially a cause for alarm because I thought that was the beginning of the exercise.  I only relaxed a little because I knew it couldn’t be since there was no voice over explaining the moves.  Anxiety aside, the opening series of movements that Yee goes through is actually very inspiring.  I’m not sure if I’m committed enough to ever work on yoga to anywhere near that level, but it was still interesting to observe how much strength you can build just practicing yoga.  If Yee’s performance is anything to go by, I’m sure climbers who practice yoga on a regular basis would stand to benefit from this form of “cross-training”.

I think what impressed me most about Yee’s DVD is that this is probably the first yoga workout DVD I’ve seen conducted by a yogi (if you don’t include the one by Ganga White and Tracy Rich) that really shows you how far you can go with yoga if you really plan to take it that far.  Most of my other yoga DVD workouts are done by fitness instructors whose mainstay expertise is not in yoga. 

This is the first of Rodney Yee’s DVDs that I’ve seen so it might be a little premature to be praising his DVDs so much.  I have bought three others so I’ll be back with further comment.  Yes, perhaps I went a little overboard but I figured this is probably the only series I’m going to find in the local DVD shops that will help me develop my yoga in a meaningful way beyond just an exercise to trim and tone.  I’ve seen many yoga DVDs but they are all stand alone titles.  If I do decide to take yoga to the next level, Yee has an Advanced Yoga DVD that I can buy which will save me from having to look for yoga classes that I probably wouldn’t be able to find the time to attend anyway (unless I had a baby-sitter for Gavin).

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Today, I did 40 minutes of Yoga Zone - Yoga for Abs.  Well, okay, it was more like 36 minutes because the DVD ended at that time even though they say on the cover that there are two 20 minute sessions. 

What do I think of the workout?  It was seriously way too easy.  Yes, I know it says it’s for beginners on the cover but considering I found yesterday’s workout doing Yoga for Weightloss a bit of a challenge, I thought this might be challenging, too.  Instead, it was so easy, I was starting to feel sleepy going through it.  I couldn’t wait to get to the end of the workout not because it was too tiring but because I was bored!

If you already know a bit about yoga and want a more challenging workout for your abs, I’d definitely give this one a miss.  I’d only try it if you don’t know the first thing about yoga because they really take you through the moves.

Since I felt like I hadn’t even worked out at all, I decided to try a little of one of my new Rodney Yee Yoga DVDs - Strength Building Yoga.  More about this in the next post…

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It’s Week 6 - Day 1 and I decided to try one of the new Yoga Zone DVDs that I bought for my SIL.  Well, she won’t be here to claim them until Chinese New Year so I might as well test them out for faults or something.  That way I can take them back for an exchange if there’s anything wrong with them.

I was supposed to start on Monday after taking both Saturday and Sunday off last week.  Ideally, I’m trying not to have two break days in a row so that I don’t develop a habit of skipping my workout, so having three break days in a row was simply sacrilege.  The fact that it was a public holiday was an ever poorer excuse for why I didn’t workout.

Anyway, what’s done is done.  The good thing is that I got started yesterday.  I did a 30 minute workout from Yoga Zone: Yoga for Weightloss.  The DVD is intended for beginners and the full program runs for approximately 55 minutes. 

Unlike the other Yoga Zone DVDs I have, this workout isn’t broken up into two 20 minutes workout sessions.  Instead it is split into two main workouts - a 30 minute weightloss workout and a 20 minute bonus for conditioning the body.  You can elect to do various parts of each workout to customise your own workout but I never do.

Despite it being a beginner DVD, I thought the workout was still pretty challenging.  If I thought I was going to breeze through this DVD simply because it had the word “beginner” written on it, I certainly thought wrong.  Perhaps I overestimate my abilities, or perhaps the DVD really is more challenging than it appears at first site.  Even before the end of the “awkward chair” pose, I was already begging to stop because my thighs were burning.  This is probably why I didn’t end up doing the conditioning bonus exercise, even though I had planned to when I first inserted the disc into the DVD player.  My body was pretty much done by the end of the first 30 minutes.

The poses were basically pretty simple ones but the effort required to hold them was a bit more than I had anticipated.  As reflected in any beginner DVD, they take you through each move slowly with lots of explanations on how to do each pose correctly.  They also run through the program with the simplified pose and the more challenging option which allows you to tailor the workout to your personal level of fitness.  I’m pleased to note that I was able to stick with the more challenging options all the way through even if it was a bit of a struggle.

To think I had bought those Rodney Yee Power Yoga DVDs thinking I wanted a more challenging yoga workout and here I am still struggling with the beginner’s workout!  Looks like I might not be putting the Rodney Yee yoga DVDs to use any time soon.

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I was walking around with Gavin in The Curve shopping mall, hoping to expend some of my curious toddler’s energy when I came across a new “Rock Corner” I had never seen before.  In case you’re wondering, Rock Corner is a music shop that also sells DVDs.  I’ve bought some of my home workout DVDs from branches of this store (also located in The Gardens, Midvalley and Bangsar Village 1).

I decided to pop in and take browse through their exercise DVDs and was pleasantly surprise to discover they had three new Yoga Zone titles that I hadn’t bought before.  Since my SIL has been hunting all over for them, I picked them up for her.  These are the three new titles I bought:

Yoga Zone: Conditioning and Stress Release

Yoga Zone: Yoga for Abs

Yoga Zone: Yoga for Weightloss

While I’m waiting for her to come back to pick them up, I might give them a go first (the privileges of buying stuff for your SIL).  I’ll let you know how they go in the following posts.

The only thing that bothers me about doing yoga at home is that I haven’t really found a yoga series on DVD that allows me to develop my yoga as I go along.  Now that I’ve be active for five weeks, I’m actually really getting into the whole yoga fitness thing.  As I’ve said before, I’d really like to build up my strength using yoga but I haven’t really found a DVD series is focussed on building strength except for the Total Flow Series - Fire by Ganga White and Tracy Rich. 

I’ve been looking around to see if I can find a reliable Yoga DVD series that will help me focus on building strength, power and stamina but most of the DVDs I’ve seen so far are all for beginners.  That’s not to say I’m an expert or anything but what happens when I do progress past the beginner stage?  Does that mean I’ll have to start looking for yoga classes to develop further?

I stumbled across a series by a yogi called Rodney Yee while in Rock Corner.  What caught my eye was the fact that most of his DVDs were about strength, stamina and flexibility (well, I could do with a bit of work on the latter, too - for a woman, I’m not very flexible).  The only reason I hesitated was because I’d never heard of this guy before and wasn’t sure whether his DVDs were reliable.

A quick search on google when I got home revealed that he’s pretty popular in the states and has quite a collection of yoga DVDs.  He’s also been practicing yoga for nearly 30 years so I guess I can’t really go too far wrong with his DVDS. 

Another popular title I found was by a guy called Brian Kest who has also been studying the art of yoga for some 26 years and even went to India to study under the yogis there.  Based on his resume, he sounds like a better bet but it all depends on whether I can find any of his DVDs in the local DVD shops.  I’d buy it online but after my experiences of buying online DVDs in this country, I’ve decided it’s just a lot safer not to.

Does anyone else know any other yoga DVD titles that are great for strength training?

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Today was day 5 of my week workout and I completed 20 minutes from my Yoga Zone Sunrise, Sunset DVD.  Yes, it was a bit of a pathetic effort but I was planning to make up for it with an extra session this weekend.  I haven’t completed three cardio sessions like I had targeted for my Go Workout Mom goal for this week either.

What I achieved this week:

Monday - 30 minutes FitBall Ball and Band Level 1
Tuesday - 46 minutes FitBall Ball and Band Level 2
Wednesday - 20 minutes Yoga Sunrise, Sunset
Thursday - 40 minutes Yoga Fat Burning
Friday - 20 minutes Yoga Sunrise, Sunset

Today’s workout was rather light but probably a good thing because I don’t think my muscles have fully recovered from the yoga burn on the previous day.

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I did 40 minutes of yoga today - 20 minutes after putting Gavin down for his afternoon nap and another 20 minutes after waking up with Gavin (I had to stop halfway because he woke up for milk and I sort of fell asleep while nursing him - oops!).

It has been a while since I last worked on this DVD and I do think I’m getting better at it.  Although I still struggle to shift smoothly from cobra pose (Bhujangasana) to down-dog (Adho Mukha Svanasana) - as in, I have to cheat a little (okay, maybe more than just a little).  Another movement I struggle with is the Cat Movement (Ashtanga Namaskara), which, ironically, is supposed to be a simpler alternative to chaturanga - although I found that really hard to believe.  At least until I discovered I’ve been doing chaturanga wrong all this time.  Suffice to say I cheated my way through that one, too. 

Although I was initially contemplating another series of yoga DVDs, I think I need to work more on my form and get the movements correct with the current series of DVDs I have now before moving on.  After reading the descriptions for some of these poses, I’ve realised I haven’t really been doing them quite right.  Trying to follow a video by listening to the words or while you’re half looking at the screen with your head twisted in at an odd angle isn’t exactly doing it right either.

While I was tempted to buy a hardcover book on Ashtanga Yoga from MPH that was selling at 50%, I’ve realised that there is an enormous resource on the web on yoga moves that are even better.  They have videos and step-by-step shots to tell you exactly how to do each move.  Now that’s definitely got to be better than a book with photographs that I’ll probably never read any way.

These are three yoga sites I like:

Yoga Cards - There’s a lot of free stuff you can download from this site, including yoga videos of yoga workouts you can do at home.  I haven’t tried downloading anything yet, but it looks good.

ABC-of-Yoga - I like this site because they have a short cartoon that shows you how the pose is supposed to flow as well as pictures and detailed descriptions of the movement.  They also tell you the benefits of each pose.

Yoga Journal - for details of poses you can’t find on ABC-of-Yoga, you’ll find them here.

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This was one of my landmark achievements in rock climbing.  Always known as one of the routes on the far left that only the “good climbers” climbed, it is graded 6A+ which is also the same grade as Monsoon.  For some reason, even though we’d climbed Monsoon to death, we were still unwilling to give it a go, until Fearless Leader paved the way forwards.

There’s a lot of beta revealed in this post so it’s best not to read on if you want an onsight of this route.

Shortly after Fearless attempted this route, Thin Man followed suit.  When Thin Man was climbing this route in his sleep, I started to top-rope it.  I liked Water on the Rocks because it was the style of climbing I loved best at that time - crack climbing (at least for part of the way).  Crack climbing is more technical than it is physically challenging so I knew it was simply a matter of figuring out how. 

The crux the point at which you have to move away from the crack to a ledge and hoist yourself up over it.  If memory serves me right, it is a very slight overhang that was enough to make it a real challenge for me.  Back then, overhangs were not something I particularly relished climbing. 

The crux for me was to move from the end of the crack to the big jugs at the ledge that made it possible to get over the ledge.  This was the route that taught me never to forget my legs.  The one time that I did, I found myself wondering why I couldn’t reach the big jugs.  Whenever you can’t find a good handhold, move your feet up.  You will be surprised by what a few inches of extra height can exposed - like a jug or two that were originally out of your reach. 

Water on the Rocks was the first of the “routes on the far left” (this was before they added the new routes beyond the hut) that I had ever projected.  It was a significant achievement for me because it represented a style of climbing I hated - overhangs (however slight it might have been).  Ironically, I can’t remember the crux as well as I remember the second pitch of Monsoon which makes me wonder if the second pitch of Monsoon was a more significant route for me?

Of the routes at Damai, it was Monsoon, Water on the Rocks and Jah Lap Climbing that held a special, deeper meaning for me.  Although I have climbed every route at Damai (the old wall, not the new routes that were bolted later), these three are the routes that stick out most firmly in my mind. 

By the time I could climb the three routes on the far left, we migrated to Nyamuk, White Wall, Volley Ball and Comic.  I think that was when I finally considered myself to be out of the beginner’s category for rock climbing.

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