Yoga on Wii Fit Plus

Ok.... I want to blog about ALL kinds of yoga I encounter, so I think it's fair to include Yoga for Wii Fit Plus. For those less tech savvy, Wii Fit Plus is a fitness video game for the Wii Nintendo System, which uses a "balance board" that you stand on as your controller. It senses your movements and thats how you do the activities in the game, more or less.

The good: Each pose is carefully explained and shown to you step by step, with useful tips on breath and body placement. For most poses that use the Wii balance board (essentially your controller for the game), it tracks your balance. So for example, half moon pose will track how your weight shifts on the board and it will guide you to balance yourself properly.

The bad: Super limited on the number of poses. I think there were like.... 18 or so? Had most of the basic stuff, but missing a lot of classic poses too. Some of the poses were very awkward to align correctly using the balance board. The gate pose, for instance, requires you to keep your extended foot on the board, but the added elevation of the board cocks your ankle in a way that is really uncomfortable. Also, the most basic pose for any yogi, downward facing dog, just felt totally wrong on the balance board. It required you to put your hands on the board and "evenly distribute" your weight between your hands and feet. Except for me, the amount of pressure it measured on my hands wasn't "even", so in order to even it out I had to add more pressure, throwing off my usual alignment. I've been doing downward dog long enough to know that the way it was trying to make me do it was not correct. Finally, as always when you do yoga on your own, you have no one there to make adjustments so its hard to be sure you are really doing the poses correctly if you are newer to the practice.

My yoga workout that I constructed took about 40 minutes, and it was maybe marginally challenging. The nice thing about this program is that you can pick and choose as many poses as you want and repeat them as much as you want and build your own flow. So if you want to do the same yoga practice every time, you can. Or if you want something different every time, you can do that too. The game itself has a very clinical healthclub feel to it, which kind of takes away the serenity and 'zen' nature of yoga that I enjoy so much. No good cool down or Namaste. It is nice to see how some of the poses relate to your balance though.

PS The big Chicago move is happening Aug. 30, and in an effort to save money I will be doing most of my practice at home when I can! I'll try to blog about those experiences as well, I'm hoping to do at least 2 more classes before I go (still have a Cityoga pass & a Mindful Movement Studio's class I've paid for!)

Pilates @ Cityoga (yes....I know it's not yoga!)

So I tried out the Pilates class at Cityoga today. I know, I know, it's not yoga. However, I've noticed most yoga studios I've been to often offer a pilates class, and the two are often paired together, so I feel it is relevant. I've also noticed that pilates borrows from yoga, and I've been to many yoga classes which borrow from pilates as well.

Let me just say, this was by far the hardest pilates class I have ever taken. I've only taken a couple, but I always left those classes feeling like I didn't even work out. Well my whole body is telling me right now that I have definitely worked out. This was mat pilates class meant for all levels.

The class: There were only 3 of us, plus the instructor, so we certainly got some individual attention. We started off using 3 lb weights right away doing some arm exercises. We were in the hot yoga studio, so it was kind of dark and warm, so that was a little uncomfortable. We did some really difficult plank work which I definitely struggled with. Later we did a lot of work with the ring (is that what you call it?) between the knees, the ankles, etc working different areas, which was also very challenging. Serious leg-shaking stuff. I will tell you what though, I definitely feel like I got my workout. Serious muscle fatigue right now. I think what made it challenging was the amount of reps, and variations on each area (for example, we'd work out the left side for what seemed like forever, doing tiny variations, then move to the right). I think the other part is that I do virtually no weight training, so adding the weights made a huge difference.

I think I've been going to too many classes/gyms frequented by an older demographic and so the classes are lower impact. With Cityoga, that is NOT the case, which I love. It certainly has made me re-evaluate my fitness level! I'm definitely open to more pilates, but now I know it can kick my ass!! I just wish there were a way to distinguish the levels of difficulty. This class was considered all levels, but it felt advanced to me. Another studio I took pilates at for all levels felt like a light stretch session.

Vinyasa Flow at Cityoga (not the core one, this is new) tomorrow. I have a feeling I may be hurting still from pilates. No pain no gain?

Update: Skipping Vinyasa flow. I am SO SORE. I don't want to injure myself :(

Jason Mraz loves Yoga too!

http://freshnessfactorfivethousand.blogspot.com/2011/06/lean-into-discomfort.html

Check out this awesome post by one of my favorite musicians, Jason Mraz! How fitting that the day I start blogging about yoga, Jason puts out this great post on why yoga is awesome?