Hot Yoga to Restore Body Health
Written by Dr. Minakshi Welukar.
Hot yoga is getting popularity across many countries due to its novel approach in reinventing one’s personality. One of the intense forms of fitness regimen, hot yoga aids in achieving a leaner, stronger and flexible body. With regular practice you can notice better muscle strength, improved body flexibility, and significant weight loss.
What is Hot Yoga?
Hot yoga is a kind of yoga exercise conduced in a room of hot and humid conditions. Firstly, these yoga poses were introduced by Bikram Choudhary and also known by his name as “Bikram yoga”. Such energetic yoga is performed in a room heated to 105F (40C) with a humidity maintained at 40 percent.
A hot yoga session consists of 90 minutes practice comprising of a series of 26 poses and two breathing exercises in a specific order. Prolonged and well-controlled contractions of all major muscle groups restore muscle strength and joint flexibility.
Principle of Using Heat
Secrete of health benefits of hot yoga lies in the use of heat. Body stiffness associated with sedentary lifestyle becomes a major concern in medicine today. Heat allows extended body stretching with comfort. Stretching in high temperatures and profuse sweating brings a synergistic effect to get better health results.
After adding regular hot yoga exercises to ongoing treatment, symptomatic alleviation of debilitating and refractory illness is seen in terms of both severity and frequency.
Health Benefits of Hot Yoga
If you are regularly doing hot yoga in a certified studio, it bestows with following health benefits:
Detoxification
Profuse sweating during yoga poses flush out toxins from your skin and help in body detoxification. Detoxification assists in effective functioning of internal body organs like the liver, improvement in body immunity and relieving chronic fatigue. Detoxification is good to cultivate the sense of well-being and ease.
Improve Endurance
Hot yoga improves oxygenated blood supply to each part of the body, so they can function at an optimal level. This encourages healing capacity and speedy recovery. Additionally, achievement of balanced strength and flexibility along with healthy weight is a wonderful way to build body endurance.
Restore Body System
These asanas are designed to warm and stretch muscles, ligaments, and tendons. Opening of joints and muscular alignment works in a co-ordinate manner to restore body systems. You can experience better muscle tone and a feeling of a well-stretched and relaxed body.
Enhance Mental Health
Hot yoga practice demands strong mental focus for holding each pose for predetermined time. This helps to develop concentration, patience, determination and self-control.
Hot Yoga: Word of Caution
Those performing hot yoga can experience headaches, blackouts and hallucinations. Some may even notice back pain due to excessive back bending without adequate control. Hence sufficient preparation is required before practicing hot yoga to reduce adverse events. As hot yoga isn’t suitable for everyone, you must be well aware about your own health. Here are some tips before starting a hot yoga session:
- It must be practiced in moderation only.
- Stretch your body only up to realistic level and not be in competition with others.
- Take breaks when needed.
- Maintain your hydration by drinking plenty of water.
- Avoid eating too much before class.
- Replenish water loss with drinks fortified with electrolytes and minerals.
- It must be practiced in certified yoga studios only, providing proper supervision at an individual level.
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