Yoga is a complete science of life that aims to connect the body and mind and bring harmony through postures, breathing exercises and meditation. While the conventional approach to yoga has its own benefits, practicing yoga outside can transform the experience and enhance it. Yoga has the advantage it can literally be done anywhere. So let’s take it outdside !
Why Yoga Benefits Skiing
Practiced regularly, yoga has huge and multiple benefits : physical, psychological and spiritual. Its fundamental principle is body and mind fitness. Postural exercises help work on the physical aspects while breathing exercises permit to work on the mental aspect.
Combined with skiing, yoga can prevent injuries and acts as a way to warm up muscles and the rest of your body before going up the hill, or for stretching as you cool down after skiing. The two practices complement each other perfectly. Yoga will also sharpen and complete your skiing skills. How? The benefits are really close, if not identical, to what skiing requires: balance, flexibility and concentration. To go one step further you can work and tone your entire body with strengthening poses.
Yoga session
Why not taking the opportunity to unroll your yoga mat outside during you ski holidays ?
Val Thorens offers open-air classes in beautiful outdoor locations. Yoga is in fact about being in the moment and at one with nature. And what’s a better way to connect to nature than being on top of the mountain ?
The yoga class starts with a short warm up to prepare joints and muscles for the remainder of the session. Interspersed with mountain walking, the yoga course goes through several short sessions: flexion posture and balanced stance to develop concentration, twist poses to relax and stretch the spine, toning spinal nerves and back muscles, followed by various breathing exercises to purify the body and bring energy in. The session ends with the tradition salutation of the sun before rounding it off with a meditation.
Practicing yoga outside adds a different dimension, all of your senses – scent, sight, and touch – are stimulated and turn the practice into a sensuous experience which will revitalize and refuel your body.
Who Should Try Yoga?
Yoga is for everyone wishing to stay in good physical, emotional and mental health and wishing to improve their health. Through the practice you will definitely find you can develop, not just your skiing, but your entire physical and mental well being in your daily life. And consequently increasing relax and improve your internal focus.