BALANCING YOUR TRAINING

Have 30 minutes spare for fitness? Often we pick what we enjoy, I’m certainly guilty of this. With my time more limited these days, I find myself reaching for the dumbbells and opting for a Strength or Cardio session. But I’m becoming acutely aware that I am missing the benefits of having yoga in my weekly routine. My muscles are stiffer and where I’m choosing more intense workouts, I have found that I have limited opportunities to wind down and really tune into how I’m feeling both mentally and physically.

In this latest blog post, Evelyn shares the benefits of combining Yoga, Cardio and Strength Training.

Why should we balance our training?

On paper Yoga, Cardio and Strength training are very different. If you just did Yoga, Cardio or Strength training alone you would experience benefits but what if I told you that these different disciplines actually compliment one another. If you want to maximise results, combine the three to perform better across the board.

Benefits of Cardio

Cardio training elevates the heart rate. It allows the heart to pump blood more effectively and improves energy and lung capacity. This results in improved stamina for strength training and yoga, allowing you to complete longer sessions with more ease. Cardio is also a great way of warming your muscles prior to completing a yoga or strength sessions.

The issue is, alone cardio isn’t very effective at building muscles…

Benefits of Strength Training

Strength training builds muscles and improves stability, both of which are required in yoga. For example, you need strong arms and chest to perform Chaturanga Dandasana effectively. You need enough arm strength so that you hips and chest stay lifted as you lower down, while your elbows stay hugged in at your sides. Whilst building leg strength can help with warrior poses and overall balance.

The issue is, alone there is a risk of injury….

Benefits of Yoga

Yoga teaches to you to move with breath which is particularly useful when adding resistance to your training. You’ll find that yoga will improve your flexibility and result in a larger range of motion (e.g. allowing you to squat deeper and more effectively). Ultimately, a balance between flexibility + strength is the best way to prevent injury.

The mindfulness + breathwork aspects of yoga helps you recover from your strength sessions by stimulating the parasympathetic nervous system your “rest + digest” state.

How to balance your training

Don’t worry you don’t need to do all three disciplines every day but you could have a go at combining exercise types. For example, you could warm-up with cardio before a strength workout or cool down with yoga after a strength workout. Give the examples below a try:

Example 1: Join Evelyn for 5 minutes of Cardio before joining Hannah for a 30 minute strength session.
Example 2: Join Evelyn for 20 minutes of Full Body Strength before joining Olivia for a 15 minute Restore Flow.

Strengthen + Flo

Or you could try our signature Strengthen + Flo class which combines the Strength and Cardio elements for you in one standalone class. There are two new Strengthen + Flo classes with Evelyn & Olivia on demand now - one upper body class + one lower body (both 30 minutes).

Another way would be to dedicate different days in the week to different styles of training. Make sure you give your muscles time to recover e.g. don’t do strength on 2 consecutive days. The Balance and Glo live schedule of classes helps vary your training and provide opportunities to schedule in rest days:

Monday: Cardio + Core
Tuesday: Yoga
Wednesday: Rest Day
Thursday: Yoga
Friday: Strength
Saturday: Rest
Sunday: Yoga

To summarise

The benefits of combining cardio, strength training and yoga include:

Strength
Flexibility
Endurance
Increased muscle mass
Less risk of injury
Decreased stress

Mix up your training by stacking different class types (see examples above), trying a Strengthen + Flo class or alternating class types during the week.