Yoga Sandbag: Strengthen Your Bridge Pose

Setu Bandha Sarvangasana (Bridge Pose) is certainly one of yoga’s most versatile poses. Once I studied with B.Ok.S. Iyengar in India, variations of Bridge Pose have been a go-to. For these of us who unintentionally ingested parasites, Supported Bridge Pose was therapeutic. Setu Bandha Sarvangasana ready our again, shoulders and quads for Sarvangasana (Shoulderstand) and Urdhva Dhanurasana (Upward Bow Pose). By itself, Bridge Pose expands the entrance physique whereas it strengthens again muscular tissues. Working towards with a Yoga Sandbag ups the ante, offering resistance to problem the again muscular tissues even additional.

“Bridging” can be a staple of core work in energy coaching. As with yoga, there are many variations. You may follow it with toes on the bottom or on an train ball. Or you’ll be able to follow lifting into Bridge on one leg—on or off an train ball. And you’ll add barbells or weighted bars. I’ve practiced all these variations, and I desire the soundness and flexibility of a Yoga Sandbag to conventional weights.

There are a pair causes that Yoga Sandbags work nicely on this capability. First, they mould to your physique, so they have a tendency to remain put in your hip joints. You don’t have to carry them in place such as you do with conventional weights. Second, you’ll be able to add or subtract sand to seek out the proper weight in your follow. As my again has gotten stronger, I now use a 10-pound sandbag on every thigh for a complete of 20 kilos. However I’d suggest beginning by utilizing a single sandbag as pictured above.

Follow Bridge Pose with a Yoga Sandbag

1. Collect your props: Yoga Mat, Yoga Sandbag and a Yoga Strap. You might or might not wish to use a strap, however have one shut by, simply in case.
2. Knees are likely to splay out to the perimeters in Bridge Pose, so that you would possibly wish to follow with a Yoga Strap. Putting a Yoga Strap round your thighs may help you retain your thighs parallel.
3. Lie in your again in your mat together with your knees bent and the soles of your toes on the ground.
4. Place the Yoga Sandbag in your hip joints, the crease the place the thighs meet your pelvis.
5. Place your arms shut in to your sides and bend your elbows in order that your forearms are vertical.
6. Press your elbows into the ground and arch your lumbar backbone away from the ground.
7. Lengthen your arms alongside your physique.
8. Lengthen your knees out, away out of your pelvis, as when you’re lengthening your quads. It will provoke the elevate of your backbone off the ground.
9. Now elevate your hips up towards the sky, adjusting the sandbag if crucial in order that it stays in your hip joints.
10. Clasp your arms beneath you, or maintain a strap between your arms in order that your arms are parallel.
11. Floor your arms and shoulders to assist broaden your chest, and proceed to stretch the knees out away from the pelvis.
12. Maintain for five to 10 deep breaths.
13. Launch the pose and return to mendacity in your again together with your knees bent. Repeat as many occasions as you want.
14. Another choice: Be happy to follow repetitions, lifting into Bridge Pose on the exhalation, inhaling within the pose, and exhaling as you decrease down. Follow 10 to twenty repetitions, staying within the pose for only one inhalation.

About Charlotte Bell

Charlotte Bell found yoga in 1982 and started instructing in 1986. Charlotte is the writer of Aware Yoga, Aware Life: A Information for On a regular basis Follow and Yoga for Meditators, each revealed by Rodmell Press. Her third guide is titled Hip-Wholesome Asana: The Yoga Practitioner’s Information to Defending the Hips and Avoiding SI Joint Ache (Shambhala Publications). She writes a month-to-month column for CATALYST Journal and serves as editor for Yoga U On-line. Charlotte is a founding board member for GreenTREE Yoga, a non-profit that brings yoga to underserved populations. A lifelong musician, Charlotte performs oboe and English horn within the Salt Lake Symphony and people sextet Purple Rock Rondo, whose DVD received two Emmy awards in 2010.