I did my very first yoga class ever tonight!
My sister gave me a yoga mat and block and strap for Christmas last year, and it came in so useful! I’d used them a little at home but I learned so much more at my first Yoga for Athletes class tonight.
The class was taught by the lovely Ms. Terry Cockburn, and you can read more about her in this recent article here.
She led us through some breathing exercises in the beginning, then we did some “spine-lengthening” type stretches. Then we moved into these very painful … but beneficial, I can tell … hip stretches. They were so hard, I could not really hold them the whole time. Then some really nice calf and hamstring and IT band stretches at the end.
The practice was very focused on legs and that was perfect. And a little on the lower back, too.
You always hear from runners how much they need massages/expensive treatments/whatever to undo the damage that running does to the body. And for a long time before I started running, that’s what turned me off of running, because I didn’t want to need that. But you know what? You don’t realize how very stiff and sore and inflexible you are after marathon training until you try bending in a way that you had no problem doing several months ago …
So, I’m really excited about the class and I’ll keep you posted about how it’s going. Didn’t take any pictures tonight cause, in Jen’s words, I didn’t want to be a creeper. 🙂
My inner knee/hamstring/medial collateral ligament pain is feeling much better than it was this morning. Still, my plan is to take tomorrow’s run off and just do a lot of walking — walk to work, then a long walk with the dogs at night, then a massage scheduled at 7 p.m. I’m hoping that I feel good and whole for a long run scheduled on Friday morning.