BYSR Blog

Question:

Noodle, I have a question for you. Why is it that the heat in the room varies so much from one day to another? One day the windows are open and a cool breeze blows through making me feel like I didn’t get a real work out, and other days it’s so hot I think I’m going to puke. Is there a standard temperature?
Dick H.

Answer:

Dear Dick:

Man, I totally know what you’re talking about! You should see what it’s like when you have a fur coat on!

I have to sleep in front of the fan when I'm all hairy! It's too hot!

When all my hair's been shaved off, I have to snuggle in the covers to stay warm!

The standard rule of thumb for the temperature of a Bikram Yoga room is 105F and 40% humidity. If you’ve travelled around the country, however, you’d see that some studios keep it hotter than that, and some keep it closer to 105. Some studios are more humid (in climates like Florida, Hawaii and Texas) and some are a little drier, (in Colorado or Arizona). From studio to studio it has a lot to do with the climate, the heating technology that the studio has installed, preference of the owner and even slight fluctuations seasonally.

There are many variables that will determine how hot the yoga room feels to you. We can group them into 2 categories:

1. The environment (the room and everyone/everything in it)

• How hot and/or humid is it outside. (More humidity = feels hotter)
• How many people there are in the room. (more people = more humidity)
• Whether the room has windows. How leaky they are.

Some studios, in the interest of keeping the heat exactly even and “perfect,” choose a room with no windows that’s heavily insulated and sealed. We could try to hermetically seal our yoga room, but in our opinion, that feels like you’re doing yoga in an airplane cabin. We like our windows and the fresh air that comes in through them, along with the fresh air that gets pulled in through the heating system, itself (our system has a special feature with louvers on the roof that allows us to vary the amount of fresh air we pull in, which can temper the humidity).

-AND-

2. YOU!

• If your immune system is compromised.
• How much alcohol, sugar, (whatever else naughty you can think of) you’ve consumed lately.
• If you ate.
• If you didn’t eat.
• How hydrated you are.
• How much sleep you’ve had.
• If you’ve done other sweaty workouts.
• How much you’ve been practicing lately.

We’ve had exceptionally strong classes in scorching hot rooms (teacher training), and had to sit several times in a relatively cool room, it almost seems like there’s no rhyme or reason! There are so many variables, that trying to get the exact right combination and keep everything external to you perfectly under control is an exhausting enterprise all by itself.

I don’t have thumbs. I can’t run a thermostat or get ice out of the freezer. I have to surrender and relax and hang onto my happy equilibrium whether I can change my situation or not. Take it from me, the greatest favor you can do yourself, is to adjust your level of effort based on how strong and energetic you feel. If the heat doesn’t feel like much, hold your poses a little longer, lift your leg a little higher, sit a little deeper in your awkward pose. Concentrate and celebrate your strength. When you’re feeling tired, back off on your effort slightly and concentrate on surrender and relaxation. When you can adjust your effort to match your environment and how you feel, you’ll have a practice that is an authentic reflection of where you are and how you feel today.

Love, Noodle.

Question:

Dear Noodle,
I realize that you can put your head on any knee you choose, but I’m still stuck in the first position of standing head to knee. Teachers keep saying “lock the knee”, and seldom if ever talk about what’s going on in the core and hip/glute of the standing leg. I feel like I need more strength there or some guidance. When I do kick out I’m wobbly and can’t hold it for long without panting like a dog…not that there’s anything wrong with that! I’m kind of embarassed to say I have been practicing for a number of years now.
Thanks,
Jeff S
P.S. Do you think the Lady Gaga picture is just Arjay in a blond wig and shades?

Answer:

Dear Jeff:

Oh boy! You sure are making me earn my kibble!  Standing Head to Knee pose is certainly a thorn in the side of many practitioners.  Since Bikram Yoga is presented from a beginner’s perspective, teachers rarely spend much time elaborating beyond the rigors of balancing on one leg and getting that leg strong and stable.  In fact, if teachers did spend a lot of time elaborating on the intricacies of the pose during class, you’d be spending 5 minutes in the pose!  Whew!

When in the first position of Standing Head to Knee, first, notice how heavy your foot feels in your interlaced hands.  Your “core” or more accurately, the muscles in your belly and in the front of your hip, are responsible for holding your leg lifted.  The more these muscles work to hold your leg up, the lighter your foot will feel in your hands.

– Point of clarification: Your “core” actually refers to the muscles in your belly, hip flexors, AND in your low back!  All the way around your mid-section!

Keep your body weight forward on your standing leg foot (as opposed to resting on the back of your heel or in the back of your knee).  This will cause the muscles on the front side of your standing leg to pull up almost automatically.  As a result, between shifting your weight forward and holding your leg lifted, you will be using almost all of the muscles in the front side of your body.

When the muscles on the front side of your body are being contracted, they send signals to the muscles on the back side of your body to stretch.  As you build range of motion in the back of your standing leg and low back you will eventually have the range of motion available to kick out part way, or fully.  If your standing leg buckles when you try to kick out, it means you’ve gone beyond the range of motion available to you, and are no longer using your contracted front-side muscles to hold you in place.

As far as the “glute” of your standing leg is concerned, the gluteus maximus (butt-cheek muscle) is one of the largest and strongest muscles in the body.  It does a couple of things in relationship to standing head-to-knee.   It supports your pelvis on top of your thigh bone when you are standing on one leg, and its most powerful action is to cause your body to regain the erect position after stooping, by drawing your pelvis backward, being assisted in this action by the muscles in the back of your thigh.

Many different muscles coordinating and working together are required to stand on one leg and kick out, including the muscles in the arch of your foot, your hip-stabilizer muscles and all of the other muscles we’ve already mentioned.  That’s why a) this pose is so difficult to master and b) it’s so important.  The muscles that you develop when you are working on your Standing Head to Knee are the muscles that you will use to hold yourself stable as you walk, hike, climb stairs, chase tennis balls, etc.  It’s a common complaint of people when they age that their balance is compromised by age and muscle atrophy.

I tell ya, I’m much happier walking around on my four legs than on two!  I don’t know how you people do it.  Well, except, you can reach the cookie jar on the counter, and I can’t.  I guess I’ll just have to keep on looking cute to earn my treats.

PS: No!  Arjay has never worn a blonde wig in her life!  She tried to dye her hair blonde once, but it just turned orange and fell out.  I wouldn’t know what’s that like, being a natural blonde, myself.  That picture really is Lady Gaga.  Here’s the website so you can see for yourself: Gaga Article & Pictures

Oh, man.  I need a nap.

See you at the studio!

Noodle.