Lifting Weights and Yoga: Why do post lifting yoga stretches?
An intense workout or lifting session at the gym can leave you and your muscles feeling tight and stiff. Yoga is a great way to unwind and relax your body as part of a recovery routine. Yoga relaxes the body and mind, improves strength, balance and flexibility, helps with back pain, gives you energy, removes stress and improves your posture. This makes it a great addition to include in your exercise or health and well-being plan. Lifting weights and yoga gives you the best of both worlds, strength, flexibility and balance.
Gently holding poses and breathing deeply with each pose may help reduce lactic acid build up from anaerobic strength training. This one of many reasons why combining lifting weights and yoga is a great combination. It’s also nice as a wind down session for your muscles after a lifting session. Lifting heavy weights takes a lot of energy and mental focus which can be exhausting. Yoga is a relaxing and restorative counterbalance to that intense exercise and is a nice transition post workout that can also help improve your sleep. This is particularly useful if you have used pre-workout stimulants before your gym session. It provides a soft balance and leaves you feeling relaxed and calm.
Yoga is more than a physical exercise, it also relaxes your mind after what can be an exhausting weight lifting session. It is a good mental transition from an exhausting weight lifting session to then continue through your day. Has a calming effect on your nervous system. Reducing stress through yoga and breathing may also help reduce inflammation in your body. Hence it is a great practice to include after a weight lifting session.
In this article ‘lifting weights and yoga’ we are diving into 7 great restorative yoga stretches to do after a lifting session:
1. Table Top
The first in our list for lifting weights and yoga exercises is the table top pose. This is a great pose to begin your yoga session with as it is a gentle and restorative pose. It also is a great transition pose for leading you into many other yoga poses such as our next pose the Cat-cow. Table top provides a gentle stretch to your arms, shoulders, wrists, hips, core, thighs, knees and your spine.
2. Cat-Cow
The Cat-Cow is a combination of two yoga poses the cat pose and the cow pose. It is a great way to improve mobility, stretch and strengthen your spine as well as provide a gentle massage which makes doing Cat-Cow great for supporting your back and posture. These poses stretch your core and are a good exercise to practice breath work. They are also useful for neck pain and relieve tension in the upper body.
3. Downward-facing Dog
The downward facing dog is a forward bending yoga pose and a great lower back stretch. The pose strengthens and stretches your arms and shoulders, can improve your posture and alleviate back pain. It is particularly great for the lower body so this makes it excellent if you have tight legs after squats or any other leg exercises including running, cycling etc.
4. Upward-facing dog
The Upward-facing dog pose helps to strengthen your spine and lower back, as well as your arms and wrists. It helps improve your posture, targets your core, stretches your chest, lungs, shoulders and is a great energizing pose.
5. Warrior I
Warrior 1 targets your whole body by stretching and strengthening your ankles, calves, thighs, groin, upper body and back including your core, chest, lungs, shoulders, neck and arms. It is a great pose to improve your alignment and core stability.
6. Warrior II:
Warrior 2 opens your hips and stretches the ankles, quads, core and shoulders as well as lengthening and stretching your arms. It gives you the feeling of focus as well as being grounded and connected to the earth.
7. Childs Pose:
The child’s pose is an excellent calming restful pose and also a great pose to end a yoga session on. The child’s pose stretches out your ankles, knees, thighs, hips, back, shoulders, neck and arms and keeps you feeling centred and relaxed.
Lifting weights and yoga are an excellent combination as performing these 7 yoga stretches after your gym session will keep your muscles flexible, strong and healthy. Loosening tight muscles is important for mobility and will keep you feeling good and relaxed. I hope you enjoyed these 7 lifting weights and yoga stretches and are inspired to include even a quick 5 minute yoga routine after your lifting sessions.
