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Yoga and Running:
 I have been practicing yoga for
many years now. During this time I have run essentially injury free—that is after I recovered from the injury that attracted me to yoga. Let’s face it, running is hard on the old body. As we age it gets worst. We need a way to counteract the negative impact of running and yoga is an ideal form of relief. While running causes the muscles to tighten, yoga stretches them. The impact of the footfall is replaced by having the feet firmly planted on the floor. While runners are great advocates of yoga, many advanced yoga practitioners would discourage one from running. And I understand why. In the peak of my marathon training when my muscles are tender, my hamstrings tight, and my feet sore, it is more difficult to do the poses. But at times when I have backed off from running I’ve found that the poses come a little bit easier-- especially the positions that test the tightness of the hamstrings.
I had a chronic injury. I had injured my iliopsoas muscle, which is a deep injury where the psoas inserts through the pelvis. I damaged it running full out down a very steep hill at the Bix7. It took me months to figure out what happened and identify the problem. My track coach gave me some stretches—strengthen the abdominal muscles he said. Try as I might I was unable to access the tightness. I ran 3 marathons thus injured and it got worse and worse. Soon I would only run one long run a week to train for the marathon because any running at all aggravated it, so I saved myself for the distance runs.
My wife and I enrolled in a yoga class at the local community center. I didn’t really know what to expect, but imagined yoga was a passive, meditation oriented practice, good for relieving stress, with some modest stretches—just what I was looking for. My first impression of Hatha yoga was this: it is HARD! I had no idea just how tight I was. I couldn’t sit comfortably with my back straight and my legs forward—let alone press the backs of my legs to the floor. Or standing with legs straight, bent over at the waist and touching my hands to the floor? Not a chance. The tightness in my legs stopped me well short.
With in a few weeks I noticed that I was already more limber. We learned a few positions that specifically targeted the tightness in my hip. I have now learned that the tightness in our hips is one of the major obstacles to most of the poses. I worked on my hips and my sore iliopsoas improved with time. I also avoided running down hills and began to incorporate yoga into my pre and post run stretching routines.
The benefit of yoga to my running is unarguable. The benefit of yoga to my life is the unexpected bonus. Yoga is about balance. And I have a way to seek balance in my busy life. The yoga way. As I became more serious about practicing yoga, we moved on from the community center and eventually found the Yoga Circle. Yoga Circle teaches Hatha yoga in the Iyengar style with the benefit of props such as belts blocks and bolsters. If you can’t bend all the way to the floor, you bring the floor up to you with a block. By using these props, and being instructed in detail, my practice flourished and I experienced dramatic improvement. I discovered that one thing yoga offers that running never did-- constant improvement. I know that when I have practiced yoga for 10 years, I will be much better at than I am now, and that 10 years after that even better. I shudder to think about how slow I will be running then. My teacher told me that the pose exists within us, and we strive to find it. Even our yogi’s poses are improved with time. We continue to improve, but never achieve perfection.
This concept of the yoga way is a small part of the esoteric knowledge of yoga. The yoga scriptures of Patanjali are 2500 years old and the yoga teachings of today pay homage to the origin of the wisdom. The mystical and spiritual aspects of yoga reach into all aspects of my life, especially my running. As I stride out, head held high; back straight I draw from the strength of my Jupiter
charka. Having learned that our skeletons hold us up, but our muscles just assist us in the alignment, gives me insight into how best to sit, or stand for long periods of time, and remain comfortable despite the circumstances. These lessons of yoga were what I initially rejected in the practice of yoga. I just wanted to take yoga to learn some good stretches. Not only did I learn those good stretches; I also have experienced a tremendous period of personal, emotional and spiritual growth.
RETURN TO YOGA FOR ATHLETES
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