It doesn’t matter if you are a yogi new to surfing or an experienced surfer who’s just discovered yoga. There are many benefits of combining surfing and yoga:
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Yoga is great for your upper body strength:
Surfing uses a lot of upper body strength. Most of your time surfing is actually not spent standing on a board, but paddling, duck-diving, eskimo rolling and popping up. All of these maneuvers require solid upper body strength. Yoga poses such as ‘downward facing dog’, ‘plank’ and ‘cobra’ will help you built that strength.
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Yoga helps with balance:
Good balance and core strength are key to riding a wave standing up on a board. Tree pose, Warrior III and many more help you develop a good sense of balance, which will benefit your surfing.
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Yoga helps with your pop-up:
Popping up on a surfboard requires all of the above: Upper body strength, core strength and balance. We see it time and time over again on our Surf&Yoga Escape. The ladies who have done yoga before find the pop-ups fairly easy as it resembles a Warrior 2, well kind of anyway…
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Yoga is a great pre-surf warm-up:
A few Sun Salutes before you are about to hit the water are the perfect warm-up for your surf session. Get’s the blood moving, warms up your upper body and arms and helps you get focused. And what better way to start the day with a Sun Salute on the sand into the sunrise before your morning surf.
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Yoga is a great stretch down after a long session:
You’ve been surfing a lot? Chances are that your shoulders might be a bit tender. And if you are new to surfing, you probably feel muscles in your body you didn’t even know existed. Go and get yourself into a Yin class. No better way to stretch and release your tired surf muscles. The ladies on our Surf&Yoga Escapes just love love love the yin class after a long day of surfing.
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Yoga improves your mental focus:
As every Yogi knows the benefits of yoga go way beyond the physical. Yoga is great for improving your mental focus which is great for surfing. If you have tried surfing, you’ll know that surfing can be a mind game too and yoga can help you overcome fears and any other mental barriers you may face when you are out in the line-up.
Long story short, if you are a yogi new to surfing, your practice will definitely make it easier for you to pick up the ropes of surfing. And as an experienced surfer you’ll no doubt improve your surfing by following a regular yoga practice.
Not quite convinced yet? Join us for a Venus Goes Gidget Surf&Yoga Escape and see for yourself!
Happy Surfing (and yoga), Gidgets!
Claudia
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