What is Power Yoga?

When Kareena Kapoor once spoke of her workout routine, I remember her saying that she couldn’t lift a leg when she first tried to do a surya namaskar. I always wondered why the seemingly fit Kapoor had said that. And today, curiosity got the better of me.

Power yoga sessions, at my gym, take place twice a week at 7 am, and last one and a half hour in all. I say ‘in all’ because, as I discovered, a good 30 minutes are spend warming up. Everyone rolled out their mats, minus any footwear, and were visibly gearing up for what was to come. Anupa walked in right on time, and off we were with the stretching.

I aped her through at least two ways, each, of loosening up your arms, legs, neck, back, and pretty much every corner of the body. In my opinion, the stretching bit was all the workout I needed. I wondered if I could go home then. Yeah, no. Right after, in rapid succession, she began with the surya namaskars.

Power yoga is a combination of stretches, relaxation exercises, and a lot of surya namaskars, which are an amalgamation of 8 or 12 asanas from regular yoga. You stretch your back out, touch your toes, slide forward, make a ‘V’ out of your body, stretch back—you get the drift. 

I never realised how tough it is to go from the ‘on-your-mark’ position to strategically pulling the folded leg back, and then forward, and then just generally confusing the hell out of your lower body. Also, there was also a lot of planking involved in the middle. QED, I was Kareena Kapoor this morning.

I persevered for what I was sure was at least two hours. 15 minutes into the class, I was ready to give up and never get off my yoga mat. But Anupa was very encouraging, and the hour eventually ended with lots of slow breathing exercises. The silver lining of this torture session was that the easiest thing in the world for me, and the least of my concerns, during the class was to bend and touch my palms to the floor.

Pretty mats, won't you make the pain go away?

Recommendation level: I can’t wait to go back but that may be because I've entered this weird masochistic phase of life. Basically, this is not for the faint-hearted.   

Good for: regulars at the gym, people with no knee or back problems, anyone with really solid endurance.

Pain points thus far: Everything; without a doubt.