What to Expect for Your First Hot Yoga Class
So, you keep hearing about hot yoga and all the benefits and it sounds like a really good time, but whenever you think about signing up you end up letting your anxiety get the best of you. Sound familiar? Well, if that’s the case, you’re not alone! Many of us started in your exact position–with nerves about trying something new. This blog is meant to serve as a guide, to ease your anxiety and help you feel confident when walking into Society Yoga (or any hot yoga studio!) for the first time.
What is Hot Yoga?
First, let’s talk about what hot yoga is. Hot yoga, as you may have guessed, is simply yoga postures performed in a heated room. Temperatures could range anywhere from 90-105 degrees Fahrenheit.
There are countless styles of hatha yoga (tip: we’re always talking about hatha yoga if we are talking about the physical practice of yoga). Hatha yoga can range from power vinyasa, which is flowing from pose to pose while linking your movement with your breath, to yin or restorative yoga where you are passively holding the postures for several minutes.
Your specific hot yoga experience will depend on the studio and style of yoga class you select!
What is Hot Yoga like at Society Yoga in Lafayette, Indiana?
Society Yoga is a boutique yoga studio located in downtown Lafayette, Indiana. We are a hot yoga studio where the majority of our classes are performed in our lovely heated studio. As we said above, your experience will depend on which style class you select. Our heated class menu includes:
Power Heated
Society Sculpt
Society Yoga Burn
Rise and Shine
Yin
Society Core
Society Tone
Sunday Service
Happy Hour Power
We also have the following non-heated yoga class options (for your future reference!):
Restorative
Gentle Yoga
For a detailed description of our class offerings, click here. For this blog’s purposes, we’re going to talk specifically about power heated yoga because it is one of the more physically demanding classes we offer, and thus, the one you may feel the most nervous about.
What are the Benefits of Hot Yoga, Anyway?
Before we go any further, let’s talk about why you would even want to do hot yoga in the first place! Anyone who has experienced a power heated class will tell you there’s something wonderfully invigorating about the sweaty mess you become during a power heated class. When you’ve been asked to push yourself in the heat and sweated more than you ever have then at last, you reach your final resting pose, this incredible inner peace emerges from somewhere deep within. It’s truly unlike anything you’ve felt before.
However, beyond that, there are several well-researched benefits of hot yoga! On top of a whole host of benefits specific to yoga in general, the benefits of hot yoga include:
1. Improved flexibility
It’s well known that you can get a better stretch when your muscles are warm versus when they are cold. You can compare it to a rubberband that’s been stretched and released several times versus one that’s never been stretched respectively.
With hot yoga, we’re building heat within our bodies, moving in and out of various dynamic stretches, in an already heated environment. This allows for the greatest opening of the larger muscle groups so that you can experience increased flexibility and range of motion.
Studies have found that after eight weeks of consistent hot yoga practice, participants increased the flexibility of their backs, shoulders, and hamstrings more than the control group.
2. Increased caloric burn
Yoga, especially vinyasa yoga, how reached peak popularity in the western world mainly because of the workout. It’s no secret that many people first walk into a yoga studio looking for another way to burn calories.
If you’re most interested in burning as many calories as you can, hot yoga is the best option. Increased temperatures mean increased sweat–emphasis on the increased. This demand increases the healthy stress on your heart and your lungs, resulting in more calories burned.
One study found that hot power yoga practitioners, on average, burn between 330 and 460 calories in a 90-minute class–and no shade to the research, but come to Society’s Sunday Service and you’re likely to burn anywhere from 300-600 calories in a 75-minute class!
3. Increased lung capacity
Yoga in general can improve the lung’s capacity, but as with caloric burn, hot yoga can prove even more effective. One limb of yoga is pranayama, the control of prana or life force in the body. This is often translated to “breath control” and while that’s part of it, it does not fully encapsulate what pranayama is. However, for our purposes here, breathing is what we’re focused on.
Specific breath techniques in a regular yoga practice can improve lung efficiency. Add a heated environment, and you’re increasing demand on the lungs because you’re increasing the heart and respiratory rates. This translates to benefits to your lung capacity over time.
4. Reduced symptoms of depression
People often turn to yoga to support their mental health, sometimes not until they’ve already bottomed out on their symptoms. There are many ways yoga can help reduce symptoms of depression including physical exercise, and meditation pieces. There’s also the empowerment of a yoga practice.
This study found that an eight-week session of hot yoga reduced the following depressive symptoms in women:
Pessimissim
Self-criticism
Low cognitive function
Poor quality of life
5. Improved heart health
Last on our list, hot yoga can improve overall heart health. For the same reasons hot yoga provides even more benefits to calorie burn and lung capacity, hot yoga can improve heart health even more than a regular yoga practice.
Practice Hot Yoga, but Be Aware of these Risks
Hot yoga truly has so many benefits, even beyond this short list. However, there are some increased risks you should be aware of. They include:
1. Dehydration
2. Heat Stroke
3. Danger to a pregnancy
4. Risk to specific health conditions
Any exercise program carries some inherent risks, and when you add a heated room into the equation, it does tend to increase those risks. As with any new exercise regimen, you should check with your doctor if you have any specific concerns or doubts that you can tolerate the heat.
Of course, there are things you can do to minimize your risk of dehydration and heat stroke, and we’ll cover those later on in this article.
What to Expect for Hot Yoga at Society Yoga
When you walk into Society Yoga in downtown Lafayette, Indiana, you can expect to be greeted by a friendly face, taught how to sign in at our iPad, and given a brief tour of the space including where to drop your things and fill your water bottle or visit the bathroom. We also have towels and yoga mats to rent or purchase if you’re brand new to your practice and don’t yet have these essentials!
When you’re ready, you’ll head through the double doors of the studio and find your place. We have props like straps and blocks to make your practice more accessible to you, so you’ll want to grab those first thing! We always say that it’s better to have the props and not need them rather than need them and not have them.
Before class begins, you can rest peacefully on your mat in the heat, or engage with our lovely community. Some of our long-term members will be more than willing to chat and make you feel comfortable.
Class will always start on time, and you can expect a message while you rest, followed by a guided warm-up. When you’re nice and warm, you can expect the music to get a little louder and the flow to pick up the pace a bit. Your yoga teacher will guide you expertly through upbeat, flowy postures while also empowering you to take what feels good in your body and leave out anything that doesn’t.
You’ll flow through several rounds of various sun salutation variations, including balancing poses, and opportunities to try and play with more advanced postures and inversions. You’ll be extremely sweaty and nice and loose by this point, and when we’re finished flowing, you’ll have the opportunity to get the most out of the heat while you sink into several slower poses for deep stretching and cooling down.
Lastly, you’ll get to experience that deep inner peace we mentioned earlier–Savasana. Savasana is the Sanskrit term for corpse pose–a reclined, lying position reserved for the final posture in yoga classes. It is a time to allow all the energy you’ve built and released through your practice to reintegrate and it’s a beautiful, beautiful piece of yoga. This is the part that may stand out the most to you if you’re new to your yoga practice, and we encourage you to give it a try even if you’re not so sure! You don’t have to do anything–just take rest.
After class, you can expect a slow and sweaty exit and a brief check-in with the teacher to get your thoughts!
How to Prepare for Hot Yoga at Society Yoga
Now that you know what to expect, there are a couple of great steps you can take to prepare your body and mind for your first hot yoga experience.
1. Hydrate!
Beginning the day before, it’s smart to start being mindful of your hydration levels. It’s a good idea to be optimally hydrated before you even set foot in a heated studio! If you can, aim for anywhere between two liters and one gallon of water the day prior.
If you’re taking a morning class, prioritize drinking at least a whole glass of water before you get to the studio, and ensure you bring your water bottle with you. Don’t worry if you forget your bottle, though, because we also sell water at the front desk.
Don’t be afraid to stop at any time during class to grab a drink of water, or exit the studio to refill your bottle at our water filling station.
After class, it may be wise to grab an electrolyte tablet to add to your water, or a sports drink to replenish those vital minerals that may have been depleted in your sweat.
2. Eat!
Some people can’t eat before they work out, and you may have to do some trial and error to find out what works for your body. However, for feeling and performing your best during a physically demanding class in the heat, you may want to eat a small meal consisting of mostly carbs one to two hours before class.
At the very least, try a banana or an orange on your drive! Don’t eat too much or too dense of a meal too close to class time, otherwise, you’re likely to suffer some digestive upset.
Afterward, make sure you refuel your body with some protein and carbs so that you stay feeling well through the rest of your day.
3. Get there early!
Especially when you’re new, you may find it eases your anxiety to plan to arrive at the studio 10-20 minutes early. This is especially true if you haven’t signed up online before class.
Arriving early will ensure you’re not the last to arrive to a packed class and give you plenty of time to set up your mat and any props you may want. It will also give you the chance for the instructor to briefly introduce themselves to you.
4. Listen to your inner wisdom and your body!
Lastly, as always in yoga, this practice is individual and special to you. You should try to tune in and listen to what your body is trying to tell you–whether that’s sinking in a little bit deeper to the pose or pulling back significantly compared to the pace of the class. Everyone is on their own yoga journey and we hope that you will honor your body on and off the mat–this is a zero-judgment zone, so you might even see people resting on their backs while everyone else flows!
Anytime you need a drink, take it, and if you are new to the heat, you may need to rest your body in child’s pose to catch your breath. Rest assured that even if the heat gets to you in your first couple of classes, it doesn’t take long for your body to adjust to the heat and soon you’ll be able to keep flowing.
Now that you (hopefully) feel more empowered to walk through our doors and join your first hot yoga class, you should also know that if you have any questions or concerns you can send us an email at info@society-yoga.com, or stop in to see us in between class times so that you can meet our instructors and feel even more comfortable. You are welcome and wanted here! We can’t wait to meet you!
Namaste.