Written by: Scott Robinson, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
Yoga is a very useful practice to help manage and improve performance in sports. When working with yoga for sports, there are several things to consider:
1. Movements
Identify the key movements of the sport. This is necessary to understand what yoga poses might be suitable that support the athlete during competition.
2. Tendencies
Most sports tend to lead to habitual movements that create chronic imbalances in the body. E.g., for runners, tight quadriceps, hamstrings and calves are common. For a cyclist, the habitual folding forward will create stress in the lower back and hip flexors. For a tennis player, regularly serving the ball will create the potential for wear and tear in the shoulder girdle.
Design a yoga practice around these imbalances. For example, a practice that emphasises length through the front of the body is useful for cyclists. For a runner, create practises that lengthen and strengthen the lower body. For a tennis player, work with yoga poses that emphasise mobility around the shoulder joint.
3. Yoga helps with injuries
An athlete is always at risk of injuries. To this extent, when thinking about yoga for sports, design practices that may help reduce the risk of injury through strength and conditioning work. Yoga helps unwind after the competition too. Yoga may also provide complementary support to any physiotherapy or other acute injury management techniques and practices.
4. Breathing
Given the strong connection between the breath and the mind-body connection, identify breathing habits that may be dysfunctional and that hinder performance. Specific yoga breathing exercises can be useful for an athlete in performance as well as stress management.
Conclusion
Yoga is an excellent practice for sports. It helps to support the performance of an athlete by working with those movement patterns that are predominant in the sport. It also helps to counter chronic imbalances arising during competition. Any injuries that arise during sporting activity may include yoga as part of the treatment protocol. Yoga can also help reduce the risk of those injuries arising. Yogic breathing practices can also help performance as well as manage the stress arising during competition.
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Scott Robinson, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Scott Robinson is a Finance Professional and Yoga Teacher. He is also the founder of Yogibanker ‒ a specialised yoga & wellbeing service for the financial services industry. He helped found 'dbYoga' at Deutsche Bank, one of the world's leading financial services companies as well as leading regular mindfulness sessions under the brand of 'Mindfulness Mondays'. Over the years, Scott has helped hundreds of finance professionals become stronger, more flexible and less stressed through yoga & mindfulness. Scott's passion is to bring yoga & wellbeing to the financial services industry ‒ one that is kinder, more sustainable with wellbeing at its core.
