See this post from last Friday for context When a Blog post comes back to bite you Iyengar 108 dropbacks challenge
from today's comments
Q: Were you generally satisfied with them?
A: I think I feel glad to get the 108 out of the way, to know it could be done now it's more a question of can it be done well ( by me). All these thing, tricky poses, long holds, 108 sury's or drop backs , every time you nail them you see a little more clearly that it's not what it's all about. We know this of course but need a reminder every now and again.
That said, there's nothing wrong with having some fun and giving yourself a little extra motivation and besides, the Will, like the body, needs exercising too.
Like you I want to work on the breath more, I think I was happy with a couple of sets of ten got a nice rhythm then lost it, fifteen to twenty is a nice number to play with, perhaps thirty-six. I do want to keep exploring this for a while and yes let's still do it for our birthdays as an incentive. After then I think I'd rather save it for a holy day or somebody elses birthday, certainly not Thursdays. I did 108 sury's when SKPJ died, kind of feel that things like this should be saved for such occasions, perhaps when you need to ask a boon, tapas, no?
Still can't get over Iyengar's feet how close together, straight and solid they were, 108 like that would be something to celebrate.
Q: Do your knees or ankles ever hurt from having them turned out for so many dropbacks?
A: No feet don't hurt, back feels fine too though a slight crick in the neck. When I started this experiment, what Friday, I was keeping my feet straight, lifting my heels, been using that approach for the last few months, I like it a lot better. Trouble was after twenty or thirty your thighs are like jelly, switched back to having my feet turned out and much easier for large sets, right at the end of this though my legs were quaking a bit. Want those straight, flat, rooted feet of Iyengar
UPDATE : Morning after
Was expecting the worst, a lot of stiffness perhaps but as it happens I'm feeling pretty good. No stiffness in the back, the little crick in the neck has gone and legs don't feel like jelly. Stomach muscles are... not sore exactly but feel as if I've done some serious crunches, a Pilates work-out from those crazy twins perhaps.
Practice this morning was supposed to be built around the Asymmetric series but I ended up doing the seated sequence again for all the forward bends; long paschimottanasana and it's variations interspersed with Tatakamudra ( see this post ). I did the paschi/tatkamudra combo yesterday as a counterpose, perhaps it helped to iron out the dropbacks.
What else, a couple of goes at taking the lotus back up higher in Karandavasana and a look at jumping to Urdhava kukkutasana (post to come on that) then long stays in the inversions and on to pranayama etc.
A nice morning after practice.
Wednesday, 22 June 2011
Saturday, 18 June 2011
When a blog post comes back to bite you : 108 Dropback challenge
And of all the post to come back and bite you.....
So this goes back to a string on comments on this post about Iyengar. I'd come across the wonderful video below on youtube, forty-two seconds in Iyengar starts popping out these dropbacks one after another and in comments to the post we found out that he did 108 and that this wasn't so unusual in Iyengar circles, a birthday treat as it were.
Struck by the rhythm and working on my dropbacks at the time I decided to launch the '1 week Iyengar 108 dropback challenge'. Here's the first post. Funny enough I can't for the life of me remember what happened to that, lets have a look. Here it is, Day 7 OK so I got up to twenty, think I carried on doing multiple dropbacks for a little while but then changed my approach. Now I tend to do five to seven.
So anyway, why am I bringing this back up? A comment turned up out of the blue this morning...
Grim
To go back to Iyengar challenge.
I did finally learn to standup from dropbacks this time last year.
Anyway, last few days at shala I've been doing 15-20 on the breath. Today I did 30 which just felt awesome.
108 for our birthdays right? I'm in!!
AC
I checked when her birthday was, mine being quite soon on the 24th of next month...
Grim,
Mine's some 6 wks today.
This morning I just trotted out some 50 dropbacks, so although 108 is for b'day if it comes quicker then I'm going for it!
When it's done on the breath it's such a joy and there's 'ease' to it.
108 WE MUST DO IT!!
AC
And so I said why not...
Grim
Great, I have a partner in 'crime'!
I started doing more than x3 dropbacks in order to rid myself of my hand waving habit on standing up and its seems to be working.
Mon it was 13 dropbacks, Tue. 15, Wed. 21, Thu. 30 and today 50. Sat. I rest from dropbacks but on Sun. I'll probably start the fun again.
Let the fun begin.
AC
Fun?
Got home this evening at 6pm, quick Vinyasa Krama Bow sequence as a warm up and then off I went. The video below is speeded up, I count 52 ( I thought I'd managed 54) in three lots. I took a breather after twenty of so to see how I was doing it as I wasn't sure about the rhythm and then another for a couple of minutes after another twenty to remind myself how Iyengar was doing them.
It's hard work, legs ache and the breath is tricky to keep steady but then if you look at Iyengar he's not really moving his feet at all and ....well... he's Iyengar isn't he.
I started off with my current way of dropping back, raising the heels then went back to trying my old feet turned out, still hard work.
As it happens my back feels perfectly fine, no stiffness, I did a couple of counter postures, long paschi, see how it feels in the morning. A bit of work on this to get my leg strength back and it should be possible..... shouldn't it?
Now is it silly, pointless or is there something to be gained from this. The rhythm Iyengar achieves is interesting, the steadiness of breath and perhaps that action is stimulating for the spine, we'll see.
My birthday is in five and a half weeks, A's in six.
Morning after Update
Back's a little stiff but nothing to write home about, thighs really ache though, need to reintroduce some of those squats from the Vinyasa Krama 'On one leg sequence', have been saying for a while that strong legs help your dropbacks.
So this goes back to a string on comments on this post about Iyengar. I'd come across the wonderful video below on youtube, forty-two seconds in Iyengar starts popping out these dropbacks one after another and in comments to the post we found out that he did 108 and that this wasn't so unusual in Iyengar circles, a birthday treat as it were.
Struck by the rhythm and working on my dropbacks at the time I decided to launch the '1 week Iyengar 108 dropback challenge'. Here's the first post. Funny enough I can't for the life of me remember what happened to that, lets have a look. Here it is, Day 7 OK so I got up to twenty, think I carried on doing multiple dropbacks for a little while but then changed my approach. Now I tend to do five to seven.
So anyway, why am I bringing this back up? A comment turned up out of the blue this morning...
Grim
To go back to Iyengar challenge.
I did finally learn to standup from dropbacks this time last year.
Anyway, last few days at shala I've been doing 15-20 on the breath. Today I did 30 which just felt awesome.
108 for our birthdays right? I'm in!!
AC
I checked when her birthday was, mine being quite soon on the 24th of next month...
Grim,
Mine's some 6 wks today.
This morning I just trotted out some 50 dropbacks, so although 108 is for b'day if it comes quicker then I'm going for it!
When it's done on the breath it's such a joy and there's 'ease' to it.
108 WE MUST DO IT!!
AC
And so I said why not...
Grim
Great, I have a partner in 'crime'!
I started doing more than x3 dropbacks in order to rid myself of my hand waving habit on standing up and its seems to be working.
Mon it was 13 dropbacks, Tue. 15, Wed. 21, Thu. 30 and today 50. Sat. I rest from dropbacks but on Sun. I'll probably start the fun again.
Let the fun begin.
AC
Fun?
Got home this evening at 6pm, quick Vinyasa Krama Bow sequence as a warm up and then off I went. The video below is speeded up, I count 52 ( I thought I'd managed 54) in three lots. I took a breather after twenty of so to see how I was doing it as I wasn't sure about the rhythm and then another for a couple of minutes after another twenty to remind myself how Iyengar was doing them.
It's hard work, legs ache and the breath is tricky to keep steady but then if you look at Iyengar he's not really moving his feet at all and ....well... he's Iyengar isn't he.
I started off with my current way of dropping back, raising the heels then went back to trying my old feet turned out, still hard work.
As it happens my back feels perfectly fine, no stiffness, I did a couple of counter postures, long paschi, see how it feels in the morning. A bit of work on this to get my leg strength back and it should be possible..... shouldn't it?
Now is it silly, pointless or is there something to be gained from this. The rhythm Iyengar achieves is interesting, the steadiness of breath and perhaps that action is stimulating for the spine, we'll see.
My birthday is in five and a half weeks, A's in six.
Morning after Update
Back's a little stiff but nothing to write home about, thighs really ache though, need to reintroduce some of those squats from the Vinyasa Krama 'On one leg sequence', have been saying for a while that strong legs help your dropbacks.
Friday, 22 April 2011
Krishnamacharya's Yoga Makaranda .....at last.
The Yoga Makaranda was Krishnamacharya's first book, it was written in 1932, supposedly over four days and published in the Kanada language in 1934 and later translated into Tamil. It was clearly a major influence on Krishanamacharya's student Sri K Patarbhi Jois's own book Yoga Mala and of the Ashtanga practice we know and love, as well as many of the current popular styles of Yoga.
Last Summer I was fortunate enough to study the text, line-by-line with Ramaswami, Krishnamacharya's student of over thirty years, on his 200 hour Vinyasa Krama TT course.
This book may well be considered the source, the holy grail and thanks to the generosity of Lakshmi & Nandini Ranganathan the text has now been made freely available such that we can decide for ourselves, enjoy.
'...I ask that you do not sell it but you are welcome to put it on a website for anybody to download, to email further, or to lend your manuscript to be copied by anybody. It does have typos (remember, we did this in 2006 and planned to do a final revision or new edition later) but I think it is actually otherwise reasonable (we would welcome corrections and comments). Most importantly, it will accomplish our goal that people read what Krishnamacarya had to say without interruption and without censorship. The book is powerful and wonderful and I hope any of you that reads it finds it as meaningful and relevant as we did.'
Nandini (Ranganathan).
Another version of the text has just been published by Media Garuda, I ordered a copy, which arrived this week, before I was aware of a dispute regarding their edition. The background to this dispute can be found HERE, I leave you to make up your own minds about it.
The Media Garudu edition is, it has to be said, a nicely produced book. The pictures are beautiful and it has a nice layout. At the back are a series of line drawings showing the vinyasas in and out of the postures as outlined in the text. It also has footnotes. My first impression of these were that they often seemed to seek to bring the 1930's text in line with a more recent conception of Yoga possibly held by the publishers that did not seem necessarily in keeping with the original text, but perhaps I'm being unfair.
In the next few days I'll be doing a parallel reading of the texts to see how they compare and get back to you.
Monday, 31 January 2011
Day 91 : LOTUS : Kukkutasana & garbha pindasana subroutine Subroutine from Vinyasa Krama Lotus sequence
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| VIDEO LINK |
Bharadwajrasana, raise the arms and twist then lower into the pose
Kukkutasana
Push the arms through the space between your thighs and calf muscles, you may need to spray some water on your arms if your legs are bare and the weather cooler (no sweat). If this is a problem see the notes below for garbha pindasana.
Exhale fully, hold, engage mula and uddiyana bandha and drop the shoulder blades down the back. Press down into the mat to lift but keep the shoulderbaldes lowered .
As you press down visualise moving slightly forward and up. If you just push down there is a tendency to keep falling backwards off your hands. look at picture 7 and notice how there is a slight lean forward, the shoulders over the hands.
Push the arms through the space between your thighs and calf muscles, you may need to spray some water on your arms if your legs are bare and the weather cooler (no sweat). If this is a problem see the notes below for garbha pindasana.
Exhale fully, hold, engage mula and uddiyana bandha and drop the shoulder blades down the back. Press down into the mat to lift but keep the shoulderbaldes lowered .
As you press down visualise moving slightly forward and up. If you just push down there is a tendency to keep falling backwards off your hands. look at picture 7 and notice how there is a slight lean forward, the shoulders over the hands.
Garbha pindasana
Creating space to get the arms through
Here, once in lotus, I lift my left leg a little away from the right holding just above the ankle. this creates a little more space to get the first arm through. For the second arm I press the top side of my left foot against my right thigh flexing the ankle a little to lever the leg up a little thus creating more of an opening to pass the arm through.
Video Tutorial here http://youtu.be/chQwvJN-K98
Try taking the arms through at an angle, the right arm runs parallel to the right calf, same for the left.
Video Tutorial here http://youtu.be/Ct35la57mBw
Creating space to get the arms through
Here, once in lotus, I lift my left leg a little away from the right holding just above the ankle. this creates a little more space to get the first arm through. For the second arm I press the top side of my left foot against my right thigh flexing the ankle a little to lever the leg up a little thus creating more of an opening to pass the arm through.
Video Tutorial here http://youtu.be/chQwvJN-K98
Try taking the arms through at an angle, the right arm runs parallel to the right calf, same for the left.
Video Tutorial here http://youtu.be/Ct35la57mBw
Utpluthi (Pic 4) is all about hand placement. place the hands too far forward and the weight of the hip bones will keep your grounded, too far back and the weight of the knees will stop you from achieving lift. So place the hands just forward of mid thigh as close to your thighs as possible.
Bring your shoulders over your hands, bring your shoulders down, engage the shoulder girdle and after exhaling hold the breath out and push down into the mat through your hands and lift
Mula bandha should be engaged but engage it more strongly, tuck the tailbone under, the lower half of your body should feel tight and compact, draw your pelvis up into your torso and hold.
Keep the bandhas engaged and the tailbone tucked while your breath.
In the earlier version of utpluthi you bend the body over the lotus, in a this version the body is more erect.
Sunday, 23 January 2011
Vinyasa Krama Sequences home practice sheets and posters
This week I'm working on turning my Vinyasa Krama videos into practice sheets and posters. Not much interest to the Ashtangi's amongst your perhaps, although I personally found it interestin,g and helpful, finding a posture in Ashtanga that I was struggling with and then looking at the poses in Vinyasa krama that prepare for it EG. Archer and Heron pose as prep for Leg behind head postures in the Asymmetric sequence.
Perhaps it's because I came to Vinyasa Krama from Ashtanga but I'm used to using these kind of sheets as reminders of the sequence, think Mathew Sweeney orDavid Swenson and and the short and full sequences at the back of his book. I think Ramaswami mentioned that it was something he had hoped to do in future editions of his Complete book of vinyasa Yoga but that it never came about. These are no substitute for his book of course, more like 'cheat' sheets for home practice.
So far I've made up the On your feet/tadasana ( picture is of the shorter 10 minute version), Asymmetric and Seated sequences, I hope to have the rest made up by the end of the weekend. Links are below and I'll add the others to this post when they're ready as well as to the VK page at the top of this blog. If you click on the image it should blow it up and be printable. If you think you'll find them useful then feel free to use them as you wish.
The quality isn't that great and some of them don't tally up exactly with the book, I recorded most of the video's before I attended Ramaswami's TT course, hopefully I'll get to improve on them in the future, I just wanted something to be going on for my own practice and that would also serve as a starting point for something better in the future perhaps by somebody more competent and capable than myself.
I welcome suggestions, I'm thinking of making up a set of subroutines as well as Beginner and Intermediate versions of the Sequences, perhaps some sample practice routines as well. If anyone knows how I can set up a downloadable PDF file on this blog with all of them together as a set please let me know.
Perhaps it's because I came to Vinyasa Krama from Ashtanga but I'm used to using these kind of sheets as reminders of the sequence, think Mathew Sweeney orDavid Swenson and and the short and full sequences at the back of his book. I think Ramaswami mentioned that it was something he had hoped to do in future editions of his Complete book of vinyasa Yoga but that it never came about. These are no substitute for his book of course, more like 'cheat' sheets for home practice.
So far I've made up the On your feet/tadasana ( picture is of the shorter 10 minute version), Asymmetric and Seated sequences, I hope to have the rest made up by the end of the weekend. Links are below and I'll add the others to this post when they're ready as well as to the VK page at the top of this blog. If you click on the image it should blow it up and be printable. If you think you'll find them useful then feel free to use them as you wish.
The quality isn't that great and some of them don't tally up exactly with the book, I recorded most of the video's before I attended Ramaswami's TT course, hopefully I'll get to improve on them in the future, I just wanted something to be going on for my own practice and that would also serve as a starting point for something better in the future perhaps by somebody more competent and capable than myself.
I welcome suggestions, I'm thinking of making up a set of subroutines as well as Beginner and Intermediate versions of the Sequences, perhaps some sample practice routines as well. If anyone knows how I can set up a downloadable PDF file on this blog with all of them together as a set please let me know.
The Ten major Vinyasa Krama Sequences
1. Practice sheets for Vinyasa Krama 'On your feet' sequence
2. Practice Sheets for Vinyasa Krama Asymmetric sequence