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Gary’s Tuesday Night Power Yoga/Trail Run – One of LA’s Toughest Workouts
Gary’s Power Yoga Crew, minus yours truly the photographer, and there is plenty of room for you
It’s been a long time coming. Tuesday always used to be the night I looked forward too, as a bunch of friends and I drove to Tarzana to take Coach Ilg’s High Performance Yoga® class. At that time, it was the toughest workout in LA. Many of my friends that I was able to talk into attending were beginner yoga practitioners and learned to embrace the challenge. We’d find our way through the simplest of poses working as hard as possible gaining the internal strength to match the physical strength required, as only few yoga teachers teach. I remember many classes hanging out in child’s poses, still sweating.
Gary and I weren’t even aquatinted yet. In fact, it would be a year later that Gary and I would becomes friends in the ChiRunning® instructors training class. We hit it off immediately. I quickly asked him to help me coach the Beach Runners.
From the beginning of Beach Runners, yoga has been an integral part. The first season Michele, one of LA’s best yoga teachers, drove down with me to train for her first half marathon. At the end of each Saturday run instead of just doing stretching, she started teaching a full-blown flow yoga class. The people responded and Gary and I knew that with our yoga and ChiRunning® practices, we could develop this group in ways far beyond any other marathon training program out there. Hence MaraYoga was born. More about that story later.
In those years, Gary has gone through extensive yoga teacher training and started teaching his first studio yoga class. Over those years I took him to Coach Ilg’s class whenever he was in town. Influenced by Coach Ilg’s classes combined with the graceful practice of his teacher Rosie, he started teaching one strong yoga class. This class flows like a Coach Ilg class. It is about creating strength and flexibility, understanding that these too must be in balance the same way the yin and yang together in a circle are a picture of balance.
The funny thing is many yogis out there couldn’t run a half-mile, let alone try, because they might “tighten up.” Where’s the balance in that? Hatha yoga is balance, Ha – Sun, Tha – Moon. I can rant on that later too.
As Coach Ilg only comes to LA a few times a year, Gary and I started the Trail Running/Yoga duathlon. It started with Gary, Al and I. Al couldn’t make the yoga part that day. Gary, Al and I ran in Griffith Park that day for two hours then were “Well Trained” in Coach Ilg’s yoga class. Who knew where this was going to take us. We only knew we had done one of the hardest workouts in LA that day.
Fast forward to this year. Gary starts teaching his Tuesday Power Yoga class and I leave his first class thinking, “Its back!” An ass-kicking Tuesday yoga class. The really cool thing was that this time more people showed, mostly new yogis, wondering what the hell this class was. They were not used to Gary’s unique style of yoga. “I’ve never done that before, that’s not yoga,” I heard one person say. Well friends, yoga is simply stated is the union of breath and movement. Mindfully moving your finger is yoga, so are Hindu squats. Gary knows what he is doing, making us stronger and more flexible in body and mind.
As if that’s not enough, starting last week, he decided to add a PV trail run before class. I’ll let him explain the run yet having run the hills of PV; I know that it is up and down. Trails and hills are where ChiRunners excel.
Scared, you shouldn’t be! This is where we get our strength. That warrior spirit that Coach Ilg talks about and you’ll hear Gary and I refer too. If you are new to running and /or yoga, you’ll learn to go at your speed, this is not a competition for you. I promise after a few weeks you will be stronger. You may even catch the warrior chi and find a way to make this a regular part of your routine.
Join us and Catch the Warrior Chi!
Namaste and Train Focused, Steve Mackel – Aspiring Yogi
Founder – Coach Steve
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