Hot [Bikram] Yoga + a magical night out on the town

[Guest guest]

I love that there are so many small and big gyms / studios in Portland to which you can score free 1-2  week passes.  Core Power Yoga is one of them, and they feature hot yoga.  Since Bikram, like Spinning, are trademarked names it is simply called hot yoga, but it was all done in the traditional 26 pose Bikram sequence.

The instructor was good, but void of feeling and she spoke very fast.   Since it normally costs $17 to take a drop in class I was expecting a more rich experience as I have before at other smaller, independent yoga studios.  Also, the locker room was way too small and uncomfortably, crowded.

That aside, I think I liked it.  I can't really judge it yet to be honest.  It was indeed, very hot and I have never sweat so much in my life.  I'm not exaggerating when I say my tee shirt was completely soaked and you could wring out moisture from it after class.  They did have showers there, and man that felt good.  I started the shower at luke warm and moved on to cold. 

You don't do a single sun salutation..  No, instead you start out with 's weakest area, all the balancing poses, twice.  Eagle, tree, warrior 3, dancer's pose, etc. I would say that is a good 2/3 of the class.  After that you do some easy lower back execises and yoga sit ups, but still they are challenging simply because the room is HOT.  Heidi thank goodness brought yoga towels to put on top of our mats - regular towels but with little rubber bumps to keep it from moving, though I think a regular towel would work too.

It did not smell like b.o. like I thought it might, and all the men did the practice shirtless, and I was envious of them. I was surprised that most people left the final shavasana so quickly.  When the instructor turned off the heat and opened the door I was happy to bask in the cool air wafting over my body.  I was the last one to leave and only laid there maybe 6-7 minutes? 

My critique of the practice itself which as nothing to do with Core Power Yoga or the instructor is that you don't do ANY stretching hardly.  It's mostly balancing stuff with the goal of releasing toxins in your body. I did feel fantastic afterward and would say that it worked

As you most of you know I work in Sales and once in awhile get to wine and dine on the company dime, so tonite Heidi and I met up with another manager at Wildwood restaurant,  where  I could never afford to eat there on my own.  I took it all in.  It was dimly lit, we had superb food and service, and I left feeling content.  We took a taxi back into downtown and I bussed it home where this older woman started talking to me.  She reminded me of someone you would see on one of those psychic network commercials late at night.

I was hoping that hot yoga would have fried my legs such as to get out of dong them with Noel tomorrow but no such luck.  Tomorrow I go back under the 225+ lb bar for squats and will once again be crippled for 4-5 days.  Why do I pay for this.