Manhunt Cares

By L.K. Regan

Many times you’ve walked past a yoga class, glanced in, and thought, “Yeah, right.” You’re a gym guy. You don’t do that stretchy stuff. But there are very good reasons why men going for muscle may want to work on stretching—and there’s no better way to stretch than yoga. Check out the six compelling reasons why you should try yoga below. Then try it out yourself, using some starter yoga poses courtesy of Jamila Dunn, an experienced yoga instructor at the University of California at Berkeley.

Yoga for Muscle Guys—and Everyone Else
Why do even the biggest guys need to do yoga? Dunn and her colleague Devin Wicks, UC Berkeley fitness director and premier strength coach to some of the university’s teams, narrowed down the list to these six primary benefits:

1. Increase Your Range of Motion: Stretching increases the range of motion through which you can move a muscle. If you load that muscle across that larger range, as when you’re lifting, you ask the muscle to do more work—and thus can add size. If you’ve hit a plateau, doing yoga and increasing your range of motion may give you that little edge you’re looking for.
2. Strengthen Your Stabilizers: Yoga focuses on your stabilizer muscles, not just the large muscle groups. So yoga can help to strengthen the muscle complexes you need to support the development of bulk. Too often, muscle guys focus exclusively on the big, “pretty” muscles like the pecs and biceps—but you need your stabilizing muscles to strengthen alongside them.
3. Develop Core Strength: Yoga develops core strength, which is neglected in many weight-lifting programs, but which is absolutely crucial to sustaining big lifting programs. All of your lifting should be stabilized through your core—but if your core isn’t strong, you may have trouble managing big weights.
4. Reduce Risk of Injury: Stretching helps to prevent injury by increasing elasticity.
5. Reduce Your Resting Heart Rate (And Your Stress Levels): Yoga can help to lower your resting heart rate, a goal often talked about for performance athletes but important for us all. Plus, the practice further reduces stress. A study out of Yale suggests that a regular program of yoga and meditation has a positive effect on both stress and the deleterious effects of stress on the body.
6. Loosen Up and Motivate: Yoga stretches are a great way to warm up before an intense workout. While you don’t want to do a full-on yoga class and then immediately hit the weights, a simple few poses before you strength train can help you prepare physically and motivate mentally.

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