Yoga Styles

There are many different styles in Yoga and beginners may find it quite hard to know where to start and how to choose which class to attend. The classes offered at CUYS cover Hatha, Ashtanga, Iyengar and Viniyoga. All these different styles originated from Hatha yoga.

From this base the differing style of Ashtanga yoga focuses more on the continual movement of the body, building up heat in the two sun salutations to move onto a sequence of stretches. The stretches are practiced in a particular order – these tend to be extracts from the longer full primary series which is the advanced practise of Ashtanga. The Ashtanga class has a reliable format each week that results in noticeable progressions in the postures.

The Iyengar and Viniyoga classes taken focus on the holding of postures that is featured as a component of Hatha yoga. The classes tend to be focussed on relaxation and gentle movements that are varied each week.

The best advice regarding the “which style?” question would be to try a few different ones as different people enjoy different experiences that the classes create.