Backbends for Beginners | Iyengar Yoga

Level: Some Experience You'll need: two blocks, two straps, blankets, a bolster, a chair and a wall (a stick is useful but optional) Includes: Ustrasana (camel), Salabhasana, Dhanurasana, Chatushpadasana and a supported half Halasana on a chair. No headstand. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Today Juan Carlos, a Level 1 certified Iyengar teacher, and I practise baby backbends, from the beginner stage to a little bit more advanced, using a variety of props to show the different stages. We work on the fundamentals: the shoulder blades moving down, the chest lifting and the tailbone moving in. Ustrasana lengthens the front body, bringing energy and oxygen into the front body as well as the spine. We start with a strap harness and Adho Mukha Svanasana, then Utkatasana, Ustrasana with a chair, Urdhva Mukha Svanasana, Salabhasana, Dhanurasana and Chatushpadasana, and finish with a restful half Halasana on the chair. If you don't have all the props, it's all right; we show without them as well. These backbends are really delicious. They create a lot of energy and strength. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ IN THIS CLASS YOU'LL LEARN TO • move the shoulder blades down and in so the chest can lift • move the tailbone and the middle buttocks in to open the front groin • lengthen first before you lift, so you don't compress the lower back or the neck • use a chair, a bolster, blocks and straps to find each stage ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ SELF-PACED PROGRAMS 👇 New to Iyengar yoga? Start with the Foundational course: 18 classes over six weeks. ► Foundational I & II Bundle https://desayogi.com/yt/foundations-b... ► 100-Hour Iyengar Yoga Progression https://desayogi.com/yt/100hr ► Browse all programs https://desayogi.com/yt/shop ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ CHAPTERS 0:00 Introduction 2:05 The shoulder action with a strap harness 5:11 Adho Mukha Svanasana with straps 11:22 Utkatasana at the wall and with a chair 17:38 Ustrasana with a chair 21:54 Ustrasana, hands to the heels 26:04 Ustrasana with the head supported on a chair 27:58 Adho Mukha Svanasana 28:50 Urdhva Mukha Svanasana on blocks, the floor and a chair 34:48 Salabhasana with straps 42:00 Dhanurasana 46:10 Adho Mukha Svanasana and Adho Mukha Virasana 47:54 Chatushpadasana with a strap 52:25 Half Halasana on a chair 59:49 Mini Setu Bandha 1:00:27 Savasana ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ QUESTIONS? Leave them in the comments below or find me on social: Website: https://desayogi.com/yt/site Instagram: www.instagram.com/desa_yogi_bali Facebook:   / desayogi   Subtitles added #iyengaryoga #backbends #ustrasana #yogaprops #kathycook #desayogi