It's been a year since the last episode of Sage Yoga Training, but at last I have put together a new episode, and I have more on deck for the coming months. The podcast is a series of brief routines, generally under ten minutes, for practice after a workout or on their own. You could string them together to create a longer sequence, of course. They are presented in slideshow format for reference, and I measure how long each pose is held so that they're quantitatively even. You might prefer to hold these poses longer, so please use the routines as a starting point, and customize the practice to suit your own needs.

This episode features some reclining twists to stretch the hips, spine, and chest. These are some of my favorite poses, and you can find them elsewhere, too:

• In my classes and workshops
• On my class at YogaVibes
• In The Athlete's Pocket Guide to Yoga

You can find all of the podcast episodes in many places:

For a few months, especially since my Ironman, I've been struggling with sacroiliac pain. If you don't know what this is, consider yourself lucky! SI joint issues are common among yoga practitioners. Roger Cole and Judith Lasater have both written clearly on the subject for Yoga Journal, and it's becoming a hot topic in triathlon circles. Mine gets out of whack when I run on trails (which I do as much as possible), in certain poses, and when I do stupid (and fun) things like trying to flip off the diving board.



I've gotten a surprising amount of relief from a little wonder called the Sacrowedgy. (This is an unpaid, unsolicited endorsement!) As its name implies, it fits under your sacrum to support it as you lie back and relax, allowing the sacrum and ilium to slip back into proper alignment. Whether the tool itself makes the fix or the time spent lying on the floor does the job, it's been great, and my plantar fasciitis, knee pain, and shoulder niggle all disappeared after a few days' diligent relaxation with the wedgy.

My husband's reaction has been much more exciting. He liked my pink lady wedgy so much that he ordered his own blue male version (the male sacrum is narrower and longer). It's done wonders for his back issues, most of which stem from a herniated disk (L5-S1, a classic), and he takes it to and from work religiously. In fact, we've become evangelists for this little piece of rubber, spreading the good news to anyone who'll listen. It's noninvasive, it encourages you to relax and to be still (which I love both as a yoga teacher and as a type-A athlete), and for $30, it's really worth a try.

I spent a weekend in the wonderful company of a group of teachers interested in working with athletes. Walking them through my approach to the subject helped me crystallize my own thoughts, which once again come down to this:

Yoga for athletes is not necessarily athletic yoga. Yoga should complement training, not simply pile on more stress. When sport intensity and the intensity of yoga practice are in inverse proportion, yoga can buoy the athlete by improving strength, flexibility, balance, and focus.

We discussed what to teach (teach what will benefit the students in the room), how to teach it (in a way that comes from personal experience and authority), business, and pedagogy. We practiced poses that target core and hip strength, as well as hip flexibility, and we enjoyed some gentle inversions and supported backbends that help balance the demands of sport training. Then we put the theory into practice, as I brought a dozen student teachers with me to work with the UNC football team. This was a smash success: the teachers enjoyed seeing the variety of bodies and abilities, while the players loved having so many hands to offer adjustments, and so many models demonstrating the poses. I snapped a picture of the teachers as we left the stadium.


I'll be repeating this workshop in Carrboro next year, and I plan to take it on the road as well, with stops in NYC and Southern California in 2010. If you're interested in studying the topic of teaching yoga to athletes with me, please sign up for my e-mail newsletter or contact me directly, and I'll keep you in the loop.

Here are three stretches based on a lunge, designed to get your hips open and balanced. Benefit: increased range of motion, yielding a greater stride length. Plus, they feel good. Remember: static stretches should come after a run, not before.

For a full series of postrun lunges, see the "Lunge Series" episode of Sage Yoga Training—you can view it as a slideshow at the podcast archives or on YouTube. And for a book full of routines for practice before and after your workout, please check out The Athlete's Pocket Guide to Yoga.