Flexibility, balance, and toning muscles are some of the things that come to mind when people think of yoga. Some are surprised to learn that yoga offers some strength training benefits for both the upper and lower body.
The best poses for building upper body strength are asanas that require you to support the weight of your body with your arms. In weight lifting, weights are used to build muscle strength. In yoga, the body weight is used.
There are many poses that benefit upper body strength. Some to include in your practice are cobra, plank, side plank, upward facing dog, and any of the arm balances. You can use several in a sequence, such as plank, side plank, plank, drop down to the mat, and come up into cobra or up dog. Holding poses like downward facing dog also helps to increase upper body strength.
Use a variety of strengthening poses to improve strength throughout the upper body, including the upper back, arms, shoulders and chest.
To build upper body strength, hold poses like plank and cobra. Moving in a flowing sequence through the poses doesn’t give enough time to build muscle strength. This engages and strengthens the upper body muscles. Even if using several in a series, pause and hold each pose briefly to gain the maximum upper body strengthening benefits.
The length of time you are able to hold a pose depends on your upper body strength. If you don’t have much strength, you won’t be able to hold the pose for long. Don’t worry about how long you can last. Hold each pose for as long as you can, even if it is just twenty seconds at first.
Over time, as your upper body strength improves. To keep improving, hold the poses for a few seconds longer with each practice. Gradually, you will build your arm, shoulder, upper back and chest muscles and holding the poses will be easier.
This progress happens gradually in the practice of yoga and you shouldn’t try to push it. The energy level and strength can vary from day to day. Don’t get discouraged when this happens.