Karl Henare, the owner of Kia Kaha Studios in Takapuna, discusses the physical and mental benefits of each.
Is yoga mainly about movement and fitness, or something deeper?
Yoga is a modality for self realization. Fancy words but it basically means to know yourself better, how far this takes you is your choice. So yes if you choose it can be just a way to maintain fitness… but if you decide it could mean a whole lot more. Coordinating your breath with movement helps to bring awareness to how you are moving physically. As we deepen our awareness of how we move our bodies it begins to illuminate where we may have limiting thoughts about our abilities, where we may be living through fear or where the ego may be in the driving seat. We get to then assess if these behaviours that come to light are serving us or not and if not, take steps to making change in the way we relate to ourselves and the world around us.
If someone is looking to develop core strength and balance, would you send them to a yoga class or a pilates class?
The term ‘core’ gets thrown around a lot and subsequently is often misunderstood. Your abs aren’t your core, they are part of your core. An easy way to think of it is to think of wearing a corset and your core is that area. This includes your back and sides. Good core strength comes from control and balance. Your whole core needs to work together to hold everything stable and in balance. Yoga and pilates are both exceptional for this. The difference is that the very root of pilates stems from holding a stable spine. It is also very evidence based in physiology and only focuses on the connection between mind and body.
Yoga has a lot more involved in it as the focus isn’t necessarily about your spine, but who you are as a person. There are many different types of yoga, as there are in pilates, so it really depends on what style you do and what your focus is, as a whole your posture is more likely to be the focus in a pilates class.
How do yoga and pilates complement other HIIT and cardio training?
The essence of HIIT training is to work hard and fast for short intervals. Other cardio training such as running, swimming and cycling all basically work off doing the same movement fast and repeating it a lot. HIIT and cardio workouts are great but can cause a lot of injuries. This isn’t due to them not being designed workouts, simply your body needs more than this. It needs stability and strength in the joints as well as flexibility. The control of yoga and pilates allows your body the strength, stability and control so that you can listen to your body before you injure yourself.
What about for strength and flexibility?
Both are great for your physical strength and flexibility but as a generalisation I would say that pilates focuses more on the physical strength and flexibility and yoga focuses more on your inner flexibility and strength, your mana. They do tie in closely and both offer development in each respective area but again if we draw our attention to the purpose of why each of these were created then we can find a way to get the results that we want more effectively. The combination of these two work extremely well together as they complete rather than compete with each other.
