Ardha Uttanasana
(Ard-ha Oohh-ta-nas-anna)
The standing half way lift. Have you ever held this for longer than a breathe? If so you will know why some may sigh at the thought 😂
Benefits?
- Balance
- Strengthening quads and back
- Lengthening hamstrings
- Massage the abdominal organs when repeated
I sometimes like to do this movement a few times over. Inhale Ardha Uttanasana, exhale Uttanasana and repeat x 5.
Anatomy
Similar to our full Uttanasana, this is a anterior (forward) pelvic tilt for our pelvis.
As you know our pelvis is a ball and socket joint. A pretty big one at that too! The hip joint is designed to bear weight hence it's size where as the shoulder joint like we spoke about in Urdhva Hastasana (Upward lift), is designed for maximum movement and that is why it can become injured very easily.
As you can see below, the ball of the femur also known as the femoral head (thigh bone) is tucked away nicely within the pelvic acetabulum.
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Think of it like your egg in an egg cup!
Remember we all have difference shapes and sizes so your joint may be bigger or smaller than someone else.
Lets go a little bit further this week into the joints.
1. Why do we need to warm out joints up?
2. And how do we?
_________________________________________________________________________________
1.
We need to warm up the hip joint before any extreme yoga movements because it is susceptible to stretch injury.
There is a fluid that lines the inside of our joints called synovial fluid. In order to warm this up and lubricate the joint we must move it like we do any other warm up. This is where our sun salutations come in. They warm the body before more intense postures.
Continuous Sun Salutations = Increased Heart Rate = Increased blood flow = Increased body heat = Warm muscles & joints.
Think of it like your car trying to run with no oil. The engine will seize up.
Our joints have fluid that lubricate them to work efficiently.
2.
For our shoulder joint, I always like the swan dive into forward fold because it is giving us a better range of movement in our shoulders. Also a cat/cow with a side opening twist is yummy for the shoulder too.
For our hip joint, our forward folds and the low lunge (which we will be getting to in the coming weeks) is great with some added hip circles in there 😃 Some cat/cows with knee circles (like the fire hydrant move)
If we don't warm up our joints before any style of exercise, we run the risk of injury by the adding load or weight onto our bones without the protective fluid.
So make sure during any warm ups or sun salutations you think about why you are doing it, what is warming up and how you could maybe add another level to the warm up.
Muscle time:
So the muscles used in our half way lift.
We contract (work) the :
Quads (thighs) - by pulling up our knee caps
Upper back ( Traps) - by bringing shoulder blades together
Chest (Pecs) - by opening our chest
We stretch/lengthen :
Hamstrings
Checklist
Coming from Uttanasana we inhale lift up >
Feet, Legs & Pelvis:
- Feet either together or hip distance apart
- Grounding through all 4 corners of our feet
- Toes spread wide
- Bent knees or slight bend to the knees to prevent over extension in the knee joint (that's a whole blog post on its own. If you want to know more about over extending joints, let me know and I'll do a post) Here is a picture to scare you into wanting to know more....
My knees don't do this but my elbows do. I have to always keep a slight bend.
- Legs engaged
- Pelvis is in its anterior tilt
Spine & Upper body:
- Lengthening through the spine
- Draw shoulder blades behind your heart
- Chest forward
- Focus is down
- Abdominals engaged which helps to protect your back
- 3 options for your hands depending on flexibility:
1. The earth
2. The shins
3. The Thighs
Option to use a block for this to build strength posture to build strength and to aid holding it for longer periods of time.
Neck & Head:
We want to maintain a neutral spine so think about your neck staying in line with the rest of your back. No looking up or too far down. Crown facing forward if you are in full extension.
- Eyes gazing to the earth
- Neck long extending out (you will feel this happen automatically when you draw your shoulders back and shoulder blades behind your heart)
Exhale, releasing back to Uttanasana! Yummy.
Each week I like to throw in some further anatomy knowledge to add to your growing library 😀
I hope you enjoyed this weeks posture.
As always, share your thoughts below, via email or through social media:
Next week we will tackle Plank! A favourite right?! 😰
Love & Light,
Elisa.
Refereneces:
Mark Stephens - Teaching Yoga
Ray Long - The key muscles of Yoga
https://helpyourback.org/health/hip-pain-when-sitting-is-it-caused-by-hip-impingement/
http://www.keyword-suggestions.com/ZWdnY3Vw/
https://www.dreamstime.com/stock-photo-yogi-female-standing-half-forward-bend-asana-sporty-young-beautiful-smiling-beginning-yoga-student-white-sportswear-doing-easy-image57183741
https://www.spotebi.com/exercise-guide/ardha-uttanasana/
http://www.frontsplitsfast.com/whatto-do-with-sway-back-knees
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