Do you keep track of your physical status? Many of us track our steps with a smartwatch or use an app to log weight, heart rate, and other vitals. But do you also track your flexibility, balance, and endurance? They are just as important especially as we grow older.
My yoga class is mainly middle-aged women just like me. Our goal is to develop and maintain the different kinds of flexibility, balance, and strength that will keep us safe and healthy as we head farther into our lives. We want to be able to stand up from the floor even at 100 years old!
So to keep track, we do a quarterly assessment that I call the Yoga Fitness Test. It’s a set of fairly standard fitness tests that I adapted to use familiar yoga poses.
We check our hip, shoulder, torso, and groin flexibility, our balance, and core strength endurance. There are 16 tests in total and including a warm-up, it takes about an hour to complete them; just the right length for our class. If you do them by yourself, you can probably whip through them in 30 minutes or so.
These tests can be done at home with minimal equipment. You need a ruler, a stopwatch timer, masking tape, and a strap (or string or even a towel). Also the instructions and the scoring sheet.
The scoring is imperfect. Each time you take the test, there are many factors that might change the results: the position of the ruler, whether or not you warmed up sufficiently, your state of mind. Even some actual cheating to boost your ego.
We’re not looking for precise scores, but scores as a guide over the long term that might point out a place we could stretch more or strengthen. Holding steady on a score from year to year is enough of an accomplishment for me – at least I’m not getting worse.
But bad scores do happen. For example if my plank hold time is shorter today, no big deal; I had an off day for one reason or another. But if it gets shorter each and every time I test, then that’s an area to examine.
Try it and see what you think. If you want to join us for a live session, check with me for the next scheduled date.
