Teri Weatherly walked out of her first yoga class and felt like bursting into tears. While many would have been crying after the grueling session, Weatherly's reaction was nothing less than revelatory.
"Believe me, I never cry after a run," said the 39-year-old Timonium hairdresser, who runs 4 to 5 miles or exercises at a health club nearly every day. "Something clicked," she explains. "I felt very focused and more aware of my body than I do on machines at the gym."
But Weatherly hadn't been in just any old yoga session. Her first class was part of the fastest-growing incarnation of the 5,000-year-old discipline: hot yoga.
As if it weren't steamy enough outside, Weatherly and her fellow students had just spent a little over an hour bending, jumping and stretching, heartbeats racing, sweat flying, in a studio heated to about 90 degrees. Following instructions from a teacher -- an odd mix of religious leader and drill sergeant -- Weatherly discovered muscles she hadn't realized existed.
Hot yoga is not only turning up at studios in Baltimore and around the region, it's also drawing hardcore athletes who might not have previously considered yoga a challenging form of exercise.
A version of yoga developed by Bikram Choudhury, a Los Angeles yogi-turned-entrepreneur, has gained status as a brand name, and Baltimore's first franchised Bikram studio opened in Cockeysville last month.
The Bikram workout "is fantastic for your body," says Ken Friedman, a physical therapist from Reisterstown who attended a class at the Cockeysville opening.
Friedman, a professional ballet dancer in Canada and New York before returning to his native Baltimore, took Bikram classes in Manhattan, and says he often recommends yoga to his clients -- provided they have a doctor's clearance.
In any form of yoga, he says, "even high-level athletes will find places in their bodies they have never felt before."
The addition of heat allows muscles, joints and ligaments to stretch further than they would in an air-conditioned environment, and the sweat is cleansing. Additionally, most hot yoga workouts follow a rapid pace, with the postures elevating the heart rate.
"To me it's the biggest and best bang for your workout buck," says Donna Rubin, a co-owner of Bikram Baltimore. "You get everything in 90 minutes: cardio, sweating, strength, toning and meditation."
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