85°
Ashtanga yoga at 85 degrees
Ashtanga Basics and Ashtanga Flow, taught in a warm room in the Hemingway District. Open to all levels, beginners welcome.
Two ways into the same series
Ashtanga Basics runs 60 to 75 minutes at 85 degrees and teaches the traditional Half Primary Series, with increased cueing and modifications offered along the way. It is the class to start with if the series is new to you.
Ashtanga Flow runs 60 minutes, also at 85 degrees. It is a vinyasa practice inspired by the Ashtanga series, so the breath-linked movement and the familiar shapes are there in a flowing format.
Both classes are open to all levels, and the studio says beginners are welcome. You do not need to know the Sanskrit names or the order before you arrive.
The long practice hall at Yoga Loft Studios in Oak Park, with a pressed-tin ceiling and arched windows
Why the sequence stays the same
Ashtanga is taught in a fixed order of postures, linked by breath. Because the order does not change, repetition becomes the teacher: each class you can see where you are steadier than last time and where you are not yet.
One Google reviewer, Lisa Duré, points out that Ashtanga at the studio is the same sequence each time and calls that a good fit for beginners who want to learn from repetition, without pretending it will be easy.
Owner Jill Jerome trained in the full Primary Series of Ashtanga and practices Mysore and meditation daily. The classes come from someone who lives the method, not someone who read about it.
Using the modifications
Modifications are not a lesser version of a posture. They are the version that fits your body today, and in Ashtanga Basics your teacher offers them out loud so you can choose without stopping the room.
The 85 degree room is warm enough to loosen the hamstrings and shoulders and cool enough to keep the breath long. Stay with the inhale and exhale first and let the shapes follow.
If the series grabs you, Ashtanga is part of the curriculum in the studio's 200-hour teacher training, taught by Jill.
Ashtanga Basics and Ashtanga Flow both run at 85 degrees, and both are open to all levels.
Repetition, itemised
What stays put, and what moves.
Every Ashtanga class is a repeat of the one before. That is the point, and it is also why the small changes are easy to see.
- 01
The order of the postures
Set, and linked by breath. Learn it once and every class afterwards builds on the last one.
Stays
- 02
The room
85°, a warm room, for every Ashtanga class on the schedule.
Stays
- 03
The cueing
Ashtanga Basics adds increased cueing and modifications. Ashtanga Flow is a 60 minute vinyasa practice inspired by the series.
Depends on the class
- 04
Your breath
The place to look for progress. Longer exhales, quieter transitions and holds that stop feeling like a fight.
Changes
- 05
Your edge
Some shapes open up before others. Modifications are there so the series fits the body that walked in.
Changes
- Want a faster, more athletic pace at the same temperature? Look at Power Yoga. Curious where the series leads? The 200-hour teacher training covers it. Your first two weeks are $49, see pricing, then pick an Ashtanga class on the Oak Park schedule.