When you list the health benefits of yoga, improvements in flexibility, balance, and relaxation come to mind, but you probably don’t think of it as a cardiovascular workout like brisk walking, step aerobics, running, or high-intensity interval training. Still, the fact that yoga relieves stress bodes well for the health of your heart, but whether it can improve your aerobic capacity, that’s a different story – or is it?
What Constitutes a Cardiovascular Workout?
To qualify as a cardiovascular workout, an exercise must elevate heart rate to a level of at least 60% of your maximum heart rate. A simple formula, although not the most accurate, for measuring maximum heart rate is 220 minus your age. So, a 40-year old would have a maximum heart rate of 180. Sixty percent of that would be a heart rate of 108. So, if you exercised at an intensity that got your heart rate up to 108 for a sustained period of time, at least 20 minutes, it would qualify as a cardiovascular workout.
Another way to look at whether an exercise offers cardiovascular benefits is whether, over time, it improves aerobic capacity, a measure of your body’s ability to take in, deliver, and convert oxygen to energy. Aerobic capacity is influenced by the capacity of your lungs to take in oxygen, your heart’s ability to deliver it to tissues, and the ability of tissues to take it up and use it to make ATP, the energy currency that cells use.
A measure of your aerobic capacity is V02 max, a value that tells you the maximum amount of oxygen in milliliters your body can use in one minute. If you have a higher aerobic capacity, you can deliver more oxygen to tissues during exercise and they can use that oxygen to make ATP to sustain exercise. A higher aerobic capacity, or V02 max, means you have more exercise endurance.
How Yoga Stacks Up As a Cardiovascular Workout
The most common type of yoga is Hatha yoga. This type of yoga consists of various yoga postures and sun salutations carried out in sequence framed by a warm-up and cool-down. The main goal isn’t to increase your heart rate but to build muscle endurance, flexibility, balance, and relieve stress. True to form, a study published in The Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research found Hatha yoga doesn’t meet the criteria for an aerobic workout. In fact, it led to a lower increase in heart rate than walking at a leisurely pace.
It’s not surprising that Hatha yoga doesn’t improve aerobic capacity. In fact, it slows down the sympathetic nervous system, the fight or flight component, that goes into overdrive when you do intense aerobic exercise. A study published in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research measured a variety of fitness parameters when participants did Hatha yoga for 30 minutes. Yoga didn’t increase oxygen requirements as much as walking at a speed of 3.5 miles per hour.
The conclusion? Hatha yoga doesn’t meet the criteria for a cardiovascular workout, although it offers other benefits, including the potential to help with weight control. Research suggests that, despite the low metabolic costs of Hatha yoga, it can slow weight gain in people over the age of 40. How does it do this? Possibly by relieving stress and creating greater awareness of the food choices you’re making. Plus, reducing stress is also important for a healthy heart and protection against heart disease.
Other Types of Yoga
Ashtanga yoga, also known as power yoga, is a more vigorous approach to yoga as the poses are more demanding and the pace is faster. If you’ve done it, you know Ashtanga elevates heart rate more than Hatha yoga. Unfortunately, there are few studies in the literature looking at whether Ashtanga yoga increases aerobic capacity. However, when you do yoga asanas quickly, without stopping between poses, your heart rate rises.
Depending upon your fitness level, Ashtanga MAY increase enough to improve your aerobic capacity over time. Improvements in V02 max would more likely happen if you’re an untrained beginner and be less likely if you’ve already built up some level of aerobic fitness. The way to find out if you’re getting your heart rate up enough is to wear a heart rate monitor and see if the rate rises to at least 60% of your maximum heart rate. Heart rate monitors come in handy sometimes.
The Bottom Line
If your main goal is to get into better cardiovascular shape, yoga isn’t the ideal way to do it. Although you may improve your aerobic capacity to some degree with Ashtanga yoga, it’s not a time-tested way to improve your body’s ability to deliver oxygen. Still, all forms of yoga can improve flexibility, muscle endurance, and balance. Plus, it’s the perfect complement to more strenuous forms of exercise.
Just because Hatha yoga doesn’t improve your aerobic capacity doesn’t mean it isn’t good for your heart. Research shows Hatha yoga lowers blood pressure in people with mild hypertension enough to possibly avoid the use of medications. In one study, participants experienced a reduction in blood pressure after only two weeks of Hatha practice. Anything that brings elevated blood pressure down is good for your heart!
The take-home message? You may not want yoga to be your primary form of cardio, but it’s an ideal complement to a more demanding workout schedule that includes more intense exercise. Your body needs a break and yoga helps keep your workout routine in balance. So, keep doing aerobic exercise, including HIIT, but make time in your routine for yoga too – and enjoy the additional benefits this type of workout offers.
References:
Woman’s Health Magazine. “Benefits of Yoga: Does Yoga Really Burn Fat?”
National Council on Strength and Fitness. “The Benefits of Yoga”
Medscape.com Multispecialty. “Hatha Yoga Reduces Blood Pressure in Mildly Hypertensive Patients”
Journal of alternative and complementary medicine (New York, N.Y.) (Impact Factor: 1.59). 03/2014; 20(4). DOI: 10.1089/acm.2013.0139,
Yoga in the Prevention and Treatment of Hypertension. May 26, 2015. Dr. Stacy D. Hunter, PhD.
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