Yoga in Delta

The instructors at Bikram Yoga North Vancouver focus on Bikram yoga, which was founded by Bikram Choudhury, who started his practice at age 4 and won the National India Yoga Championship at age 13. He later injured his knee in a weightlifting accident, and despite a grim prognosis from doctors who said he would never walk again, Bikram continued his yoga practice and made a full recovery. Each 90-minute Bikram-yoga class takes place in a studio heated to 105 degrees Fahrenheit and consists of one series of 26 poses. This discipline can move oxygenated blood throughout the body, increase muscle tone, improve overall health, and steam unsuspecting vegetables.

Easily accessible from the Columbia Street Skytrain station, both of the classrooms at Bikram Yoga New Westminster are heated to 40-degrees Celsius. Each day, students shuffle inside these warm studios to learn yoga postures from owner and head instructor Herminder Gossal or one of the instructors from her trained staff. During class, they teach 26 yoga postures total, one for each step of the Electric Slide. The postures’ collective benefit of improved flexibility, increased strength, and reduced stress is amplified by the heat. Also amplifying matters is the studio’s facilities, which include showers, an infrared sauna, and a Body Vibe platform that vibrates to contract muscles and spur blood circulation.

With a focus on giving its clients an intimate, small-studio experience, Sanga Yoga Studio's cozy Dunbar Street location accepts no more than 18 students per class. Studio owner and Vancouver Yoga Conference faculty member Shannon Cluff harnesses her experience from mentoring more than 40 yoga teachers to inspire and guide Sanga's team of instructors. Together, they lead a comprehensive roster of daytime and evening classes that includes Hatha yoga, Flow Foundation, and meditation suitable for both beginning and advanced yogis.

Shannon's ongoing commitment to the development and growth of yoga instructors manifests itself in her Teacher's Integration Program, where she counsels certified teachers, showing them how to refine their instructional approaches and encouraging their progress along the way with downward-facing fist-bumps.

For many, yoga is simply a great workout and stress reliever. Not for Svetlana Balysheva. For her, yoga is a gift—the ancient Indian practice helped free her from the suffocating grip of some serious diseases, allowing her to continue to raise a family of five girls. To share the restorative benefits of yoga with the world, she decided to become a certified teacher in both Canada and India.

She—along with a stalwart team of nine other certified instructors—teaches class seven days a week, separating the art into 13 different variations, including flow and power yoga. The staff also leads targeted sessions to assist the injured, overweight, or elderly with helpfully modified positions. Certain instructors introduce meditative elements throughout their classes to give students an extra opportunity to calm their minds and train their un-housebroken spirit animals.

Lisa and Danny, the owners and directors of Bikram Yoga Vancouver, began their mutual journey under the tutelage of Bikram Choudhury, the founder of the worldwide Yoga College of India as well as the style of yoga that now bears his name. After a knee injury left him crippled at 17, Bikram willed himself toward recovery with the help of his teacher, Bishnu Ghosh, and the series of 26 asanas that the two designed specifically to heal the body’s chronic physical ailments.

Today, Lisa and Danny continue to teach those same 26 poses to students of all levels. Their classes unfold in a studio heated to a fiery 40.5 degrees Celsius; the high temperatures help the body shed tension, toxins, and piggybacking snowmen. Focused breathing exercises complement sitting and standing poses that propel oxygen to the body's extremities and strengthen muscles.

Sunbeams flow through the windows of Namaste Yoga Studio, serving as a physical representation of the light that emanates from the yogis who practice here. The rays warm the floor’s hardwood planks, where groups hone ancient poses and breathing exercises drawn from yogic traditions such as Hatha, Vinyasa, Kundalini, and Yin. During many classes, students of all skill levels illustrate the meaning of the studio’s name—“I bow to you”—by bending toward sources of inspiration such as the majestic sun and their patient, attentive teachers. Power yoga classes teem with athletic poses that sculpt the muscles, and restorative sessions use complimentary props to foster stretches as deep and relaxing as a bubble bath in a moon crater. Young yogis can learn playful poses during children’s classes, and grownups seeking personalized attention can enlist in private sessions that help hone strength, flexibility, and bodily alignment.