By Mia Fatuzzo ’15, News Section Editor

Would you like to earn a gym credit by, in part, practicing yoga once a week? I would. That’s why I, along with fellow

junior Kacie Bradfish, participate in Winter PE Program, offered by Country Day to girls looking to earn one season of sports credit. This year, participants in Winter PE are enjoying circuits, spinning, and yoga. I’ve chosen to

extol the benefits of yoga because I find circuits

and spinning to be activities so challenging that they would probably be hard to write about as well.

Though there are over one hundred different “schools” of yoga, a usual class includes breathing exercises, meditation, and postures that stretch and flex numerous muscle groups. Ashtanga yoga, for example, is a fast-paced series of sequential postures, while Bikram yoga, practiced in studios heated to temperatures pushing 100 degrees Fahrenheit in an attempt to replicate yoga’s birthplace climate, uses sweat to help the toxins out of its follower’s bodies. In the Winter

PE program, we practice Hatha yoga, an electric blend of different types of yoga that focuses mainly on asanas, or postures.

According to a helpful graphic provided by the Huffington Post, yoga helps to improve mental health by lowering stress levels, decreasing blood pressure, and providing anxiety relief. Yoga is unique in that it both improves flexibility and strengthens muscles. Bradfish agrees: “I like how yoga offers both exercise and a good way to relax after school.”