Yoga and surfing — why they belong together

Every surf town has yoga. It's easy to assume that's fashion — a mat on a rooftop photographs well. The real reason is duller and more convincing: surfing is one of the most lopsided sports there is, and yoga is one of the few practices that addresses the lopsidedness directly.

What surfing does to a body

Look at a surf session as a physiotherapist would.

Paddling is hours of repetitive shoulder rotation in a prone position, with the lower back held in extension the whole time. The shoulders' small stabilising muscles fatigue; the lumbar spine compresses.

The pop-up is an explosive movement from lying flat to standing on a moving surface — hip flexors, glutes and rotational core firing in under a second, dozens of times a session.

The stance is a deep, asymmetric squat held with one hip open and the spine rotated. Always the same side. Over a week, one hip gets tighter than the other.

The wipeout is uncontrolled: held underwater, tumbled, unable to breathe. The body braces, and the nervous system spikes.

None of this is bad. It's what makes surfing feel the way it does. But it's a pattern, and a pattern repeated daily without a counter-movement becomes a stiffness, then a pain, then a week off.

What yoga does about it

• Shoulder mobility and stability for paddling — thoracic extension (cobra, upward dog), shoulder openers, chaturanga control
• Hip mobility for pop-up and stance — pigeon, lizard, deep lunges, malasana squat
• Rotational core — twists: seated, revolved lunges, revolved triangle
• Lower-back decompression — forward folds, child's pose, supine twists
• Single-leg balance — tree, warrior III, half moon
• Breath control under stress — ujjayi breathing, breath-linked movement

The last one matters more than it looks. Vinyasa yoga links every movement to a breath. After a week of that, holding your breath calmly under a wave is no longer a panic reflex — it's a pattern the body knows.

Before or after the session?

Both, and not the same way.

Before the water — Vinyasa, moderate. Twenty to thirty minutes of flow warms the shoulders, hips and spine through their full range. Sun salutations are, not by accident, a paddling-and-pop-up rehearsal: prone, press, extend, fold, stand. You want to arrive at the beach warm, not tired — so the practice stays moderate.

After the water — Yin. Long, passive holds, three to five minutes each, targeting exactly what the session loaded: hips, lower back, chest and shoulders. Yin works on connective tissue, which responds to slow sustained pressure rather than movement. It's also the moment the nervous system comes down from the morning.

What to skip: a hard Vinyasa or Ashtanga practice right after surfing. The shoulders are already spent, and the fatigue makes alignment sloppy. Recovery days are for Yin or Restorative, not for a second workout.

What the surfers notice

Not on day one. Around day three or four, the pop-up starts to feel less like an effort and more like a shape the body knows. The lower back stops being the first thing you notice when you wake up. And the wipeout — the one that used to send you to the surface gasping — becomes a thing you wait out.

None of this is mysticism. It's mobility, stability and breath, trained in the gaps between sessions.

How we do it at AMANAR

Vinyasa at sunrise on the rooftop, facing the ocean, before the morning session. Yin later in the day, when the surfing is done. The Wellness package includes two yoga sessions a week; residents on the Surf or Nomad package can join a class on a drop-in basis when there's a mat free. The weekly schedule is posted at the house.