The Science of Yoga

health-related aspects of physical fitness.”
    It was, arguably, a small step for the recognition of yoga as an aerobic activity—a step grounded in the discipline’s growing incorporation of such vigorous poses as the Frog and the Sun Salutation. Or perhaps it was simply a fluke. The lack of experimental controls increased the chance of false readings.
    Whatever the study’s scientific merit, the leaders of the yoga community, long on the defensive when it came to cardiovascular issues, seized on the modestfinding as a breakthrough. It was hard proof, they asserted, that yoga is all an individual needs to stay fit. The contention was a bold restatement of Gune’s early claims. Only now—in theory, at least—it had the steel of modern science.
    A portrait of the aerobics research formed the heart of a 2002 article in Yoga Journal. The glossy magazine prides itself on giving readers “the most current scientific information available.” It spread its lengthy cover story on yoga fitness over nine pages and illustrated it with lots of color photographs of yogis in scientific labs undergoing close scrutiny. A main location for the documentary photos was the University of California at Davis. In its article, Yoga Journal reported that it had carefully surveyed the world of science and discovered solid evidence that “optimal fitness” requires no running or swimming to strengthen the heart and no weight lifting to build the muscles.
    “Yoga is all you need,” it declared, “for a fit mind and body.”
    The article said nothing about the downbeat findings of Cooper and the Duke scientists. It did, however, highlight the Davis study, calling the 7 percent rise “a very respectable increase” and hailing the aerobic finding as a breakthrough. Even so, the article, like the Davis authors, provided little context for the figure—making no comparison, for instance, to what endurance training can do for peak oxygenation.
    Reaching further, Yoga Journal filled its article with profiles, testimonials, and anecdotal studies of people who hailed the yoga-alone perspective.
    It quoted Dina Amsterdam. “I haven’t done anything but yoga and some hiking for ten years,” she said. “Yoga completely brought me back to physical and emotional health.”
    The Davis and Yoga Journal articles quickly became the go-to authorities around the globe for demonstrating that yoga alone was vigorous enough to meet the aerobic recommendations. The door had opened a crack, and a blast of aggressive marketing shot through.
    One of the flashiest promoters was YogaFit, a commercial style that originated in Los Angeles. Its founding goal was to make yoga an integral part of the fitness industry. The style combined push-ups, sit-ups, squats, and other repetitive exercises with traditional yoga postures in a flowing kind of Vinyasa format. A centerpiece was the Sun Salutation. Seeking a wide audience, the style hailed sweat over what it characterized as yogic mumbo-jumbo, focusing insteadon earthy rewards. For instance, its YogaButt program claimed to “totally transform your thighs and glutes,” resulting in a bottom that is “sleek and sexy.” YogaFit sold. Starting in the 1990s, its fast workouts spread through gyms, spas, and health clubs, with thousands of women taking up the contemporary hybrid. Its big hit was YogaButt. To satisfy demand, the company developed a course of training that could certify instructors in four hours.
    YogaFit presented itself as a plunge into extreme fitness. Beth Shaw, its founder, claimed that the vigorous style focused minds, trimmed fat, toned bodies, and provided “a tough cardiovascular workout.” Her promotional literature, when enumerating the fitness benefits of the style, cited the number one payoff as “cardiovascular endurance.”
    In 2003, the company sought to substantiate her cardio declarations. The sixteen-page paper, “Health Benefits of Hatha Yoga,” cited no lab studies that YogaFit had sponsored. Instead, it reviewed the existing research. The paper cited the Davis study, the Yoga Journal article, and other inquiries as demonstrating that the style offered a serious path to the heights of cardiovascular fitness.
    As usual in such tellings, the paper ignored the negative findings and the context. Still, it made the best of a tenuous situation and called YogaFit and other energetic styles of yoga “aerobically challenging.”
    The good news spread. It traveled far beyond the