LA "yoga king" teacher Vinnie Marino

Vinnie Marino was in town this week-end, and the town was sweaty and HOT. together with 70 other yogis, i participated in his class today from 2.30-4.30pm and my asana got kicked. 30 minutes into the class i was drenched. by the end of the class my clothes and mat were soaked in sweat. it's a long time since i've sweated that much in a yoga practice. it felt so good and de-toxing.

Vinnie taught a hip opening flow, which is my favorite, and the flow was amazingly challenging, but at the same time it was in a very gentle and thoughtful way. that might sound strange, but it's how it felt. i was pleasantly surprised.
last time i took Vinnie's class was in LA and i was 6 months pregnant, so needless to say, today was easier :-)

the class in LA was good with amazing classroom energy, but as a teacher, the sequencing didn't leave me curious for more. maybe he didn't have a good day that day, maybe i felt the class differently since i was pregnant and hormonal, maybe i had such high expectations since i had heard soooo much about Vinnie and his amazingness ... anyway, the past is the past. i wanted to give him another try (i believe in giving people second chances. LOL) and i'm glad i did. wow. the class was out of this world. the way he designed the practice was very intelligent, creative and clever. he prepared the hips in a very unique way for major opening. we did some stuff i had not done before (i'm definately going to borrow that), and if the beginning was YANG, the end was YIN as he had us hold all seated hip opening poses for a very looooong time. which was just DE-lish!

i was so sweaty and wiped at the end i could barely get myself to ask Vinnie for a picture. but with my blog in mind, i managed! to make sure i would look ok for the shot, i quickly took a peek in the mirror. i am sooo glad i did, cause i had mascara all over my cheeks (it's true!). i had to laugh and vinnie commented with his new york accent: "atleast it looks like you had a good practice." i sure did. not from tears, only from sweat :-)

this class left me curious for more (as a student and a teacher), so hopefully it will not be too long until Vinnie returns to new york so i can experience another amazing yoga practice!

the picture came out great, don't you think?

www.vinniemarino.com