This Yoga Flow Will Loosen Up Tight Hamstrings and Hips

The workout below is for Day 23 of the Good Vibes Workout, a four-week workout plan. It’s pretty great on its own, but you can also check out the full program right here or browse the calendar here. If you’d like to sign up to receive daily emails of these workouts, you can do that here. 

Yesterday’s strength circuit had your hips and hamstrings working, and today’s yoga flow is the antidote to that: It’s specifically focused on mobility for your lower body.

The 40-minute yoga flow, led by Rita Murjani, focuses on the forward fold, a classic pose where you bend at the hips and let your head hang down as you lengthen your torso. This gives a significant stretch to the back of your body, particularly your hamstrings (a.k.a. the muscles on the backs of your thighs that tend to tighten up after leg-focused exercises like lunges, hinges, and squats). 

Forward folds, along with some variations of that pose, take center stage here, but you’ll also work with other lower-body-focused poses like downward dog, half moon, standing split, and a version of legs up the wall. (You may want to take note of the legs up the wall pose and file it away for later in the week—it’s one that feels amazing after a cardio session!)

Yoga props, like blocks or blankets, are helpful in this routine, and Murjani will show you how to use them throughout the flow to modify the poses as needed. Again, if you don’t have yoga blocks, a few hardcover books can work as well.