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Also known as: Parivrtta Utkatasana.

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Technique

  1. Stand tall with your feet together, then bend your knees and sink your hips back and down into Chair pose, keeping your weight in your heels.
  2. Bring your palms together at your chest in prayer position, spine long and chest lifted.
  3. Draw your navel in and rotate your torso to the right, hooking your left elbow onto the outside of your right thigh.
  4. Press your palms together to deepen the twist and open your top shoulder toward the ceiling, keeping both knees level with each other.
  5. Lengthen your spine on each inhale and twist a little deeper on each exhale; hold, then unwind and repeat on the other side.

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Form tips

  • Keep your knees in line; do not let the front knee slide forward as you twist.
  • Keep your chest lifted and spine long rather than rounding into the twist.
Logging: Work each side for the time indicated.

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Muscles

Strength

Primary

  • Quadriceps
  • Glutes
  • Hamstrings

Secondary

  • Pelvis
  • Hip adductors
  • Obliques
  • Spine
  • Neck
Flexibility

Secondary

  • Obliques
  • Spine
  • Neck
  • Rectus femoris
  • Vastus medialis
  • Vastus intermedius
  • Vastus lateralis
  • Gluteus maximus
  • Semitendinosus
  • Semimembranosus
  • Biceps femoris (long)
  • External oblique
  • Internal oblique
  • Longissimus thoracis
  • Iliocostalis

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Equipment

Ground (standing)
Ground (standing)

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Appears in

Flexibility
Other disciplines
Joint movements
Trunkrotation
Kneeextension
Hipextension
trains stretches

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Regressions

e0fl

Chair pose

Beginner
e0uz

Elbow-support side angle

Novice
e0iu

Crouching stance

Novice
e0vr

Sitting revolved spinal twist

Novice
e0v1

Revolved side angle hand inside

Novice
e0q1

Deep lunge

Novice
Want to log this exercise? Open it in Calistree. Text and images are used under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0; the video plays from the original source.