History of our lineage
The Yogic Physical Culture, the practice of traditional hatha yoga asanas (poses) and Western physical culture, was developed in India in the early 1900s when weightlifting was a national sport.
Bishnu Ghosh, brother of Yogananda (author of Autobiography of a Yogi and founder of Self Realization Fellowship), established Ghosh’s College of Physical Education in 1923 to teach yogic physical culture. To this day the school has a weightlifting room and a yoga room for classes and a community yoga clinic.
Gosh began to train Bikram Choudhury (today known as the guru of Hot Yoga, or Bikram Yoga) when he was four. He practiced yoga from four to six hours every day. At the age of 13, Choudhury won the National India Yoga Championship. He was undefeated for the following three years and retired as the undisputed All-India National Yoga Champion. Then Bikram developed his own sequence based on the series of 84 asanas developed by Ghosh. Choudhury claimed those 26 postures fit all body types.
His sequence is practiced in a room heated to 40 degrees Celsius, with a high percentage of humidity. Then Bikram moved to the U.S. where he met his new disciple Tony Sanchez. Tony trained with Choudhury from 1976 until 1980, when he was certified by Ghosh’s College of Physical Education. He was director of Bikram’s San Francisco Yoga College of India from 1980 to 1984, then in 1985, Tony founded the United States Yoga Association and the San Francisco Yoga Studio.
He codified the Yoga Challenge system of four progressive series, enabling practitioners of all levels to reap the health and fitness benefits of the 84 asanas of the Ghosh lineage. Tony holds the 1994 (Argentina) and 1996 (Brazil) World Cup Yoga Sport title from the International Yoga Federation, based in India and Argentina. He participated to support their efforts to qualify hatha yoga as an Olympic exhibition sport.
Tony Sanchez is one of the world‘s most respected authorities on all things hatha yoga. His specialty is the 84 asanas from the Ghosh lineage. He is one of the few yoga practitioners to hold two World Cup Yoga Sport titles from the International Yoga Federation. Tony believes, as did Ghosh, that yoga has to evolve with the needs of our society and lives.
Physical culture strengthens and develops external body muscles that support the internal toning, and therapeutic benefits of hatha yoga asanas including digestion, evacuation, circulation, respiration and secretion. The main purpose of yogic physical culture is to tone and strengthen the invisible activities of the body, including the mind, which regulates the functions of the whole body through the intricate nervous system. This is achieved with a minimum expenditure of time and energy because asana practice conserves energy, calms the mind and improves the physical wellbeing of the body, increasing powers of endurance and resistance against disease.
At Hot Yoga Ibiza, you will have the opportunity to practice the 26/2 series by Bikram Choudhury and some of the different systems created by Tony Sanchez.