These inexpensive, grippy yoga mats are available a wide range of thicknesses.
I nonetheless bear in mind the primary time I attempted yoga. A couple of cute women in my sophomore highschool class had began a “yoga membership” after college, and a buddy and I believed that becoming a member of up can be a surefire strategy to get into their good graces.
An hour of sweat, gritted tooth, sore muscle mass later, I threw within the towel. Yoga was exhausting, I discovered. It additionally was considerably painful, as a result of whereas all the women had yoga mats, my buddy and I have been doing “yoga” (or our greatest imitation of it) on the exhausting tile ground of the varsity hallway.
Quick-forward fifteen years.
I am on the cusp of thirty, and yoga has grow to be a key a part of my morning routine. The distinction between a day once I’ve carried out 10 to twenty minutes of sunshine stretching within the morning and a day once I have not is fairly vital. I’ve additionally discovered that yoga’s much more enjoyable when you’ve gotten a little bit of cushion between you and the ground. Enter the common-or-garden yoga mat.
Yoga mats aren’t simply good for yoga, both. My mats are a number of the most versatile and helpful items of “gear” in my closet. They’re good for just about any ground train, from push-ups to sit-ups, planks, mountain climbers, burpees, bicycle kicks… the listing goes on. They’re additionally useful for savasana (mendacity down) meditation, and a thick(ish) yoga mat may even function a fairly first rate mattress for tenting. I usually use yoga mats to prepare climbing gear earlier than a visit, and greater than as soon as have slept behind my Subaru with a thicker yoga mat as a sleeping pad.
Yoga mats, in fact, are available a wide range of thicknesses and supplies. Thinner mats supply extra stability and a extra “grounded” really feel that’s typically most well-liked by severe practitioners (and so they’re additionally simpler to hold round city), whereas thicker mats supply extra cushion and alleviate strain on the joints, splendid for learners, aged practitioners, the arthritic, and so forth.
The mat I acquired to check on this evaluation was the retrospec Solana, their thickest (1-inch) mat. Priced at a really cheap $39.99, this mat is obtainable in a dozen completely different colours, and is constructed from comfortable NBR foam. However retrospec’s lineup of yoga mats is a flexible, inexpensive unfold. Additionally they have a thinner Solana (0.5″), constructed from the identical NBR foam, a 6mm mat, the Pismo, and a 5mm mat, the Laguna, which mixes a polyurethane higher layer with a rubber backside for grip.
This sun-dappled, lithe and limber mannequin is most definitely not the creator….
Yoga mats are a reasonably simple piece of drugs. By that I imply that except the producer does one thing significantly heinous—like infuse their yoga mats with poison ivy or asbestos–what you see is what you get.
A yoga mat would not have to reinvent the wheel, it simply must be steady, grippy, sturdy, and (relying in your desire) supply some degree of portability and luxury.
With that in thoughts, I am very proud of my Solana. It ticks all of the bins. These yoga mats supply strong no-slip assist, are simple to wipe clear on the finish of a session, include a carry strap to retailer and transport, and better of all, are very inexpensive. The Pismo and the half-inch Solana are simply $25, and all retrospec’s yoga mats are beneath $50.
That is the kicker right here, for me. That worth level is similar to what you’d pay for a knock-off yoga mat at Walmart or Goal, however the high quality here’s a noticeable step up. I have never observed any of the scuffing and ripping on my retrospec mat that I usually see on $20-$30 yoga mats. It is held up very nicely even after a number of months of normal use.
