About two dozen yoga students dotted a shady section of the greenway on Saturday morning, listening to instructor Beverly Poppe and bending themselves into pretzels.
Poppe, who teaches the weekly class through the Altru Family YMCA, started slow. One of the first exercises had students on their backs, breathing out negative energy-and one of the final ones had them balancing on one foot, the other in hand at nearly shoulder-level.
"Let your body melt into your mat," she said at the end of the hourlong session, striding between rows of students flat on their backs. "You're feeling as light as a feather, as limp as a wet noodle."
Poppe's classes run every Saturday at 10 a.m. in the Greenway near the Second Avenue North Entrance, near the Toasted Frog. This year's sessions began several weeks ago, and are expected to last as long as weather allows.
"I started doing (yoga) after I had children, after I had my first son and it just clears my mind," Gina Allen, a Grand Forks stay-at-home mom, said after finishing Poppe's class. "It gives me the ability to get rid of things that don't really serve me."
