How to perform One-Legged Downward Facing Dog Pose
Start in Adho Mukha Svanasana. Keep your hips level and your core steady as you lift one leg up behind you to capacity.
What is Eka Pada Adho Mukha Svanasana?
This is an asymmetrical one-legged variation of Adho Mukha Svanasana that allows you to expand the areas of focus to include the hips as well as the hamstrings and shoulders.
As you raise your leg from the inner thigh, the idea is to keep your hips neutral, keeping the integrity of the original pose despite the shift in centre of gravity. This will increase the effort sustained by the wrists and shoulders and put your groundedness to the test while also further stretching your hamstrings and hip flexors.
When to use Eka Pada Adho Mukha Svanasana?
This variation is very suitable for dynamic forward bending sequences but also in practically any flowing sequences.
It can be used at the start, as a way of warming up your shoulders and hip joints, but also in the middle of your practice, as a way of transitioning between Adho Mukha Svanasana and the asymmetric standing postures.
So, you could go straight from Adho Mukha Svanasana into Eka Pada Adho Mukha Svanasana and then pull your leg up to your chest and step it in-between your hands. From there you can easily move into Virabhadrasana 1 or 2 or into Utthita Parsvakonasana.
