Peter: The First Yoga 15 Bomb Disposal Diving Officer

Peter Davis Lieutenant Commander Navy

“15 minutes of yoga left me feeling refreshed, and happy to have achieved something for myself at the end of a busy day.”

After 18 years in the Royal Navy as a Bomb Disposal Diving Officer, my body and mind have been stressed to their limits and beyond, leaving me with many niggling injuries and a battle to maintain an ageing body. Discovering Abi’s routines was a life-changing win.

YOGA FOR A LIFE ON THE GO

Whether on the road conducting bomb disposal, diving in heavy and bulky equipment, or sat at a tactical console in a ship for long hours, your body and mind take a pounding in the military. Ironically, my desk jobs have been the worst for my posture and headspace.

The beauty of downloadable content is that you can take Abi’s knowledge with you wherever you go. For me, the Yoga 15 routines have become, not just something I can fit into my all too brief downtime, but an essential escape tunnel to a calm and positive place. While the sessions are calming, they are equally a workout when you’re stretching out sore backs and shortened muscle groups.

Abi is a highly proficient Instructor but I have found her transitions and poses really user-friendly—helped by the fact that you can hit pause in her classes! 

PRESCRIPTION FOR A HAPPIER AND FITTER YOU

I’ve practiced Yoga 15 sequences in some odd places: in the bowels of a 65,000 tonne aircraft carrier, on the flight deck of an anti-submarine frigate and the heat of the Arabian Gulf—all around the world.

Maintaining fitness as a multi-discipline athlete in a high-tempo working environment means compromise. You seldom have the perfect space to bring your yoga practice into the daily grind. This is compounded when coming back from injury, as I found whilst being required to work long hours on unrelenting shifts, with a back injury.

My daily sessions at the beginning of my eight hours off, became an essential tonic for the stress of work and the toll of poor posture that would last the next eight hours…for weeks on end. While the shared equipment in the crammed “gym” space were never perfectly set up, workouts were interrupted by emergency alarms and my body craving a few more minutes in my bunk, 15 minutes of yoga or even 3 minutes of breathing would leave me refreshed and happy to have achieved something for myself at the end of a busy day. 

MAINTAINING THE GOOD HABIT

Returning home to a young family after months away, there is always pressure to catch up on time together. Any training regime hits the more complex “workout-life” balance. Yoga 15 saves you the time you might spend travelling to and from a yoga lesson and does not tie you down to a fixed time and date. 

In short, Yoga 15 and Abi are lifesavers. 

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