Bienvenue en France

Here's a picture of a gorgeous sunset from the balcony at Chez Boileau at 9 pm.

It is heartening to realise how many people wish you well when you're starting something new. As soon as I put out a post on Instagram about travelling to Bergerac to teach yoga - I had messages pouring in, friends and family reaching out, wishing me luck for my new adventure. There are times when technology makes you smile and this was definitely that moment for me.

When I signed up to work with Alpheus on the project he is building in Bergerac - Chez Boileau - I thought how different could athletes be. Turns out they are supremely different. Before I start on things I am learning from my new friends, I will share some things about Chez Boileau and my time here so far - which is literally 2 days, of which one was gorgeously sunny and the other, today, is very rainy and damp! 

I arrived in Bergerac after a flight to London, a ferry to Caen and a 6 hour drive to Chez Boileau. It took me two days. I could have of course flown to France directly - but it was a lot more expensive, I was booking tickets very last minute (being Indian and having perpetual visa issues)

and Alpheus was in London anyway, and so we travelled together from there. I name the above excuses but I think, I really wanted to meet my friend's baby boy in London and I have also always been a sucker for long road journeys. 

It was good to have taken the longer route because Ali and I got to discuss a bunch of things we wanted to implement, share our yoga philosophies (because we both belong to different schools of yoga) and also briefly discuss the sports he was coaching for in Chez Boileau - cycling and rowing / sculling. We also noticed the severe lack of people on the roads & in the villages - basically everywhere. Actually that was just me flabbergasted at seeing NO people anywhere - you have to realise, coming from India that is a huge shocker. 

Although we reached Bergerac late night at around 11:00 PM - I could sense that it fit right in with the picture I had in mind of a quaint southern French town with ancient buildings, tiny town squares, a fountain here and there. When I did get a chance to see it the next morning - it was even more gorgeous - thankfully the sun was out. 

Chez Boileau is a beautiful property, right on the banks of the river Dordogne, with a direct access to the river through the back garden. Ali takes the boats out into La Dordogne through there. There's a bunch of pictures below that take you through the property- my favourite bits are the dining + kitchen area (simply because of all the great light that pours in through the huge windows.)

There's tonnes of books in here that might interest different groups (yogi/nis, athletes)

There are boats, many many boats - these are the only ones out. 

Obviously my fav space in the house - the gorgeous yoga studio, that again has a lot of light pouring in. 

We start days here with a yoga session that preps you up for rowing or sculling. A bit of vinyasa flow combined with strong static Hatha holds for asanas that really helps rowers activate muscles that they can call upon when they row, more on that below. The yoga session is followed by a rowing session or a cycling session - depending on what you prefer. By this time you are super hungry, so we have a big breakfast. 

The day post that is really left up to you to do what you want. The town is gorgeous, so some lazy  cycling through it is always nice. But in case you are coaching with Ali, then he takes you through your morning paddle on video and helps you with tips to improve technique or for you to notice your form. There's lunch post that, followed by an afternoon cycling or sculling session. And we end with a restorative yoga session followed by a guided yoga nidra. After a super productive day you then can choose to stay in and have dinner at home or to wander about Bergerac and find tiny places to dine in. The walk along the Dordogne helps build an appetite, exactly how the walk post dinner helps digest that decadent food before you're ready to hit the bed. 

There's a bunch of fresh markets that happen in the Dordogne area throughout the week. I missed the one on Wednesday in Bergerac because I slept for 11 hours straight post my 48 hours travel here. But tomorrow, May 25 Saturday, which is also a fresh market at Bergerac, is supposed to be even better with artisanal cheese and bread - I can NOT wait. I was intending to fast, but looks like I shall keep that for Sunday. Or Monday maybe?

 The house, is literally what it is called - Chez Boileau. Ali opens up his home to share his passion for coaching and rowing with others. It is a shared space where everyone lives and works together on their respective areas - cycling, yoga or rowing. It is not a hotel with room service but it is better than that. The sense of a community living together, sharing the love for wellness, eating together and training together is a slice of the magic that surrounds Chez Boileau. Colleen, a love lady who helps maintain the house, helps keep the house functioning, but we all do our own part to help keep it clean and tidy. It's kind of like being Ali's house guests - which is awesome! A lot of the learning also happens because the atmosphere that Ali helps cultivate is one of learning and growing together as a community that lives together. No one is trying to compete with each other and no one is judging each other.

I have been learning a LOT from different athletes already. It is intimidating to say the least. I am not a cyclist who can decide on a sunny day to cycle 100km one way, just because I feel like it. I am definitely not a rower and I have run one 10K in my life, so I can tick that off my "list of things i have done". But when I am not too busy being intimidated, I get to learn a lot around here. I am keen to pick up any bits of information they share not only about the physicality of their sport, but also the mental and emotional aspects of it.

Yesterday we all had to record our stats on Ali's system with weight, body fat percentage, body hydration levels, visceral fat, metabolic age, muscle mass, bone weight etc. I have historically dreaded doing this sorta thing. And as someone who is not an athlete I have never felt the need to track these numbers or to react with horror if either one of them is "not perfect". Because my philosophy in life has always been "there is no perfect". As long as you are healthy and fit (which are two very different things), and you are content with where you are in life emotionally, how do you care what your metabolic age is ( mine 21 by the way). But turns out athletes care very much about these kind of things. And why not. If you are a cyclist, and you are going up the hill in a race, you do not want to be carrying additional weight on you. So it then makes sense for them to track these numbers and be obsessive about them.

So I grudgingly stood on that scale and smiled politely as my body fat percentage stood out (in not a nice way) from the rest of the lot. Of course i knew that would happen. The only cardio i do is when I decide to up my surya namaskar speed by a few seconds and decide to do very many of them and work up a sweat at the end of it.

But while that may not be my lifestyle, it so happens that it is the lifestyle of those I am teaching in the next two months. So I need to, as a teacher, learn what issues affect my students, what their goals are, what their training sessions for their respective sports look like - and I am very slowly learning.

Ali is also adamant that I do need to get some cardio in. He took me out on my first ever road bike ride today. I love riding bikes, but I have never used road bikes for long distances. So today was a first. The gears are tricky - but I guess that will just take a bunch of practice. So I'm scheduled for one more session tomorrow. Why am I doing this? Because next week, there's a group coming in and they are all cycling to Château de Montbazillac and I want to be able to do it. The country-side is utterly gorgeous and the château itself is as well. See, that is the kind of stuff that I need to motivate me. Okay?

Now obviously getting on a boat to scull is not as easy as hopping on a bike, so Ali has me getting on the rowing machine tomorrow just to get used to the technique and then we shall tackle the boat. That is if I tackle my fear of being out on a water body first. Elizabeth Gilbert asks you to choose curiosity over fear (unless of course it is absolutely dangerous for you to be curious, in which case choose fear and you get to survive - not all fear is bad!)

So that was me sharing all I have been up to in the last two days here at Chez Boileau. I am teaching yoga, and this is a yoga blog after all. So going forward I will be refraining from sharing too much about the crazy touristy things i do here at Bergerac, for that head over to my other crazy blog 

I'll end the post today with something my new cyclist (and ex-rower friend), Paul, shared with me. He was talking about having good awareness of the gluteal muscles, knowing when and how to engage them and he mentioned a yoga pose. I realised he was talking about veerabhadrasana three or warrior 3. But(t) of course! Warrior 3 not only brings your concentration to the glues, but also forces you to use your quadriceps a lot more. That then means, you are not placing all that weight of your body on the knee of the standing leg or hyper extending the knee back - both of which are crazy bad for your knees. If you learn to engage your quads and eventually your gluteal muscles, you are using those muscles to do the work they were meant to do and you are leaving your joints alone and injury free.

Another great one that helps you actively engage the gluteal muscles is the sethubandasana or the bridge pose. More often that not, may yogi/nis leave those posterior muscle group dormant and use only their back strength to lift their hips up. But the gluteal muscles also have a huge role to play in hip mobility, by engaging them in sethubandasana, you are immediately taking the extra pressure not only off your back but also off your knees because most of us tend to push our knees out too much when we lift up in the bridge pose.

So there, two exercises that are awesome for some gluteal muscle activation for rowers is veerabhadrasana and setubandasana !

Maybe I'll put up pictures of me doing the asana here on this blog.........let's see.

Namasté.