Stretching is a good idea

Alicia Robinson

Some yoga enthusiasts think of their preferred exercise as a panacea,

and Randi Beck wants to spread its curative powers.

Beck recently opened Yoga Works in Newport Beach, the company’s

fifth studio in Orange County.

“You can go on and on with the benefits of yoga,” said Beck, who

runs all five studios. “Anybody can do it ....Some people think you

have to be flexible to do yoga, and it’s the opposite. You can become

flexible by doing yoga.”

The studio offers about 75 classes a week in several types of yoga

and for different ability levels. Most yoga uses breath control and a

series of postures to develop awareness, flexibility and strength.

Yoga can help relieve stress, and Yoga Works’ design fits in with

that goal. The studio is sparsely decorated and serene, with the

goldenrod-yellow walls almost blending into the blond hardwood floor.

The two classrooms are bare of furniture, and the reception area

includes a display of yoga clothes, books, gifts and accessories for

sale.

“They did a good job here,” said Steve Horowitz of Corona del Mar,

who was taking a yoga class last week. “They made a really nice,

pleasant environment.”

Horowitz said he is an active person who tempers his more

strenuous pursuits with yoga. He’s a skier and mountain biker, among

other things, who added yoga to his activity roster six years ago.

“I have an injury, and I was trying for solutions to my injury,

and this was the best thing I found,” he said.

For Beck, the search for a place to take yoga classes led to a

career running yoga studios. About 13 years ago, she was the

vice-president of a publishing and distribution company who did yoga

in her spare time.

Back then, most of the classes were held at odd hours in gyms or

in people’s homes.

“I just knew how wonderful it was, and yet I couldn’t find yoga

here,” she said. “It wasn’t accessible.”

Shortly after that, she opened a Yoga Works in Costa Mesa. A few

years later, she changed the name to Yoga Place and added three other

Orange County studios. Now all Yoga Place studios are taking on the

Yoga Works name. It took a few years to get the studios off the

ground, but she’s enjoyed every day of it, Beck said.

“How fortunate am I to be able to give people such a gift?” she

asked. “The gratitude that I get has just been incredible.”

Now that yoga is much more popular, there are a number of studios

to choose from.

“There is [competition] but we really don’t worry about that,”

Beck said. “We just do what we do.”

Now that the Newport Beach studio is open, Beck is looking ahead.

She plans to expand into the San Diego area in the near future, she

said.

Yoga Works is at 230 Newport Center Dr., suite 230, Newport Beach.

A grand opening will be held June 26 with free classes,

demonstrations and food, and donations will be accepted to benefit

the Orange County Burn Assn., which assists burn victims.