Rocket® Yoga: Your Guide to Progressive Ashtanga Vinyasa

by David Kyle

Break free from the limitations of classical ashtanga yoga with the progressive and dynamic practice of Rocket® yoga. This modern style of yoga is rooted in traditional ashtanga but allows for more freedom of movement based on individual anatomy and fosters empowerment through creativity, endurance, and rhythm.

Rocket ® Your Guide to Progressive Ashtanga Vinyasa presents the beauty and benefits of Rocket yoga—from its history and philosophy to the sequences and practices unique to its style. You’ll begin your journey with nine guided activities to prepare for your practice, covering aspects of yoga such as drishtis, bandhas, breathing techniques, and mudras. Then explore the asana library, packed with hundreds of stunning color photographs and detailed instructions for more than 90 poses, consisting of standing, seated, inversion, and rest postures. Nearly every pose includes modifications to adapt the movements to your body—making Rocket yoga ideal for your personal needs.

Next, move through the traditional ashtanga series before adding a new dimension to your practice with five Rocket yoga series. Each Rocket yoga series has guiding photo sequences and a targeted Beyond the sequences, you’ll find additional activities and suggestions for customizing your practice, as well as teaching tips especially for yoga instructors. The benefits of practicing Rocket yoga are as diverse and numerous as the poses. The poses work on every part of the body, making Rocket yoga ideal for relieving stress; building strength, balance, and flexibility; and stimulating increased consciousness.

With Rocket Yoga , you’ll join the thousands of devoted practitioners who use this fast-paced and stimulating form of yoga to transform their experiences of life.

288 pages, Paperback

Published February 27, 2023

About the author

David Kyle is an associate professor of sociology at the University of California, Davis.

Librarian’s note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Reviews

[Bernie Gourley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book provides an overview of Rocket Yoga, which is newcomer to yoga's ranks that adapts from the Ashtanga Vinyasa school of Pattabhi Jois. The objective of Rocket is to make the practice more adaptable, both in terms of being suitable for a broad range of students and for individual students to adapt the practice in ways that would fit their objectives, strengths, and limitations. There are also adjustments made in the sequence to streamline the flow.

For those unfamiliar with Ashtanga Vinyasa, it is a fixed form flow style. Fixed form means that at a given level one is repeating the same sequence the same way every session until one bumps up to the next level. This offers great advantages for building fitness, muscle memory, and connection to the practice, but many find it tedious and the threat of burnout is ever-present. Rocket attempts to keep the benefits of fixed form practice but to mitigate the burnout factor by having three sequences that can be interspersed in one's practice, as well as by allowing more room for individual variation. Ashtanga Vinyasa is also often perceived as daunting because as a flow form it involves a lot of vigorous transitional movement and also because even some of the preliminary series asana (postures) are challenging for your average practitioner. While Ashtanga Vinyasa generally allows for modification, Rocket leans into this a bit more. (That said, the Rocket system also has ways to step up the challenge as well.)

As with many system-centric yoga books, much of the book is description of the asana (postures) that make up the system as well as elaboration on how they are sequenced. However, the book does open with philosophical and historical background and ends with discussion of how the practice might be adapted (e.g. there is a section for pregnancy.)

The book has a lot of color photographs that are clear and well captured (if of limited perspective.)

If you are an Ashtanga Vinyasa practitioner (or perspective practitioner) and are curious about how the basic concept might be adjusted to mitigate potential burnout or make the system more flexible, I'd recommend giving this book a look.

[Online Eccentric Librarian · Rating 4 out of 5]

More reviews (and no fluff) on the blog http://surrealtalvi.wordpress.com/

I come to this book as a complete newcomer to yoga - I have never done it before nor even explored it. I was hoping this would be a starting point but have to admit it was quite overwhelming and looks to be a situation where you have to/want to commit 100% to the spirituality to really 'get' it. As such, this is a very immersive book where everything is titled in hindi/sanscrit and you will be fully informed of the philosophy. It is well photogaphed/laid out so if this is your thing, you'll find a lot to like here. But for me, it definitely was NOT a place to dip my feet into the yoga pool to get a feel for it.

The book begins with a chart breaking down every pose with the hindi/sanscrit name and then an English translation. Next to that is a small photograph and the page number where it can be found. These postures will be gone into in more detail later in the book but I find it a smart decision to have the index in the front and easily accessible. And there are a lot of postures - though I doubt most of us will be doing the handstands/headstands as on the cover.

The next part of the book is the history and philosophy of rocket yoga - how it is an 'unsanctioned' offshoot of ashtanga vinyasa developed by a Larry Schultz (the mentor/teacher of the author) in the 1990s. It was admittedly very hard to have a lot of respect for Schultz after learning he got into yoga because he saw an elderly man doing yoga and he had an attractive young woman as his girlfriend; Schultz decided he wanted that life as an old man and having the pretty young thing as a result. The rest of the philosophies feel that way - somewhat outdated and even sexist as if a remnants from the 1960s and 1970s.

Chapter 2 includes the fundamentals: introduction to the Tristhana method and daily cleansing rituals. That is followed in chapter 3 with the progressive Ashtanga Vinyasa method. In these chapters you find: how to use a yoga mat, vocabulary words to incorporate, tempo and music, theming classes, a list of focused gazes, banhas/energetic locks, a chakra chart, etc. Many of these subjects include preparation and practice paragraphs that are easy to find and use.

Chapter 4 is the chunk of the book and takes the postures from the chart in the front of the book and breaks them down. For example, the adho mukha vrksasana pose (handstand) includes a pronunciation guide, definition, full color photograph, numbered paragraph steps on how to do it, and modification suggestions. These are broken down into four sections: standing postures, seated postures (primary series), seated postures (rocket intermediate), inversion and rest postures (finishing series).

The next section puts the postures into practice in the form of sequences. There are 8 of them, divided into two categories of Classical Ashtanga and Original Rocket Yoga series. The photographs of the postures are nicely laid out so you can do the sequences. Each one has an introduction and then the posture photographs and page numbers they can be found.

Finally, the book ends with making the practice your own. This includes creating your practice plan and customizing your practice. This can be softening or challenging your routines, meeting minimum daily requirements, practicing drills and even practicing yoga during pregnancy.

So yes, this book is very nicely laid out and easy to follow. But for me, it was a deep dive into a total life commitment into yoga that I was much less interested in. It was confusing in many areas since a lot of it was about spatiality, mystical energy, a LOT of foreign words and concepts, and a feeling of indoctrination rather than welcome. As such, this is good for someone fully committed already or looking to dive headfirst and fully into the yoga deep end of the pool. Reviewed from an advance reader copy provided by the publisher.

[Brooke · Rating 3 out of 5]

357:2025
This book is interesting and worth perusing; however, I do yoga for the wellness benefits (mental and physical) and I'm not looking for an entirely new system of practice. That said, I would absolutely recommend this to someone who is. I will also be trying at least a couple of the sequences just to mix it up a little.

[Alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everything I could have ever wanted in a book about the Rocket.