here's a super helpful email a friend, who's a yoga teacher, sent me last october.
Yoga is super for increasing core strength, lengthening muscle and good joint health. Also, yoga's breathing practices are very beneficial.
In fact, now really is the perfect time to start a yoga practice, since the level of yoga practice should be inversely proportional to your bike training. My advice is always to start off slowly.
You'll need to find a teacher...
Athletes have quite specific needs and require a teacher who is highly experienced, and who understands your specific areas of strength and weakness.
For someone new, who has specific needs (as a +40 cyclist who wants to work on core strength) and time-specific goals (when does you're racing start again?), one-to-one teaching is definitely the best start, in the same way that a personalised training plan is a far better use of your time than a generic one.
It should only take one or two one-to-one lessons to create a personalised plan that would be money and time well spent. Then you can practice at home- lengthening and strengthening- before attending a more generic class. You can follow up in a few weeks, or longer, with another on-to-one session to develop the plan.
It is as easy to injure yourself doing yoga, as it is in any other form of physical exercise for which you have not prepared, pushing beyond your personal muscle and joint limits... especially in a class...
Starting with a plan specific to you will help you stay injury free, and make the most of your free time. 20 minutes once a day is better than 2 hours once a week. Plus, you'll improve faster. It will still be challenging!
Strong muscles are frequently tight muscles, leading to areas of weakness which also have to be addressed.
Better to find a teacher highly trained in a tradition which concentrates on alignment and posture correction. It may be slower yoga, but it will be safer for you, and your knowledge will transfer to any subsequent class or style of yoga.
Most schools will offer trial a lesson at a reduced rate. Avoid Ashtanga and Bikram for now- too much like aerobics and the greatest potential for injury. Be aware that some schools of yoga incorporate chanting, sanskrit, philosophy, which may or may not interest you. Read carefully between the lines!
Iyengar has the best anatomical and structural alignment and correction. The level of detail may seem overwhelming at first.