‘Where Cirque De Soleil meets yoga': Destin instructor brings aerial yoga to Emerald Coast

For hundreds of years, yoga practitioners have been perfecting and improving the art of controlled body postures. And while the eagle pose might be tough for some, Susan Authement-Dunnam says she prefers to do it upside down.

“With aerial yoga, I feel like I can breathe in my body again,” said the owner of Destin Pilates Center located at City Market.

Known by some as cocooning, aerial yoga is the newest trend swinging into the world of fitness. The classes use silk swings to support the weight of the body so students can maintain proper posture alignment while relaxing the muscles.

“I have a bad back,” Authement-Dunnam said. “And when they told me I would have to have surgery, I went straight to yoga and Pilates and never looked back.”

For the past 3 years, she’s been instructing classes in Pilates and yoga at her old studio on Airport Road. But after seeing an episode of Good Morning America about aerial yoga, Authement-Dunnam decided it was time to take her workouts to the air.

She and Lisa Moberly, manager and certified Pilates and yoga instructor, both traveled to the Boulder Circus Center to train. There the two learned the vertical versions of sun salutations, hip openers, deep stretches, forward and backward inversions, and backbends.

“It’s where Cirque Du Soleil meets yoga,” said Authement-Dunnam.

The silks can serve as a safety harness for beginners who are still mastering the more advanced yoga moves, or they can be used to challenge even the most advanced yogis. But more than anything, Moberly says aerial yoga gives adults the chance to be a kid again.

“I had a 60-year-old lady come in, and once we got her in the silk she just beamed,” she said. “She said she felt like she was in elementary school again.”

Aerial yoga classes are $20 each. Destin Pilates Center, located at 36150 Emerald Coast Pkwy Suite 108, also offers Pilates reformer classes, springboard and mat classes, and Thai yoga. For more information, visit destinpilates.com.

“Aerial yoga is the type of workout that doesn’t leave you all sweaty and tired. You can come in, do it, and leave feeling great.”