ORLANDO, Fla. -- Skip Wolfram is about to give new meaning to the phrase "warming up."
Clad in black spandex shorts, he steps to the front of an exercise room that four glowing space heaters have heated to more than 100 degrees.
Fourteen students stand ready to sweat. For the new ones, there comes a warning:
"You may get dizzy," says Wolfram, the class instructor. "Don't panic. Don't freak out. This is not a race. This is not a competition."
This is Bikram yoga, an exercise routine that's hot in more ways than one.
Flamboyant yogi Bikram Choudhury introduced his yoga style to the United States more than a quarter-century ago, but only in the past few years has its popularity exploded.
Students stretch, kick and balance themselves in rooms heated to temperatures as high as 105 degrees. Such intense heat, Choudhury says, allows muscles to stretch better.
Fans swear by it, but many yoga enthusiasts, such as James Greenberg, say they see no benefit from this extreme exercise. Greenberg, who has written for Yoga Journal, calls Bikram "some weird macho manifestation."
Still, as yoga has become more mainstream, so too has the Bikram brand.
Choudhury has established a chain of Bikram's Yoga College of India studios, offering a uniform product. Just as people know their cafe lattes will taste the same at any Starbucks, Choudhury says teachers at Bikram studios should repeat the same sequence of 26 poses, recite the same dialogue, have the same expertise.
Choudhury, 57, a native of Calcutta, began studying yoga when he was 4 and brought his style to the United States in 1971. He's now a wealthy celebrity, legendary for his collection of Rolls-Royces, his brash style and his Hollywood followers, including Raquel Welch.
Wolfram, an avid surfer, said the intense yoga "really fit my personality as far as needing to work hard physically to get the mental effect. I really enjoyed the way that it made me feel and, consequently, the subsequent effect was that I felt more mental serenity, peace or whatever you call it."
As new student Nancy Antolic repeated the stretches in the oppressive heat, she looked wide-eyed at her fellow exercisers.
Twenty minutes into the routine, her face was red. Twenty minutes after that, she was face-up on the mat, wiping sweat from her chest with her hand and towel.
Toward the end of the class, the students got to lie down--but they were still working hard, pulling themselves up to grab their toes and exhaling in short staccato bursts that made them sound like crickets.
Students say the yoga makes them more flexible, gives them an all-day high and relieves stress.
Wolfram, who credits Bikram yoga with relieving pain in his back from a surfing accident, says it's worth a try for people suffering from chronic illnesses.
"The reason a condition is called chronic is because doctors can't do anything about it," Wolfram said. "That means that you need to try something which is now considered alternative therapy. At least through a consistent yoga practice, you'll be able to get, perhaps, some relief from some of the symptoms."
"He feels very strongly about what he's doing," Wolfram said. "He feels it's the most important thing to share his yoga with America."
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