Reverse Warrior
विपरीत वीरभद्रासन
Viparīta Vīrabhadrāsana — a beginner standing pose that works the obliques, quadriceps, latissimus dorsi.
How to do Reverse Warrior
Read all of it before starting, and read the cautions further down before starting at all.
Begin in Warrior II with the front knee bent over the ankle.
Turn the front palm up and slide the back hand lightly down the back thigh.
Reach the front arm up and back, lengthening the side waist rather than crunching it.
Keep the front knee bent and the chest facing the long edge of the mat.
Hold, come back to Warrior II, and change sides.
Hold: 30–60 seconds. Keep the breath moving throughout — if you are holding it, the pose is too much for today.
Muscles worked
Where the effort and the lengthening land. Primary groups do most of the work; secondary groups assist or are stretched.
What Reverse Warrior does
Described mechanically — what the movement does to muscle and joint. Not a list of conditions it treats, because a pose does not treat conditions.
- Lengthens the side body and the muscles between the ribs.
- Maintains the quadriceps load of Warrior II throughout the side bend.
- Opens the shoulder overhead with the torso on a diagonal.
Reverse Warrior is one of 18 standing poses in this library and one of 88 poses rated beginner. Poses built on the feet, where the legs carry the work and the floor is the reference point.
Who should skip Reverse Warrior, or change it
- Low back injury — bend far less and keep the ribs stacked.
- Neck injury: keep the gaze forward instead of up.
- Shoulder injury on the lifted arm.
- Knee injury on the bent leg.
General information only — not medical advice. Some asanas are unsuitable during pregnancy, injury or specific conditions. Learn from a qualified teacher and stop if anything hurts. If you are pregnant, recovering from surgery or managing any health condition, ask your doctor before starting a practice, and learn the pose itself from a qualified teacher who can see you move.
Common mistakes in Reverse Warrior
What tends to go wrong, and the specific correction — not "engage your core".
MistakeSliding a lot of weight into the back hand on the thigh.
FixKeep that hand light — the side waist should be doing the work.
MistakeFront knee straightening as the torso leans back.
FixKeep the knee bent and the front thigh working.
What a practice like this costs in energy
Nobody has measured a single asana in a metabolic cart. The 2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities publishes MET values per style of practice, so Reverse Warrior is mapped to the nearest published code — 02150, yoga, Hatha, 2.5 MET — and the figures below are for a practice of that kind, not for holding this one pose.
| Time practising | 10 min | 20 min | 30 min | 45 min | 60 min |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Calories | 31 | 61 | 92 | 138 | 184 |
Calculated as MET × 3.5 × 70 kg ÷ 200 kcal per minute — the standard ACSM relationship, shown in full on the method page. Scale it to your own weight by multiplying by your weight in kilograms and dividing by 70. The whole activity dataset, including every non-yoga activity, is at BurnLab.
Questions
How do you do Reverse Warrior?
Begin in Warrior II with the front knee bent over the ankle. Turn the front palm up and slide the back hand lightly down the back thigh. Reach the front arm up and back, lengthening the side waist rather than crunching it. Keep the front knee bent and the chest facing the long edge of the mat. Hold, come back to Warrior II, and change sides. Hold for 30–60 seconds.
What does Reverse Warrior work?
Primarily the obliques, quadriceps, latissimus dorsi, with the shoulders, hip abductors, intercostals assisting or lengthening. In mechanical terms: lengthens the side body and the muscles between the ribs.
Who should not do Reverse Warrior?
Low back injury — bend far less and keep the ribs stacked. Neck injury: keep the gaze forward instead of up. Shoulder injury on the lifted arm. Knee injury on the bent leg. This is general information, not medical advice — if any of these apply to you, ask your doctor and learn the pose with a qualified teacher rather than from a page.
Is Reverse Warrior suitable for beginners?
Yes. Reverse Warrior is a beginner-level pose on this site, which means it is learnable in a first class and has a version that works for most bodies. The cautions above still apply.
How many calories does Reverse Warrior burn?
The honest answer is that nobody has measured a single asana. The 2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities publishes MET values for styles of yoga, not for individual poses. Reverse Warrior sits closest to Compendium code 02150, yoga, Hatha, at 2.5 MET — about 92 kcal for 30 minutes of that kind of practice for a 70 kg adult. Holding one pose for a minute is a rounding error either way.
Sequences that use Reverse Warrior
Related poses
More standing poses — first at the same level, then the rest of the family.
Asana names are traditional. Every step, benefit and caution on this page is written for YogaPath rather than reproduced from any book, studio or other library — see how this site is written. Energy figures derive from the 2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities. General information only — not medical advice. Some asanas are unsuitable during pregnancy, injury or specific conditions. Learn from a qualified teacher and stop if anything hurts.