Cowherd Poseगोरक्षासन
Gorakṣāsana — an advanced seated pose that works the hip adductors, ankles, quadriceps.
15–30SECONDS HELD
One line on the timetable. Cowherd Pose is held 15–30 seconds, with the breath moving throughout — and no set practice here is built around it — it is held on its own.
SOURCE·YogaPath sequence data — stay times as taught·one breath ≈ 5 s at an even pace·REVIEWED JUL 2026
How to do Cowherd Pose
Read all of it before starting, and read the cautions further down before starting at all.
Sit with the soles of the feet together as in Bound Angle and draw the heels in close to the body.
Turn the soles further upwards so the feet form a cradle in front of the pelvis.
Come up onto the knees and shins, keeping the heels together underneath the seat.
Sit back down onto the upturned heels, using a folded blanket underneath if the ankles protest.
Rest the hands on the knees, lift through the spine, and hold briefly.
Hold: 15–30 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 Cowherd Pose 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.
- Holds both ankles and feet in an extreme turned-out, flexed position under body weight.
- Keeps the hips in deep external rotation with the knees fully bent.
- Loads the quadriceps and inner thighs to keep the narrow kneeling base stable.
Cowherd Pose is one of 29 seated poses in this library and one of 61 poses rated advanced. Poses taken on the floor, where the pelvis is the base and the spine works above it.
Who should skip Cowherd Pose, or change it
- Any knee injury or knee replacement — skip; the joint is bent and rotated under load.
- Ankle or foot injury, plantar fasciitis, or bunion pain.
- Recent hip replacement.
- Balance loss, since the base is very narrow — practise beside a wall.
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 Cowherd Pose
What tends to go wrong, and the specific correction — not "engage your core".
MistakeDropping the full body weight straight onto the heels.
FixLower slowly with the hands on the floor and pad the seat until the range arrives.
MistakeLetting the knees slide wide so the shape collapses.
FixKeep the knees drawing towards each other and the heels together underneath.
How the energy figure on a yoga timetable is reached
- Nobody has measured a single asana in a metabolic cart, so no per-pose figure is published here — not by this site and not by anyone.
- The pose is matched to the nearest style of practice in the 2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities. Cowherd Pose sits at code 02175, yoga, Power, 4 MET.
- That MET value is put through the standard ACSM relationship for a stated reference adult of 70 kg.
- The result is the cost of a practice of that kind for as long as you practise — not the cost of holding this one shape.
- Scale it to yourself: the relationship is linear in body mass, so multiply by your own weight in kilograms and divide by 70.
kcal/min = MET × 3.5 × kg ÷ 200
= 4 × 3.5 × 70 ÷ 200
= 4.90 kcal per minute
The same practice, hour by hour
Read it the way you would read a timetable: pick the length of session you actually sit down for, and that is the figure.
| Time practising | 10 min | 20 min | 30 min | 45 min | 60 min |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Calories | 49 | 98 | 147 | 221 | 294 |
SOURCE·2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities·code 02175 · 4 MET · 70 kg reference adult·REVIEWED JUL 2026
The whole activity dataset, including everything that is not yoga, is at BurnLab.
Asked before class
How do you do Cowherd Pose?
Sit with the soles of the feet together as in Bound Angle and draw the heels in close to the body. Turn the soles further upwards so the feet form a cradle in front of the pelvis. Come up onto the knees and shins, keeping the heels together underneath the seat. Sit back down onto the upturned heels, using a folded blanket underneath if the ankles protest. Rest the hands on the knees, lift through the spine, and hold briefly. Hold for 15–30 seconds.
What does Cowherd Pose work?
Primarily the hip adductors, ankles, quadriceps, with the spinal erectors, feet, pelvic floor assisting or lengthening. In mechanical terms: holds both ankles and feet in an extreme turned-out, flexed position under body weight.
Who should not do Cowherd Pose?
Any knee injury or knee replacement — skip; the joint is bent and rotated under load. Ankle or foot injury, plantar fasciitis, or bunion pain. Recent hip replacement. Balance loss, since the base is very narrow — practise beside a wall. 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 Cowherd Pose suitable for beginners?
No. Cowherd Pose is rated advanced. The shape itself is rarely the problem — arriving at it years too early is. Work through the beginner and intermediate seated poses on this site and learn this one in person.
How many calories does Cowherd Pose 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. Cowherd Pose sits closest to Compendium code 02175, yoga, Power, at 4 MET — about 147 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.
The rest of the seated poses on the wall
More seated 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 and what it is written from. 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.
SOURCE·Published asana references·asana names, alignment and cautions as taught·REVIEWED JUL 2026
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