Santa Monica Yin Yoga Studio on Ocean Park: Monday 6:30 pm

Santa Monica Yoga sits at 1640 Ocean Park Boulevard, and its longest slow class of the week is Yin Yoga on Monday at 6:30 pm, a 75-minute session taught by Juli McGene. A single in-studio class is $30, new students can buy three classes for $59, and the door is shut 15 minutes after the start, which makes this one of the gentler late policies for a yin yoga studio on the Westside.

The studio's homepage pitches itself as your friendly neighborhood yoga studio with no scene and no drama, and the setting backs that up. It sits on a residential stretch of Ocean Park Boulevard in Santa Monica's 90405 zip code, away from the Third Street Promenade crowds, and the people walking in on a Monday evening tend to be locals who live within a few blocks rather than tourists hunting for a beach class.

Hours are posted per day on the site: Monday 7:15 am to 9 pm, Tuesday 7:30 am to 8:45 pm, Wednesday 7:15 am to 9:15 pm, Thursday 7:30 am to 8:45 pm, Friday 7:15 am to 8 pm, Saturday 8 am to 5:15 pm, and Sunday 8 am to 8:30 pm. Classes are booked through the Mindbody schedule linked from the site.

The class description traces this style of yin to Paulie Zink, a martial artist and Taoist practitioner, and says poses are held long and relaxed, with five minutes as a typical hold. Seventy-five minutes leaves room for maybe eight or nine shapes plus a real final rest, which is the main reason to pick Monday over shorter yin hours elsewhere in the city.

Juli McGene's teacher bio says she trained in yin practice and instruction with Denise Kaufman, Machelle Lee and Sarah Powers. Sarah Powers is one of the best-known names in the yin and insight tradition, so the Monday class leans toward quiet, attention-heavy holds rather than a stretch-and-chat session. If you want to talk your way through a pigeon pose, this is the wrong room.

There is a second in-studio yin on Tuesday at 3:30 pm, 60 minutes, listed with Sophie Clemo on the teachers page. The mid-afternoon time suits people who work from home, teachers out of school early, and anyone who finds an evening class too hard to protect. One honest caveat: the October 27 Tuesday session showed as cancelled on the booking page, so Monday is the dependable weekly slot.

Neither class is a workout. If you are looking for something that leaves you sweating, the studio's flow classes are a better use of your $30, and yin is best treated as the recovery hour you add on top. People who come from desk jobs, from long runs along the beach path, or from a week of surfing tend to get the most out of the long holds.

New students have two intro options. The New Student 3 Class Pass is $59 and must be used within 60 days, which works out to under $20 a class. The New Student One Month Unlimited is $119 for 30 days. If you plan to come for Monday yin only, the three-class pass is the cheaper test, while the unlimited month makes sense if you also want to try the morning classes.

After the intro, a single in-studio class is $30 and the 5 class pass is $130. Members on the Monthly Auto-Renew pay $175 a month and can cancel any time after the second monthly charge. A one-month unlimited without the renewal is $220, and a guest pass for a friend is $22, which is the cheapest way to bring someone along to the Monday hour. Do the math before choosing: the five-class pass brings each visit to $26, so it beats the drop-in rate once you know you will be back for at least a few Mondays. The auto-renew membership only pays off at roughly six or more classes a month, which is realistic only if yin is one of several classes you take each week.

Bring your own mat or rent one for $3. Every other prop is provided, and yin uses them constantly: blocks under the knees in butterfly, a bolster along the spine in a supported backbend, a blanket folded under the hips for a seated fold. Collect them before class starts, because getting up mid-hold to fetch a bolster disturbs the whole room.

The studio closes classes 15 minutes after the start time. That is more forgiving than studios that lock at the start, but walking in at 6:44 pm still means missing the opening centering. You can cancel booked classes online, and no cancellation fee or time window is posted on the schedule page, so release your spot if you know you cannot make it.

Parking is the one thing to plan. The lot behind the building is reserved for instructors and staff, so students use the street. On the studio's block the metered spots on the south side allow two hours and the north side allows three. A 75-minute class plus changing fits inside the two-hour limit, but only if you are not lingering on the sidewalk afterward.

Clover Park lies about a mile east along Ocean Park Boulevard, and the city lists it at over seventeen acres. On a Tuesday afternoon after the 3:30 pm yin, its open lawns are a good place to walk off the stiffness that long holds can leave in the hips before you get back in the car. After the Monday evening class, a short walk down the boulevard toward the coast is the easier choice.

Address: 1640 Ocean Park Boulevard, Santa Monica, CA 90405. Yin: Monday at 6:30 pm for 75 minutes with Juli McGene, and Tuesday at 3:30 pm for 60 minutes. Drop-in $30, intro three classes $59 or one month $119. Mat rental $3, props included. Doors close 15 minutes after start, and parking is metered on the street.