About Our Instructors
Christina Alexa
Christina Alexa is the founder of The Practice Room Center for Yoga and Healing and the Abhyasa Yoga Institute. She is certified at the 500 hour level within each discipline of Integrated Yoga Levels I and II, Resonance Yoga and Resonance Movement. Christina also holds certification in a 5 year intensive Resonance Healing Therapy program and is Resonance Healing Therapist, a Reiki Master in the Usui Tradition, a Keeper of the Lodge (sweat lodge). Additionally she attended the first Amrit Yoga Teacher Training in Rhode Island taught by Yogi Amrit Desai, founder of Kripalu Yoga and Amrit Yoga. At the age of 15 Christina began studying yoga in a quest for personal growth, healing and spiritual connection. Self taught for several years, she found her spiritual teacher at the age of 19 and spent the next 21 years in deep devotional service and self-study. Throughout this time Christina received several initiations by master teachers and healers of both the elemental/shamanic traditions as well as the yogic lineage. Christina has been sharing these practices through teaching and healing work for over 13 years, and draws from 28 years of personal healing and practice in her work. Christina has also studied Anatomy and Cranio Sacral work with International Teacher Ellen Heed and Vinyasa Yoga with Rolf Gates.
Sarah Breslin
Sarah first fell in love with Pilates during her freshmen year at Tufts University in 2000. When she moved to Merrimack, NH in 2006 she began taking lessons with Michelle Burgess at Pilates at the Mill. First certified through Mad Dogg Athletics for SPINNING, Sarah began teaching SPIN in February of 2007 and initiated training through STOTT Pilates immediately following her SPIN certification. Sarah has since completed Mat and Reformer Level 1 & Level II, Anatomy for Functional Training, Injuries & Special Populations, and Chair I and is also CPR/AED certified through the American Heart Association. Believing that fitness is not a short-term goal, it is a continuous, daily, life-long choice, Sarah’s personal fitness motto is “Sustainable Fun!”
Lori Card
Lori’s Grandmother introduced her to yoga at a young age. Since then, she has traveled the world, working as a flight attendant for 25 years, enjoying the incredible opportunity during her layovers to drop in and explore many different yoga practices and instructors. To balance her busy life and combat stress, she decided to deepen her personal practice and attend a yoga teacher training program. Finding a supportive yoga community in the middle of New Hampshire, she was hooked. “To practice yoga on and off the mat is the path I hope to guide my students on.” Lori is also Reiki I and II certified and an avid outdoors woman who enjoys hiking, biking, skiing and kayaking.
Jennifer Churchill
Jennifer is a RYT at the 200hr level and a certified ChildLight Yoga Instructor. She completed her Glow Prenatal and Postnatal Yoga Teacher training with Amy Hopkins and is working towards her Doula certification through CAPPA. As a teenager Jennifer began studying yoga in a quest for physical fitness and personal growth. As she practiced she found that Yoga offered her body and mind so much more and she began to incorporate it as a vital part of her life. Jen’s goal is to share the power of yoga with her students through all stages of their lives so that they can find strength inside and out. When she is not spending time with her family, teaching yoga or helping women birth their babies she works as a veterinary technician at an ER Veterinary Clinic in Concord, NH. She is also honored to share yoga with the high school students and staff at New Hampton School where she resides with her family.
Kate Criscone
Kate first began practicing yoga as a college student in Portland, Oregon. Kate truly credits yoga in helping her to work through stored trauma and heal fully from a severe back injury in 1999. While in Portland, she apprenticed with Dr. Laura Washington, a yoga teacher and Naturopathic Physician with the Art of Health, Inc. She also spent a year studying with Herbalist, Cascade Anderson Geller. She trained in Chen T’ai Chi with Sifu Gregory Fong and also Pilates. Kate integrates these different modalities into her own practice. Kate completed her 200 hr Yoga Teacher Training through the Abhyasa Yoga Institute and is currently studying Intuitive Healing Therapy to compliment her Reiki I certification. Kate has an abundance of gratitude for yoga and loves being able to share her passion with her students. Her intention with each class is to create a nurturing and safe environment, helping students to cultivate a deeper connection to body, heart and inspiration both “on” the mat and “off.”
Kim Currell
Kim discovered The Practice Room two years ago and is truly thankful for the balance and sanity it supplies her life as a Mom of a rambunctiously, fun 3 year old. But before Yoga there was DANCE! She tapped for 12 years and would still be tapping if she could sing (no Broadway future.) She dabbled in Jazz, Modern, Flamenco (while living in Madrid), Belly (if you count her gold medal awarded at Istanbul’s Orient House). Her passion for dance and desire to feel fit has lead her to ZUMBA. Get ready to move and burn an insane number of calories as you groove. You don’t need to know how to dance, just move your body and follow her lead. It’s easy! Kim guarantees you will have a blast! When she’s not dancing or working as a corporate meeting planner, you will find Kim enjoying a boat ride on Squam Lake with her family.
Linda Goodwin
Linda has been in the fitness industry for over 15 years. She started her career teaching Spin, body pump, step aerobics, Pilates and Personal Training. She began Pilates to enhance her workouts by strengthening the core and increasing her balance and improve posture. Over the last seven years she has taught Pilates using various methods of teaching and equipment with a special focus on posture and balance control. Linda completed her mat certification with AAAI/ISMA in the summer of 2009 and has continued to train in the practice of mat and also reformer Pilates. Linda encourages her students to have a “can do” attitude in fitness and her motto is “you’re never too old to get fit.”
Lori Groleau
In November 2010, after months of low back and intense sciatic pain, Lori tentatively entered The Practice Room on the advice of a Chiropractor. She started in our Beginner Series and within a month her sciatica completely disappeared. She continued to take yoga classes and found herself wanting to know more so she enrolled in our 200 hour Yoga Teacher Training. Fast forward 11 months and Lori has almost completed her training and is passionate about sharing the Yoga experience with others who may have similar challenges. Lori works in human resources and her position focuses on employment and wellness. She is married and has 3 grown sons, and a beautiful daughter-in-law.
Siobhan Kleckner
Siobhan began her exploration into yoga as a science and philosophy at the age of fifteen. Since then she has enjoyed a strong personal practice weaving vibration, texts, and contemplation into her time on the mat. She has lived all over the country, and in 2008 she began to formally study yoga philosophy in Boulder, Colorado. Since then she developed a yoga program at an all-boys summer camp in Wisconsin, and offered yoga to girls living in a safe house in Portland, Maine. After moving back to her home state of New Hampshire, she enrolled in the 500 hour Yoga Teacher Training at The Practice Room. Siobhan is a mother of one, artist, vocalist, equestrian, and nature lover.
Yvette Ladd
In addition to being an ACE Certified Personal Trainer and certified at the 200hr level as a Yoga Teacher, Yvette is also a registered pharmacist. Since being introduced to a Nautilus gym at the age of 15, Yvette has been fascinated by the human body and inspired to share her passion for health and fitness as a means of improving the well-being of her patients and community. In 2009 Yvette sold her independent pharmacy so that she could focus on offering preventative health services to clients and patients seeking to better understand and manage their health.
Tammy Levesque
Tammy has been a professional Fitness Trainer and Yoga Instructor in the Lakes Region for over 15 years. With a BA degree in Exercise Science / Health from PSU and Cardiac Rehabilitation Training from URI, Tammy decided to pursue many different Certifications to enhance her knowledge and understanding of the human body in performance. She has trained as a Breast Cancer Survivor Fitness Trainer-YMCA, Tuft’s University Strong Living Senior Program Instructor, Yoga, Ballecore, Spinning, H2O Aerobics, TRX, Pilates and all forms of Group Exercises. In addition to managing a personal trainer business, she is the Lakes Region’s Healthy Eating Active Living Community Health Educator for the Public Health Office. Tammy also enjoys teaching as an Adjunct Professor at Plymouth State University in the Health and Human Performance Department.
Elis Marcoux
Elis fell in love with yoga from the very first class and dove right into passionate practice. Yoga was everything she had been looking for and learning about from a young age: the philosophy, meditation, and physical practice. Intrigued with the human body and how it works, Elis loves to share the beauty of yoga with people to help them learn about their bodies and themselves. She is a 200 hour Yoga Instructor certified through the Abhyasa Yoga Institute. She shares a passion for music and dance with her partner Jonathan Belfontaine who writes and produces music as “Outlet”; they perform together, sharing the love and being immersed in the energy of people. In addition to teaching and working at The Practice Room Elis also works at a local organic farm in Meredith (Arbutus Hill Farm) with Jon and the kids.
Pasha Marolwe
Pasha has worked as a fitness professional for 20 years. She is the owner of Holland Hill Fitness Studio, group fitness/yoga/tai chi instructor, personal trainer and life coach. Pasha’s journey towards yoga and tai chi began in 2011 when a series of traumatic experiences lead to issues of chronic pain, stress, insomnia and anxiety. While her mobility, flexibility and state of mind improved, her joint pain continued and Pasha received a total hip replacement in 2006. She plans to stay fit through hiking, biking, aerobics, weight lifting, yoga and (her new love) tai chi for the rest of her life. She is passionate and helping others find ways to challenge themselves physically and mentally to improve their health and well-being.
Peter Stekl
Peter Stekl is a dynamic Qigong and spiritual teacher. He has been a graduate and teacher of Heart Awakening for 12 years, helping hundreds of people to awaken their hearts to unconditional love and access a deeper peace and the innate wisdom to move through life more gracefully. Peter entered into an intensive 12 year training under 3 renowned Qigong masters and has since developed a unique teaching style that combines the benefits of the eastern traditions with spiritual and emotional healing techniques. What Peter is most passionate about is assisting people in having direct experience of the Divine through an open heart. This is where true healing takes place. Peter also holds a Master’s Degree in Environmental Science and is an Essene Priest with the Tree of Life in Patagonia, AZ.
Gail Stevens
Gail is a long-time resident of Holderness and has been teaching exercise classes in the Plymouth-Holderness area since the early 1980s. She holds a bachelor’s degree in Health Sciences, with a concentration in Exercise Science. She has taught aerobics classes, weight training and a running program, all of which included yoga-based stretching components. Her personal practice is a blend of several styles of yoga, having taken classes from a variety of teachers. A casual yoga practitioner for many years, somewhere in the mid-1990s Gail began a more focused study of yoga and felt called to teach. This yoga teacher has evolved over the intervening years as her personal practice grew and blossomed. Two years ago, Gail found The Practice Room and felt that she had come “home.” She enrolled in the 200 hour yoga teacher training program and plans to continue her studies in the new 500 hour training which is set to begin in January of 2012.
Jen Whitcher
Jennifer is a graduate of the Abhyasa Yoga Institute for Yoga Teacher Training at the 200 hour level. A New York native, she came to NH in 1999 after meeting and marrying her husband Philip. She spent years working within the community before deciding to further her education by attending graduate school for Mental Health Counseling at Plymouth State University. It was during her graduate studies that she began to practice yoga. She began yoga to relax and find balance in her life, and quickly found more. “l feel a wave of wholeness when I practice; a deeper connection physically, emotional and spiritually.” Jen works as a Licensed Clinical Mental Health Counselor in private practice in Gilford, NH. She is interested in furthering her studies at Kripalu in Yoga Therapy this coming summer.
Emily Wolpin
Emily first discovered yoga as a graduate student while living in Philadelphia. Unable to afford a gym membership, unwilling to run outside in the smog-filled city streets, and just enough space in her studio apartment for a yoga mat and DVD player, she decided to give it a try. What began as a whim quickly developed into a serious personal practice. Emily found herself returning to the mat day after day. The aches, pains, and sore muscles accumulated from years of competitive sports and working-out melted away, as she enjoyed greater physical strength, inner peace, and self-confidence. A New England native, Emily moved to New Hampshire with her husband and started a family. After attending several yoga classes throughout the Lakes Region, Emily immediately realized that she had found a unique and special place as soon as she entered The Practice Room. She enrolled in the Teacher Training Program and became a 200 hour certified Yoga Instructor. Emily is also a mother of two toddlers and a high school French teacher.