New Greensburg yoga studio's classes differ by matter of degrees, instructional styles

Students can relax at room temperature or sweat it out at Tonified, a new yoga and fitness studio in Greensburg.

Owner Tony Ranieri has drawn upon four decades in the fitness business and his more recent exploration of yoga techniques in developing the studio and in selecting its range of instructors: five, including himself.

“You really have to find the instructor that suits your needs,” Ranieri said. “Everybody has their own methods and their own style. You need to experiment and find the class for you.”

The studio opened Jan. 9 at 116 N. Carpenter St. in a building that had been vacant for a number of years, previously housing an after-hours club.

Ranieri teaches a yoga workout class that literally is hot. Ceiling heating panels can raise the temperature in the studio space to more than 90 degrees.

“People who take the hot class want to sweat,” he said. “Sweating eliminates toxins. I think it’s good to expose your body to extreme temperatures, hot and cold.”

The movements students in that class perform are “not all yoga,” Ranieri said. “I throw in some core exercises and leg and arm exercises. I try to build some strengthening movements into my classes.”

On the other end of the spectrum, students at Tonified can sign up for a yoga fundamentals class that takes place at room temperature.

“It’s slower-paced and very calming,” Ranieri said. He said a “warm” class, where the temperature is set at about 80 degrees, offers a middle ground for students.

Ranieri said people don’t have to be blessed with flexibility or be physically fit to benefit from yoga. He noted he might add a chair yoga class for “people who can’t move up and down.”

In addition to getting the body moving, yoga can help to increase mindfulness, Ranieri said.

“A lot of people don’t realize the mental benefits that come from yoga,” he said. “You try to coordinate your breath with the movement. It keeps you focused on living in the moment for that one hour, where you try to let go of all the issues and problems that went on in your daily life.”

Ranieri, 73, of Hempfield has operated fitness stores and a training center and worked as a substitute physical education teacher. He continues to offer personal training and works with wrestlers.

He discovered yoga about five years ago and completed a 200-hour course to become a certified instructor. Among other things, he credits yoga with allowing him to take up skiing at 71.

“I’m really a proponent of strength training and cardiovascular training,” he said. “What yoga does is tie all those things together.”

Ranieri, who also holds a real estate license, was showing the Carpenter Street building to a friend who wasn’t interested in it. But, he realized, “It had no pillars or posts. I thought, ‘What a beautiful yoga studio this could be.’ ”

It took about a year to renovate the building, adding the front windows it had lacked, a handicapped-accessible ramp and a new paint job. He turned to his daughter, Jenna Ranieri, for interior design ideas.

The renovation benefited from a $5,000 facade improvement grant, drawn from an annual pot of about $200,000 — part of a program that is offered by the Greensburg Community Development Corp. and receives funding from the Greensburg Foundation Family of Funds of the Community Foundation of Westmoreland County.

The grants are an added incentive for improvement of eligible business properties in the downtown district and several adjoining zones in the city. Approved projects must have a total value of $10,000 or more and can include signage.

The Tonified makeover “was a good project for us,” said John Stafford, executive director of the GCDC. “It’s in an area that we were trying to revive.”

Visit tonified.com for more information about the new yoga studio and thinkgreensburg.com to learn more about the facade grant program.