MEET OUR TEAM
LARISSA DIAZ
Instructor - Vinyasa, HIIT, & Yin
200-Hour Registered Yoga Teacher & Reiki Practitioner
With 15 years of teaching experience, Larissa Diaz is dedicated to creating a safe, inspiring, and healing environment for her students. A firm believer in the power of energy work, she integrates her practice as a Reiki healer with her yoga teachings, fostering holistic healing on physical, emotional, and spiritual levels.
Guided by her own transformative healing journey, Larissa emphasizes the connection between movement, breath, and stillness. She believes yoga is an invitation to surrender safely, explore inward, and align with our highest selves. Her classes offer a space for self-discovery, energetic balance, and personal growth through mindful practice and heart-centered intention.
ITSA ARAVENA
Owner/
Instructor -
Bikram Yoga, HIIT, Vinyasa & Yin.
I began practicing Bikram Yoga in October of 2011 while navigating anger, depression, and anxiety. After hearing about Bikram Yoga in a college course, I felt a deep pull to try something new. I knew I needed change and healing in my life. Yoga quickly became my home, my peace, and my love. Through my practice, I learned to stand in front of myself, look into my own eyes, and know—no matter what I had been through—that everything was going to be alright.
Yoga allowed me to see the truth within myself and to meet that truth with acceptance, without judgment, attachment, regret, or disappointment. Day by day, my practice gave me a space to detach from stress and worry, no matter how difficult life felt.
As my life continued to transform, I realized I wanted to help others experience the same healing I had found. I felt called to share yoga and movement with those seeking physical, mental, or spiritual balance. In the spring of 2013, I became a certified Bikram Yoga Instructor.
To this day, yoga continues to heal and guide me. It supported my recovery after a car accident in 2015 that fractured my neck and carried me through two separate pregnancies—one in 2016 and another in 2020—with my son, Matsi and my daughter, Anitsa. Yoga continues to lead me along a path of love, light, and acceptance. My goal as a teacher is to bring balance and peace into your day. I teach with a heart full of love, understanding, and compassion, honoring that every day on the mat is different and that life is always unfolding.
See you in the hot room.
I am a certified Bikram Yoga Instructor (2013) with a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology (2016). My continued education includes Baby Om (mommy and me postnatal yoga), Yin 96, Little Flower Yoga (Kids Yoga Level 1), AFAA Group Exercise Instruction, AFAA Perinatal Fitness, AFAA Midlife Fitness for Women, Reiki Healing Levels 1 & 2, Sound Healing, and AFAA Yoga Essentials 1 & 2.
HEATHER GRACE
Instructor - Bikram Yoga
My yoga journey began in the summer of 2011. I was introduced to Bikram Yoga through my mom, and after that first class I was hooked. I couldn’t get enough of the heat, the postures, and the euphoria I felt leaving the hot room. I completed teacher training in the Fall of 2012 and have been teaching ever since! Nothing is better than watching my students grow in their practice and leave the yoga studio with more confidence and control over their breath and body. When I’m not in the hot room, you can find me spending time with my husband, daughter, three dogs and two cats! See you on the mat soon!
RAJNI WINT
Instructor - HIIT, VINYASA & YIN
Hi there! My name is Rajni!
I am a devoted yogi that is completely captivated by all things self care but especially this practice of the body and mind. I began my practice here at this studio at 18 and stuck with it ever since! Over the years i have gotten trained in HIIT Pilates, Vinyasa, Yin, Little Flower Yoga & more. I hope to continue to expand my knowledge and experience more in this lovely realm as the years go on.
I was very idle before i began practicing, feeling like i did not really have a purpose & definitely needed to be doing more with my time and once i started i fell inlove. When i first began i lost 20 pounds almost immediately and after seeing what it did for my body i began to notice how beneficial the practice was not only for my physical but my mental, emotional and spiritual self as well. If you want to change & grow in all the best ways then i truly believe this is it!
To students: Come here with an open mind and heart as much as you possibly can! Come to the hot room as often as you can and watch all the ways that your body, mind & soul change. Watch how your body transforms as well as a happier, healthier and better version of yourself emerges!
PETER SHEDLETSKY
Instructor - Bikram Yoga & Yin.
Peter found his way to Yoga and meditation because of overwhelming stress and chronic back pain. His journey started in 2012 in our Bikram Yoga studio. After experiencing the instant benefits of the practice, he wanted to share it with others. In June of 2014, he became a certified Bikram Yoga teacher and joined the Yorktown Bikram Team. Soon, he also got trained as a Yin 96 Yoga Instructor, and about a year later, took a Sivananda Teacher's Training Course in the Bahamas. He stayed in a Sivananda ashram for another three months to teach and deepen his personal practice. In 2019, he traveled to Kerala, India, where he studied with Yoga Masters and assisted in a Yoga Teachers Training.
Peter believes that Yoga and Meditation can improve everyone's life, and it's a gift that should be available to everyone.
During the Covid-19 lockdown, Peter was offering free online Yoga Classes for the public. He even developed a special beginners program just for men. Because of the transformation he experienced through Yoga, Peter is not only a teacher but a true ambassador of Yoga. His students love Peter's gentle and playful approach and his "signature" relaxations. Besides teaching and practicing Yoga, Peter runs a house painting company. His passions are heavy metal music, reading, hiking, urban exploration and photographing old cemeteries, abandoned buildings, and ruins.
PAIGE SAVASTANO
Instructor- HIIT & Vinyasa
Paige began practicing yoga nearly ten years ago and quickly discovered how deeply grounding and transformative the practice could be—both on and off the mat. What started as a simple college curiosity grew into a steady source of physical strength, mental clarity, and emotional healing. Yoga became a place where she returned to herself, found peace in challenge, and connected more deeply with her own inner guidance.
For the past six years, Paige has been a devoted member of the Yorktown Bikram studio, where she fell in love with the hot room and the powerful, renewing energy of Bikram, hot yoga, and hot fitness. The consistency she built there shaped not only her body, but her mindset, her confidence, and her overall sense of wellbeing.
Inspired by how yoga supported her through every season of life, Paige earned her Group Fitness certification and is now completing both her 200-hour Yoga Teacher Training and Yoga Sculpt certification. She strives to create classes that are energizing, welcoming, and spiritually grounding—spaces where students can challenge themselves, reconnect with their breath, and feel more at home in their bodies.
Paige is honored to share her love of yoga, movement, and mindful connection with the community that has given her so much.
STEVE ZAGAMI
Instructor- Bikram yoga & HIIT
Being a Marine and a firefighter, i literally had to be pushed into my first yoga class. I was involved in a bad accident and had fallen into depression and was in chronic pain. I was retired from the fire department and was hooked on pain killers. Another fire fighter convinced me to try a hot yoga class. I hated that first class, being so out of shape and full of the toxins from the pain killers. But I felt so good after the class and actually slept through the night. I went back the next day and became hooked, that was 11 yrs. ago and I haven't stopped since. I no longer take pain killers or anti-depressants. I won't say I'm pain free but Bikram yoga is my prescription now!
USMC
NYC Firefighter
Registered Nurse
Bikram Yoga teacher Fall 2014
Inferno Hot Pilates teacher Fall 2016
BRIAN HUFNAGEL
Instructor - HIIT
Coach Brian has 20 years experience coaching and training young athletes for elite competition. He is certified in personal training and sports nutrition. He takes a functional approach to fitness and wellness as he identifies the needs and strengths of each client and creates an individualized fitness plan towards strength, mobility and stamina. Coach Brian is also a C licensed soccer coach and has held a Director of Coaching position with a premier soccer club for the last five years.
