Instructor Raina Nemeth 39, and her partner Martin Kelln, 45, both of Birmingham, Michigan, demonstrate some of the positions learned at the Partner Yoga for Singles class at the Center for Yoga in Birmingham, Michigan.

DETROIT — Yoga helps you improve your strength, balance and flexibility. But can it get you a date, too?

That's the concept behind the occasional Yoga for Singles workshops at the Center for Yoga in Birmingham, Mich. Taught by Raina Nemeth, who met her boyfriend in a yoga class, the workshop takes the format of speed-dating and moves it to the mat.

The idea sprang up when Nemeth noticed many of her single friends looking for love online as well as asking for help finding partners so they could attend her couples' yoga classes.

So she decided to take the concept of partner yoga — where two people work together in poses that require lifting and leaning — and use it as a more natural way to make romantic connections.

"All these people ... spend a lot of time on the Internet, looking for someone who is perfect on paper," said Nemeth, 39. "But when they meet, the connection is just not there. This way, you can feel organically if there is a connection with someone, without words getting in the way."

The workshops run 90 minutes on a Saturday night and typically draw about 30 participants — half men and half women. Nemeth dims the lights, adds candlelight, cranks up the heat and plays non-typical yoga music like Marvin Gaye.

Karen Schultz, 45, is a single mom of two boys who said she's very picky when it comes to finding a mate. Her usual response to singles events is to "avoid them at all costs." But she loves yoga, and goes to classes nearly every day. She figured, why not try singles yoga?

"It would be nice to meet someone," said Schultz, who attended the Feb. 6 workshop. "But at the very least, I love yoga and figured I'd learn some new tricks."

She arrived feeling anxious, which Nemeth said is normal.

"At first, it's totally awkward," Nemeth said. "Like a junior high dance."

The participants lay their mats in a circle facing each other, and introductions are made. Then the men roll up their mats and join a woman on her mat.

Every three minutes or so, the men rotate to the next woman's mat, where they work together.

"It's sensual, not sexual," Nemeth said. "It's nonthreatening in a safe environment. You're touched and touching someone and being vulnerable."

Within 15 minutes, Nemeth said people are transformed, laughing and sweating and getting into compromising positions with people they've just met.

"She makes you OK with it," Schultz said. "In one position, she had a guy put his feet right on top of my thighs. ... Then you fly up in the air, like you do when you're little kids. You don't know the person, and it's a little intimate."

In another move, she sat face-to-face in a man's lap with her arms wrapped around him.

Nemeth said these close encounters help show whether participants have chemistry with someone — much more than a typical conversation over dinner can.

"I think yoga focuses you to be in the moment," Nemeth said. "You really have to pay attention to what you're doing instead of trying to impress someone by watching your words. In most dating situations, you're concentrating on putting out this image of yourself. Yoga encourages you to be your authentic self. Your conversation is limited, so you have to be in the moment. People start to be themselves, they're not worrying about what everyone is thinking."

After the class last weekend, Nemeth said one attendee contacted her to ask for another's number. But it's not always about making an immediate love connection.

"Sometimes there are love connections," she said. "But some people come to yoga every day and never talk to each other. This is a good way to get to know the community you're in every day. So friendships can be made, and you can learn some new postures."

Schultz said for her, the classes didn't result in a date. But she's willing to try it again.