Passersby sweat it out at Times Square with a Bikram yoga class on Monday, the longest day of the year. (Henry Lam/ Epoch Times Staff)

NEW YORK—The Times Square Alliance presented their annual celebration of the first day of summer and the longest day of the year, also known as the summer solstice, with a whole day of yoga exercises Monday.

At 12:30 p.m.—the hottest time of the day—participants gathered in Duffy Square and got ready to “draw on the full force and energy of the sun” with Bikram yoga. Birkam yoga involves movement through many postures, rather than sitting or chanting, and its classes are often conducted in a sauna-like environment of 105 degrees Fahrenheit.

The first Bikram yoga studio was opened in New York in 1999, with Donna Rubin and Jennifer Lobo as the co-founders. After Lobo moved to New York from San Francisco, she was surprised that there were no Bikram yoga studios in the Big Apple. Following one conversation with Rubin over lunch, the plan was set in place. Now the two have four studios throughout the city, including their first, which is located at 8th Avenue between 48th and 49th streets and is the closest yoga studio to Times Square.

“If you could create tranquility in the most crazy, high energy place in the world that would really be a great oxymoron, or a great opposite,” Lobo said before starting a yoga class filled with 60 percent beginners.

New York City is known for being a city that never sleeps. With taxi horns, construction, and every other imaginable source of noise, it is often hard to find a quiet corner anywhere outdoors.

“New York yogis are some of the best in the world because they can bring that eternal peace to their practice and disregard anything going on outside, noise or whatever it is,” Lobo said.

Karen Alexander, a hospital emergency room worker from St. Louis, was invited to the yoga event by her friend but was not ready for the heat. Instead, she enjoyed the seating set up in the shade.

“You don’t see stuff like this in Times Square … It’s a nice change,” she said.