Balance Rediscovered via Ballet

Part: Follow

Dances: Nightclub 2-step, Waltz, Tango, Viennese, Foxtrot, Quickstep

Hovers: 1

Tuesday night began as practice normally does, with a nightclub 2-step and round. I felt that my balance was much more under control for this practice, and I think that was due in large part to the ballet class I had taken prior to practice. This was only my second class, but at a different studio than before. I'm still a bit overwhelmed and have a lot to learn, but I think this will be a better class for me to attend consistently to get comfortable with it and will be good cross training.

Our rounds are mainly about stamina and consistency, and I think we're continuing to improve in the stamina department. Sometimes the dancing isn't so pretty, but we keep it together enough to make it with some semblance of ease.

Practice focused on quickstep: our last long side. While we don't usually have any problem getting through this section, it doesn't feel smooth and it's not always entirely together. There is a lot of shifting from inside to outside partner and some interesting footwork. Jeff says it doesn't feel like I know what the timing is. I do, but as Simeon was explaining to me in my last lesson, sometimes a mismatch in shape, connection, or stride length will feel like a mismatch of timing. Or, I could just to be late. Either way, I know I have a tendency to take steps that are too large when I go outside partner for weave type figures, and coupled with Jeff's tendency to let the right elbow go too far back, that makes for some difficulty exiting the position quickly and smoothly. We danced through the entire section very slow multiple times, to get a better feeling for where we were relatively speaking. This was where I noticed that my balance was much better than Sunday and Monday; I wasn't rushing Jeff's steps and wasn't falling into each step as it came.

We concluded practice for the evening with the Moon River waltz. I'm not sure why our waltz is so much better than our other dances, but that still continues to be the case. It takes a lot of control too, so I think that is something we've developed a lot through our practices. Our next hurdle will probably be the flexibility, which is going to help us make some big strides in foxtrot, I'm guessing. (No pun intended.)