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Improve Your Dancing With Yoga: Uttanasana — Forward Bend. The Yogi’s ‘Throwaway Oversway’.
Guest Writer: Lubosch Bublák Editing And Translation: Kerstin Lange Photography: Helmut Römhild
But it’s just about letting the upper part of the body dangle, isn’t it?
Well, whatever you call it: aiming your body towards the floor will result in pain shooting through the rear parts of your legs.
Dancers are trained to smile even when they are making extreme efforts.
But this is about yoga and the Forward Bend yoga pose should bring
a calm composed expression to your face, indicating the positive influence of yoga on health and mental balance – and not
increase your ability to hide stress and strain behind an ‘ever-smiling pretty face’.
Feet Set Apart, As Wide As Your Hips, With A Bit Of Inward Turn ...
but how do I bend forward correctly?
The most important thing is: never try to imitate what the yoga model pictures in yoga books show.
Most of the models have 20 years of experience and can stretch accordingly.
The best preparation for dancing is to bend at the knees and let the palms slide down along the shinbones.
Almost instantly you will feel that a lot of things are wrong with your body: my work with dancers again and again confirmed that most of them are not flexible enough, especially in the rear part of the thighs and the back.
Gastautor: Lubosch Bublák
Yoga teacher, former competition dancer,
BDY, VYLK, TaMeD e.V.
www.ashtanga-yoga-kiel.de
Power Yoga In Dancesport.
In a short sequel of articles Lubosch Bublák will introduce yoga postures which are helpful for the competition dancer.
Using these power yoga poses immediately before entering a competition a dancer can harmonize body and mind,
make muscles, tendons and joints flexible and strong and considerably reduce stress:
only a well-balanced organism can fully use the music’s potential.
photos will show the yoga posture in detail while the text will highlight the important
aspects of the yoga exercises.
The 2 yoga teachers demonstrating the yoga poses are Alexa Potrykus and Petra Reiter-Löbbing.
They will show additional yoga exercises helpful not only in dancesport.
There is simply no time to fully exercise yoga before a competition starts.
But even a brief sequence of yoga poses, easy to go through, giving the final touch to all the other preparations and training
will show results as if by magic.
Power Yoga can become an integral part of the training for ballroom dancing.
While going through their yoga exercises 5000 years ago the Indians probably didn’t consider any implications
for ballroom dancing, for Slow Waltz or Samba.
Nevertheless the competition dancer can benefit from yoga by using a short sequence of yoga postures to raise awareness and concentration.
Yoga poses are demonstrated by Petra Reiter-Löbbing and Alexa Potrykus.
Petra Reiter-Löbbing
Yoga teacher (BDY/EYU)
www.vitalcenterwentorf.de
Alexa Potrykus
Yoga teacher
TSV Glinde von 1930 e.V.
www.tsv-glinde.de
The yoga photos were shot on the premises of Vital Center Wentorf and sportsclub TSV Glinde. We are grateful for the generous support.
Vital Center Wentorf e.K.
www.vitalcenterwentorf.de
TSV Glinde von 1930 e.V.
www.tsv-glinde.de
Tendons, Ligaments, Muscles: Make Them Work For Your Sport.
Place your feet firmly on the ground, lower your arms, and try to gently stretch your legs.
The idea is to raise the ischium, moving it away from the knees towards the ceiling.
It is not easy to work on the rear part of the thights because they consist not only of muscles but also of the tendons and ligaments. To stretch them a dancer needs a lot of patience:
To be successful means to be able to move the frontal portion of pelvis towards the big toes and tilt the pelvis giving it a forward inclination.
So instead of bending the lower back and the lumbar spine you are working with your hip joints, which is the correct and healthy way to do this exercise – it even intensifies the effect of stretching.
But only a workshop can provide more detailed instructions, e.g. how to use the power of your abdominal muscles and perform the legendary Uddiyana Bandha.
Ground Contact.
You can place your flat hands on the ground or hold your toes? Careful! Overambition is not part of the exercise –
so don’t start to haul yourself down towards your legs.
Better let gravitation do the work of gently stretching the back downward. This is how it should be done and your spinal discs will be thankful, too.
Hold your elbows in your hands, let your neck relax and your head hang down like your arms.
The Yogi’s ‘Throwaway Oversway’.
Using this exercise for slowly stretching your legs and your body will improve circulation. Your legs will feel fit and ready to go.
Practice Uttanasana for about half a minute and you feel refreshed like returning from a short holiday.
Take a few deep breaths – and join the next competition.
The Forward Bend is the Yogi’s ‘Throwaway Oversway’:
It can lead to emotions beyond the beginner’s imagination if the yogi is able to master all the necessary skills.
For the dancer it is a handy tool which will bring fast and flexible legs, a relaxed shoulder area, a flexible back.
The Forward Bend yoga pose is perfect for reducing stress and chasing away dark moods.
Like the Downward Facing Dog it is extremely benefical for the competition dancer.
©: Ballroom Website, 2009
Updated: 26.05.2009