Using the supporting foot and leg

Another tale from pygmalion's dance life, LOL.

When I took my ISTD exam and when I've gotten critiques for the past couple years, I've always gotten the feedback that I don't effectively use the supporting foot and leg to power my motion, particularly for smooth dancing.

Well, now I have a new coach who has the most powerful legs I've ever seen. No wonder he's a top smooth competitor. At any rate, I've become very conscious of how wimpy my legs really are.

Any ideas or experiences you can share for how you became aware of your supporting leg and/or learned to use it for smooth dancing?

Ha ha ha.

I just started lessons with the best smooth/standard coach within a three hour drive (at least -- maybe more), and I'm so lucky. He has beautiful use of legs, better than anything I've seen.

So I asked him about this yesterday, and we worked legs.

Here is an observation. To use your legs, you have to get down into the knees. I mean down. If you can't feel your quads engage, you're not down far enough. There's more, of course, but I'll post later.

But about using the quads, my coach told a story about his early training, when he was still middle school aged. His coaches used to make him practice all his routines step by step, with the non-supporting leg so far into a lunge that the knee was almost touching the ground. That far down. As a teaching tool, of course. But it gets the idea across. To use your legs, you have to use your legs. If you can't feel the muscles of your legs, you're missing something.

Yup.

You'll find that if you tuck your hips under your torso sufficiently, and you do a good job of stretching your torso, your knees will bend automatically. Now you need to do both ... stretch without the hip tuck, or hip tuck without the stretch, and it won't happen. It almost feels as if your hips/pelvis push your knees out of the way.

This coach is great. 8)

I figured out the hip tuck tip the hard way -- by not doing it and developing pain the small of my back. I just tried it again, and the image of my hips pushing my knees out of the way really helps. Thanks. 8)

Having a lot of trouble with this myself, with leg extensions, proper balance and drive off the supporting leg ........

Will try the overemphasing of the bend in the supporting leg when I'm practising at home by myself and see if it helps me. Sounds like a good idea. I'm guessing it will probably help balance and movement from the hip as well?

Will let you know how I go.

supporting leg

Gosh, this is all great info Pygmalion, on use of supporting leg.
I've also been watching Dancesport on GTV. If you sit and watch a lot of rising stars and pros dancing, you really notice their technique and how they use those legs! :artsy:

Jenn,
OK, if you've sort of got a feel for that, let's take it a step further. Again, same constraints, you must maintain center stretch and tone at all times.

Consider that tucked position to be "neutral." Now, try to press the floor with the inside edges of the feet isometrically (draw your feet together and split your weight between the feet.) While maintaining this pressure, start tilting your hips upward ... it should almost feel as if there's a string connected to your bellybutton (or hips), and that string is being pulled diagonally upwards towards the ceiling. Allow the pressure on your feet to roll as far forward as possible, while continuing to tilt the hips upward. Once again, center tone and stretch must be maintained at all times for this to work.

So what happens as a result of this "shaping?"

I tried this, and what I say is going to sound strange, but the shaping makes me feel as if I'm being pulled forward from my center, and creating that movement suddenly becomes a whole lot less work. Does that make any sense?

Needless to say, I'm going to try it again (and again) and record my observations here.

Here's an exercise my coach gave me, to help develop foot rise and ankle strength. He got this one from a coaching session with one of the world's top standard coaches, who shall remain nameless.

Use closed boxes -- back, side, together. Forward, side, together. (or the oppostie for leads)

When you get to the "together" step, the 3 count, when your rise is at its highest point, hold as long as you can. Raise and lower your arms slowly while you hold. When you've held it as long as you possibly can, slowly and with control, lower your foot toe-heel.

Then do the other half of the box and repeat, as many times as you can.

I hope the description makes sense.