How are your practices going?

practice this morning was annoying...the older I get, the less I retain....I feel as though I am going to have to start making it a point to practice the very next day after my lessons, because if I don't make the time til the weekend, most of my notes mean nothing
 
Solo practice on bronze leader things. In Standard worked more on the "breath in the frame" in the swing dances; in Latin, more effort in eliminating the hunching in my shoulders - but not really liking what I saw in the mirror.
 
Practice last night focussing on the things I got from lessons in NY last week - all of which sound like really simple things to change, but make a big difference in my W and FT. W changes are fixes to a couple of things that were not working well, and FT is a new way of thinking about my basic actions that makes a huge difference in the way that it looks and feels, but that I'm finding difficult to apply consistently... more practice is needed. But at least I get another 2 weeks solo while pro is out of town :)
 
Solo practice as leader. I made it through bronze Paso to tempo; but jive still eludes me. Bronze standard seemed to be working OK, but I'm not sure that I'm hitting all the "breathing" spots.
 
Rough couple of solo practices recently. I've been slacking a bit too much in the solo practice department, and it shows as I'm no longer executing routines without thinking, which in turn causes me to fall behind the music at times. I'm also probably demanding more quality than I used to, which coupled with the higher tempo of USAD music vs. NDCA is making prepping for Gumbo especially ego-bruising. Expecting it'll get better as I get more consistent with the solo work, though!
 
Last night's solo practice was really short, but some of the things I've been working on as a bronze leader felt a bit easier - foot pressure in cha cha and rumba, and the early rise in the reverse turn in foxtrot.
 
Yeah dancing at an ndca comp is like a vacation compared to usa dance in terms of tempos and song length. Train for longer and faster makes the rest easy .
 
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Mr 4 styles said:
Yeah dancing at an ndca comp is like a vacation compared to usa dance in terms of tempos and song length. Train for longer and faster makes the rest easy .
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I think song length is less of an NDCA thing and more a pro/am vs am/am comp thing. Everything at nationals in Provo was at least 1:30, most pushing on 1:45 for the rounds we danced - I remember wishing the jive had been shorter, and I'm the weirdo who gets an ear-to-ear grin when we get to the jive drills in technique class.
 
Danced so hard in practice that I broke my shoe... snapped the metal post in the heel in FT. Again. Sadly, it is the same foot as the one that I snapped late last year... anyone need two abused left shoes without mates?

Finished the practice in practice shoes (which felt weird), and thankfully had one more (even older) pair kicking around the house, so didn't have to resort to my comp shoes. And I have no new ones in my stash... because I'm going through shoes faster than anticipated this year!

Also, what am I doing that is making this happen? Did I just get a bad batch of shoes? (I bulk order several pair at a time.) Do I really do that many heel turns in FT that I'm wearing them out?

These ones were going to get cycled out of the rotation in about 6 weeks anyway, but it's a bit annoying. And I'll be at comp next month with my backup pair newly purchased on-site, so that's not great for my stress level :(
 
FancyFeet said:
Also, what am I doing that is making this happen? Did I just get a bad batch of shoes? (I bulk order several pair at a time.) Do I really do that many heel turns in FT that I'm wearing them out?:(
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Is it worth returning them to the supplier? They may like to know and figure out why this is happening, so that they can modify/improve the design for the future, especially if you buy bulk from them. My man does this with his tramping equipment, and the manufacturer has made a number of modifications as a result of his returns. He really uses his gear too (in the same way you do with your shoes!!).
 
Well, I only go through about 4 pair a year (used to be 3, but I'm dancing more), so I doubt that I'm the type of customer that would get a response... also, it's not happening right away, so I can't really complain and ask for a replacement/discount on a new pair. They are lasting a few months.

As it has happened to 3 out my last 4 pair though, I'm thinking that maybe there was a less-than-quality batch of metal used by whomever makes the posts for them. The first I thought was a fluke, but now it's a trend... so maybe worth an e-mail, just so they are aware.
 
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