Men and Women have different exercise goals?

[dTas]

I have a question about follows needing to look soft and flowy. Flowy, yes, but soft? It seems that if you're working on strength, soft is the last thing you're going to look. Yet it requires a lot of strength to dance well, and grace to dance beautifully. Is there exercise for grace?

I also question how much certain styles have followers who look flowy. Smooth, f'rinstance, has kind of given up the ghost on flow, from what I've been observing recently. But strong? Definitely.

The latin dances in general often don't look flowy (bolero and int'l rhumba being exceptions), yet you need amazing strength, agility, and speed for them. Are there different exercises you'd recommend for Latin than for Standard/Smooth?

everyone has their own definition of flowy... the point being that women should look feminine and men should look masculine. (or how ever else you would like to define the two roles of dancing; lead vs follow)

even in Latin/rhythm there is a vision of the lead initiating and taking command and the follow reacting and finishing the movement. it may not be flowy (or soft) but it shows the roles of the people in the dance.

anyway... you can still be physically strong and look soft.

and yes there are exercises to help you look soft and graceful. ballet has many good examples of this.

as for exercises between Latin and smooth... i see the two types of dancing as natural contrasts to each other. what makes Latin look Latin is not what makes smooth look smooth and visa versa. so any exercise learned in smooth has a natural contrast in Latin that should also be learned to understand the technique. i don't think there's a technique that you would learn for one dance that you shouldn't understand its contrast in another dance.

for a simple example: you learn to "move your hips" in Latin... so you should also understand how not to move your hips and you have smooth. so if you learn a soft styling for a smooth dance it is good to know its not so soft contrast in Latin. or understand how a soft styling in Latin may not work in smooth.