Re: ballroom question; lady's arch pose

On Apr 7, 9:55 am, avid_dan...@xxxxxxxxxx wrote:

Many competitive followers dance with dispoportionate arching
that throw the individual as well as the couple balance off.
Look at the body lines of the dancers, which reveals how torso
weight is distributed over the supporting feet. If the
backward-moving linearly-travelling person arches backwards
(excessively), then she/he can't control the speed and quality
of the travel since the upper body will pull (fall) away without
any lower body support; the forward-moving partner is then
forced to provide the support, which is "painful." Bad balance
and body lines are manifested in the stiffness and strain of
movement in the couple, feeling/looking like a tug-of-war
where timing and floorcraft is sloppy.

You've quite accurately described some of the problems of dancers with
incomplete training. On more skilled ladies however, the backwards
poise is not so much an arch, and it does not prevent them from
balancing when they are over their foot. In fact, on a dancer with
good foot usage, the backwards action is substantially more
controllable than the forwards, because the sturdily built heel of the
foot can support the entire body weight a lot more reliably than the
poor toes can.

The arching back while travelling backwards linearly actually
contradicts the mechanism of sway and is poor physics. Note that
if rotation, partner-revolution, or forward travelling is
involved, then backward "arching" is good and necessary. The use
of the word "arch" is less desirable than something like "lean"
because it connotes a bent body line, which already makes for
bad physics.

Your argument is not making that much sense; in a backwards movement
absent rotation, there won't be any sway to "contradict"

If the man let go, would the lady fall backward, or is she supposed to
balance herself even in the arch back pose? In other words, is the man's
right arm supporting part of the weight of the lady?

There may be a little "support" partners offer each other,
but good dancing doesn't entail either partner "carrying"
the other (except in specific, choreographed, moves).

Well said.

Driving _forward_ is consistent with "arching" back.
It's driving backward while arching backward that makes
bad physics.

Not really. If it's done right it is not bad physics at all. On the
other hand (I don't know if this is why you endorsed it, but if it is)
if your forward movement "arching" inovlves leaving part of your body
such as hips or shoulders behind to try to keep your balance over your
foot, then you have not yet learned how to move in a closed hold. A
little projection of the center is good; but leaving anything but the
departed foot behind is very very bad.

It's not only beginners. Lots of "advanced" dancers
don't know how to move well either, by practicing
the poor/wrong way so much so to make it appear decent.
Especially when the partner is there to compensate and
hide the deficiencies.

I find a number of active and succesful competitors have fallen into
some questionable habits, which nonetheless do produce results, both
in some qualities of the dancing and in placements. But the coaches
who can put the wisdom of long experience on top their own competitive
careers generally exhibit (and when given a free hand, teach)
extremely sound mechanics. This takes the form both of judgement to
know when too much is too much, and detailed insight into methods that
can make it possible to do more in ways where it would not be too
much.

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: how to get windows vista working?
    ... If you don't like MS fine, but at least MS does maintain as much backwards ... situation about dropping support is going to happen with the PowerPC Macs. ... I will buy an Intel-based Mac and run my PowerPC ... programmers who know what they're doing to re-write Vista from scratch, ...
    (microsoft.public.mac.virtualpc)
  • Re: Riding Backwards
    ... > * Don't look over your shoulder, that will throw your balance off. ... When riding backwards, he turns his head to the side to look ... Wheel Rider - From the Over 50 Group ...
    (rec.sport.unicycling)
  • Re: Slipping turn vs. carving turn revisited
    ... Hopping, awkward weight shifts, balance problems, harsh ... You may have been trained to be a ski instructor, ... I have no such double standard. ... make claims should provide support for them. ...
    (rec.skiing.alpine)
  • RE: WSE 3.0 SOAP Router for load balancing
    ... It is not allways possible for us to go the hardware or windows based load ... I was going to take a custom approch to "Route SOAP Messages Based Upon ... For the WSE 3 loading balance, I think you can consider the following ... Microsoft MSDN Online Support Lead ...
    (microsoft.public.dotnet.framework.webservices.enhancements)
  • Re: Maximum age.
    ... Walking backwards is less than convenient, ... tip our balance forward again. ... If our knees bend backward wouldn't every step require lifting the ... is hard work. ...
    (rec.arts.sf.composition)