dance monday
Topic: dance

Dance class tonight after some hiatus. We've switched from Thursday evenings to Monday. We saw Johnny's new studio, next door to his current place.

A mix of things. First we ran into foxtrot because Johnny had a new Michael Buble cd. Then we went into rumba, then tango.

List of tango steps: basic, basic/promenade/quickstep/close, lunges, turns with lunge, fans, multiple single fans, basic/open/turn into sweetheart/step/backrock/step/backrock/open/quickstep/close I think!

Anyway, it felt good.

 

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just how good the pros are
Topic: dance
Okay, let's do a little comparison of my efforts and the pros. Here's a description of today's stage of the Vuelta a Espa?a from VeloNews.

Racing has been underway for about two hours on this, the toughest stage in this year's Vuelta. The 207 kilometers of today's route covers a wide range of terrain, but really the most decisive of it will be the six rated climbs that hit riders from the start. The day started with the Category 3 climb to Minide. At km50, the route moves up the 16km of Category 1 roads up the Puerto de Connio and that's followed almost immediatly by the Cat. 1 Puerto de Ranadoiro (8km) At km 102 the Puerto de Cerredo (Cat. 3) warms the riders up for the 10km hor categorie Alto the San Lorenzo (10km - at 9 percent). Of course, the surviivors then get to fight it out on the Cat. 1 Alto de la Cobertoria (9km - 8.5 percent). So, what do you have planned for your day?

207 kilometers translates to 128.62 miles. Vinokourov won the stage in 5:50:43, close enough to 6 hours for my purposes. Vino rides 28 more miles in the same time...with six categorized climbs. If the stage had been as flat as the course I rode, he would have ridden closer to 180 miles. It took me 15 hours to ride a 200-mile flat course. Even just taking on-bike time, it took me almost 13 hours. The pros do it in half the time. Yesterday, Vino won a 113-mile flat stage in four hours, averaging 28mph. I can hold 28mph for, oh, thirty seconds, longer if I'm drafting...but not much.

I'm not trying to minimize my own accomplishments. I'm proud of them. I still pedalled through the miles myself. I'm not an armchair quarterback. But it's good and necessary to recognize what others are doing, whether I'll ever match that or not. Credit where credit is due.

another dance lesson
Topic: dance

Okay, let's see what I can remember. We added three things in swing and three or four in rhumba.

Swing. a travel move where i basically walk my partner down the floor eight steps, starting by pulling her in on the first step, then alternating. A real skit turner. Then there were two variations of a kick step. Left foot kicks out and the rocks back.

Rhumba. reviewed steps. First, basic salsa style. Step back. Turn in with twirl out. Underarm turn on back step. New were Cuban steps to travel, Cuban steps to travel back. Then leading Cuban steps. I think those were all there were.

We saw ourselves on video. Not a good thing, like hearing yourself speak on a tape. Almost unrecognizable at times. It didn't look anything like it felt, and how it felt...and feels...is much more important that how it looks. To others, it must look the way we feel. I like that.

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friday, july 21
Topic: dance

Dance class yesterday evening. Taking a little break from salsa, back to swing. We learned well, I learned a couple of new steps. One was the sweetheart, another was the sweetheart push, and I've misplaced the name for the third one. For the sweetheart, the lead brings the lady in with the left hand, then matches steps to the right, then to the left, then to the right, then turns her back out and finishes on the back step. For the sweetheart push, the lead is holding both hands with the lady. When the lead steps to the left, he pushes the lady's hands to the rights. When he steps right, he pushes the lady to the left into a spin. He takes her hands again and the end of the spin and finishes with the back step. The third, unnamed, starts with a normal swing sequence with a hand change on the backstep. The lead steps forward with the left foot while pulling back with the right hand. He passes behind the lady's back, facing her back. The lead the pulls forward with the right hand and opens up. The lady is now passing his back. There are five passes total, after which the lead takes the lady into a spin, finishing with a backstep.

It took me a while to catch on to the footwork, but it was pretty cool after it started to work.

We also reviewed some rhumba, but that's starting to escape me now that I've described the swing. Let's see. Yes, we reviewed how to do a turn. I had forgotten to do a backstep out of the turn. I'm not picturing the rest. I'll get back to you on that.

Ride tomorrow with a couple of guys I've not ridden with before although I know them pretty well. It should be good. I'll have to map out a route or two.

40k TT on Sunday morning. We'll see how fast the boy can cruise right now. I'll have to practice my hydration.

Keep it between the ditches folks.

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Dance competition finals
Topic: dance
The dance competition finals were last night (Friday, June 9), held in a packed house. There were eleven judges, most of them being local celebrities, but also two from the Miss Iowa pageant that our teacher had scored. No pun intended!

The dancers who did lots of "wow" moves–drops, dips, flips–got lots of points. Kat and I have a much smoother style. Actually, Johnny wanted us in there because he wanted to show that salsa could be done in many different ways. While I was a tad disappointed to not have been named in the top five, I know that we danced as well as we have before. And what topped the evening was the fact that one couple from the audience came over afterwards and said that what we had done was what salsa was all about, and that the audience was "breathless" waiting to see what we’d do next. We put a lot of passion into our dancing. We’ve seen on the dance programs on TV that the crowd likes the flash moves, but we’re not built for that. So, we do what we’re good at and leave it at that. We seem to have our share of fans, and hey, we’re dancing.

friday morning check-in
Mood:  quizzical
Topic: dance
Dance lesson and dance session last night. A couple more rumba moves, including a promenade where I lead the lady around while I travel backwards. Very smooth. Danced at Pulse afterwards, very few dancers there. We had the whole floor most of the time, which was good, but a little lonely, actually.

227.5 on the weight this morning, strange rise. We'll see what happens tomorrow morning. I'm feeling a little stiff, not too bad, just different muscles being brought into play. There's a group going out tomorrow morning, have to check the weather.

new moves
Mood:  bright
Topic: dance
Dance class last night. Going to have class for the next fourteen weeks. Started with cha cha, went to rhumba, ended with waltz. I have to remember to open into a lead before going into a turn. Also, cha cha is side to side, starting with the left foot into a right-foot rock back. Turns in rhumba start with the second foot movement. Waltz control step is a left forward, right forward, right back, then turn left foot and start normal sequence.

I'm having my normal frustrations with unlearning and learning.