Should I improvise or choreograph my performance?

Most pole dancers don't get a lot of performance opportunities. Unless we are highly involved in the competition circuit or working as exotic dancers (which is pretty much all improvisation so doesn't factor into this blog post), the vast majority of what we do is relegated to the studio, our homes, and maybe our YouTube accounts.

But every once in awhile, those of us who are pretty serious about our pole hobbies will have the opportunity to perform in public. It could be a local competition, a showcase, a studio performance, or some sort of local event that you've been asked to perform at (hopefully for money--this isn't a cheap hobby!).

For most polers, the first question they ask themselves will be, "What will I WEAR?!?!" The second, though, will be, "Do I just get up there and dance, or do I have to write a routine?"

The truth is that either way is totally fine. People do it both ways. So you just have to decide what's better for you. Obviously I can't do that for you, but what might help is going over what it's like to do each, and what the pros and cons are.

Improvisation
Improvisation should play a huge part in your studio or home training, so you should be pretty comfortable transferring that practice to a public space.

Training

Since you are not running a routine over and over, your training will not change much from your day-to-day routine. You'll probably just keep practicing the moves you were working on anyways, and doing some freestyling. Even if you don't have a routine in mind, though, it's a good idea to have a mental list of what moves you think you will and won't use. We all have our "default moves" that we pretty much throw into everything, but that probably won't be enough to fill up a whole song. What else do you have that would be a good fit? More importantly, what do you NOT want to do? Are you sure that combo you've been working on is ready for an uncontrolled environment, where you or the pole might be too hot or too cold or too slippery and you won't be able to do anything about it?

And please please video yourself, even just once. Routine or no, you're bound to catch something you're doing that needs to be cleaned up, whether you tend to flex your feet when you fonji (I know I do) or make a face when you drop your legs down & up in an iguana (I do that too).

Before the show

You'll mostly be reminding yourself to include the moves you want. You shouldn't be stressed out about too many things beyond general performance anxiety.

During the show

Hopefully, you will be totally into the music and the moment, connecting with the audience and feeling amazing. Here are some other thoughts that will probably run through your head, though:

"OK, what should I do next, um..."
"WTF this song is LONG!!!!"
"Crap, I think I did this move like three times already."
"Uhhh what else what else was I supposed to do..."
"Why aren't we done yet? WHY IS THIS SONG SO LONG?"

After the performance

You should feel awesome and elated. But you will probably be saying, "Gahh, I forgot to do like 10 things I meant to do!! Dammit!!" and maybe "I think I just did the same couple of things over and over."

That's the biggest problem with improvisation. You'll be relatively chill beforehand, but kicking yourself afterward for everything you didn't do. The good news is, you're the only one who knows that. The audience doesn't know you didn't do an Oona split, and even if you think it would have blown their minds, really they were probably just aweing at how beautiful and graceful and amazing you are. You can tell your fellow polers about all the awesome stuff you were GONNA do, but the general public really doesn't know the difference.

Other pros and cons

The best thing about improvisation is that you are totally adaptable to any situation. It doesn't matter how thick or high the poles are, or whether or not they are attached to the ceiling. No ceiling? Don't use the ceiling. No problem.

Routine

Writing and mastering a routine is quite a lot of work, but extremely rewarding.

Training

Depending on how much time you have to prepare, you need to start practicing way in advance.
Of course it's all relative to your time frame, but you should be doing complete run-throughs of your routine at least a couple weeks before go time. Because you're gonna find that what worked in your head, and what worked one chunk at a time, is usually impossible to actually pull off in context. Generally, especially if you are a more athletic-style dancer, you're gonna get completely winded after the first verse. Stamina is a topic for another day, but for now let's just say you either have to keep practicing 'til you get used to it, or re-choreograph so that you get more "rest" time. And there's no way of knowing in the beginning which one it's gonna be, ie, whether or not what you want to do is going to be possible for you or not.

You also don't want to overtrain. That's also a subject for a future column, but for now: if you're running your routine a lot, you're practicing the same moves over and over, on the same side, day after day. This can easily lead to overuse and imbalance. Be careful and make sure you have at least a little time dedicated to working your other side in there. Try running your routine, even in slow motion and without music, on your other side. It doesn't have to be good, but you have to try. (See also: Reasons to learn tricks on BOTH sides.)

Before the show

You're gonna be freaking out about everything. It matters a LOT what kind of equipment you'll be working on, and sometimes the people you're communicating with are not very specific. Yeah, so it's 8 feet, but if it's self-standing then you can't do your ceiling lay. Will there be enough floor space to do the kinds of floor work and dismounts you were planning? Plus, you have all these moves to worry about. If it's too slippery to do a monkey tail (or whatever the kids are calling it these days), and you have one planned, you're pretty much screwed. Once you have your routine set in stone, you're going to find that you are not willing to deviate from it. When you have planned down to the last hair flip, it seems inconceivable to change an entire move, which will affect timing, height, transitions, and maybe the entire sequence it's a part of.

During the show

If you've trained and practiced right, you should really slay here. You should have the moves so memorized and second nature that you can concentrate entirely on personality, showmanship, and just rocking it. That said, something will always go wrong. Hopefully it will be something small, but just know that there will be a little snag or glitch somewhere and no amount of preparation will prevent that. I once had a routine that I agonized over, including a really difficult, really fast spin sequence. In my performance, the pole got semi-stuck and wouldn't spin fast, so the entire effect was lost. Not my fault, nothing I could have done about it, and yeah I was pissed because it was a really super cool thing, and that whole verse pretty much just fell flat. But the audience didn't really remember that, they went ape for my performance overall.

After the show

You should be feeling good. If you were prepared, then you almost certainly did all your moves well, in the right order, and hopefully were able to add on a lot of stage presence. You'll still be mad about that one thing that didn't go right, but you will hopefully have put on a real show, and that's what the audience will respond to.

Other pros and cons

Because it matters so much what the setup is, your routine may not be reusable in its current form. That is, you planned on a static pole and a spinning pole twelve feet high and going all the way to the ceiling. Your next performance might be on a single nine-foot static stage pole. It won't transfer without some serious editing. So you're looking at doing a TON of work and maybe being able to use it once. You better at least get it on video! You should probably video your dress rehearsal, too, in case that comes out better.

Combination of the two

If you're not ready to commit to one plan or the other, you can always do something in the middle. One example is to freestyle, but to practice freestyling to your song so many times that you've got a pattern going of what you're going to do when, even if you're not committed to it. Another is to choreograph just parts of the songs. For example, you know you want to climb to the top of the pole during the guitar solo, and you know what you're going to do once you get up there. You almost might consider planning out just the beginning and the ending of the song, so you know you that no matter what else happens, you'll start and end strongly.

Which you pick depends a lot on personality type and performance style, so it's a really individual choice. Don't worry--as you perform more over time, you'll find what works best for you. Good luck and let us know how it went!

Image of Cleo the Hurricane from Pole Dance Italy

sigh...YOU'RE NOT GOING TO BULK UP!!!!!!!

Part of teaching pole means working with and talking to a lot of women. Most people I deal with have a decent understanding of the way exercise and the body work. They might come from another kind of fitness background (dancers and gymnasts make fabulous aerialists!), or maybe they just remember stuff from high school science or health class.

But there's no escaping the occasional whine of, "But I don't want to bulk up!"

Or, its more prevalent sister remark of, "I just want to tone!"

<sigh.> Ladies, for the love of god, YOU ARE NOT GOING TO BULK UP!

If you're grossed out by pictures of female body builders, that's fine. It's a matter of taste. I mean, I'm kinda grossed out by extreme flexibility, even though some of my students go ape for contortionists. But what you need to understand is that those women didn't become so hulking by going to pole class, or even by hitting the gym. They had to work really, really hard to get that way. Part of that has to do with a specifically-targeted weightlifting regimen, and an often larger part has to do with cramming as much protein down your face as possible. Either way, it was not a side effect of poling, or of trying to get stronger.

And I'm sorry, but toning is fake. It is not a thing. It was made up by the fitness industry to assuage the fears of those of you who are afraid of bulking up. "Toning" is just losing a little fat and gaining a little muscle so you can see the definition a bit. It still involves making your muscles bigger, whatever you call it.

(And this is off-topic, but since we're on the subject of exercise myths pedaled to women: you can't lose weight off one part of your body by exercising that particular part. Build muscle yes, lose weight no.)

Still concerned? There are some reasons you might gain an above average amount of muscle:

Easy gainers
It is with muscle as with fat: some people gain it easily, some people don't. Your muscles might get bigger faster than other people's. You're just a mesomorph. Unless you're a legitimate freak of nature, though, you're not going to turn into She-Hulk by working out for strength or general fitness. Although for aerialists, you might not want to work out too hard on muscles that you don't need for your apparatus. Balance is essential, of course, but muscle weighs a lot, and you don't want to make yourself harder to lift. I'm an easy gainer, and I don't do a ton of lower body workouts. I did when I was a runner, but as an aerialist, I just don't need as much leg strength as I used to, and as long as my tush looks good, I'm happy.

Genetics
Some people have disproportionately-sized feet or hips. Others have disproportionately-sized delts or quads. Chances are, this will be somewhat apparent before you start gaining. I have large biceps. But even when I was a high schooler and not doing any exercise, I could flex and put on a pretty impressive gun show. My arms are much bigger when I am exercising, but they were kinda big to begin with. My shoulders and pecs don't get nearly as enlarged. There's not a lot you can do about this--if it's not a muscle you need for your apparatus, you can exercise it a little less, but if it is, I wouldn't sacrifice strength because you feel self-conscious about your muscles.

OK, now that I've hopefully convinced you you're not going to turn into The Tic, I'll concede that you are going to gain muscle. If you work hard, you might even gain enough muscle that people say, "Wow! You're in really good shape. What do you do to work out?"

Please don't let this make you feel unfeminine! I have muscles, and I'm pretty much a girlie-girl. I like make-up and dresses and kittens and hearts. And if you were going to call me attractive (to which I'd say, "Why thank you!" unless you were a creep, in which case I would probably reject you in a way that did not involve letting you down easy), you'd call me conventionally so. Not a supermodel, but not a fetish model, either.

Tell ya what--go ahead and do your darndest at your craft. If you feel you've gained too much muscle, you can back off your training and go back to how you used to look.

But you won't. I have yet to see it happen. I don't know a single aerialist who has said, "Hmm, I look too athletic. I liked myself better before." Sure, we complain about not being able to zip up dresses, or short sleeves being too tight on our arms. But it's a bragging kind of complaining.

A few final tips:

Your workout regimen
Actually delving into detail about how to train for strength vs. bulk is beyond the scope of this post--plus, most of your exercise will likely come from your aerial workouts and conditioning, and less from hitting the gym. But I would be remiss if I didn't at least mention that the general guideline that most people agree upon is if you want to build just strength, without hypertrophy, do just a few reps at a very high weight. Ironically, this is the opposite of advice that's peddled to women who "don't want to bulk up," which is the whole 3-4 sets of 8-12 reps thing.

Hang out with other strong women
I never appreciated my muscles, or even my strength, before I became an aerialist. Suddenly it went from a party trick to something that people around me admired and wanted to emulate. If you want to appreciate your muscles, hang out with other women who appreciate them--theirs and yours.

Don't get carried away
Maybe I convinced you a little too well. Seeing these changes in your body can get addictive, and you might be tempted to start hitting the gym harder so you can see even more results. That's fine if that's what you want for yourself. But if your primary goal is to become the best aerialist you can be, you'll want to avoid bulk just for appearance's sake. Stay light, so you can fly.

So stop worrying and get on that pole (and in that gym). Be strong and love it.


Image from oxstyle.com

Building strength for pole: from global to specific

 
If you are a pole dancer or other aerialist, chances are you want to get stronger. Not to invent statistics, but I'm pretty sure less than 0.001% of aerialists don't want to be stronger. This applies especially to polers, who often enter and, at first, advance in the field with much less strength than those who focus on traditional circus apparatuses.

There are a lot of ways to gain strength, but it helps to have a gain plan. (That was a Freudian slip for "game plan," but I like it and I'm keeping it.) You can advance to a point by just doing random exercises-- it's better than nothing-- but you can plateau quickly and stop seeing results if you don't know what you're doing. So I'm going to get you going by explaining four ways you can go about gaining strength, from the general to the specific.

1. Heavy lifting multi-joint exercises

Exercises can be thought of in terms of what joints are bending. Dumbbell curls, which work your biceps, involve bending your elbows. Leg curls involve bending your knees. If you want to be efficient, doesn't it make sense to work more joints at once?

If you want to get strong-- not build bulky, heavy muscles, but just lift more weight-- you should be dedicating a good amount of your strength training time to lifting heavy. After all, you're pretty heavy, and you want to be able to lift yourself.

The traditional powerlifts are the bench press, the deadlift, and the squat. There are other variations and personal favorites, but those are the most standard. You can start doing any of them at light weights, but unless you already have perfect form, you should probably get a personal trainer to help you for a session or two. You can get away with a lot of mistakes at 20 pounds that could cause serious injury at 200 pounds. Whether you get a trainer or not, make sure you have a spotter, especially for the bench press. (If you can't get a spotter, you can use a Smith Machine, but it takes away the stabilizing effects of the lift, which you definitely want for pole dancing.)

Advantages: Good for efficient and balanced strength gain.


Disadvantages: Heavy weights can lead to injury if you err on form or try to lift too much; need a spotter.

2. Do muscle group-specific exercises.

Let's say you feel you have good strength overall, but you feel like a specific muscle group is lagging. Your abs have no problem with inverting, but your arms get tired from climbing and holding your weight up, so you want to work on your biceps. You might decide to take a more traditional "gym rat" approach: do extra "arms," "upper body," or just "biceps" workouts. 3 sets of barbell curls, 3 sets of machine curls, 3 sets of pull-ups-- or whatever your favorite workout of the month is.


Advantages: Variety; you can focus on your problem spots.


Disadvantages: You have to be careful not to create imbalances: if you work on your abs, you have to work on your lower back, too; You want to make sure you're gaining strength and not bulk.


3. Specifically targeted exercises

This zooms in on your needs even further than targeting muscle groups. In this level of granularity, you are finding or designing exercises that imitate the stunts you are working on. For example, let's say you want to work on shoulder strength, for all those inverted moves that involve putting weight in your bottom arm. That can be anything from the caterpillar to the twisted grip handspring. If you were on the "muscle group-specific exercises" level, you'd be doing shoulder presses. For "specifically targeted exercises," I like to have my students to handstand walk-ups. That is, kneel facing away from the wall or pole, place your feet on the wall or pole, and start walking your feet up and your hands in until you're in a handstand position, hold, then walk yourself back down. Not only are your shoulders getting a workout, but you are upside-down, you are balancing, and most significantly, you are briefly holding your weight in one arm at a time, which is what you will be doing in your stunt.

Advantages: You can tweak all kinds of exercises to make them more appropriate to your specific goals.


Disadvantages: You'll need a lot of creativity. You'll be creating your own exercises a lot of the time, and not every move will be easy to plan for.


4. Just do the move.

If you are pretty close to succeeding at a strength trick, there's a lot to be said for just doing the trick over and over and trying to get it. Each move is not just a matter of brute force, but of practice. Otherwise every powerlifter could execute every pole move perfectly on the first try. Experimenting with a power move, when you are already strong, can be more effective than hitting the gym. I got my flagpole straight and solid not by doing extra pecs and delts at the gym, but at repeating it in front of a mirror over and over and being picky about my form.

Advantages: You're training your strength and your stunts at the same time-- two birds! one stone!


Disadvantages: You have to be close to succeeding at the move in the first place, or else you'll just frustrate, and possibly injure, yourself.

Which level of granularity you choose-- from the global to the local-- will depend on your needs, your timeline, and your personal preferences. You can pick one of the above tracks and stick to it, or change it up and keep your muscles guessing. Either way, I suggest coming up with a "gain plan." Gain strength, gain repertoire, and gain the knowledge of how to make your body do what you want.


Photo from EzeeDictionary.com forums.