- Hi dancers.
I am so excited for today's video.
I have my good friend, Kendall, coming in.
She's an expert in her field
and she's going to be helping us,
on how to get better pirouettes.
How to be a stronger turner,
how to nail those pirouette's.
So that you can keep going
with all of your turn technique,
and work your way up to harder tricks.
So, let's get started.
- Hi guys, I'm Kendall
from True Dance Potential.
We are a personal dance training program
working with dancers all over the United States.
I'm a personal trainer,
a Pilates Instructor,
and I'm really excited to help you become
a better turner today.
So for our first exercise,
we're going to focus on core stability.
So Miss Auti's laying down,
she's going to bring her legs into a tabletop position.
Now tabletop,
means
that your legs are a little bit lower there,
and then your knees are going to be right over your hips.
So,
maybe move up just a little bit.
Ah, yeah.
Perfect.
So they're called leg changes.
So what you're going to do is
one leg is going to go down and touch the floor.
Yes,
and then you're gonna bring it back up to center.
And then you switch legs,
so the other leg goes down
and then you bring it back up.
Perfect, so keep going.
And I'm going to tell you
what you need to be thinking about.
- Okay.
- So instead of just flopping your foot down,
to do it like if you're bringing your toe down like this,
that's not really working your core.
You don't want to realize, you're just
(laughing)
not really working your core.
We want to think about keeping the knee
in the same spot.
So that the hip is what's moving the legs.
So you're reaching the toe out and down.
Now with your core,
you want to think about pulling it in.
So what happens if we don't breathe?
Are you breathing?
- I am now! (laughing)
I am now.
So, so I like to exhale
every time.
So that way
you can feel your core working,
and we're working these muscles in your core
called your transfers of dominance.
And what happens is it runs sideways.
So with your transfers of dominance,
it's your stabilization
muscles, core muscle.
And that way, when you're in a pirouette position,
you want to be stable in your core,
and rather than just squeezing your belly button in,
you want to think about activating this muscle,
and trust me you will feel it after a few of these.
- Yeah.(laughing)
- Yes, and keeping your chest open is important too,
good posture in your pirouettes.
So I like to press my hands down into the floor.
Yeah.
Perfect.
Okay, you can relax.
Cause I know you're probably dying.
(laughing)
- I was waiting for that.
- Yes.
Okay, so our next exercise, we're going to be talking
about your arms and your back.
Now your arms and back are really important
in finding that stability, theme
theme of this video.
Stability, and then also pressing down.
So,
you might hear a cue like, "Oh, press your arms down."
But if you're just pressing your arms down,
and you're not working your back,
it's not really going to do a lot for you,
your arms, just go like this.
- Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah!
- So this exercise is called Rows,
and we're going to do it with a band.
Now,
you're going to sit facing,
you could face the side actually.
- Towards you?
- Yeah, face towards me.
- Okay.
- You're going to flex your feet.
Yes. Good.
Now we're going to take the band
and wrap it over your feet
or around your feet,
around the arches,
and hold onto the ends.
Yeah.
Now make sure you're sitting up nice and tall.
You might want to lean back a little bit with your hips
uh
not that much.
(both laugh) too much.
- She's like, bring it back.
I say that all the time, like
nope, hmm too far, no.
It's because
you want to be really precise with it.
So you want to make
- Okay.
- Make sure you're in one,
Oh, which you are one straight line.
And now what you're gonna do is bring your elbows back,
close to your rib cage.
Pull.
Yeah.
More,
more,
more.
Okay, and now release.
So that's how my
- And one.
- One, one breath. Exactly.
So if you, if it gets a little hard on the band,
you can um
hold it a little bit closer to the ends,
Yeah.
- Okay.
- So you started your arms straight,
You want, you want tension to be on the band.
Then you're going to pull the elbows back,
and keep your chest open,
keep your sternum open.
And what we're working on
are these muscles
that are right behind you. You have two big muscles,
your Latissimus Dorsi muscle.
and now these ones are the muscles that you'll feel pressing
down when your arms are
in first position or even in a second position.
Yeah.
So once you do a few of these,
try them really slow at first,
so that way you can really feel those muscles activating.
And we want to make sure
that we can recruit all those muscle fibers
and get them working.
- Okay, so start slow,
But then would I eventually work up to like.
- So
- One, and out.
- So, yeah.
The tempo doesn't matter as much.
Just if you're trying it for the first time
make sure you're doing it properly.
And not just like
going through the motion because you're not.
- Or, doing this, I feel like
- Yes
- I did this a lot.
- hmm
So you don't want to be, you don't want to be curling.
You don't want to be keeping your arms straight.
You want to think about the elbows coming back
and they stay really close to your ribcage, too.
but
- Guys, I'm ripped.
(laughing)
- So what happens, too, in this exercise,
a lot of times people bring their shoulders up.
Now we don't want to bring your shoulders up
because then that's going to happen.
Your pirouette's gonna look like this,
so you wanna press them down, land them through the neck,
I like to breathe out on this exercise too.
So when you pull your arms back,
exhale
and then extend forward.
Yes.
Now another thing that happens when you do this,
sometimes, when your arms extend forward
people like to go like this.
That's also not really good for stability
because now your muscles aren't really working.
- Right.
- Actually your muscles are working harder
because you have to come back to that position every time.
So we're working more muscles than just the
the lats.
- So stay here, even, on the return.
- Exactly. Yes.
You have to think about pulling your shoulder back
a little bit
and then keeping your shoulder in place
while you're just working your arms.
Yeah.
How does that feel?
- Great! I love these ones,
- Yeah
- I've always loved those.
- Yeah they're one of my favorites
hmm
Now the same thing with your core
that we just worked on with your leg changes,
you want to think about,
think about stabilizing
your core.
- Yeah so it's not like, loosey-goosey?
- So you're not,
Yeah. So you, so sit back in your hips,
yeah, we don't want that.
You want to think about saying straight up now,
you also don't want to stick your booty out
because that's going to be bad for your back.
So.
(laughing)
- Save that for later.
- Uh huh (laughing)
- So we go here.
- And then release forward.
Exactly.
Yep, that's it.
- Yay!
- Good.
Okay. So for our third exercise,
we're going to do an exercise called side leg lifts
Now these are for the outsides of your hips,
which are also good for hip stability,
not letting your hips drop side to side
when you're in passe.
So we're going to start laying on your side.
You're going to take a band,
and put it in around your knees again.
Not around your knees, above your knees.
You can do without a band too
but Ms Auti is strong enough, she can use the band.
- Am I? (laughing)
Okay.
- So you're going to lay on your side
just in one straight line.
- Step one, learn how to put a band on.
- Okay.
- So hard.
- Yes.
- Perfect.
Okay. So,
most important thing before you even move a thing
your hips
cannot go forward.
You have to keep them not back like that either.
We're stacked right on top of each other.
- Okay.
- Open up your shoulder, I like to use my hand here,
and kind of press down for stability too.
That's kind of helpful.
And then you want to bring your feet
just a little bit in front of you.
- Yeah, Okay.
- Also helps you balance.
So what you're gonna do is she's going to lengthen
through the hip and reach the toe way, yeah.
You're going to keep this position.
And now she's just going to lift the leg up,
just about there, and then back down.
Yeah.
Good. Now keep going up and down,
and what we're working on are these muscles right here
on the outsides of the hips.
And you'll start to feel it.
I'm sure you already feel it.
- Oh my god, yeah, already.
- But what's important is that,
try it like
this.
You don't want this to happen in your hips.
- Mhm
- You want to keep everything nice and long.
So try to think about reaching out,
and then up.
- I love these ones, I don't know why I'm a weirdo
but I like the way that it feels,
cause it just feels like it's really working
- Mhm
- everything.
- You can really feel it, yeah.
- So how does this
how does this translate to like, our actual pirouette?
Like for people who are maybe newer to dance.
- Yeah.
- What would this do for the turn?
- So
what's important when you're in your passe position,
you want your hips to be even,
because that's how you're going to balance.
That's how your body is going to balance most efficiently.
If you're lopsided, it's gonna be.
You're gonna fall over. (laughing)
- Yeah.
- So with this exercise
- Simply put.
- Pretty much.
So if your, if your hips are strong,
the outsides of your hips are strong.
Yeah. You might wanna
do the other side.
- Ignore me.
- If the outsides of your hips are strong,
then your hips aren't going to go side to side,
and you're going to be able to balance longer,
and then theoretically,
turn longer to do more turns
because you can hold that position.
- Oh, this side is like, burning way more.
- Yeah.
Well and
bring this forward
- Okay.
Are my feet in the right position?
- Um, bring them forward a little bit more.
Yeah, there you go.
Okay, now go.
Perfect.
Now,
we don't want your leg to go all the way up.
- Yeah.
Like that's not.
- It's not really,
I mean, you might feel it,
but it's not really working the muscle the best way.
So just think about halfway.
Going up a little bit, and then releasing.
Now you want to control the way down.
Don't just plop down.
- Oh my god, the way down is so much more, like
taxing
- When you think about controlling it?
- Yeah. Yes, I know.
- As opposed to just like going like that.
- Right,
because that way
when you're controlling it,
you're actually working this build,
you're working the opposite leg
and then,
you're gonna be able to control
the landing of your pirouette.
- Ooh, the landing!(laughing)
- Which is also hard,
Cause sometimes we fall out of your pirouettes. Which
- Yeah.
I know, we all do, but we want to think about controlling it
so we can be
as, I don't know
um
- just like gracious on the way down.
- That's a good word. Gracious on the way down,
- Yeah.
- And finding that position is really important.
- I have a lot of dancers that can do like,
three, four pirouettes,
but the come-down is like so intense.
- Yeah.
- As opposed to just kind of like slowly lowering.
- Mhm, exactly.
- Um, kinda interesting to think about.
- And what happens when we start to lose our balance,
is we can start to freak out mid
mid-turn,
and then you want to land as quickly as possible.
- Right.
- Totally get it, I-I do the same thing,
but the more we think about
lifting up and like slowly coming down,
and then you'll be able to control a little bit better,
and go into whatever your next movement is,
we'll be able to get there more efficiently.
So for our last exercise,
we're going to take all of those concepts
we've just learned, and we're going to put it into practice.
So we're going to do, actually,
first we're gonna put on the band.
- ugh
- again.
- Around both knees?
- Around both of your knees, yeah, right above your knees.
You don't want it to be on your knees,
cause we don't want to put any stress on those joints.
- Okay.
- Right above, Yeah.
And then we're going to come into a pirouette prep position.
So
uh huh
arms strong and stable from doing this, those rows. But,
- Yes.
- I want you to take an even bigger step back.
Now, bend your knees, try to hover off the ground.
So we're doing like a back lunge, a full lunge,
not like, just a prep.
- Got it.
- What you're going to do
is come quick up to passe,
and you're gonna hold.
Yeah.
- Ooh, my hands are really slippery.
The band was like, whoosh.
- That might happen.
Don't worry about it too much,
think about just getting your knee up,
cause the quicker you get your knee up to passe.
- Oh my god.
- oh
- That was too quick for the band.
- I guess so.(laughing)
- It's okay, we'll just reset it, right?
- Yeah, you can just reset it.
It might be a little bit annoying,
But if you're wearing just, like, I don't know,
if you're wearing leggings or if you're wearing shorts,
you probably shouldn't have a problem.
- Pro tip, don't wear slippery pants.
That's just a life lesson.
- So, I know
- Okay. Sorry.
- Okay. So, think about your hips.
Hips staying right in line with each other.
Yes.
Deep lunge,
and now
press up into your passe.
Yes.
Now why don't you show it from the side,
so I can talk about
the um
your placement, because that's really important.
- Okay, this way, so I'm doing my right?
- Uh
Yes.
- Okay.
- Okay, so when she steps back into that back lunge,
go ahead and go.
Yeah.
And now shift your weight back.
We don't want that.
And now shift it way way way forward.
You also don't want that,
because now we're sticking out our hips.
So you want to be right in line.
So head, shoulders and hips all in one line,
and then your knee should be right over your ankle,
it's hard to hold this position.
- Yeah!
I'm like trying to smile, but. (laughing)
- Okay. So now from here,
I want you to press through your heels.
So when you come into passe,
you press through this front, this front heel
and you kick off with this back toe,
and then you come up to passe, yes.
So this is practicing how we get
to that passe position quickly,
because you want more turns.
- I don't know why I looked this way,
Should I um,
should I attach it for like, the actual pirouette,
or do you recommend that we kinda float the passe?
- Um Attach.
- Attach?
- I usually like attaching because it's more,
it's closer to the
like a real pirouette.
- Right, you're like actually doing, okay.
- Yeah.
So go ahead and try it again.
Think about a deep lunge, because now when we lunge,
we're strengthening the supporting leg
and lengthening up through the hip flexor.
So it's a little bit of a stretch
and then press your arms down
hold your core and now press up.
- Ugh
- Yeah
- Okay, that attaching made it harder.
- It's hard right?
So even when you're in your passe position
you want your head shoulders, hips, all to be in alignment.
And then
let's um
can you turn around and face the other way for me.
In your, Oh.
(laughing)
So
Hold it.
Like um,
you're in posse.
- Mhm.
- You don't want this.
- Oh, I see.
I see, I see.
Yeah. So we don't have to like open up?
- No, you want the square hips
it's your inner thighs squeeze in together.
- I did switch legs.
My hips like burning.
- You guys should try these out.
It's hard to hold.
- Yeah, so exactly.
So, you're not sitting into your hips,
not sitting like this.
You're not lifting, you're keeping everything still
but then you're squeezing your inner thighs together.
- Yeah, I feel like when I went on the left side
like this is my, I'm looking in the mirror
but my left hip hikes.
- Yes.
- And then I kind of sit into my right.
- Yeah, so what you can think about
is
you said your left hip hikes. Yeah.
- Yeah.
- So, what you can think about is
lifting through your torso.
So that way you create space in your spine,
space in your hips.
It's like lifting all of your organs up.
(laughing)
- Lift them up.
Okay, yeah.
No, it really does make a difference,
as opposed to like being here.
- It's hard to feel it,
because it's more of a energetic cue
and like very internal.
So don't worry too much about finding that specifically.
But if you have trouble finding
that the placement of your hips,
it's something to think about.
- Okay.
I like that way.
- Yay good.
- Yay
All right guys, let's recap.
All of Kendall's exercises.
(Upbeat music)
Okay, so very first exercise leg changes.
You want to do about 10 to 15 of these reps.
Perfect.
(upbeat music)
Okay, so the second exercise are rows for your back.
Yeah, perfect, you might think about
bringing those elbows back
and we're going to do about 10 to 15 of these reps as well.
(upbeat music)
So the next one is side new leg lifts.
Laying on your side and the lifting the leg up and down.
Perfect, make sure this leg stays parallel.
And we're also going to do about 10 to 15 of these too.
- That's the magic number.
- Pretty much all of them.
(laughing)
(upbeat music)
So the last one we're going to do is the back lunge
into the posse with the band.
Perfect.
Deep back lunge
and then quick passe up.
And then we're only going to do about eight to ten of these.
We don't want to overwork,
these muscles here.
- Guys, I'm so thankful for Ms. Kendall
coming on today
and teaching us how to be better turners.
Um, she has her info for you.
Of how to follow her, find her, book her
all the things.
So please tell us.
So you can find me on Instagram, Kendall underscore TDP
or you can email me at Kendall at true dance potential
dot com.
And then I do 30 minutes, 45 minutes, 60 minute privates.
I'm doing virtual privates right now.
So if you're interested in getting some more
individualized training,
definitely message me.
- Yay.
Thank you so much
- Thank you.
- I want to give you a hug but
(laughing)
Maybe next year.
- An elbow. (laughing)
Bye you guys, I'll see you next week.
(upbeat music)