Static stretching before an activity decreases
strength and power. Photo by Erin Baiano.
Health practitioners who work with dancers are a
dedicated tribe. They love the art and its performers, hoping for long careers,
less injury, and years of pain-free dancing. Yet frustrations mount when they
see easily preventable problems in their patients day after day. Sometimes it’s
not rocket science but a small change, like how you walk, what you do outside
of class, or a hand placement at the barre, that can make a huge difference.
Larger mistakes take more consideration and may need reeducation about how our
bodies really work.
Dance Magazine
spoke with three leaders in dance science to get their gripes out in the open,
which could possibly lead to healthier choices. So, listen up: The experts know
their turf.
Know Your Stretching
“I wish dancers wouldn’t stretch the way they do,” sighs Jennifer Gamboa,
president of Body Dynamics, Inc., in Arlington ,
Virginia . “They love to plop down
before class and stretch out, using static instead of dynamic stretching.”
Here’s the problem: According to recent studies, static stretching before an
activity decreases strength and power. A static (or passive) stretch is one
where you assume a position and hold it with some other part of your body, or
with the assistance of a partner or some other apparatus, such as hoisting a
leg onto the barre and just hanging out there. “If you stretch a chain-link
fence, it becomes deformed. The same thing happens to the muscle fibers,” says
Gamboa, who works with Washington
Ballet’s dancers. “The brain has to adapt to that change, so the muscles are
not as strong and less able to produce speed. Plus, you have less agility.
Static stretching before classes decreases strength, speed, agility, and useful
range of motion.” The worst part is that she sees static stretching at the wrong
time in a dancer’s daily schedule. “I find dancers doing static stretching
between the barre and center work, and again before rehearsal, where often
speed, power, and agility may be in demand.”
It’s not that static stretching is bad in and of itself, but it puts you at
risk. “You are more likely to land incorrectly, and are more susceptible to
injury,” she adds.
Gamboa prefers dynamic stretching, which involves movement that is of low
intensity and uses a broad range of motion. Leg brushes, arm circles, trunk
rotations, lunges across the floor, and other large movements constitute
dynamic stretching. “Even walking or biking to class is an ideal way to get the
blood moving and raise the body’s temperature. Simply put, the body needs
movement to get ready to dance.”
You don’t have to stop having those long, luxurious stretch experiences.
“Static stretching should be done at the end of class, the end of rehearsal,
and the end of the day,” Gamboa says.
Walk Like Normal People
Marika Molnar, president and founder of Westside Dance Physical Therapy, hopes
that some day dancers might quit walking like ducks. “Walking with the hips and
the feet turned out on a daily basis creates too much stress, especially on the
feet and ankles,” says Molnar, who works with New York City Ballet dancers. “You end up
rolling medially over your arch and putting stress on your posterior tibial and
flexor hallucis tendon. You also put too much stress on the medial knee, which
can affect the stability of the patella. Dancers immediately try to hit
180-degree turnout before they prepare properly.”
Turning out in class is one thing, but turning out 24/7 quite another. “The
gait pattern is a bad habit, a sort of identity,” she says. “The 180-degree
first position happens because that’s what they were taught early on. We need
to bring awareness to the importance of walking correctly. Dancers should get
to class earlier and warm up their bodies before assuming the strict ballet
position. Teaching good walking skills nurtures the spine, hips, and feet.”
Another major pet peeve for Molnar is when dancers hold on to the barre with
the hand directly to the side instead of slightly forward. The position can
wreak havoc in your alignment. If your hand is not in your peripheral vision,
chances are it’s too far back. “When the hand is back on the barre it may cause
the elbow to be behind the body, which then destabilizes the scapulothoracic
area of the back [the shoulder blade wings off the rib cage],” says Molnar.
“This is a very unstable position for the arms, and can be the cause of
shoulder subluxations.”
Turnout, Bones, & the Gym
Bridget Quinn, MD, has a long list of things she wishes she could change in a
dancer’s perception of health. Pushing turnout tops the list. “Forcing turnout
is the source of lordosis, increased strain on the sacroiliac joint, and torque
on the kneecap—which can lead to patella and anterior knee pain,” says Quinn,
who works with Boston Ballet’s dancers. “It affects the whole kinetic chain.”
Quinn finds that the common habit of planting and screwing the feet in fifth
position is often the culprit in forcing turnout. “Then dancers tend to pronate
the foot, which can lead to flexor hallucis longus (FHL) trouble, the Achilles
of dancer’s foot,” she adds.
There are safe ways for dancers to improve their turnout. First they need to
remember that turnout starts at the hip. “You can build deep external rotation
strength,” says Quinn, “and improve the flexibility of the iliofemoral
ligaments.” She suggests the classic clamshell exercise to improve the hip’s
external rotators. Lie on your side with your knees bent. Without moving your
hip back and forth, open and close the top leg. You can increase the tension by
using a Thera-Band as resistance.
Quinn would like to dispel the myth that all great ballet dancers had perfect
turnout. Many did not have 180-degree turnout, and went on to highly successful
careers. “They danced,” Quinn says, “and we never noticed their turnout.”
Another trouble spot is the belief that you can get all you need within
technique class. “Dance is an art form, not a whole-body conditioning regime,”
says Quinn. “There are still too many dancers who do not do any cross-training.
Class alone leads to imbalances and weaknesses, and there are not enough aerobic
challenges.”
Bottom line, the rate of injury for dancers is too high. The quality of
teaching continues to improve and dancers are becoming more informed on injury
prevention. Yet the technical legacy comes with some immovable issues. What
dancers need to change is in their control. Listen to the experts. They speak
from love and experience for the form and its practitioners.
Nancy Wozny has
made most of these mistakes. Now, all her mistakes happen on the page and are
made in Texas ,
where she lives and writes about art and health.
