Designing a Fitness Regime

Prinicpal Dancer and Youth Wing Director Vishwakiran Nambi’s third blog in the body conditioning series. Read on…

Once you have identified your body type and its fitness needs,the next step would be to design a suitable regime to suit your needs. Now, every professional dancer will have certain physical requirements which are common for dancers practicing any style. These will be the first things that you will be adding to your regime. Just to give you an idea of what these might be, I will put together a list I feel are absolute fitness necessities for any professional dancer and also the methods they could use to achieve the desired level of fitness.

Strength training Hands, legs, feet, Abdominal, Back-lower, mid and upper, Scapular muscles, Neck, Glueteus, Wrists, fingers and mainly all the joints.
Methods of training– Body weight exercises, Yoga, Partner based resistance exercises and low intensity weight training.
Duration– 90 minutes every alternate day.

Stamina training Muscle endurance, increasing lung capacity, Increasing longevity in dynamic movement.
Method of training– Dance Aerobic fitness, Running, Martial arts training, body weight exercises.
Duration– 60 minutes every alternate day.

Speed training Increasing agility and mobility in limbs, torso and joints.
Method of training– Martial arts training, body weight exercises, Increasing speed of dance routines.
Duration– 30 minutes sessions twice a week.

Flexibility training Increasing static and dynamic flexibility of group of muscles and joints.
Methods of training– Yoga, Body weight exercises, Partner based flexibility stretches, Ballistic extensions of limbs, Martial art training.
Duration– 90 min sessions, twice a week.

Balance Increase balance in body for movement.
Methods of training– Yoga, Understanding of body alignment through movement anatomy sessions, Technique training in the respective style, Martial art training, aerial silk training and Body weight exercises.
Duration– 90 minutes session.twice a week.

These areas collectively should be able to guide you towards becoming a fit professional dancer. Remember, for a professional dancer ‘fitness is not an option’.

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