Excellent control of balance and stability of the foot and ankle are important in any dancer. Poor balance responses might make your supporting foot wobble and you may discover it tough to support en demi-pointe, or be continuously remedied for rolling arches!
There are many things that can affect your balance, consisting of; your vision; your experience of where your foot and ankle ligaments are (proprioception), and the balance sensing units that in fact sit inside your inner ear. It is very important to train the stability of the ankle while getting rid of a couple of the feedback systems that we utilize to establish all parts of the total system. Lots of dancers rely far excessive on their vision to keep their balance, and this ends up being an issue when carrying out or turning in low light circumstances.
Test yourself and the strength of each system by attempting each of the following workouts. Attempt standing on a single leg in parallel or turnout, with each of the following variations:
Closing your eyes.
Basing on a pillow, or soft foam mat.
Attempt turning your head from side to side.
Tilting the head from side to side.
Attempt a fondu/small knee bend on each leg.
Attempt all of the above in bare feet and then in your pointe shoes and feel the distinction if you are currently in pointe shoes!
All of these are terrific tests and training concepts for enhancing your control of your ankles. Keep in mind to constantly turn on your deep turnout muscles and core supporting muscles when stabilizing in turnout, so that your hips do not twist excessive!
Establishing control of the little ‘intrinsic muscles of the feet are important to establishing excellent balance. Lots of perfect workouts for this are described in The Perfect Pointe Book, a resource established specifically for dancers to get maximum control of their ankles and feet. It is an important part of any dance training whether the dancer is en pointe.
Excellent control of balance and stability of the foot and ankle are necessary in any dancer. There are so numerous things that can affect your balance, consisting of; your vision; your experience of where your foot and ankle ligaments are (proprioception), and the balance sensing units that really sit inside your inner ear. Establishing control of the little ‘intrinsic muscles of the feet are vital to establishing excellent balance.