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New Jersey Dancing Pix
October 29, 2007

After the Dancing. Tony Scheppler, my teacher, and me. Gee, I don't look tired.

Just as on the television dance shows, in a dance competition you never know what is going to happen, what the results will be, until the dancing is done, the scores are added up and the votes are tallied. It can be both exhilarating and disappointing, energizing and exhausting, You never know what may impact on your performance. It's a test of every competitor's mettle, stamina, focus and fortitude. And it can be very

Dancing the Foxtrot.   Photo: Alliance Video Photography

humbling. This weekend's dance competition was all of that for me. I got off to a great start and overall did well. I took mostly first places (8 out of 10, one second, one third) in my single dance competitions and placed second out of 13 competitors for the Closed Championship (2 rounds of four dances each for a composite score). But, I was not done yet. After that, I still had the

Two to Tango. Photo: Alliance Video Photography

Scholarship Competition to dance. 

Each and every round of dancing was very rigorous and the music seemed to play for a longer period of time than usual. Whether it was or not, it sure seemed so to me. My energy level began to diminish more I danced, so that it became more difficult to maintain proper position, timing and technique, while smiling to boot! I think that I also was suffering from some residual affects from my recent business trip to India — jet lag, sleep schedule disrupted, reduced training time and minor digestive upset. By the time, I went out onto the floor for the Scholarship round, I was tired and it showed in my dancing. The final dance was a Quickstep and I practically ran out of gas! And I was very glad when the music stopped. Needless to say, my lack of energy was reflected in my placement — sixth. The judges can tell. 

If anyone ever tells you that dancers are not athletes, and dancing is not real exercise, that person is certainly someone who has never really danced. As for me? Well, it's back to the jogging track and early morning runs to build up my stamina, and it's making sure that I schedule in other workouts to build up my core strength among other things. And back to the studio to work harder on what went wrong as well as to learn new stuff.

Posted by Caroline Kennedy on October 29, 2007 | Comments (1)