Pole Dance Challenge Week 7

Last week I danced to The Pretty Reckless – My Medicine which is a great song to pole too, I really enjoyed it. I also remembered to include a lot more stuff this time so I think it was a little less repetitive.

I have decided that from now on I will start slowly including tricks into my freestyle dances. Only one or two at first but gradually building up over time. After all the whole point of this challenge is to improve fluidity and flow of the whole thing. I think my dance now is much improved from where it was seven weeks ago so we’ll see how things go when I start including some tricks!

Pole Dance Challenge Week 6

Last week I danced to ZZ Top – Legs which was suggested by a friend. I threw in a few tricks this time as the friend that suggested the song is not a pole person so I wanted to show that I do tricks as well as dance should I decide to share the video. I ended up having a complete mind block though when dancing and ended up reverting back to boring and repetitive like I was doing for the first few weeks of the challenge, although it is all flowing a lot better now than it was back then (so the challenge is working). Watching the video back it isn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be. Technically there were only minor things wrong with it, it was just a bit boring! On the way home I kept remembering all the things I had been planning to put in but forgot. Like hip circles and bodywaves. Yes, really. How did I manage to forget that!

Pole Dance Challenge Week 5

I can’t believe it’s been five weeks since I started this challenge (well technically tonight it’s six weeks since I’m always late posting…), it’s gone by so quickly!

Last week I danced to Christina Aguilera – Not Myself Tonight. Normally I decide in advance what I’m going to dance to but this time I didn’t and I think that was a mistake. I love Christina but I wasn’t really feeling the song for some reason. I chose it in a hurry and I think that reflected in my dancing which I felt wasn’t as good as the previous two weeks. I have tonights song chosen so hopefully I’ll get back to feeling like I am progressing.

Pole Dance Challenge Week 4 (plus corde lisse and gymnastics)

Last week I chose a different style of music for my freestyle dance as suggested by one of my students. I danced to Nero – Guilt. I enjoyed it as it was nice for a bit of a change. I’ll probably go back to rock tonight though! I feel that my freestyles are slowly becoming less repetitive and I am actually starting to enjoy doing them now so that’s good. I might even start posting the videos soon!

Last night was the last Corde Lisse class for a few weeks. It was a good class working on back balance (which I still can’t do), budda and catchers into key of stomach neatly. Since there is no gymnastics for a few weeks I took the opportunity to use the space and crash mats to do a bit of handstand and cartwheel practice. We had a little gymnastics club going on in the corner of the space at the end of the corde lisse class which caused some amusement. I was quite pleased with my handstands and cartwheels, they do seem to be improving steadily so that’s good.

Pole Dance Challenge Week 3 (plus other updates)

Last week I danced to Garbage – Only Happy When It Rains. I really enjoyed dancing to that song, it was a bit faster than the previous two weeks’ songs which made for a bit of a change. I still struggled with repetitiveness though but think I am improving a bit. I have no idea what I want to dance to tonight will have to see what takes my fancy at the time!

I have carried on with the gymnastics classes on Saturdays and I’m really enjoying it. It’s quite challenging but already I can see some improvements in my handstands, cartwheels and flexibility. They are away at competitions for the next three weeks though so no classes. I have exercises to do so must try and keep them up.

There is a South West Pole Showcase coming up in April and several of my students are interested in taking part so from tonight we will be looking at coming up with a routine and putting a little show together which is exciting.

Pole Dance Challenge – Week 2

Bit late with this post again! Last week was week two of my pole dance challenge and I think there was a small improvement on the first week so things are moving in the right direction!

I danced to Staind – Outside which comes in at just under 5 minutes so I was quite pleased with myself for dancing to the whole thing. It did get a bit repetitive but not as much as last week, although I did cheat slightly and put a shoulder mount in there! I’m not sure how I’m going to manage to make this weeks dance less repetitive. I haven’t watched any pole videos this week to get ideas from as I’ve had lots of other stuff going on. Oh well, we’ll see how things go later.

Pole Challenge Week 1 (plus other updates)

This week has gone by fast!
Well I started my pole challenge after class last Tuesday. I was worried that I wasn’t going to be able to do it as I had forgotten to charge my mp3 player and camera and both were flashing low but luckily they both held on! I danced to Avenged Sevenfold – Gunslinger. Watching the video back I wasn’t as horrified with it as I thought I would be! I started off ok although I did start running out of ideas pretty quickly. I have been watching videos this week for ideas so hopefully tonight it will be a little less repetitive (although I’m bound to have a mind blank as soon as I start). I’m not posting the video. I’m thinking I’ll make a montage in a few weeks time when there will hopefully be some improvement to show!

I will post a video of the opening dance at Miss Pole Dance Australia though. This video is my new inspiration. If I can get to be even half as good as these ladies then I’ll be super happy!



In other news corde lisse has been going quite well. We have been working on pickups and meathooks which I really like and they have been improving nicely. Last night I had a little play on the aerial hoop as well which I enjoyed (much to my surprise – I hated trapeze). Tempted to go to a one off hoop class at some point.

On Saturday I did a gymnastics class. The gym where I teach pole has a competitive gymnastics squad and I was allowed to join their training session. It was great fun and I think it will really help my pole as I plan on going every week. I was working on handstands, cartwheels and straddle levers. My legs ached loads on Sunday! Looking forward to next week.

Pole Dance Challenge

I have decided to set myself a pole dance challenge. I want to improve my flow and make my pole dance more fluid and graceful which is something I feel I lack at the moment. It takes me so long to master new tricks I just seem to spend all my time doing that and the overall art of it all suffers as a result, so I have decided that I need to do something about it.

I am going to do regular freestyle dances and video them and post the videos here (possibly. I might chicken out of that last bit to start with!). Hopefully if I manage to keep it up regularly I should start to see some improvement. I’m going to start simple, with mainly dance and floor work elements and then as I get more comfortable with it I’ll start adding in more tricks, although it’s not about seeing how many tricks I can jam in, it’s about making sure that what I do put in fits and flows and is well executed. Hopefully this will also help improve my stamina as well because at the moment the only time I dance to a full song is when I’m in training for a competition.

Of course I’ll still be learning new tricks as well and I’ll keep up the occasional posts on how that’s getting on (I’m currently working on improving my split grip Ayesha / Straight Edge and the Holly Drop).

I’d be happy to receive song suggestions if anyone wants to send me any. I mostly like rock / metal but open to most music really.

Also if anyone has any comments / suggestions / constructive criticisms on the videos feel free to send me those as well. Oh, and if you think I’m not sticking to the plan feel free to give me a kick up the backside and tell me to get on with it!

I'm planning on doing the first video after class tomorrow so hopefully I'll be posting it sometime on Wednesday.

Looking back at 2011 and goals for 2012

2011 started off badly, I was going through some tough times personally and it affected my pole. I managed to lose pretty much all of the progress I had made at the end of 2010 when training for Pole Divas which was disappointing. Things started picking up though and by the start of the summer I felt I was beginning to progress again. I was tempted to enter the UKPPC but decided I wasn’t ready and so just entered the Bristol Pole Championships (BPC) instead which gave me more time to train and prepare. Leading up to the BPC I was considering pulling out on several occasions but I’m glad I went ahead with it as having the competition to focus on really helped my pole training and I feel I started to make more significant progress. I was not that happy with my performance on the day, I messed it up in a few places and it should have been neater but I’m I did it and I will probably do it again this year! Since the competition I have managed to keep my momentum going and have still been improving. Most notably by getting my Ayesha and straight edge which I have been working on. They are still not 100% but I’m getting them most of the time now so I think it won’t be long until they are reliable. I managed to get in a bit of practice over the Christmas and new year break. Normally I end up doing nothing for two weeks but I only went one week with no activity this time. I’m hoping I can keep up the progress into 2012.

My pole goals for 2012 are –
Get my Ayesha / straight edge completely reliable and neat
Be able to lift my shoulder mount
Get more new moves (I’ve been doing quite well with this lately so hopefully that will continue)
Make everything neater, remember to point toes etc.
Do more routines to help with flow, grace and stamina
Do more work on moves that I tend to avoid (mostly layback related stuff)

I think they are all pretty obtainable!

UKPPC Final

Sunday 11th December was the final of the UK Professional Pole Championships held in Birmingham. We were there to support Robyn of 360 Pole Dancing in Bristol who was competing in the Professional Level having successfully made it through the video heat and the live semi final back in October.

There were so many performances that I was looking forward to seeing over the three categories and I was not disappointed.

First up were the instructors. These are people who teach pole but do not perform. There were lots of great performances but the two stand out ones for me were Emily Smith and Nicole McIntyre. Sadly Emily didn’t place but Nicole was awarded runner up. The category was won by Kristina Walker. You can watch her winning performance here –



Next up was the Professional category. These are people who teach and perform. This was my favourite category which I think on the whole featured the best performances of the event. Robyn put in a good performance but unfortunately didn’t place. Lauren Red was the runner up and Bendy Kate was the winner. Also from this category Sarah Scott was given the Sponsors choice award. You can Bendy Kate’s winning performance here –



Lastly was the Elite category. The competitors in this category are all winners or runners up in a national professional competition and are competing by invitation only with no video heat or semi-final. Again all of the performances were brilliant. Karen Chaundy was the runner up and Annie Norris won. You can watch Annie’s winning performance here –



As well as the competitors we also got guest performances by Tess Taylor and Jess Leanne Norris. Both of which were very entertaining. I had been looking forward to seeing Tess perform as I really like her style.

So it was a very enjoyable event. They are planning on running it annually so I am very much looking forward to next year’s event!

The Bristol Pole Championships 2011

Well, last weekend was the Bristol Pole Championships which I competed in. I have been training hard for the competition and it has been quite a journey to get there. I have suffered from terrible nerves weeks before hand and on several occasions came really close to pulling out but hung on in there thanks to the encouragement of my friends and pole students and in the end I’m really glad that I did go ahead and compete.

As I said I was training hard , making sure I practiced my combos every time I was on a pole and then as the competition got closer running through the full routine a lot. It was the routine run throughs that really kicked off my nerves. The combos that I was managing to do perfectly every time on their own were all going wrong when put into the routine! I think I actually only managed two successful run-throughs the whole time. The three days before the competition I was struck down with a nasty cold type bug. Luckily it was short lived and by the day of the competition I was feeling a lot better and was no longer relying on lemsip capsules!

On the day itself I was really nervous. There was a problem in my category with the pole being slippery and some of the competitors that were on earlier than me had problems and had to go on again and re-do their routines which wasn’t helping the nerves at all. Eventually it was my turn and luckily the pole was pretty grippy. I didn’t make any major mistakes and was reasonably pleased with how it turned out. Watching my video back I have decided that I really need to work on pointing my toes and that I need to hold the positions for longer. I held my hip hold for what seemed like ages at the time but watching it back that’s actually the only one that I held for the right amount of time so I will be working on those things for future routines.

You can see my performance here –


Robyn from 360 Pole Dancing was defending her title in the competition as she was last year’s winner and I’m pleased to say that she was successful. You can watch her winning performance here –


Before the competition I had said that I was never going to enter another one again but now I’m not so sure! I’ll see how I feel next year!

Pole Competition Training

The Bristol Pole Championships are just over two weeks away. I am competing in the advanced category and I’m already terrified! I feel really underprepared as I only wrote my routine at the beginning of the week (although I chose my music and had a good idea of what combo’s etc I wanted to include weeks ago and have been working on them for some time). I can do all of the sections (except for the spinny pole bit, but more on that shortly) when I do them on their own but as soon as I start putting it all together to the music I just seem to lose it completely and end up messing it all up! I couldn’t even manage to shoulder mount on Tuesday when I attempted a run through and my shoulder mount is pretty strong as it’s something I’ve been working on a lot.

The competition has two poles, a static and a spinny. Competitors have to use both poles in their routine for a minimum of 30 seconds. I will be doing the bare minimum of 30 seconds on spinny as I hate it! I really struggle with it. I suppose it’s because I’ve done very little spinny work. I had one hour long lesson as part of a workshop day with Jamilla a couple of years ago and have played around on it on occasions at pole jams or on my own but nothing serious so it just feels so different (and so much harder!).

So lot’s of work going into practicing my routine over the next 2 weeks. Hopefully I’ll be able to pull it together in time! I feel much more nervous this time around than I did when I entered Pole Divas last year. I think that is partly because I know what to expect this time. It’s silly but I enjoy all aspects of competitions except for the actual competing bit! I love the focus it gives me, when training for a competition my poling generally improves so much faster than if I don’t have anything to work towards. I like picking out music and writing the routine and I even quite like deciding on the outfit (although I find that quite difficult).

I know quite a few other people that are entering. They are mainly in the other categories. Robyn is in the same category as me defending her title from last year. Daniel who won the intermediate category last year (who I have never met but have seen perform a few times) is in the advanced category this year. I don’t know who else is in the same category as me but I think it is full so there will be ten competitors in total.

I’m likely to give up competing after this as I don’t think I can stand the nerves again! We’ll see if there’s another post like this one in a years’ time!

UK Professional Pole Championships

Yesterday I went up to Birmingham to watch the semi final of the UKPPC and to support Robyn of 360 Pole Dancing in Bristol who was competing in the Professional Level.

The journey up was nice and easy and we found parking and the venue easily. We got into the venue and had really good front row seats.

First up was the instructor category. The standard was really good and I enjoyed all of the performances. My favourite was definitely that of Emily from Emily’s Pole Fitness in Swindon. She did a fabulous Saw themed routine which you can see here –



After a short break it was the turn of the Professional Competitors. Again the standard was really high and there were some fantastic performances. You can see Robyn’s routine here –



In addition to the competitors we also got to see two guest performances which were doubles acts. Bex and Emy with their Tomb Raider themed routine and Dan and Steve with a vampire themed routine. I never used to be a fan of doubles but I do quite like it now (although I still much prefer singles).

Six competitors from each category were selected to go through to the final which takes place in the same venue on 11th December. I’m pleased that both Robyn and Emily made it through to the final which I am very much looking forward too. For the final there will be the Instructor and Professional categories along with the Elite category which consists of previous winners of national competitions.

Pole progress

It’s been a whole month since I last posted! Oops! I’ve been quite busy with my poling and feel that I am making progress (albeit a little slowly). My aysha is coming along. It still needs a lot of work but I’m getting it more regularly now and I know where I’m getting it wrong when it doesn’t work out right so that’s good. My genie is there now, I just need to remember to point my toes! The shoulder mount lift is coming along slowly. Sometimes I can manage to lift it all the way up from sitting but mostly I’m getting part of the way up. I had a practice session on my own at the studio on Friday night and was pleased with that. I videoed it all which was helpful as I can look at the footage and see how the moves are looking and spot what I’m doing wrong.

I went to a mini pole jam / practive at 360 pole dancing in Bristol on bank holiday Monday which was fun. There was a Chinese pole up as well as the normal poles which was good, especially as it was a 3 meter one. I haven’t had a chance to go on a decent height Chinese pole for ages.

Corde lisse is going well. I couldn’t go on Monday night as I was ill which was annoying but hopefully will be back to normal by Monday. I hate missing classes.

I have finished bootcamp for a while now as I am going into full pole competition training mode. As my Friday night practice worked out so well last week I plan on making it a regular fixture for a while so Wednesday has become my rest day.

My pole classes are hopefully picking up a bit now that August is over. I’ve had quite a lot of new enquiries over the past week or so, so with any luck the classes will get a bit busier.

Lots of activity!

Well last week was a busy one. I was back at Corde Lisse on Monday after 5 weeks off and so found it quite tough going. It’s good to be back though and it was nice to see everyone. Looking forward to tonight’s class although I don’t have much energy at the moment!

My pole classes on Tuesday were quite, August has officially kicked in! As I only had one person in the later class I managed to get a little bit of practice in which was good. Also now that I am using semi-permanent poles I don’t mind so much when I have less people than expected as I haven’t lugged heavy x-poles up the stairs and put them up for no reason!

Bootcamp as usual on Wednesday. It’s going pretty well, I can definitely feel that my overall fitness has improved.

Went to pole class on Thursday as normal. I was quite worn out by this point so was quite glad that it was heels week and we spent a lot of the lesson working on a spinning sequence. I did have a go at shoulder mount from sitting and nearly managed to get all the way up, I will have this soon, it’s so close. I also managed a few ok-ish ayshas. The longest I held one was about four seconds so not too bad.

On Sunday I had a “garden” pole party for my birthday (which isn’t quite yet but this weekend was a good date to hold it). In typical British summer fashion it was pouring down with rain all day so the planned pole stage in the garden and the BBQ didn’t happen but I did manage to fit two poles up in my lounge by pushing all of the furniture out of the way. One of the pole was an x-pole and the other was a Chinese pole made by putting rubber tubing onto an x-pole and it worked nicely and went down really well with everyone.

General update

Well as you can see the blogging more often has been a failure so far! In fact July has pretty much been a failure and I’m glad to see the back of it! A lot has been going on in the past month which has left me lacking in motivation and energy but now I hope I’m back to some kind of normality and ready to go again.

My pole classes remain busy. They are no longer full but still have a healthy attendance so that’s good. It always goes quiet over the summer anyway so I expect it to get busier again in September. I’ve been working on re-designing my website and hope to have the new version up and running sometime this month. One of my students is due to do her PDC level 3 grading this month, she works really hard and has achieved a lot.

I covered a pole party for Robyn at 360 pole dancing in Bristol on Saturday. I haven’t taught a party for ages so it was quite good to get back into that.

My personal pole practice has been ticking along slowly. My no handed genie has improved (although is still in need of a lot of polishing and practice!) and I feel that I am slowly making progress with my aysha again, I think I will have it back before too long.

It’s my birthday this month so next weekend I am holding a garden mini pole jam at my house. The idea started as some of my students said they wanted to have a go on a stage pole and a Chinese pole so I said I would do something in the summer so that they could. I am planning on building an outdoor Chinese pole but haven’t had time as yet but hopefully I’ll be able to buy the rubber this week and get an x-pole up to use as a Chinese pole.

I am considering entering the UK Professional Pole Championships. This is a new national competition for instructors with three different levels of which I would be entering the lowest level – Instructor (the other two being Professional and Elite). The first round is by video submission for which the closing date is 31st August. I’m not sure if I’m going to be ready by then. I have picked a song and have part of the routine worked out but all of my moves require polishing and I need to be able to pull off that aysha convincingly. I’ll see how things go!

I haven’t been to corde lisse all month as I was late trying to book onto the last block and it sold out before I could book my place. The new block starts tonight though and I am signed up to it so looking forward to getting back to that. Hopefully I won’t have lost too much strength.

I’ve still been going to bootcamp every week. That’s going well, I can see improvement.

Activities Update

I must start updating this blog more regularly! I have decided to enter another pole competition this year so the training starts now and I will use the blog as a way to keep track of my progress.

My pole classes are going well. The second class is now full and has a waiting list for the first time ever and the first class is on its way to filling up as well. I have been considering putting on another class on a different day but not sure if I will be able to fit one in so still thinking about that.

My personal pole practice has been going ok. Been going to class every Thursday as usual. I have just about managed to get my no handed genie. I just have to tidy it up now. Still working on lifting my shouldermount and starting to go back and look at the aysha again. I have decided that I need to do a lot more conditioning as this will help with everything and I want my nice strong, tidy air invert back as it’s currently looking somewhat lacklustre!

Corde lisse is going ok. I have only been able to attend about once a fortnight for the past few weeks but I think I should now be back to being able to go every week. We have been looking at a sequence of moves, last night we were focusing on the figurehead which I think is one of my favourite moves to do on the rope.

I have still been going to bootcamp every week. Have been getting on well with that and can see improvement in my overall fitness so that’s good.

I haven’t been to parkour for a while which is a shame as I really enjoyed it but I can’t do everything and that was the thing that had to give for now. I’m planning on going back at some point though as it is great fun and hard work.

Update

I’ve been feeling ill for the past week so not really done a lot. Hoping to get back into it this week though starting with the return of Corde Lisse tonight. Circomedia aren’t running the Monday eve class in St Pauls at the moment due to availability issues and I (and most of the rest of the class) were unable to attend the alternative Thursday eve class in Kingswood that they put on so the instructor has started up his own classes on a Monday evening at The Island. I’ve never been to the island for a class before so will be interested to see it. I’ve seen in in photos and videos from my friends silks class and it looks like a nice space. Not as nice as the church in St Pauls but a lot nicer than The Albany so will soon see!

Pole wise I felt I was getting my mojo back a bit after a bad start to the year (I’m hoping the week off that I’ve had hasn’t put me back again). Robyn at 360 Pole in Bristol had a birthday pole jam a couple of weekends ago which was good fun. I like a good jam, it’s nice to catch up with people that you don’t see very often and see what everyone else is working on.

My classes are still going well, it was a quite one last week but I was actually quite glad as I was feeling ill and felt like I was going to fall off the pole every time I touched it! Hopefully that has gone now as I am expecting this week to be back to normal attendance.

I have been given the go ahead by my venue to buy some semi-permanent poles so I hope to get those ordered this week and fitted soon. They will really speed up my set up and packing away times plus I won’t have to lug three heavy x-poles around with me which I am looking forward to.

So hopefully fully back into the swing of things this week.

UK Pole Dance Day

May 1st was UK Pole Dance day. This is an annual event done by the performers society, Equity. The idea of the day is to promote pole and get people involved. I wasn’t going to do anything but decided (somewhat last minute, just three weeks before) to hold a free taster session. The session went quite well. Three of my regular students came along to help out and have a play on the poles. I also had four people that had never tried pole before. Two ladies and two men who one of my regular students had brought along. Everyone seemed to enjoy it, I know I certainly did.

The day that before a couple of friends had been round my house for an afternoon of pole. We all worked quite hard and did quite well. It was fun and something I hope to do more often. I have a scaffold pole ready to make a Chinese pole for the garden so I’m hoping for a good summer so we can make use of that.

Pole on Thursday went well. I was pleased because I got the genie pose with one hand. I hadn’t attempted the genie at all for at least a year (at which time I couldn’t do it at all) so I was pleased that I got the one handed version. I will now be working towards no hands which hopefully won’t take too long (I did manage it for about a second on Saturday during the pole session at home). I’m glad I got a new move, it’s made me feel better about pole again as I had been back in a bit of a rut after a horrible start to the year followed by my shoulder injury that stopped me doing a lot of training.

My classes are still going well. The 8:15pm class is full and I have been getting new enquiries so hopefully I can get a few more people to join the earlier class as well soon.

I haven’t been to parkour since as my Friday nights have been busy but going back this week. There is a pole jam in Bristol on Sunday to look forward to as well. No Corde lisse at the moment though as the church that the classes are held in is in use for other tings for a while so the classes have been moved elsewhere and to Thursdays which is no good for me. I have put my name down for a master class with Jukka Juntti though so hopefully that will go ahead.

Pole, Bootcamp and Parkour!

Well it’s been a while since I posted. Most of the month has been pretty quiet. I’ve been teaching my pole class on Tuesdays as normal but apart from that I wasn’t really doing much (resting my shoulder) until last week when I jumped straight back into action!

Monday was my night off as I am not doing the current Corde Lisse block (again due to wanting to rest my injured shoulder) but the rest of the week was all go.

Tuesday I taught my pole classes. The 7:15pm was quite quiet but my ladies are progressing nicely. The 8:15pm class in currently full so that was a busy one. My three new people seemed to enjoy it so hopefully they will be back again this week. All of my regulars are doing well and mostly manage to get a new trick each week.

Wednesday I did a bootcamp session with Bootcamp Somerset. I’ve know Matt for a long time as our Mum’s were best friends. He set up his own personal training business last year and it seems to be going well for him. The bootcamp was hard work but quite fun. There was quite a lot of cardio exercise which was the main reason I wanted try is as although I do quite a lot of strength work I do nothing in the way of cardio so that’s an area that I need to work on. Hopefully I’ll be able to make the bootcamp sessions a regular thing.

Thursday I went to pole class. I was aching from bootcamp the day before so was a little feeble in my attempts! I was mostly working on shoulder mount lifts, which has gone downhill a lot due to lack of practice but as long as I keep up the practice it should start to improve again. I was also attempting back hook to invert which was always really hit and miss but is now very much miss! I think the last time I tried it was back in September so no surprise there. It’s something I would like to be able to do well so have to remember to practice it regularly. I haven’t made any attempt at an Aysha for at least six weeks. This is entirely down to my shoulder injury as attempting it was causing me pain so I thought it best not to push it. My shoulder is feeling a lot better now though so I am hopeful that I will be able to start working on this again soon.

Friday I went a long to a Parkour class that has just started up at the Gym where I teach my pole class. The class was for ages 15 – 35 and I was worried that I would be the only adult in a class of 15 and 16 year olds but went along anyway as it’s something that I have wanted to try for ages. My worries turned out to be well founded, there were only four other people in the class all of whom were teenage boys. I did really enjoy the class though but found it quite hard. I’m a bit of a wimp so some of the stuff we were doing was a bit scary such as somersaults off a spring board (mine were more like forward rolls but I did improve a bit as the session went on). I had a couple of issues about the way things were run but as it was only their second week teaching I am hoping that they will sort that out once they are more settled in to teaching. It was a great workout, I ached like mad all weekend and can still feel it in my quads now. I’m hoping I’ll ache a little less next time!