How to improve your flexibility for dancers

10 Top Stretches and Exercises to Improve Dance Flexibility

by Stelle World on Jul 16, 2020 0 comments

Flexibility is an important part of dance. Dance flexibility can take up to 6 months or a year of constant discipline depending on the age of the dancer. It can be frustrating for dancers who expect to see results right away. 

Here are a few stretches and exercises to improve dance flexibility for young dancers. 

1. Standing Hamstring Stretch

This stretch is great for the neck, back, glutes, hamstrings, and calf muscles. Start off standing tall with your feet hip-width apart. Bend your knees slightly and rest your arms by your side. 

Exhale as you bend forward from the hips and lower your head to the floor. Try to keep your head, shoulders and neck relaxed as you do this stretch.

Wrap your arms around the back of your legs and hold. Experts suggest that you hold a stretch for 10 seconds to 3 minutes. If you go into a stretch and feel as if you immediately want to release it is a sign that you need to spend more time stretching this area as part of your dancer workout plan. 

When you are done holding your stretch bend at the knees and roll your way back up to a standing position. 

2. Piriformis Stretch

The piriformis muscle is located outside the butt. It is a deep internal hip rotator. Your deep internal rotators produce a lot of movement at your hips and stretching these muscles should be apart of your daily ballet workout. 

Sit on the floor with both legs extended out in front of you. Cross your left leg over your right and place your left foot flat on the floor beside you. Then place your left hand on the floor behind your body. 

Put your right hand on your quad or bring your elbow to your knee and press your left leg to the right. You should feel a twist in your body when you are performing the stretch correctly. 

3. Lunge With Spinal Twist

This stretch helps open up your hips and improves mid-back mobility, which is a necessary part of ballet turns.  

Start with your feet together and take a big step forward with your left foot. Now your feet should be in a staggered stance. Bend your left knee as if you are lunging. Keep your right leg straight behind you. 

Your toes should point downward to the ground. You will feel a stretch in your right thigh. Now place your right hand on the floor beside you and twist your upper body to the left. Reach your left arm up toward the ceiling and stretch as if you are trying to touch the ceiling. 

Hold the stretch and then repeat on the other side. 

4. Tricep Stretch

An area of deep stretching often overlooked by dancers is the arms. Most dancers focus on the legs but you will also need arm flexibility to complete many ballet positions. 

For a tricep stretch stand tall with your feet hip-width apart. Extend your arms up over your head. Bend your right elbow and reach your hand behind your head to touch the top middle of your back. 

You can gently pull your elbow toward your head yo get a deeper stretch. You should feel the stretch in your neck, shoulders, back, and triceps. When you are done holding the stretch repeat on the other side. 

5. 90/90 Stretch

This is another great stretch for dancers because it hits both hips at the same time. Sit with your right knee bent at a 90-degree angle out in front of your body. Keep your foot flexed and your sole should be facing the left.

Let your leg rest flat on the floor as you place your left knee to the left of your body. Bend the knee so that the foot faces behind you. Be sure to keep this foot flexed too. 

Try your best to keep your right glute on the floor and move the left glute as close to the floor as possible. This may not be possible if you have been dancing a lot and are super tight in your glutes or hips. 

Hold the stretch and repeat on the other side. 

6. Frog Stretch

Another one of our dance tips for flexibility is to not sit crossed legged. Crossing your legs can lead to tight hips. Here is a stretch you can do if you do happen to sit cross-legged a lot. 

Get down on all fours and slide your knees wider than shoulder-width apart behind you. Turn your toes out and rest the edge of your inner thigh on the floor. Shift your hips back toward your heels and keep your feet flat on the floor. 

If you can move from your hands to your forearms for a deeper stretch.

7. Butterfly Stretch

This simple stretch helps the hips, glutes, back, and thighs. Sit on the floor with your back tall and your soles together. Bend your knees out to the side. 

Hold your ankles or your feet, engage your abs, and slowly lower your upper body toward your feet as low as you can go while at the same time pressing your knees down into the floor. 

8. Shoulder Squeeze

This stretch relieves poor posture and releases tension in the back. Sit on the floor with your knees bent and feet flat. Clasp your hands together behind your lower back and straighten and extend your arms.  

Squeeze your shoulder blades together for a few seconds and then release. Repeat this stretch for 5 to 10 times. 

9. Side Bend

This easy stretch keeps the groin, and hips inner thighs flexible. Kneel on the floor with your legs together. Keep your back straight and your core engaged. Extend your left leg out beside you.

The reach your right arm up and rest your left arm on your left leg. Gently bend at the torso and right arm to the left side of your body. Try to keep your hips facing forward as you hold the stretch. Then repeat on the other side. 

10. Neck Stretch 

Most dancers forget to stretch their necks. A good neck stretch can positively impact the rest of your body. 

Drop your right ear down to your right shoulder. Press down on your head to deepen the stretch and hold. When you are done, complete the stretch on the other side. 

Keep Working on Your Dance Flexibility

No one has ever become flexible overnight. To improve your dancer flexibility, stretching should be apart of your daily routine. Just keep at it and you’ll start to see a noticeable difference. 

Stelle is a dance label created by a mother of three girls who love to dance. Our blog is full of great content like this article on how to help your budding ballerina do a proper plie squat. 

• dance,   flexible dancing,   stretching

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How to Boost Your Flexibility

"How can I get more flexible?" It's a question every dancer has asked themselves at one time or another. Whether you're attempting your first split or trying to nail a crazy high extension in your new dance uniform, flexibility is one of the key components to being a great dancer. If you want to improve yours, it can certainly enhance your rehearsals in the studio and performances on the stage. Just make sure you take the right approach. Here are some tips to help you in the process.

Tip #1: Take your time.

There's no fast way to get more flexible. So don't look for some quick fix on the Internet that will magically elongate your dance moves. It doesn't exist and you could actually wind up hurting yourself in the process. In fact, when you try to make too much progress too fast, you're going to end up with some kind of sprain or strain in your muscles, tendons or joints.

Instead, take a gradual approach. Try to slowly and patiently improve flexibility so that your muscles have the time they need to safely adapt.

Tip #2: Warm up first.

Another vital tip to improving your flexibility involves warming up first. If you start stretching with cold muscles, you're going to wind up with an injury because your muscles aren't limber and ready to stretch in the way you want them to. Doing so can also cause muscle instability that impacts both your strength and agility.

So rather than jumping into difficult stretches or exercises to enhance flexibility, warm up first with a few minutes of cardio. This can be as simple as some jumping jacks or running in place for a couple of minutes. Then ease yourself slowly into your first stretching pose and take it from there.

Tip #3: Listen to your body.

When it comes to stretching and building flexibility, everyone's body is different. What's easy and comes naturally for one dancer -- who's more limber -- might take months of work for another. That's why it's important to listen to your body and pay attention to what works for you. Some dancers are naturally built to be more flexible, so don't compare yourself to others during the process.

When you're holding your stretches, also be careful that you don't hold them for too long. In the beginning of class, aim for holding your stretches no longer than 15 seconds. Toward the end of class, however, you can hold stretches for longer - from 60 to 90 seconds.

Tip #4: Perform dynamic stretches before class and static stretches after.

According to Dictionary.com, a dynamic stretch is "a type of sports fitness routine in which momentum and active muscular effort are used to stretch and the end position is not held."

These types of stretches -- such as shoulder rolls, torso twists, and arm swings -- are best used just after warm up, at the beginning of class. Some other good dynamic stretches for the lower body include hip circles, forward and backward lunges, and leg swings. Regardless of which you choose, dynamic stretching is ideal for the start of class because you're getting your heart rate up, while also stretching and warming up muscles.

Static stretching, on the other hand, involves holding a certain stretch for a specific period of time. This is usually best done toward the end of class, during your cool down period. You should hold these stretches for at least 30 seconds, or even up to 60 or 90 seconds -- especially if you have a particular muscle you're trying to enhance flexibility in. At the end of your dance class, your muscles will be nice and limber, so you'll be able to push them further during static stretches.

Both dynamic and static stretches are good ways for dancers to improve their flexibility. However, it's best to avoid ballistic stretching, which incorporates bouncing movements where the muscles and tendons are rapidly stretched and relaxed. This can cause strain and can even damage tendons, joints and muscles.

Tip #5: Use strength training.

If you're trying to improve your flexibility as a dancer, then add some strength training to your workout routine mix. While flexibility improves the length of your muscles, strong muscles mean you can hold your dance positions for longer.

Tip #6: Don't push too hard.

If you're having sharp or severe pain, chances are, you've taken things too far. Don't continue on or try to push through the pain. Pain is your body's way of signaling that something is wrong. Likewise, don't stretch for too long before a big performance. Doing so can actually cut down on your ability to perform your jumps properly.

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types of flexibility and basic stretching exercises