Sometimes the pole gods are against you...

We had a workshop with Jenyne Butterfly yesterday. I took the advanced workshop, with the instructors and other students in the competition program. Jenyne was wonderful, I learned several new tricks - but as with learning anything slightly above your level, I'm struggling with the moves and feeling uncoordinated, inflexible and ugly on the pole.

But I have new bruises, which always seems like a good sign. It means I'm pushing myself. At the workshop, I explained to Jenyne that I'm working on opening up my moves. I need to be more flexible and really stretch into each trick. She said, "Every move should be hard. There shouldn't be any moves where you're just hanging out. Everything should be difficult. You should be pushing yourself all the time."

I'm trying to keep that in mind and think through each new trick. I don't want to just try it ten times and have each try be as bad as the last.

Right now I'm working on the allegra, from the apprentice (corkscrew with top leg extended to the ceiling). The top knee gets threaded through the space between the top arm and the body, to hold you to the pole while you move the bottom hand behind the bottom knee. The pole is against your bottom hip and stomach, between your calves and thighs. Then the top hand releases, bottom leg straightens and you end up holding the pole by the inner thigh on the top leg and your grip on the pole behind that knee.



It's a simple move but I think there's a trick to not getting pole burn on your thigh, one that I haven't quite mastered yet.

I'm trying to keep Jenyne's advice in mind. Work hard, be smart, think it through. And pray to the pole gods for mercy.