Written on April 10th, along side Ballet Barre 1 with Dutch National Ballet:
I keep saying I’m going to get back in shape, do ballet barre more often, etc.
Now a couple of caveats here: I have always been terrible at exercising at home. Always. Even when I was training in a dance studio 6 days a week. (And that goes for ballet and ballroom.) However, because I was already in the studio 6 days a week, it didn’t really matter because that on it’s own typically kept me in shape. Then I left college and the only thing I had to keep me in shape was teaching dance and my once a week ballroom lessons. And since I left Vermont, I haven’t even had that.
Let me tell you, being cooped up during a pandemic makes you itch to move. Which is probably a good thing, because I’m usually too tired at the end of a work day to then get into a ballet class. But working from home, I need to be doing something. And even better – I’m at home, so lunch time actually ends up being a decent compromise. (Also, my husband used a carabiner to yank our chandelier out of harm’s way in the dining room so that I have more space.)
That being said, trying to do the barre exercises from the Dutch National Ballet may have been attempting to fly too far too fast when I’m out of shape, but it did feel good right up until after the pique exercise – which is when I had to call it quits for day one. (My legs were getting a bit too shaky for my liking – and those piques were fast.) But that was still 20 minutes in, which is far more concentration than I’ve been able to give an at home barre in a while. The exercises are mostly the right pace, and I really enjoyed the fact that we didn’t get any direction (only music) for the left side. It was a good memory exercise and allowed me to focus on what I was doing rather than whether or not I had the pattern right.
If you’re interested in giving this set of barre exercises a go, here’s the video. I actually really enjoyed this format.