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First-ever contortion class
Oct. 30th, 2014 10:27 amWell all right then... I took a contortion class and didn't get hurt.
The teacher did something that I really, really liked: asked each person's goals for the session AND followed up with repeat students on what their goals had been for the last session. It was encouraging to see that these had both made some progress on the things they wanted. I said I wanted a better pike, which is apparently unusual.
Then we did splits stretching; nothing revolutionary, maybe, but a style I haven't done before. Lots and lots of 60-second blocks of static stretching, with the back knee and then the front foot on a block and then two blocks. It was relaxing enough, really -- nobody pushed or pulled on me. And I didn't feel jealous when I saw people doing dynamic acro across the room; I'm getting more comfortable with the idea of taking a break from that.
Interestingly, I couldn't quite do a flat split on the floor (on either side) at the end of all this, which I can at the end of my home-rolled split routine. That doesn't mean this style won't help me, though. I need active flexibility, and I also need to be able to more quickly get into ranges of motion that I currently have but am slow to get into. I'm certainly willing to give this method a shot, in addition to my own stretching; at the least, it gives me 75 minutes per week when I'm mostly thinking about flexibility, which is good...
I expect the backbending work to be more interesting and less comfortable.
The teacher did something that I really, really liked: asked each person's goals for the session AND followed up with repeat students on what their goals had been for the last session. It was encouraging to see that these had both made some progress on the things they wanted. I said I wanted a better pike, which is apparently unusual.
Then we did splits stretching; nothing revolutionary, maybe, but a style I haven't done before. Lots and lots of 60-second blocks of static stretching, with the back knee and then the front foot on a block and then two blocks. It was relaxing enough, really -- nobody pushed or pulled on me. And I didn't feel jealous when I saw people doing dynamic acro across the room; I'm getting more comfortable with the idea of taking a break from that.
Interestingly, I couldn't quite do a flat split on the floor (on either side) at the end of all this, which I can at the end of my home-rolled split routine. That doesn't mean this style won't help me, though. I need active flexibility, and I also need to be able to more quickly get into ranges of motion that I currently have but am slow to get into. I'm certainly willing to give this method a shot, in addition to my own stretching; at the least, it gives me 75 minutes per week when I'm mostly thinking about flexibility, which is good...
I expect the backbending work to be more interesting and less comfortable.
