[Poledancefan]

Welcome, Voelle!

My name is Joel, just one syllable. But when I was little, my grandmother would call me Jo-el when I was bad and I knew I was in trouble. My name comes from my parents JOhn and ELise. Voelle is a great name, Is there a story behind the name?

Joel

[Poledancefan]

Flosquito

Rotate your workouts and don’t do the pole every single day. That will allow different parts of the body to rest while you work on another kind of exercise. I practice the pole every third day. I do treadmill one day, weight machines the next day, pole the third day. You could try changing emphasis WITHIN the pole workout. Spins one practice, aerial work the next, inverts the one after that.

If you are pole dancing for 20 minutes, then that is a good twenty minutes of pole. Are you documenting your practices with a video camera?–because maybe if you had old videos of yourself in earlier practices and your improvement would be more obvious to you. I look at some of my old videos and they are hilariously bad. I look at my videos from last week and they are just…well, bad!

Keep a sense of humour about it. Enjoy the process and go as slow as you need to. You will pick up the moves and you will get better. If you are feeling discouraged, go watch some of my awful videos and have a good laugh because I bet you have passed me up already. You are going to be an absolutely fabulous pole dancer one day–I am absolutely confident of that!

Joel

[Poledancefan]

I just ordered Jamilla’ s box set yesterday. I ‘m pretty excited about it!

I’ll second the comment about it being difficult to get a hold of Leigh Ann. She is an awesome dancer and I am a regular subscriber to her vids. I know she is a stunt trainer for movie stars or something, so maybe she is just super busy all the time… A few years ago she was in the running for on-line Playmate of the Year and did a video asking for votes for her submission. I couldn’t get the link to work and PM’ed her for the right http link and she didn’t answer–so I couldn’t cast the vote! Follow up is important–especially in a people profession like fitness and training…

I do know that Jamilla, Alena (and of course, our very own Veena!) do cultivate and build relationships carefully and that would be an important factor in deciding which instructional videos to purchase.

And of course, when little Henry is walking and Veena and the webmaster have enough time to burn those lessons onto DVD, Leigh Ann and Jamilla will have a little competition, LOL!

When can I place my order??!!

Joel

[Poledancefan]

Yes, I know Alena has expressed mixed feelings about the possibility of pole as an Olympic sport. That may have something to do with the standardization of governance, judging, and moves.

There are a number of competing organizations and I wonder if they could all get together and form a single approach to the sport…or if that is even a good thing.

I did sign the petition–partly as a matter of respect. I just think pole deserves more exposure–even if the Olympics is not the final destination. I have to admit there is something a little fun about the anarchy in pole dancing. All of the styles and individualism makes it the Golden Age of the dance/sport/hobby!

And I am not the least bit uncomfortable with the exotic/erotic aspect of pole dance. Many of the You-Tube polers are shamelesly erotic, sensual, and sexual in their style of dance and I think that is just fine. I would hate to see that aspect of pole dancing go away (and it probably wouldn’t!) But it would also be nice to have a venue for a straightforwardly athletic exhibition of gymnastic ability.

I spend a lot of time galumpfing around the pole and falling on my butt–nothing erotic about that and I think there should be a place for that, too!

And Olympic or some other quote/ unquote "legitimate" sport broadcasting would make many people who feel insecure about taking up pole feel more comfortable about it.

Joel

[Poledancefan]

I think ambivalence about pole is an equal opportunity thing–for Boys as well as Girls. My daughter Johannah is obsessed that her best friend never see the pole room in the basement and always closes the door when she comes over. But before I bought her her own FLIP camera, I discovered a few video clips on mine with her doing spins! (Ahem! she’s also not supposed to pole alone–for safety.) Laurie’s pretty adamant about not letting her post any of those kinds of vids, so I’ve tried to get Johannah involved in some of my videos as a spotter–and let her sneak in a spin or two.

It’s too bad that the "sleazy" label gets attached to pole dancing, but frankly, I think that sexism has a lot to do with it. The parking lot is always full at the strip club a few suburbs over–I bet none of the guys there think of themselves as sleazy–only the dancers get labelled that way.

So yeah, I pretty much agree with all the ladies in this post. Kids will pick up on however you present the activity. And if they get ashamed of it later, it’s probably no big deal. When he was a teenager, Jake always made me drop him off at school a block away because I drove a Honda Civic and that wasn’t a cool car. Now he lectures me about how I should take public transportation because cars use too much gas…

Joel

[Poledancefan]

This is my biggest problem in learning how to pole. I have no structure whatsoever. I pole every third day. I rotate weight machines at Bally’s on day 1, treadmill on day 2, pole on the third day. All workouts are two hours but the pole workout is mostly catching my breath between trying moves! Sometimes I copy stuff from the expert village tutorials. I worked a lot of material on Karol Redke71’s basic pole moves video. I have considered Veena’s on line tutorials also and if my life were less hectic, I would subscribe to them–maybe next summer during break.

I really need to take lessons in a studio because I have a hard time disciplining myself and I don’t understand the "foundations" of the sport. Words and terms fly at me and I do get confused–Bracket, Half Bracket, Full, Split, Dominant, Subhand… I really wish I had some sort of schematic that would explain how moves build on each other–I think I would get this in a class. I’ve screwed up my wrist and my right achilles tendon already, LOL!

But I am kind of bullheaded and stubborn. So the more irritating and frustrating it gets, the more determined I am to at least hit some of the markers–an invert, a gemini, this or that particular spin. I’m very aware of my age, so I do take it VERY VERY slow to avoid a serious injury, but I’m used to aches and pains.

I think there is something to be said for just muddling through. Tempered with a little caution, I do believe that persistence and practice always pay off,even is it’s totally disorganized. But if you can, find a class because it’s just more efficient to learn from some one who already knows the pitfalls and the secrets of the game.

Joel

[Poledancefan]

I just saw the video! It was great. I don’t see any reason why boys and young men (or older men, LOL!) shouldn’t pole. Regular dancing has hundred of different kinds of styles–Irish step, ballet, break, tap, ballroom… In each of these dance genres, there are styles that are feminine and others that are masculine. And I pole pretty much as a fitness activity, not so much for dancing. But I wish I could dance! I discovered very late in life that there’s nothing the ladies like better than a man who can dance…

Joel