Rachel Osborne
Forum Replies Created
-
Thank you SO much that is super helpful.
I hope your aches pains and injuries are now fully under control. Both heat and ice feel very relieving so will combine in order you suggest. -
Oh gosh poor you, definitely heal up before doing it again!
I had game-changing advice on this which will share in case it helps you. I was taught that a pole sit is not a straight thigh- clamping sit but an optical illusion. You are not sitting straight on the pole, clinging on with a tiny, tortured bit of skin:you are twisted – tilting your hips to distribute weight along your long, strong thigh bones, cushioned by muscle and fat, rolling your thighs inward towards each other, engaging all your muscles so the skin is supported by the muscle underneath and doesn’t catch and year.
And then you tilt your rib cage and upper body the other way so you appear to be straight.
To have a feel of it, exaggeratedly cross your legs whilst sitting on a chair and look at yourself in a mirror. Drop the hip bone of the underneath leg so you are pushing it towards the chair seat. The other hip will rise. You look all wonky, yes?
Now shift your upper body and shoulders away from the dropped hip so your shoulders look level. Ta da!
Good luck.
Ps. Sudacrem nappy rash cream is amazing for healing chafing, raw skin.
🙂 -
I used it to kick start a massive overhaul of my diet and fitness a year ago. Combined it with low carb clean eating which worked very well and lost 35lb and became lean. I found though that fast days were too miserable and so switched to 16:8 every day – eating within an 8 hour window and 16 hours not eating (including sleep time).
Basically working out first thing fasting, then protein/veg brunch and early dinner of protein and veg and good fat – tracked what I ate on My Fitness Pal.
I think for some people especially women, shorter fasts can work better but we are all different. I think the science stacks up.
Mumsnet has an excellent 5:2/fasting forum which I found invaluable (and a low carb forum too – you don’t have to be a parent to use the site)
http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/fasting_diet
Good luck!
-
WebJunk you are science-tastic! Applause!
🙂 -
I have no idea but I’d get a bucket and put cement in that, and have the pole in the bucket then bury the bucket. What about the walking about area round the pole? Paving slabs?
-
New York City Ballet workout 2 is amazing for this sort of thing and is on youtube.
-
Thanks for reminder, day 7 tick.
-
Hey nuffstyle great to hear you have a pole in your sights! Re chrome in Caribbean climate; I train at studios with chrome so that was a reason to choose same for home, as I’ve never tried anything else (my UK pole when I lived there was stainless steel).
Pros: tough, can handle salt island humid air without corroding and is cheaper option (though shipping added 200 bucks to a 299 pole :-0)
Cons: must be warm to grip. Yes, it’s warm
here and with a/c on is still 79-80f- but chrome requires ten mins of friction ie climbing spinning sliding to warm the metal. This means you get fit as you can’t just climb on and freestyle.Even when pole is warm I use grip aid for my hands as I sweat on this climate on my hands. It can be frustrating halfway through a dance to have to bail out of moves because no grip. As I break the pole in over time, use rubbing alcohol and a microfibre cloth daily, it gets grippier.
I hear brass is super grippy in warm/humid but not tried it: we all have different body chemistry. I would say chrome rewards love, time and effort/body heat well and gets better with time and dedicated practice. Brass I hear can rip skin off, titanium gold get slick and dangerous in our humid climate. Powder coated I’ve heard doesn’t work well at all.
In winter I turn a/c off. There is a fine line between grippy-humid-air- and happy- warm- lightly-sweating dancer (and sweat on body dried by ceiling fan is awesome grip) vs. wet slippy sweat and condensation on pole – slithery mess on floor.
I would suggest trying every pole you can and if in doubt get chrome x pole: you can always buy different finish a and b poles if you hate it rather than replace whole pole.
Re puking; if coconut water stupid expensive (pisses me off too when coconuts are everywhere!) then try an isotonic sports drink or pint of sugary cordial with a tablespoon honey and half a teaspoon sea salt or Himalayan salt and a squeeze of lime .
-
Maybe lock pole if you are going to try something inverted that is new and daring (and get out the crash mats!) but yeah permanent spin mode and practising everything that way has made all the difference.
I find I need to think through combos first to work out where I’m likely to get fast spin or slow down using the ‘lean out and away = slow down’ mantra. If a pole sit is going too fast it can seem scary to lean away or go into a plank because the instinct is to curl in and clutch pole which only makes it go faster. Stretching a leg out instead helps if you have spin death grip.
I always go into CAR low enough to touch ground with hands and from a swan/drama queen spin because I can slow right down if I need to by extending my arms and straightening my legs. If I want to do a jade on spin I go in from a secure gemini to a straight pike; stretching arms and legs out will control the spin whereas a tuck hip hold will not slow me down at all.
Your head and hips are also heavy and moving them close to or further from pole when climbing or posing will help to control the ride.
-
Aha! I love fan kicks done super slow on spin but never thought about inverting that way! Thanks!
-
Hey! You’re Barbados I’m in Cayman. Don’t underestimate how brutal summertime humidity is for us Caribbean dwellers. Are you getting enough salt and minerals as well as water? Protein coconut water shake good for keeping up electrolyte balance….
-
Look I’m not an expert, I’m intermediate and restarted pole last October after several years off; prior to restarting I had never used spin but fell in love when I started in November at a studio where the poles were always on spin mode and now my own pole is permanently on spin.
Things that helped me: never locking pole so mounting, climbing, inverting always requires tiny muscle adjustments to keep pole steady which means muscle memory becomes automatic. I then just get used to it. When it comes to deliberately spinning I’ve internalised the way to ‘ride’ the pole so I am in control.
Understanding that extending [a leg/arm/both] away from pole will slow me and tucking in close will speed me up.
Filming myself: when I think I’m going at warp speed I’m actually not.
Dismounting and leaning/looking up and away then straight at pole will restore equilibrium, if still dizzy spin other way or pirouette the other way.
Everyone’s vestibular system is different and some people love and feel energised by spinning whereas others hate it. If you find spinning hard don’t feel you have to spin all the time when on spin mode. Perform as if on static and just put in a few controlled spins or poses and do scary stuff like CAR when the pole is at rest.
Hope that helps sorry for woffle.
-
Totally excited!
-
Thanks Veena glad I don’t have to bail out!
-
Yeah it was only pointed out to me recently that I always spin and invert backwards! Which is one reason why gemini is so much easier I guess! I always work on spin, have never locked my pole to static.
Now I’m spinning forwards I need to work Scorpio plus it’s essential entry from chopper to various combos and it’s a bit of a pain having to switch from gemini to Scorpio to, say hip hold then jade because I end up close to the bottom of the pole.
I’m currently banned from inverts for 7 days due to overtraining rotator cuff/shoulder girdle/forearms which have all locked up/got sore (seeing chiro) so will work with all the tips next week (hopefully).
Thanks again
-
Veena, I’m seeing chiro and he says my shoulder girdle, rotator cuff, pecs, delts, rhomboids are all over trained and I must rest them for a week, no inverts, pull ups etc.
Can you suggest how I can modify the Ab challenge for a week to allow upper body healing time?
Many thanks
-
^ was for Milla
-
Hmmm, have you got any frozen peas (or ice cubes in sealed plastic bag) – which can wrap in a soft cloth (it MUST be in a cloth not touching skin) and place round ankle, while you sit down and have it propped up above heart level?
Doing this for 10-15 mins every hour, letting the treated area get warm again for at least 45 min is much better than ice baths. And less traumatic and risky.
I would consider getting an x ray too.
(First aider not medic disclaimer)
-
And good luck healing Polewalker
-
You’re doing no more than 15 min with ice and no ice on bare skin? Because too much ice will aggravate it and cause frostbite type injury, delaying recovery! Good luck healing Milla
-
Pool? Pole! Sorry!
-
It’s lovely on spin too, going forwards or backwards, and you can do pretty stuff with arms – crossing at wrists, then releasing outside arm and sweeping it round, up and back. You can enter it aerially from spinning side climb or basic spinning climb then move your legs to side of pool and hook knee.
It’s one of my favourite moves.
-
Thanks that is really helpful. I think I need to bring hands super low and really lean back tipping legs back to get enough space to wrap thigh and calf.
It’s very automatic now for me to go into outside leg so I’m already moving my hips that way as I chopper. To wrap inside leg means moving hips the other way and getting pole deep in hip first.
Realised my contact points with Scorpio vary a lot whereas my knee hook for Gemini is always the same so that doesn’t help either, the muscle memory isn’t there.
I still find Scorpio painful because of having loose skin and very low body fat on thighs after weight loss: there is no subcutaneous fat cushion for the muscle and bone of the thigh and the loose skin gets caught and tears.
Thanks Lina.
-
Can’t get leg on pole easily and smoothly – outside leg hooks easily but inside leg I have to move hips, fidget leg into place and it’s ugly and pole loses spin.
