Actor's Gym - Circus Day 1

Last night, we had our first day of Circus 1.  In this class, you cover a wide spectrum of circus arts, including aerial arts, tumbling and contortion, and other work like stilts, unicycle, and juggling.  The class is set up differently due to the number of things being taught along with a larger number of students.  The set up goes like this: warm-up, floor work, split off into two groups where one group works on an aerial apparatus and the other on a floor skill.  Sylvia is the instructor for this class.  She is intense, and she is going to kick our butts, but it's a good contrast compared to the Aerial instructor, Nate, who is extremely laid back, but just as good at teaching.  Nate will tell you what's wrong and tell you how to fix it and Sylvia will just grab a hold of you and fix it for you.  The fact that the instructors are so keen on fixing you right away is fantastic.  I've had plenty of dance instructors who will let you do something incorrectly for the longest time, and by the time the get around to explaining you were doing something wrong, it's already embedded in your muscle memory and it's hard to relearn it.  In this environment there is a lot of fast, healthy learning.

For one of the floor exercises yesterday, we worked on handstands, which was something I was really nervous about.  I have scoliosis, so there is a natural twist and sway in my lower back, and it is very difficult to self-correct when doing handstands.  You cannot do a handstand with a swayed back, and I don't have enough core muscle to pull my stomach in enough to correct it.  Thankfully, Nate, who was the assistant instructor for this class was able to help me hold myself up so I could learn more about how the core helps keep you up in the handstand.  I was even able to roll out of the handstand, which was something I didn't think I was going to be able to do.

The two main skills we worked on were trapeze and juggling.  Juggling is very hard, I feel like I'm catching on quickly.  I got one full "juggle" with three balls and that was good enough for me.  I think I want to go out and purchase some balls to practice with because it is so much fun.  I can't wait to be able to juggle.  The aerial was a little harder today, perhaps because my upper body is so worn out from aerial yesterday.  I have a really difficult time with slippery hands, I can't seem to keep my grip.  Hopefully the blisters on my hands will turn into calluses and will help me be able to hold on better.  I also really need to work on my core strength.  It's really difficult to have control over your body when you aren't strong enough to hold yourself up.  I'm going to work on my core and my arms this week and throughout the rest of the summer, so hopefully these tricks will become easier.

Until next week.