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| Esther Fairfax |
Back to the Barre. It is the next best thing after zumba for something new and challenging. I have tried it once and much like zumba i liked the fun factor, the moves and having a different work out. BUT zumba virtually gave me whiplash as I honestly thought i could copy my hyper flexible cuban teacher in the toronto heat of the summer. Clearly not. In contrast i never felt the true benefits of barre as it was post back injury and i had to play it safe. This did not feel like a safe option for weak backs so go easy on both of the above if you have any injury.
I admire any form of exercise based on ballet dancers who i view as elite athletes. Thing is we are not all built like ballet dancers and most of us require some conditioning before getting to this level of movement otherwise injury happens. In my quest for the ideal all round exercise class I am going back to our roots. A time when movement was easy...crawling along the floor as a baby, swinging from the trapeze as a child, climbing trees and running with gay abandon! Yup. You can see it now...a class of 8 in the Quaker Meeting house (were i teach) literally climbing the walls. My classes have not evolved that much but they are varied. I drip feed in these natural ways of moving after the basics of pilates have been mastered. You need a strong inner core for this kind of work - it is not for the feint hearted! Fancy a challenge?
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| Lotte Berk |
So Lotte Berk sounds like a strong, feisty and determined lady. After the war her family moved from Germany to England. It sounds like the only thing she really admired about England was Shakespeare but she stayed so there must have been more to it. By the 1960s she was alone having ended a destructive love affair, and bored so she came up with the idea of sharing her exercises she used in her dancing days to keep supple and slim. It took off in a big way and she became quite famous among celebrities, royals and the wealthy. It was a tough regime and her wicked sense of humour that drew them in. She introduced the cobra (see stretch above) to those with bad backs which worked a treat until one day she hurt her own back demonstrating the exercise. A Harley street doctor gave her pelvic tilts for relief which re-shaped how she taught her exercises. This is how it became known as the Tilt Technique.
Now Barre is a big name based on Lotte's concept. Hot barre, booty barre, pure barre...take your pick!
References
http://www.lotte-berk.com/
