Controlling body composition - nutrition

From the results of last week's survey (thank you for participating in it!) one issue was raised several times - nutrition and weight control.  So here's a guide on how to begin addressing your nutritional needs while maintaining control over body composition.

Concussion in dance and aesthetic sports

Concussion, also referred to as minor traumatic brain injury (mTBI), is an injury more commonly associated with contact sports than with dancing. There has however been an increase in recent years in the number of reported concussions in dancers, and it is necessary for the dance teacher, director, choreographer and dancers themselves to be able to recognise and react to a concussion when it occurs.

In aesthetic sports such as gymnastics and cheerleading, and in dance related genres such as physical theatre, the reported instances of concussion are significantly higher than in dance, largely due to moves performed while elevated and in performing tricks and stunts. In cheerleading, stunts are responsible for 90% of the concussions suffered by athletes, with the majority of these affecting the bases, rather than the athlete in the air. Across various genres of dance, from street to ballroom to contemporary to lindy-hop, numerous aspects of choreography can pose a risk to dancers if not executed properly. With dance choreography constantly pushing new limits of dancers' physical abilities, and increasingly incorporating tricks and stunts in pieces, it is useful to now consider dance alongside gymnastics and cheerleading as an activity carrying the potential for concussion. 

In a wide variety of sports, it has been found that concussion is under-reported, and that athletes go on to perform or compete after sustaining a head injury. It is imperative for the safety of the dancer or athlete that all concussions are recognised and appropriately addressed. Self-reporting of symptoms has been proven to be ineffective at identifying concussion, and so standardised testing procedures should be in place to ensure concussions are identified and appropriately addressed.

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(c) Little Shao, 2013.

Anterior Pelvic Tilt in Dancers

Correct alignment is crucial to dance technique. A common alignment issue in dancers is an exaggerated anterior pelvic tilt - tilting the the pelvis forward. No two individuals will have identical spinal and pelvic alignment, and so it is perhaps useful to think of there being an  range that can be considered optimal rather than one set alignment that is perfect. The anterior pelvic tilt pulls the body out of correct alignment (outwith the optimal range), resulting in flawed technique and impaired performance. Your lower abdomen will protrude and your backside will stick out. Over and above the artistic flaw, anterior pelvic tilt impairs turnout and prevents proper muscle recruitment, can cause hip pain, back pain, knee pain and flat feet.

The hip flexors connect the femur to the hip and lower back; tight, short hip flexors cause the hip to pull forward. Any misalignment of the hips will effect the back, and anterior pelvic tilt will give a pronounced curvature of the thoracic spine. This in turn may then produce upper back pain, shoulder and neck pain, headaches and migraine.

Healthy hips are essential in dance, the turnout and all subsequent movement of the lower body originates here. While pelvic motion is central to many of the basic movements of dance (for example the battement de vant, a la seconde and derrière all display differing degrees of pelvic motion), the body should have a neutral home alignment. The internal rotation of the hip displayed with APT goes on to effect the lower limbs, producing subsequent internal rotation of both the femur and tibia, reducing turnout. This can cause or exaggerate existing over-pronation of the feet, causing foot, ankle and knee pain. Incorrect alignment further predisposes the dancer to injury.