One of the key components to an elite Irish dancer's performance is crossover. As a dancer,
you’ve probably heard your dance teachers encourage you to “cross!” or have seen on your adjudicator comment sheet from a feis, “knees open”, “crossover”, or “tighten knees”. And you work tirelessly at home in front of the mirror to get one knee in front of the other. But you could be missing a key component to enhancing your crossover - strengthening your adductors!
Your adductors are a group of muscles, on the inside of your leg, that run from your pelvis to the inside of your femur. They assist in providing pelvic stability and are responsible for adducting the leg, (moving the leg towards the midline of the body). For Irish dancers, that means strong adductors are the key to enhancing your Irish dance crossover!
Dancers tend to spend a great deal of time stretching (or over-stretching) their adductors but rarely focus on strengthening this group of muscles. Strengthening your adductors will improve your crossover and allow you to have more control to cross when dancing.
Stay tuned to our blog where later this week, we'll release various strengthening exercises for your adductors.
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photos of dancers by: Joe Mazza
adductor photo from: http://www.nolanlee.com/blog/what-is-a-hip-opener-part-ii