User:Patrick.Rucinski/sandbox

Physical Demands

Ballroom dancing is a partnered activity that comprises of a male and female counterpart. Over the years, competitive ballroom dancing has evolved so much in its choreography, requiring a higher level of athleticism. Many individuals that spectate or dance socially often underestimate the physical attributes and demands of ballroom dancing. In order to compete at a world level, elite competitive dancers undergo rigorous training to help and enhance their competition performance. These dancers seem to preform at such a high level of energy expenditure that a deeper understanding of these energy demands may help build specific training programs used to sustain a high quality dance performance consistent over a few rounds of a competition.

In 1988, an Australian study was conducted to determine the heart rate and estimated energy expended during ballroom dancing. Professors Blanksby and Reidy of the Department of Human Movement and Recreation Studies at the University of Western had ten competitive ballroom dance couples simulate a dancesport competition, dancing their competitive routines in either the Latin American or Standard division. After administrating all required laboratory tests (in order to record their height, weight, body fat percentage, fat free mass and the resting/maximal heart rate and VO2 values), the couples danced a five-dance final, given a 15 to 20 second break between each dance. Throughout the final their heart rates were telemetered and recorded. The purpose of this study was to estimate the energy requirements from heart rates acquired during competition simulation and previously recorded measures of VO2 and HR.

The average heart rate for male dancers in Standard was 170 beats.min-1 and 168 beats.min-1 in the Latin American. Females elicited 179 beats.min-1 and 177 beats.min-1 respectively. Astrand and Rodahl (1977) classify any exercise being extremely heavy if it measures above the HR of 150 beats.min-1. They also stated that if oxygen consumption measures are higher than 2.0L.min-1, it also classifies the exercise as extremely heavy. All but the females in the Standard dance sequence didn’t exceed an oxygen consumption level of 2.0L.min-1. Finally, the energy expenditure calculated for male athletes, estimated to be 54.1 ± 8.1 kJ.min-1 of energy for Standard and 54.0± 9.6kJ.min-1 in the Latin American dances. For females it was 34.7 ± 3.8 kJ.min-1 and 36.1 ± 4.1 kJ.min-1. Nevertheless, it is evident that Ballroom dancing is a vigorous sport, equally demanding for both the male and female athletes. It requires a cardiovascular system to be able to work at such a high energy level in order to match the given physiological strain.

Two other similar experiments were conducted exhibiting very similar results and analyses. In all three of the experiments, significant differences in the energy expenditure between the male and female athletes were noticed. Generally males had a higher energy expenditure then their female counterparts. This is evident due to the anthropometric differences between the two genders and the oxygen transport capacity.

Comparing the mean gross energy expenditures (in kJ.min-1) between ballroom dancing and other sports, it is evident that competitive dancing is equally as demanding in comparison to other sporting activities such as basketball (35.83 kJ.min1) or cross-country running (44.37kJ.min-1) (Consolazioetal,1963).