How To Do Ballet Stretches

Hello, I'm Zoe from South London Dance Studios in Herne Hill and my students are going to demonstrate some ballet movements. We are going to show you how to do some stretches for ballet. So first of all, we are starting with a hamstring stretch, so we are going to start with a hamstring stretch.

So girls take your scarves and face the side, you're going to lie down on your backs. Keep your legs bent up Georgia, stretch your right leg up into the air, and put the scarf on your foot. Stretch the leg and then you're going to gently pull the leg towards you, and hold it there.

We will hold it for ten seconds and then we will do the other leg, and sitting up. The second stretch we are going to do is the calf stretch. So, Georgia and Tasha are going to this at the bar, so if you go to the bar, and Nandi and Maddy are going to do it in the center.

So, let's start with the one at the bar, so we are going to just take the feet slightly apart so that they are under the hips, and you're going to take your left leg backwards into calf stretch. Bending in the front, that's it and you're pushing down into that calf stretch, making sure it's staying in parallel, and we will hold that for about ten seconds and then we do the other leg. Another calf stretch is lying on your back and centre.

So stretch up your right leg, and you're going to flex the foot up as far back as you can, and point, and flex, and point, and flex, and point, and you would keep doing that about ten times, and then the other leg. Let's all come back into the middle and do a stretch in second. So facing the side, just move the scarves away.

Sitting in second and this is to stretch the inner thigh. So, sitting up first of all straight back extend the legs and gently reaching forward. Put the hands on the floor and reach forward, try to keep the backs straight and go as far down as you can.

And we will hold that there for about ten seconds, and up you come. Let's now go up to the fronts and do our last stretch. And we are going to stretch out the spine, so gently pushing up onto your hands and arching the spine.

Gently take the head back and try to keep the neck long, reaching right back and lower and now go back up, sit back on to your heels, and round your backs so that your spine is going the other way. Sit right back on to your heels Sasha, that's it and now try to round your back. If you want to find out more about our ballet classes or our other classes, top modern and street jazz, please visit our website. .