Stay on the supporting leg longer. Has anybody not been told how important this is. Take for instance a Reverse Turn in Foxtrot for the lady. How many find their Heel Turn a bit of a mess.One way of making sure that it will not be done correctly is to move the none supporting leg to soon. Think about it, you have two beats on your right leg, don't be in too much of a hurry to bring the LF to the RF. In other words . Stay on the supporting leg longer. This also applies to the man on most of their steps Going from the first step of the Feather to the second step as an example. There the rear foot can be held untill the third step is taken. Let the judges have a good look at that rear foot, that's the one which is seen the most.

There's a lot of merit in this, but I'd change the description. It's not so much staying on the leg, but keeping the foot on it's place on the floor a little longer after you depart it - delaying the closure or pass through.

Some concerns:

- this applies best to feet that are trailing the entire couple. feet of the person ahead of the motion will need to retract a bit earlier, for example in(ballroom) tango the lady's feet go right through and do not trail (in front of) her body when she moves backwards

- don't leave the body on the spot too. the body must move through the standing foot as a step is prepared, and then move off of it, coincident with or ahead of the free foot moving out. exception again: tango, where the free foot moves while the body weight is still over the stable part of the foot, and the body moves through the standing foot only to catch up with the moving leg

- this will require stronger feet in order to be able to support weight from further towards the toe, and stronger angles in order to be able to support weight from the rear edge of the heel with the toe released.

Suomynona. What do you think of the advise given on the Tango by Michael Barr from a IDSF World Titles. Walk from position to position. No flighting of the body. This lady is breaking her neck line by hoding her head too far back.There are lots of interesting comments by the always expert commentators. Karen Hardy. This competitor is destroying his leg line. He needs some elastic on his trouser bottoms fot Latin. The most interesting I found was by Michael Barr when he said that most of the champions in Modern in the past have been quite small in stature. They were talking about the British winner Domenico Soale at that time.

Yes, I agree that most steps in tango are walks from position to position without flight - I would actually say stable position to stable position. A very important part of that is not arriving past the stable position at the end of the step - if you arrive too far, you have to take another step in the same direction, which is called body flight.

But I think there are some exceptions where a different technique is called for. These have to do with body positions where the stable position to stable position, foot before body, method would not really work. One example is the reverse turn lady outside - there the movement through the outside step needs to be more continuous with the body bringing the foot as in the swing dances, rather than leading the foot as in most tango actions. Another is the step out in promenade - unless danced as a static point action, the step out in promenade really wants to flow right through to the step through in promenade. But the step through in promenade ends normally, in the stable position of the foot. If you were dancing something like a closed promenade, that would be espcially important as the step through continues the direction of the step out, but after the step through the direction changes abruptly to become a sideways action. Coast through the step through and your closure from promenade will be weak.

Correction: now that I think about it, it's the movement INTO the lady's outside step of the reverse turn that must flow, with the body leading the foot. Arrival on the outside step and preparation for the next step could probably return to normal tango action.

This would make the outside partner action consistent with the step through in promenade.

Suomynoma. There was no mention of the feet turned in on the last but one step of a Reverse Turn in the Tango for the lady. In other words the foot is place and with no turn on the right as the left foot is brought into position. Can't think of a better way of explaining this other than the foot is place into position with no turn on that foot, not like we do in a Feather Finish for the lady when the foot continues to turn.The lady should find that in the Tango the feet are turned in
on that particular step. Do you agree that in the Tango the step is from the knees to the foot and not from the thighs or hips. If my knees are close together like I was bound at the knees with a wide peice of elasic, thats the feel I am told to get which brings me to using the inside and outside edges of my feet also.