After reading these four full pages of discussion under the topic " Forward Walk in Slow Foxtrot, I sincerely want to give my salute to Anonymous. I think he ( or she ?) reasons clearly on the main points and substains his focus of the argument neatly. I consider myself as a green apple in the field of Ballroom Dancing. I have not yet read the famous books quoted here and in the past three years I am under the training of one same coach only. But somehow, I totally see what Anonymous means and couldn't agree with him more. Although I am a naive beginner ( I said so because believe it or not, my coach just keeps teaching me the basics of Waltz for 3 years and I just start to learn Foxtrot recently ), I still want to add my comments as follows:
1. Seamless is seamless. The flowing movement is so continous and so smooth that I can't see that there is a split second we should effort to strike a balance which we distribute our weight equally on both feet. Even though there is a blink of time that our weight is transitted to the middle, this is just a passage. Like Anonymous said, this is trifling.
2. During the longest stride we try to accomplish, even though we are on the heel and on the toe of the corresponding feet, the weight is not neccessarily to be must at the middle of the parting feet. Raise the toe of the front foot just 1cm, I can feel the shift of weight happen already. ( Am I wrong about this, Anonymous? )
3. At home I always think about how to improve my techniques and power of dancing. So, sometimes I sneak to the parking garage under my apartment building and practice my forward movement on the slightly upward slope so as to propel myself forward by more efforts. I definitely feel that my body is more ahead. ( Am I right about this, Anonymous? )
All in all, I just venture to write and let Anonymous know that he makes himself clear in his discussion and I am on his side. Pardon this green apple from Hong Kong for her clumsy English.

After reading these four full pages of discussion under the topic " Forward Walk in Slow Foxtrot, I sincerely want to give my salute to Anonymous. I think he ( or she ?) reasons clearly on the main points and substains his focus of the argument neatly. I consider myself as a green apple in the field of Ballroom Dancing. I have not yet read the famous books quoted here and in the past three years I am under the training of one same coach only. But somehow, I totally see what Anonymous means and couldn¡¦t agree with him more. Although I am a naive beginner ( I said so because believe it or not, my coach just keeps teaching me the basics of Waltz for 3 years and I just start to learn Foxtrot recently ), I still want to add my comments as follows:
1. Seamless is seamless. The flowing movement is so continous and so smooth that I can¡¦t see that there is a split second we should effort to strike a balance which we distribute our weight equally on both feet. Even though there is a blink of time that our weight is transitted to the middle, this is just a passage. Like Anonymous said, this is trifling.
2. During the longest stride we try to accomplish, even though we are on the heel and on the toe of the corresponding feet, the weight is not neccessarily to be must at the middle of the parting feet. Raise the toe of the front foot just 1cm, I can feel the shift of weight happen already. ( Am I wrong about this, Anonymous? )
3. At home I always think about how to improve my techniques and power of dancing. So, sometimes I sneak to the parking garage under my apartment building and practice my forward movement on the slightly upward slope so as to propel myself forward by more efforts. I definitely feel that my body is more ahead. ( Am I right about this, Anonymous? )
All in all, I just venture to write and let Anonymous know that he makes himself clear in his discussion and I am on his side. Pardon this green apple from Hong Kong for her clumsy English.

Green Apple. Your English is excellent. Pharagtaph numbered 1. This should really be a new thread. Marked Seamless.As a lady answer one question. Where is your body at the time that you step back as in Foxtrot or Waltz as the moving foot is placed in position. If you know the technique on step one for the lady there is No Foot Rise. Wouldn't that mean that the lady actually stands still as the man passes. I can say right here that if the lady does not allow the man to arrive first she will be there before him. Would you not say that this is a slight pause which should appear to be seamless. I will quote from the book again. Lady Waltz first step back LF. Commence to rise at the end of 1. NFR Foxtrot Rise at the end of 1. NFR. And again from the book and nothing could be clearer. If you are able to watch any tapes you will see excactly this. Swing the left leg back from the hips ( not the knee) At the full extent of the stride ( the very last bit of the toe touching the floor) lower on to the ball of back foot so at this point the ball of the back foot and the heel of the front foot are touching the floor. Continue to move backward , draw the RF back to the LF and at the same time slowly lower the left heel to the floor. MAKING SURE IT DOES NOT TOUCH THE FLOOR UNTILL THE RIGHT FOOT IS LEVEL WITH IT. End of Quote. If this is done correctly wouldn't you say that as the left heel rolls to the floor there is a feeling of being in one place as the knee bends towards the front. Tell me one more thing. A sprinter after they leave the blocks and untill they lunge at the tape. Is their body not verticle with the legs going first. As Jonathan once wrote the legs will travell twice the speed of the body. All of the above is for the competition dancer or for one who would like to dance correctly. If you go to 5. 27. 2006. you will se a part copy of the Administrators comments given on 2 25 2004. I would suggest that you read it carefully. Plus the writting above from Alex Moores book, some of which is on page 13. There are some good teachers from Europe residing in Hong Kong. Several Russians so I have been told. Good Luck.

GreennApple. Make that spelling Paragraph in the first line.

Green Apple,

I am intrigued by your idea of practicing the forward walk on a slight incline.

In actual dancing of course the walk must be a free action to which the dancer fully commits his or her body weight before there is a leg there to receive it. But it is human to want to practice slowly, experiment, and understand the evolution of the movement. The problem with the forward walk (unlike the backward one) is that you cannot slow it down without altering the technique, since you cannot move slowly through the phase of instability.

I'm not yet sure, but your idea of walking up a slight hill may give just enough resistance to allow practicing a slowed down walk with the kind of forward body position required for a real one - with the incline providing the slowing that is impossible to achieve while maintaining a proper body position when the walk is horizontal.

Green Apple. Walking uphill will only prove one thing. That is the push must come from the rear foot. Which is as it should. It seems to me that some writters are medal or social or just beginning. The others competition dancers. They are as different as chalk is to cheese. The medal dancer will probably know nothing about bending the knee as the body arrives. That is bending to your own front whether it be the man or the lady going forward or backwards. If I were you i would go to Learn the Dances on the left side of your screen. Then find Forward and Backward Walks. You will see the bending of the knees ( compression ) on frame one. You will se Mid Stride on frame three. If you take frame three for forward and frame three for backwards and place one on the other you will see they are identicle. You won't know which is which. Frame four will show you the flexing of the knees both bending equally. The positioning of the head is not shown. This comes later. Any queries on Latin. It's all here. Best Wishes

Is acceleration mentioned in any technique books?

Inertia and acceleration are to be controlled while walking or dancing. Straight walking steps can be practised slowly by accelerating from 0 m/s to any velocity or decelerating from any velocity to 0 m/s. From inertia view of point for example velocity of 5 m/s is the same as 0 m/s and acceleration from 0 m/s to 1 m/s is the same as acceleration from 5 m/s to 6 m/s, a = 1 m/s**2

There is not any continuous constant velocity. But there are seams of constant velocity when acceleration ends and deceleration begins and when deceleration ends and acceleration begins.

When stopping walking or dance videos frame by frame there are few postures which can be demonstrated being moveless at balance. Others are possible because of controlling of acceleration and inertia. Constant straight velocity does not create any balancing forces.

SQQ. Makes sense to me. I will add this. In our studio we practise to music as soon as possible. I know one young lady who told me that the first time she danced to music was when she did the medal.How crazy is that. Solo practise to your own timing is worse than useless. Obviously you will allow more time than you have on some of the awkward bits. Then one wonders why in practise I can do this fine, but can't when I really need to with the music.

"Inertia and acceleration are to be controlled while walking or dancing."

Perhaps, but only in "legal" ways. You should not allow your body to assume incorrect positions by attempting to achieve unreasonable control over acceleration.

"Straight walking steps can be practised slowly by accelerating from 0 m/s to any velocity or decelerating from any velocity to 0 m/s. From inertia view of point for example velocity of 5 m/s is the same as 0 m/s"

No, this is false - you overlook an extremely important issue: Acceleration in dancing is caused by having the body weight in an unbalanced position, specifically forward of the standing foot. Acceleration is a result of the falling past the foot that occurs in this position.

The slower you are moving, the more time you spend in this unbalanced position, hence the more its acceleration integrates to increased velocity.

The result? You CANNOT slow down a dance figure below its intended speed without CHANGING THE BODY POSITION to prevent the excessive acceleration that would result - usually this means changing body position to one incompatible with closed hold.

"When stopping walking or dance videos frame by frame there are few postures which can be demonstrated being moveless at balance."

Exactly - and the ones that can't be demonstrated stationary can't be demonstrated slowly either, because the acceleration would grow out of control.

"Others are possible because of controlling of acceleration and inertia."

Specifically, those which rise can be demonstrated slowly, because rising actions decelerate.

"Constant straight velocity does not create any balancing forces."

It doesn't create them, but it implies them - constant velocity is of course the result of balanced forces.

"Green Apple. Walking uphill will only prove one thing. That is the push must come from the rear foot."

First, most of the motion is carried over from the previous step. Most of the "push" comes from having the body weight forward of the standing foot. Any muscular "push" from the back foot plays at most a small roll, and only when taking very large steps.

Walking uphill gives you a tool to balance out the acceleration due to being forward of your foot - it lets you practice slowly in a way that you could not otherwise do in a proper body position.

"It seems to me that some writters are medal or social or just beginning. The others competition dancers."

A number of people here are competitors with lacking knowledge of fundamental technique... for example, many are ignorant of the necessary body alignment to enable cosed hold.

"Then find Forward and Backward Walks. You will see the bending of the knees ( compression ) on frame one."

Indeed, you will see it done incorrectly!

The dancer there is making two mistakes: one minor but serious, the other major but trivially corrected. First, the dancer is allowing her hip to lag a slight distance behind her knee as it bends forward. This is not permissable - closed hold required that the hip advance over the bending knee. She's only making the error by a small amount, but the fact that it's shown at all shows the author's misunderstanding of movement in closed hold.

Many are reluctant to keep their hip sufficiently forward over the knee, because doing so will cause the body to accelerte - forcing a commitment to the step incompatible with demonstrating it slowly.

More trivially, she has her moving leg in advance of her body. It should still be parallel to or even behind her standing leg at this point. Fortunately this error is easier to fix, since fixing it does not result in an accelerating body weight position.