Stretching the LimitsBy Nicole Lewis Thursday, April 8 1998
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There are many differences in the ways dancers and gymnasts are trained, but the two disciplines have much in common. Local choreographer and dancer Lucy Bowen McCauley believes gymnasts can learn a few things from dancers, and she recently landed a job teaching students of the USA Gymnastics women's programs.
Last fall, McCauley was invited by Kathy Kelly, head of those programs, to demonstrate stretching techniques to students at Bela Karolyi's training camp in Huntsville, Tex. Kelly discovered McCauley through one of her pupils, local star gymnast Dominique Dawes. McCauley remembers being nervous at Huntsville, and thinking, "I don't know gymnastics; how am I going to fit in?" Somehow she did, and now McCauley is an official national Olympic trainer, spending at least one weekend a month in distant parts of the country, loosening up various gymnasts' joints and muscles. "It's a lot of luck that what I teach is what they need," says McCauley. McCauley, 40, learned her stretch techniques from exercise physiologist Jean-Paul Mustone while studying dance in New York City almost 20 years ago. "This is deep stretch, not feel-good stretch," McCauley says. "The class is choreographed and you loosen up certain muscles before others." She says there's no real new material in the stretch technique, just a different approach to known methods such as yoga. The goal is better body alignment and flexibility, so the first things McCauley teaches the gymnasts are to drop theirtailbones, lift their breastbones and most importantly, breathe. Gymnastics is a whole new arena for McCauley, who describes herself as a girl who ate, slept and breathed ballet while growing up in Indianapolis. After high school she won a scholarship to study at the Joffrey Ballet School in New York City. While she danced with several companies, after her training it became clear she was not destined to be a great classical ballerina. "I never had the body to be an ABT [American Ballet Theatre] dancer," McCauley says. "I didn't have great feet." To make things worse for her feet, one of them got run over by a car and McCauley could not dance again for a year. "The doctors said you can't go on pointe again, and I said, 'You know, that's okay,' " she says. McCauley switched to modern dance and performed for several years with Washington's respected Eric Hampton Dance in Washington before leaving that company to start her own. In 1996 she formed Bowen McCauley Dance, which performs about twice a year in Arlington. On a recent afternoon, McCauley was busy putting the finishing touches on her fast-paced world premiere, "4/Bach." The two-hour rehearsal is precious, stolen time from the dancers' and her own busy schedules, says McCauley, a slim woman who is prone to much movement with her hands. When she's not jet-setting around the country for the Olympics, McCauley stays busy running the company, choreographing new works, keeping herself in shape (she still performs) and teaching dance and stretch classes around town. While she is not currently using her choreography skills with the gymnasts, that might come in time. McCauley has been asked to observe the girls' performance on the balance beam and floor exercises; later, she will give them her input. She says the greatest challenge for the choreographer would be the gymnast's floor exercise. The small dance parts in between tumbling sequences are considered "rest periods" for the gymnast, she says, so the choreographer can't devise anything too showy or strenuous. McCauley sees her gig with the Olympics as an adventure (there's a possibility she'll travel to Australia with the team in 2000), an opportunity to learn about something new and make some good money. The existence of Bowen McCauley Dance, however, is not in danger. To rehearse and plan for the upcoming show, McCauley took a month off from her duties with the Olympics. "They know I'm not willing to give up all this," she says. "And they don't need me full time." |