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Raise Your Game: Why dance?

Camilla Dallerup: Why dance? I just love to perform. I wanted to perform wherever, whenever and dancing seemed to be the tool at the time. Then I fell in love with it and started competing. When I was a child my mum took me to dancing school where we did theatre, singing, dancing, tap, ballet - every type of dance really.

In the beginning I don't know why I competed, I think it was just a quick way to perform. Theatre took longer to rehearse. I like practicing for a week and then getting out there. I'd have small goals all the way... so that's it.

RYG: Were you always good at sport?

CD: No, I was slightly bored with sports at school really. I suppose that was quite difficult for me because I chose to have my life outside school. I went to school to learn different subjects, but my life started when I went to my dance school. I did that every day and that was where my friends were.

I was the outsider because I had a life besides school, but that made me quite tough. I needed that for dancing because you need to be mentally strong when you compete. I'm sure that's something Colin Jackson has talked about - how mentally strong you need to be.

RYG: How much training do you have to do?

CD: My schedule is really different to what it was when I was working upwards. I'm not really competing much at the moment. I'm doing shows so I'm doing a schedule that's completely built to having the stamina to do a 45 minute show with my partner. I've been competing since I was 6-years-old. I've been in that studio at least five times a week, but I wanted to be there.

Your training schedule becomes your life. When I danced with Roger Black we talked a lot about this. It's not how many hours you spend in the studio or on the running field always, it's also how much mental training you do. When I leave the studio I'll be thinking about how training went and how I can improve tomorrow. It becomes more than just a few hours, it becomes your life.

RYG: We interviewed James Martin for RYG and he said he lost two stone doing Strictly Come Dancing - is that true?

CD: Did he tell you I changed his diet as well and took all the chocolate bars away? He was allowed one chocolate bar a day. He ended up asking 'Can I have a chocolate bar?' (laughs).

RYG: Do you cope with pressure well?

CD: I think I do. I've put a lot of pressure on myself since I was very young. I don't know what it is with me but I've always got this urge to try the unknown. If there's something that I know I might not be good at I have to prove to myself that I can do it and survive it. I suppose I quite like pressurised situations. I did presenting for the ´óÏó´«Ã½ Dance Factory and we had to do three live shows. I just remember when it went live I thought 'What am I doing here,' but then I completely fell in love with it. I really like putting myself on the line.

RYG: How does it feel that moment just before you're going to go out and dance?

CD: It feels ok. I'm not nervous for me, I'm nervous for another person, which is a really strange situation. You go through life knowing how to control your own body. Even when I've been really nervous to go out and dance; like in Japan in front of the Prince I was shaking... you learn to control your own body. When you're nervous for someone else, thinking, 'Will he remember? Is he going to do that corner turn right? Is he going to close his feet?' This is a scary thing.

RYG: When you're partnered up with your celebrity for the first time, do you ever think to yourself - I'm not going to be able to do this?

CD: I have to say, with James last year, when he took the first steps I really thought 'What?' I can say this cos I told him; I said 'What do I do with this?' Because he was stomping along. What we did were exercises. I gave him lots and lots of exercises, and he went home every night and came back better the next day.

This is where disciplined people work well in these situations. It became his life for those three months, although he was working very hard, dancing is what he wanted to do, and look at him, he just transformed. He became a dancer, he still dances today and that's what makes me proud. We danced six months later, he could do the whole waltz, the whole foxtrot, and he loved it. That is a great feeling.

RYG: That must make you feel really good as a teacher?

CD: Absolutely. I danced with David Dickenson in the first series. We didn't get very far in the competition but my victory there was that I made him give up smoking. He's still not smoking two years later so that is a good thing. If you smoke and you exercise a lot, when you're exercising you can't breathe properly, it makes you aware - hang on I'm not that healthy.

RYG: If you could would you put dance on the curriculum?

CD: Absolutely. I just think that dancing is such a good way to exercise. I can only advertise it for me because I've had the most wonderful experiences. I've made great friendships that have lasted me my entire life. I've travelled the world with dance. I've met people from all walks of life who've really inspired me in different directions. It's a great way to socialise and interact with other people.

Today everything is about email and text. We don't really get to interact a lot. When you go dancing you can go with a group of friends or you can go with your partner... whatever. That feeling of just suddenly mastering a step that you've been working on for weeks... it's brilliant, it's the best.

RYG: Can you teach anyone to dance?

CD: Yes you can teach anyone. I think Strictly Come Dancing shows that. What you have to allow is that some people take longer than others and that's ok. It's like me singing; I wasn't a natural, but I set myself a goal. I will learn, I will keep practicing. I take longer than maybe someone else, but that's ok. I'm really loving that because it's another way to express yourself.

RYG: Strictly Come Dancing has really made dancing sexy for young people. Suddenly young people are interested in a formal way of dancing...

CD: For me dancing was always sexy. It was so lovely to wear all these brilliant dresses. Who doesn't want to dress up like a princess all the time? I have to say, 25 years on, I'm still not bored with dressing up.

Strictly Come Dancing has given it a fresh look. It doesn't have to be in a stuffy ballroom and all about the feathers and the fake tans as people like to make out. You can hang around with some girlfriends, you have jeans and a t-shirt, and you put on the music. You dance and you dream away.

Dancing is escapism, that's what it is. It's a place where you forget everything that goes on, all the serious messes in the world, all the homework, all the troubles, and you just dream about the music and express yourself. What I love about dancing the most is probably that it's individual to each person. Everyone can look beautiful, but in their own way. You can take 10 people with 10 different builds and they find their style.

RYG: What is your favourite dance?

CD: The Rumba. It's the slowest and the most difficult one technically, probably because it's so slow. It's where I can share my passion and my feelings - sadness, happiness, love and loss - with my partner.

RYG: How do you begin choreographing a dance?

CD: Sometimes you hear a piece of music and you think 'This music touches me, I want to explain this music to other people with my dancing.' That's probably how it starts mostly. On Strictly when I was a doll with James Martin winding me up, that started with the dress. I see inspiration every day. You go to watch a musical, theatre, a movie, listen to music. You just collect all these things and you build it from there.

RYG: Do you write the steps down?

CD: I don't write the steps down now no. When I'm creating with Ian we just feel things. Sometimes a mistake is the best step you can ever make. When you're trying to do something and then maybe he will throw into something and that becomes a step - that's the best step, when it just happens. We can put a new piece of music on and just start flowing and talking to each other through the moves, it's really interesting.

I would write the steps if I was doing it for someone else maybe, and obviously for the celebrities. Ray was very disciplined because he was learning the steps like a script. He would write down 'I have a right turn', 'I have a heel turn', things like that. We wrote down his entire routine and he would read through it every day. That comes down to discipline.

RYG: Dancing can give you an awareness of your body can't it? Standing up straight, how you look?

CD: I think dancing does so many things for you. It works your mind, it works your body. It releases your endorphins so you feel better, you feel happier, and it gives you a great awareness of your body. I'm very aware if there's something wrong, if I need to go to the chiropractor if my back is not right.

Also it gives you confidence. I've taught a lot of teenagers who've not been comfortable in themselves, especially boys, but dancing can change that. What I always teach young people is that if you go into something with a great open attitude, you're going to be much more lucky in life.

RYG: What advice would you give to young people who want to emulate your success?

CD: My dad advised me when I was about 18 that 'If you want to follow your dreams that's great, but why don't you just get an education next to it and find a way to balance both?' That meant a lot of discipline, and that was hard. I thank him for that today.

If one day you get an injury, or you decide this is not for you, then you've got another option, so that was probably one of the greatest bits of advice I've ever had. I actually gave dancing up for a little while to finish taking education in Denmark. I studied Law and Finance and became an Estate Agent. Then I felt ready to follow my dreams.

RYG: One last question. When you go out and socialise, do you find that if you get up to dance, everyone else clears the dance floor?

CD: No, I feel that when I get up to dance everyone comes to join in, cos I get really into it. People think, 'Surely you dance all day, you don't want to go out Saturday night'. I love going out Saturday night with my boyfriend who's a non-dancer, who just knows a few basic steps and get dancing with all my friends. You just want to move, feel the rhythms of the songs. No, I never get sick of dancing... never.