Different shoes for different floors?

[sumayasaahir]

What kinds of shoes do you wear for

1. Pergo/wood floors?
2. Stage
3. Carpet
4. outdoor venues, non stage?

I was practicing my song today for 3.5 hours on my Pergo floor in bare feet (can you tell Ive got a tad of OCD?). Ouch! Now Im gonna have the mother of all blisters.

Then I went to the studio where I danced in my ballroom heels, that were WAY too slippery for that Pergo floor.

Friday I will be dancing on carpet, and now Ive gone and confused myself. Ballroom shoes or no shoes at all, do you recommend?

I think im going to invest in foot undies for practicing in my home studio and work studio.

[Lauren_]

For practice, I like leather split-sole ballet slippers on just about any flooring. I also like teaching sandals (Pedini or Grecian sandals).

I had lyrical shoes but didn't like them, and I don't think the foot undeez or dance paws would work for me either, because I discovered I like my heel covered & my toes held together.

I'm still experimenting with my ballroom shoes.

[Gia al Qamar]

You think YOU'RE obsessive?! LOL!
I carry with me to gigs my dance shoes (these are outdoor 'street' shoes that are like ballet flats with a 1/4" heel) as well as lyric sandals and sometimes also foot undies.
When I arrive at the venue, I check out the floor and determine which shoe I'll need. For teaching, I usually wear Pedinis, for master classes or the workshops I take, I like the lyric sandals. I have Hermes as well, but retired them long ago...
I never wear ballroom shoes.
Gia

[badriya_al_ahmar]

I can tell you from experience that any kind of half-sole, foot-undeez, etc are not very practical on carpeting--no matter how well they fit, they eventually torque around and start cutting off the circulation in your toes. At least that's what I've found. I think that something that covers the entire sole of the foot is better on carpet--ballroom heels are fine if you are mindful of not catching a heel against the carpet pile.

Marley floors are my least favorite floor. I have no idea why they are supposed to be such a great thing.

[HotDogYogini]

A marley floor is only great if a proper subfloor has been put in under it. Otherwise it's only ok. Similarly, Pergo isn't bad, but, if the sub-floor is concrete, it would be best not to dance on it, regardless of what shoe or foot covering you wear. For outdoors, dance sneakers or regular sneakers are better. I use my dance sneakers on carpet & find that to be fine. I am now taking a class in a matted aikido room, & use gel socks with a Dr. Roth's arch pad under them. That works pretty well. (The studio doesn't allow any kind of shoes.) For a brief performance, I do like ballet slippers, personally.

[vilia]

I usually wore heels, so I'd carry two pair to every gig that I'd not done before. One pair would have leather soles, the other would be the same kind of shoe but with rubber on the soles and heels. I found I used the leather soles the most, because the majority of floors were either carpet or not terribly slick (and I always liked a little slickness for turns). BTW, Stiletto (sp) heels don't work well on deep or shag carpeting because they throw you off balance, but the wider character shoe type heel is usually okay. The rubber soled shoes were for super slick floors, particularly wooden ones that had been polished ... uuuggghhhh! If you wear ballroom shoes with the suede bottoms, they work well on slick floors too.

Uneven floors and outdoors are another problem, and I've been known to shed my shoes completely for a floor with throw rugs that I could trip over or big lumps and potholes that I would not be as aware of in shoes. Outdoors, I've worn both ballet slippers and character shoes, but they're usually ones that are a little older and I don't mind if they get a bit messy.

A lot of this depends on your dance style, too, and how much you move around the floor, but I discovered it's best to practice both with and without shoes so that you can dance either way, depending on the situation.

A good tip a teacher once told me is that if you find you're going to have to dance on a very slick floor and you don't have appropriate shoes with you, dowse the bottoms of your shoes with Coke right before you go on and enter with a series of spins or walks all around the floor. By the time you're done with that, you'll have a stickier floor to dance on.

[Genisis]

I am a Virgo so I completely understand the utility of this question.
At class/workshops or dance practice I always wear athletic sneakers. I jump, stomp and shimmy a lot and it really improves and preserves your body.

When performing I just use whatever type of shoe I like be it high heel or boot and I add inserts, heel pads and non-slick sole adhesives. I just put them on the bottom of my shoes and its instant traction. Thats my little secret for doing backbends in high heels on wood floors. ;-)

http://www.footsmart.com/P-Foot-Peta...erz-90084.aspx

Take care of your feet!
~*Genisis*~