"Wanna do the Berlin Dance Competition again next year?" I asked Sharon.

"You bet," she replied.

We had just finished the February 2002 Berlin competition and had not made the semi-finals. The clock was running and we had one year to knock 'em out with something spectacular.

Following the 2002 instructions, we stuck to moves that were strictly salsa - no jazzy shines, no posturing, no hip hop. Although the crowd loved what we did, the judges did not advance us. They were looking for a show, not a dance. After our performance people asked us where we had learned some of our moves. They were very surprised when I told them we had learned a number of our favorite turns and dips from an instructor who had gotten stuck in a time warp that went back 15 years. Ironically I had to show that instructor a cross-body lead - the staple of most salsa taught today.

"Outrageous moves next time - meltdowns, dips, spins, everything," we vowed. "We are in this for fun," Sharon said. "Let's see how far we can go. No expectations."

Now we started the unromantic, unsexy chore of designing a sizzling, sexy, show-stopping salsa routine. Recalling Argentine tango, a dance where the woman is literally shown to the entire room, we began to think about moves and music. The longest trip begins with the first step. And we took a lot of steps on this particular journey.

It is one thing to play with the music, doing whatever feels nice at the moment. Flirty, sexy, comfortable - no two patterns are ever the same. It is another thing to compete with the music. For a competition we would have to dance the very same moves with the very same expressions and emotions, note for note, each time we heard our music. Any slip or pause would throw the entire routine off. But we were up to this challenge.

Fun and Sexy

"What do you want to do?" I asked Sharon.

"Something fun and sexy," she replied.

"Jeez, we have a lot to do."

We started by looking at what we did not want to do.

Shines were out. While shines show off footwork like jazz, we did not think they were sensual. There is no direct physical connection to the partner. And we were not interested in going toe-to-toe with our shine-oriented competitors who would hopscotch through almost a third of their routines.

Since the crowd really liked our sexy and sensual dips, we would make them our salsa signature. Working from our strength made perfect sense as we snap off dips the way most couples snap off turns.

As we were unknown in the local salsa circuit, we also decided to take a number of workshops from various instructors around town. That way, these instructors (who are in some cases the judges), would 'know' where the moves came from and would find it 'easier' to judge us.

Klutzes at Work

We tend to be really klutzy while learning and this seemed to be the impression we left with everyone who saw us at the workshops. We stumbled through men's and women's sexy styling. We waddled through five- and six-element turn patterns, knowing we would keep only two or three elements from them. And we suffered through the shines that often came along with the workshops.

With limited time in the week to dance, we went out only once every few weeks. We had to make every second count, since I was taking four courses, working full time and freelancing. We did a lot of our practice and training in the studio where I teach fitness - enjoying the mirrors and the nice wood floor.

September rolled around. We had to find the music we would use. And it would take time to really learn it and work up moves for it. I know a salsa disc jockey who offered to make a CD for me. I asked him to fill it with music that "would make the crowd go bananas." He did not disappoint. Picking through that CD song by song, we settled on track 7 - a very strong and fast song. In fact a commercial selling a popular back remedy uses it.

We asked our old-time instructor if we could do part of the dance showcase that his ballroom students do every year. He thought it would be a great idea since we were so different from the ballroom crowd. When we ran our music by him, his only comment was, "It is a little fast." We told him it was 3 minutes and 30 seconds long but we believed we could fill it. This piece is so fast, even the "On 2" crowd would have trouble keeping up. That would be our other secret weapon - sexy, sizzling and fast. After our instructor watched us run through a few figures with the music, he smiled. We knew we were on to something special.

Our old-time instructor's showcase was in early February and the Berlin competition preliminaries started a week later. The clock was ticking loudly now.

Learning the Showstopper

December was a turning point: a dip and showstopping dip workshop was coming up. And the showstopping dips were indeed - showstopping. They included front and back neck drops, a drop done twice with a turn between each drop, and a neck cradle. We stumbled and hesitated through the entire two hours, soaking up every nuance and every element that went into these dips. Then we went home to practise. It took a month to get the neck drop working safely.

Some things were easy to decide. We would use the entire song for the dance showcase but we needed only 2 minutes for the Berlin competition. Now it was time to choreograph moves to music. Most of our potential competitors either hired an instructor to choreograph a routine for them or they memorized a professional routine from videos. With thousands of dollars in prizes at stake, spending hundreds of dollars for a routine was a good investment. We were so glad we did this the hard way - by ourselves. We wanted to be true amateurs and we wanted this to be ours.

Make a List - Check it Twice

Sitting down with a blank sheet of paper, we wrote down every element and figure we knew, counting the measures and bars each one needed. Counting the total number of bars in our song, we saw that we had more than enough moves to fill the song. Cutting things out is so much easier than trying to fill up.

Woo! Hoo! Things did not seem so impossible now!

Knowing a mixture of classic New York salsa and newer cross-body oriented salsa, we began to string our figures and turns together so they would flow nicely from one to the next and would complement or punctuate the music.

"This is hard, tedious work," I said to Sharon. "But I think it will be worth it."

We walked through each figure, then listened to the music. "Will we ever finish this?" "We can't move fast enough to stay on the music," we lamented.

Yet our routine began to take shape. We would let our moves tell a little story.

Guy sees Girl, Guy flirts with Girl.

Girl flirts with Guy.

Guy and Girl tease each other.

Guy and Girl finish in each other's arms.

No Austin Powers MoJo, no ears painted white, no props, no hallowe'en costumes, no hip hop. Straight black for me and Sharon's flippy skirt would let the salsa speak for itself.

We could only use our music for the finals so we decided to start apart. This would give us a flirty start and allow us to work into any melody the preliminary and semi-finals would throw at us. Opening with a few Suzy Qs - our concession to shines - Sharon's double turn and a quick drop we nicknamed the Ah Ha! dip would catch the crowd and the judges off guard. No one would be expecting such strong moves so soon. Keeping this heat up for another whole minute and a half - a very long time when plotting out moves to music - was our biggest challenge.

A dizzying blur of arms and a flirty nose-to-nose pattern we called Giovanni 2 would keep things sexy and sizzling. Our old instructor's Tornado ending with a flirty rico suave and our second embrace would fan the flames.

We began naming our figures - attempting to commit moves to music to feet. Sharon called out the name while we were training so I knew which figure to start as we were learning our way through the music. This was so mechanical! But creating a sexy competition routine is hard work. Putting in the 'attitude' and actually enjoying the routine would come later.

Ouch!

By mid-January, we were breathing, eating and sleeping salsa, and we were walking through our figures with and without the music. Neck cradle, push push, figure 8, double dip, Tango slide, Ebon dip, neck drop, Tango finish became a blur. After one intense practice, Sharon's hands and wrists were badly bruised from all the dips. Doing a dip once is easy, but repeating it five times in a row to get it right was starting to take its toll. We practised until Sharon would drift right on her basic turns. Then we knew we had had enough.

Surprisingly, we did not fight with each other or burst into tears. Somehow we were able get through this very stressful experience smiling and still talking.

Sharon had a reputation as a very quiet person in her office, so Latin dance, salsa, dance partner and dance contest really rocked those folks. We now had an unofficial cheering section as they asked how things were going and tracked our progress. When they heard the competition was at Berlin, they ooohed and aahed. The name Berlin in Toronto has a cachet like no other. And Berlin (now Manhattan Fuel) is the standard that all other clubs try to reach.

A project often takes on a life of its own and our Berlin Dance Competition was running us. After a lot of hard work and stiff shoulders, we finally got through our entire routine - no hiccup, no pause, no nothing. Just pure salsa. Two days were left until our instructor's dance showcase and about 10 days until Berlin.

"Again, with attitude!" I barked one more time - more for me than for Sharon.

"This feels so good now!"

Testing...Testing...Testing...

We turned up for our old instructor's dance showcase almost as soon as they had the venue open. He was a little anxious. Since the last time he had seen us, we were stumbling around and hesitant.

"Can you run through it for us?" he asked. His own dance and business partner were there with a few students.

"Here is the music - let's go." I told Sharon we needed to know our routine so well that we could perform it anytime - on demand. Off we went!

The Ah Ha dip worked as advertised - we kept going! The music rolled like a wave and we were surfing its crest! Flirty, sexy, sensual - it worked! A tango embrace with Sharon's leg up over my hip as the last note died away was our finish. They were spellbound! Later we found out that they had no clue what was coming next as we whirled from one figure to the next. Ballroom and dancesport is predictable while street dancers are not. Sizzling, sexy and fast paid off! Nailing the moves right on the beat really brought it home. Our energy was infectious.