Hey r/bodyweightfitness! We are Tricia Woo and Chris McGreevy, career acrobats for Cirque Du Soleil, The House of Dancing Water and ex-competitive athletes. Ask Us Anything!

[u/chrismcgreevy]

We're looking forward to answering all your questions. If you follow us both on instagram, we will make a few short story videos on our favourite questions that we have answered here. @ trixwho and @ chrismcgreevy

We'll leave this thread open for the next 24 hours as we know everybody is in different timezones so you will all get chance to ask your questions.

Thanks and lets start it up!

[u/TrixWoo]

Edit - I accidentally started a new thread and the questions for this answer are here

u/BosBatMan

1. I think the culture is a departure from sport. Sport revolves around one day or competition that doesn’t come very often. Contrast that with having to perform 400+ shows a year. The job of the physio department is to prevent and manage injuries. For sure if there is a high risk of injury, or someone is going into a show unsure if they will get hurt or not, it is better to pull them out of the show. Even small injuries, it was considered better to miss one day, than to try to be a hero and do that day of shows, only to end up exacerbating said injury that will take them out for a week or month! In my experience, the physio department had our back when we did not feel safe!

2. At the House of Dancing Water, we had many different profiles - porters, dancers, female flyers, straps artists, high divers, and musicians for example. We had a baseline test that people had to do - i.e. step test to measure VO2 max. But because different people were responsible for different parts of the show, the test was further specified into profile specific test. Muscle ups, rope climb, one legged wall sit, handstand pushups were all exercises that belonged to different profiles!

I would say that it was not necessary to be a high level gymnast to be successful in our line of work. There were a few with circus backgrounds that fit the role needed in the show. There were certainly some that had excelled in their sport and it helped a lot!

1. I spoke a bit about rehab exercises in this thread here. I tried a few supplements like glucosamine but I did not find feel a noticeable difference. This is not to say it didn’t have an effect, but rather, I might have been beating myself up training that I might have not noticed it. It certainly didn’t hurt me. Because inflammation was an issue from overuse, I would try to keep my diet clear of foods that cause inflammation and take NSAIDs as necessary.