Bellydance for Beginners with Suhaila: Fitness Fusion Series

General considerations

This is a set of four belly dance fitness DVDs with Suhaila Salimpour, which you can buy individually or, if you buy them together, it works out a bit cheaper.
These belly dance DVDs focus mainly on four different disciplines:

1. Bellydance for Beginners FitnessFusion JAZZ: the focus is on jazz dance steps, with three routines and the jazz steps are layered with movements of the hips.
   
   
2. Belly dance for Beginners Fitness Fusion BUNS:  the main focus is on exercises to tone the glutei. There are also some exercises on muscle isolation and drills on hip locks and other basic belly dance movements.
   
   
3. Belly dance for Beginners Fitness Fusion PILATES: in this DVD Suhaila guides you through some Pilate's exercises, aimed at strengthening the core muscles and the lower body, some of which are quite challenging. Drills on basic belly dance moves are also provided.
   
   
4. Bellydance for Beginners FitnessFusion YOGA: Suhaila guides you through some yoga exercises and belly dance moves drills, including undulations and hip locks.

Some exercises are quite challenging, the quality of the DVD's is very good and Suhaila is a very good teacher, who explains the movements very clearly.

Content

Each one of these DVDs has a warm up section; a section with exercises typical of the chosen discipline to strengthen the muscles; belly dance movements’ drills; a performance at the end and one special features section with a bonus workout (a bit more challenging than in the main section) and a bonus performance.

Advised level

These Suhaila Salimpour’s DVDs are fitness DVD's, rather then instructional and they are perfect companions for your practice at home. They can be used also by non belly dancers, but they are very useful for belly dancers as the exercises in these DVD's are aimed at strengthening exactly the main muscles needed in belly dance.
Even though they are called ‘Bellydance for Beginners’, I think that even the intermediate dancer can find something challenging and discover something new. For example, it is interesting to try and do some of the layered moves that Suhaila performs with no effort, such as squeezing your buttocks alternately while at the same time doing perfect undulations. These belly dance movements seem impossible to perform the first time but, the longer you try, the easier they will become.

Also, I found that, for advanced belly dancers, these DVD's are very good for warming up when practicing at home.

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