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How to work out like a badass ballerina in the gym

New York City Ballet principal dancer Sara Mearns and personal trainer Joel Prouty.Annie Wermiel/NY Post


That babe next to you at the gym pumping hundred-pound barbells? She’s a ballerina, not a bodybuilder.

These days, top dancers can’t get by on grace and agility alone — which is why more of them are hitting the gym after they leave the barre. As New York City Ballet principal dancer Sara Mearns and other stars have discovered, dead lifts and squats lead to better pirouettes and pliés.
Cross-training, says Mearns’ trainer, Joel Prouty, can prevent injury and increase a dancer’s endurance and strength, improving performance during a rigorous career. But it’s still a fairly new concept.
“There was no cross-training when I was a dancer,” Prouty tells The Post. “There was this fear that it would take away from the aesthetic” and cause a “bulky” look — “but it doesn’t have to.”
Prouty, 39, performed with several ballet companies and toured with Twyla Tharp before retiring in 2010 to focus on the athleticism of dance. He took exercise physiology courses at New York University and began training dancers “away from the watchful and sometimes-judgmental” eyes of companies wary of extracurricular training.
Now, he says, “almost every major ballet company in the world” has started to embrace cross-training, as dancers are eager to prevent injury and unlock their full potential. He’s got a slew of high-profile clients on board, including American Ballet Theatre’s James Whiteside and the Martha Graham Dance Company’s Lloyd Knight, plus Mearns, who started working with Prouty in 2012 and says he has helped her perform with less pain after a back injury kept her offstage for 8 ½ months
“For so many years, I was just [overcompensating],” the 33-year-old dancer, who will reprise her role as the Sugarplum Fairy in “The Nutcracker” this year, tells The Post. “If I was injured, instead of making that part of my body stronger, I would just use other muscles that were strong already to make up for it. I’ve now found those muscles in working with Joel.”
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