The " pitch " in a partnership ( or without ), initiates the fwd action,,, the compression from the supporting leg creates the kinetic energy needed to complete the desired direction and speed .. hence,, motion...

If your weight is in the correct position ( over the ball of the foot ) the slightest body projection will initiate the fwd motion ..as the "body " commences its pitch, the flexing of the knee and releasing of the heel, happens simultaneously.

And.. could a man with no legs move fwd ( or back ) of course.. he would fall over,, but move he did !

A better e.g... watch a baby try to take its first steps.. it thrusts its body fwd without using its leg to " catch " the falling body.. hence the term " body falls, leg catches " .

Terence. I can't by that. I still say a person with no limbs and without moving the head forward cannot move. And what about if our movement in dancing is to the side. Would you say that the body moves first there also. How about to the side and slightly back. Do you guys actually watch a top dancer frame by frame. Maybe you might like to take a look at a Closed Change on this site and tell me what do you actally see. And if you watch John Wood in action. His foot goes way out in front, much further than the one on this site even.
This not a Rumba Walk we are discussing where the body does go to the point of imbalance and is then caught by the moving foot.

Anybody. Answer this. According to the Technique books, all of them. On a Forward Walk in the Standard Syle at the full extent of the stride as the front heel is on the floor and the ball of the rear foot is also on the floor. Exactly at this point where is the body.
Untill this is is understood and is done correctly, nothing we do will be right..

"Anybody. Answer this. According to the Technique books, all of them. On a Forward Walk in the Standard Syle at the full extent of the stride as the front heel is on the floor and the ball of the rear foot is also on the floor. Exactly at this point where is the body."

While this is too subtle a point for some of the official references which come from an era of movements that were fairly small overall, the actual answer is "substantially closer to the front foot than to the rear foot".

This is true even in non-dance walking. But it needs to be even more true in partner dancing, for the simple reasons that there's a partner's body in front of you for an overextended leg to run into, and there isn't anything behind you in the space you just vacated.

One noted exception is in the geometry of tango walks and similar situations in other dances; there the movement for the front leg is not actually towards the partner's body but across it in front or behind, and thus the leg can be safely sent somewhat further in advanced of the body than in the more usual cases. However the body is still likely to be closer to the front foot than to the rear.

You will see some difference of degree between different dancers. Generally, those who are closest to their front foot can have the straightest lower backs while remaining in body contact or near contact. Conversely, those where the closeness of the body to the front foot is less pronounced tend to have some arch in their lower backs in order to keep their hips further from their partner's and thus create room for the front leg to be a bit further in front of their body.

You move from the CORE ( unless you,re a chicken ! )...and if anything precedes the core, its the knee ( very slightly ,as Gleave said )..

If I had coached my profs in the manner you described, they would never have gotten out of rising star category..

can anyone post a link showing a top professional dancing, say, a foxtrot feather step, with the moving foot moving no more than about 6 inches in front of the body?

Hi anonymous
Thanks for answering my posting. I was really trying to make headway on Cyd's original comments about the moving foot being no more than 4-6 inches in front of the body. Nobody seems to have contradicted this comment yet i do not see it in the teaching videos i have (made by ex-world champions). I see a body pretty well mid-way between the feet at, for example, the instant the right foot reaches its position for step 1 in the feather step.
Can i ask a follow-up question (at great risk because it will divert from the original point)?
When the moving foot is passing the standing foot, shouldn't they both be under the body?

You will see the property of the forward moving body being substantially closer to the front foot than the rear on videos of top dancers actually dancing. Related, on the initial heel lead steps you will see that the front knee doesn't tend to get nearly as straight at maximum extension as a lot of lesser dancers try to make it. The foot placement is much closer to being "under" the body (especially if you extend the inclined line of the torso to down to the floor) rather than having the sense of being out in front of it.

However, it's interesting to note a lot of the same dancers will sometimes show broken down figures using very different proportions and orders of movement than they do when they dance. But as their talk progresses and they get closer to a "full" solo or partnered demonstration, their mechanics and actions change back to what is required for sublime partner dancing. Presumably when they are doing otherwise they are exaggerating the moving leg usage to show direction of movement and stretch, rather than action and proportion.

Thanks for these responses.
Here are some examples (you will notice they are 'real' competitions)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oD2Lj5noYhI&feature=related

At about 1 minute and 38 seconds, you will see a couple moving across the scene from the centre of the floor. But all through, on movements like feather steps and 3-steps, it's clear that the bodies are pretty well between the feet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23qwbFOVM1E&feature=related

Maybe it should 'feel like' the moving foot is no more than 6 inches in front of the body.

If anything, these videos support, rather than contradict my points.

They show a lot of examples of step one actions being onto a visibly bent knee, body closer to the front foot than the rear, such that the step is effectively contained within the movement of the body instead of reached out in front of it.

Similarly, they show step two actions where the moving leg is closely related to a line extended down the front of the torso to the floor.

But these examples are not, however 100% perfect - if you have a way to precisely pause the video, watch the couple in blue (we don't need to bring their names into this) at 0:24 in the Blackpool video where his right leg does go slightly too far out in advance on step one of a Natural, and see how it forces her out of position.