PM: Your story of how
you started pole dancing
is connected to your wife
and is really quite beautiful, could you repeat it for
those who have not heard
it yet?
We had a dance school together. She was teaching pole, me
- a lot of other dance styles.
She begged me to do pole, as
sometimes I was substitute
for her (funny enough - break
dance of all dance styles is the
most similar in physics to pole
dance), but I didn`t want to.
Then she fell very sick and had
to stay in the hospital abroad.
I couldn`t stay with her there,
as had to take care of our
school - the one giving us
money for hospital bills. I was
very frustrated, sad and angry,
so decided to take my energy
into something new and physically demanding. I wanted to
make a surprise for my wife.
I started looking for championships I could apply to. The
one, that seemed ok and was
not too far away from us was
World Pole Dance in Zurich. I
was placed third. It hit me only
after a while - that it was world
championship and I performed
on pole for the second time in
my life.
PM: Does your wife travel with you to all your
competitions now? Does
she ever get jealous? You
must have many admirers
by now... :)
Yes, she always comes to
competitions with me. She is
a huge support, she worked
for a while on talent TV shows,
so she knows perfectly, how
to encourage and inspire, and
take stress off. That`s her special talent. She is never jealous. Actually, I think we have
less “jealousy-friendly” climate
now. Because I dance solo,
before often I had to work in
couple. And most of the dances, you know, are about passion and love. More than that,
when you work on TV shows,
usually participants live together in one house, isolated
from their families and friends.
Poor girls, who are only 1819 years old, fall in love with
dancers, choreographers, their
housemates MADLY! During
my work there I had girls sending me their pictures, trying to
kiss me etc. But even then we
never had any issues with my
wife. By the way, I have supporters not only among girls.
Few days ago I posted picture
on facebook, then said to my
wife: somebody commented - i love you! She was like: I
just hope, it`s a girl. I looked
up and added: No, it`s Steven
(Retchelss). My wife: Steven
is ok.
and street dance has been
a great advantage when
you started pole dancing?
Yes, of course. Gymnastics is
the best base for pole dance
among sports. Break dancing - is the best base for pole
among dance styles. So if
you have children, they are
interested in pole, but you are
not sure yet, if you want them
to do it that early - sign them
up for gymnastics or break
dance. When they are 13-15
they will catch up with pole
immediately.
PM: Do you still do street
dance? Is there any time
for that l