A hula hoop is not the first thing that comes to mind when I think “comeback artist”. Travolta, circa Pulp Fiction maybe, but hula hoop? It turns out they have more in common than you may think, and I’m not just talking about hip action.

Hula hooping has recently experienced a resurgence after casting aside its innocent roots as a child’s toy and emerging as a sassy new tool of dance and exercise. Today’s hula hoops little resemble the lightweight hoops first introduced to America in the 1950’s. These beautiful hoops of glory are bigger and heavier than their predecessors and are strikingly adorned with ribbons, sparkles, and in some cases luminescence, (or bioluminescence if you believe hoops carry their own life force).

My first encounter with Hula Hooping

Hooping, or hoop dance as it is becoming popularly known, is visually similar to ribbon dancing, and is equal parts physical exercise and movement art, with a pleasantly surprising meditative quality.

Kristina Sutcliffe, owner of O Dance in Boulder, is a certified Zumba and Hoop Dance instructor and all around movement connoisseur. Pulling from her experiences in ballet, modern dance, and salsa, she teaches people how to move with the hoop by incorporating elements of dance. “It becomes a fun exploration. The hoop reacts to you; you’re playing off of each other,” she says.

Sutcliffe gravitated away from her beginnings in ballet, finding it too structured and ‘Black Swan-esque’, and attained a degree at CU in modern dance, which she deemed healthier for herself in both body and mind. However, it wasn’t until after a twelve-year hiatus from the dance scene, spent mainly in the company of family and wedding flowers (her business at the time), when she discovered hooping at a blue grass festival with her daughter, who encouraged her mother to try it. Now, after teaching it for three years, Sutcliffe credits the hoop for reviving her dance spark, and says she has come into her own methodology. Her motto at O Dance is to “keep movement in people’s lives.”

“Every human being can dance.” says Sutcliffe. “We all have it in us to move through space, but there is not much dancing in this society. There are lots of linear things like running, biking, yoga, and pilates, rather than dance, which is circular. It takes you out of the western way of over thinking, and allows you to just feel. Any time you have a circular energy in life, you give something and get something back, like riding a wave kayaking; you hardly having to paddle. You feel on top of the world.”

Sutcliffe in the Studio

In class I witness the simple beauty of hooping, and it is hypnotizing. A halo effortlessly orbits around the body to a subtle, pulsating rhythm. The hoop travels up and down torso, chest, and neck, is extended into the air above, and lingers on fingertips before spinning buoyantly down the arm again. The repetitive motion is like a heartbeat, and is simultaneously powerful and graceful, not to mention a great ab workout.

Hooping might be the perfect ‘do anywhere’ workout. Sutcliffe witnesses people’s bodies change from doing it for just 20 minutes a day. “It’s a great cross trainer,” she says. “People are able to expand their movement capabilities.”

Just like any dedicated athlete, hoopers can attend annual retreats for extended training. This summer, the Spin Summit, a rocky mountain Colorado spin conference, is being held for 5 days in July at Winter Park. Similar to yoga retreats, scattered people from the hooping community converge at one location and stay in cabins or tents. They study with master hoopers from around the world, hooping for 12 hours a day in various workshops and “jamming” at night. At last year’s hoop conference, there were 250 hoopers in Santa Cruz.

Hooping students of O Dance Studio meet outside of class to casually hoop together in the grassy parks of Boulder with the help of an iPod and portable speakers. Many of the students speak of the tight sense of community they feel when hooping together. As a socially friendly activity, not to mention conversation starter, the group is ever evolving, enticing unsuspecting passersby like sirens, and tempting them to step out of their comfort zone and into a hoop.

To see what all the hoopla is about, try ODance for hoop classes held at various locations in Boulder. http://odance.net/