Muscles Store Potential Energy

TL:dr; No, they don't because they can't. Nor can muscles us PE from gravity. Refer to Potential For Energy to see what you feel is going on.

Dance Myths and Biomechanical Reality (SBAS Perspective)

This section collects common misconceptions in Standard and Smooth dance instruction—especially those repeated in syllabi or coaching—that conflict with biomechanical principles and SBAS modeling.

Each myth is followed by a fact-based rebuttal, grounded in physics, anatomy, and first-person insight.

❌ MYTH: “Push into each other to create tension and explode outward”

✅ FACT: This is a theatrical device, not biomechanical truth.

While the sensation of opposition may feel “powerful,” it:

• Does not store mechanical energy
• Does not aid lead/follow timing
• Often results in bracing or premature movement

True redirection power in Smooth comes from:

• Coordinated foot pressure against the floor
• Use of center mass + rotation
• Controlled muscular sequencing

❗ Do not try to generate power by pushing into your partner. It's not physics. It's drama.

❌ MYTH 1: "Your Muscles Store Potential Energy Like a Spring"

Claim: When you rise or shape, your muscles store potential energy, which you can later release for power or explosiveness.

In Reality:

• Muscles do not store mechanical energy like springs.
• Muscles generate force through active contraction, not passive recoil.
• Any energy "release" must be consciously initiated via motor control.

What’s Actually Happening:

• Dancers create readiness to move by applying force against the floor, storing pressure in the floor–joint–frame system, not inside the muscles.
• There is no internal spring-like recoil. Explosive motion is the result of sequenced contraction and redirection of existing momentum, not energy storage.

❌ MYTH 2: "Rise Stores Energy for Lowering"

Claim: When you rise (e.g., in Waltz or Foxtrot), you’re storing energy that gets released during lowering.

✅ In Reality:

• Rise is an action, not a storage state.
• There is no mechanical energy held during rise—just elevation of the center of mass.
• Lowering is not a release—it’s another action.

What’s Actually Happening:

• Rise creates a change in geometry and mass distribution.
• Lowering is a controlled descent, requiring active eccentric control of the supporting leg muscles.
• There is no bounce, spring, or “energy return.”

❌ MYTH 3: "Push Into Your Partner to Build Tension for an Explosive Release"

Claim: Leader and Follower should press into each other’s hands or arms to build tension, which can then be released explosively by breaking contact or changing direction.

✅In Reality:

• This does not store energy. It builds brace tension that must later be overcome.
• The “release” is not powered by stored force—it’s powered by a new muscular contraction.
• If both partners are pressing, neither is free to move.

What’s Actually Happening:

• Instructors may be trying to teach the feeling of coordinated preparation.
• In practice, this approach leads to rigid frames, early movement, and awkward transitions.

Better Alternative:

• Use torso rotation, foot pressure, and frame elasticity to shape and prep.
• Let the lead/follow dynamic control energy direction, not pushing.

🧠 In Summary:

• SBAS models energy through physics and biomechanics, not metaphors.
• Dancers generate energy, redirect it, or absorb it.
• There is no free ride. If energy appears, it came from conscious movement, floor pressure, or rotational torque—not mysterious spring-loading.

Muscles do not store mechanical potential energy (PE): a proof sketch

The Claim:

“During dance, muscles store PE like springs and later release it explosively.”

Step 1 — What “muscle” must do to create/hold force

Skeletal muscle force arises from actin–myosin cross-bridge cycling that requires ATP at every stage (attachment, power stroke reset, and crucially detachment). Even isometric (no length change) contractions consume ATP; there is no “free” mechanical store waiting to be released. SpringerOpenPMC

Therefore: If you relax a contracting muscle, you don’t get spring recoil; you simply stop paying ATP and the force vanishes unless some other elastic element (not the contractile fibers) was loaded.

Step 2 — Where elastic PE actually lives in the muscle–tendon unit

Canonical models (Hill-type) separate a Contractile Element (CE) from Series/Parallel Elastic Elements (SE/PE)—physically the tendon, aponeurosis, connective tissue, and passive myofilament elasticity (e.g., titin). Those elastic elements can store and return PE; the contractile element does not. PMCBioMed CentralPhysiology Journals

Therefore: Any genuine mechanical PE you feel/see is in tendons & passive structures, not in the ATP-driven cross-bridges.

Step 3 — Empirical evidence for elastic storage (not in contractile fibers)

In locomotion, tendons store and return elastic energy, buffering work on muscles and improving economy; this has been measured across species and at human joints (e.g., ankle plantar flexors). PMC+1The Company of Biologists JournalsPubMed

Therefore: The “spring” you can exploit in dance is mainly tendon/fascia elasticity plus gravitational PE (rise), not muscular PE.

Step 4 — Consequence for the “explosive release” narrative

If muscles truly stored mechanical PE, we’d see passive recoil on relaxation (work output without ATP). Instead, release requires new motor drive; the “pop” comes from timed activation + elastic tendon recoil + gravitational fall, not muscle-belly springing. SpringerOpenPMC

Side-by-side: coaching claim vs mechanics

Hamilton / Least Action connection (why good dancers look “effortless”)

Hamilton’s principle picks the motion minimizing (technically: making stationary) the action \($∫(T−V) dt\)$In dance, optimal technique tends to minimize costly muscle work by (i) using gravity (V) wisely and (ii) redirecting momentum (T) while exploiting elastic tissues for brief storage/return—not by banking energy in the contractile apparatus. sonometrics.comPMC

TL;DR “proof”

1. Cross-bridge mechanics require ATP even to hold or reset → no passive mechanical store in muscle belly. SpringerOpenPMC

2. Elastic PE is measured in tendons/passive elements, not contractile fibers. PMCPubMed

3. Locomotion economy gains come from tendon elasticity and gravitational PE, consistent with observations in sport and gait—exactly what well-danced Smooth exploits. The Company of Biologists JournalsPLOS