Jenny Collins is a lifelong dancer with a passion that spans decades. Now, as part of the team Dance Out, she’s one of the people taking dancesport to the 2011 Outgames in Wellington next year. express caught up with her to talk about the upcoming games and her team’s place in it. 


Jenny has been dancing almost her entire life, trying out different styles along the way. Recently her passion has led her to running dance classes for the lesbian ball – she taught Auckland’s lesbian community how to dance before their big night.


“I’ve run dance classes for the lesbian ball for the last few years,” says Jenny. “Then last year I was speaking to Bonny Brown, a woman from the class, who said she thought we should enter into Outgames. We kept in contact and then at the beginning of this year decided to put a team together. We enlisted Brian Jones (dance pro from Dancing With The Stars) as our coach to teach and extend us, and started classes in February. It started out with just 11 women in the first class, then it took off and now we have 35 on our books and about 22 dancing every week.


“We did a display dance at the lesbian ball and we had seven couples dancing. It was really awesome and all involved are really committed to entering competitions at Outgames. We practice a couple of times a week now.”


At Outgames in Wellington next year, the group will be competing in ballroom and Latin dances – the waltz, quick step, rumba, cha-cha, foxtrot, tango, jive – the works! 
“There are a few ways the competition works – you can go in as a beginner – there are four styles you can choose from and can dance in all four or your choice of the four,” says Jenny. “In the graded section you have to dance two Latin and two ballroom dances, so you have to do a minimum of four; there are also people who will dance six or eight times. 


“Most of the people in our class will be entering in the beginners’ section because they are new to dancing but we’ve got people who have danced before who will be graded; there’s a real mix of dancers.”


Jenny has danced with opposite sex partners before, but says she loves dancing with women. 
Dancing with women is fantastic. I’ve danced with men before, and roles are obviously very much set. With same-sex dancing, one person leads and the other follows – you choose whatever you’re more comfortable with and you can switch roles; the freedom and flexibility of same-sex dancing is great.”


Right now the group is looking for people to join them, whether to become part of the Outgames team or to learn dancing for fun. And even though the group is pretty full of women right now, they’d love guys to come along too!


“We’re mainly women – we started out with just women, we’ve had guys come regularly and others try but right now we’re only women. We do want to teach guys too, so if there are guys out there willing to learn to dance, we’d love to have them.”
If you’d like to meet the dancers heading to Outgames next year, head along to Dot’s Bar on Sunday 24 October, where the group will be doing display dances to live music. Tickets are available through Jenny personally.


If you’d like to learn to dance, classes are held at the Grey Lynn Library Hall, Grey Lynn, Auckland. are Thursdays 7.30-8.30pm for experienced dancers and 8.30-9.30pm for beginners. No experience necessary and no partner required. 
For more information call Jenny on 0210568101 or email her – .