Nastia Liukin and Derek Hough have had a crazy week as usual preparing for Dancing With The Stars amid their busy schedules. While Hough is starring with the Rockettes all week in the “New York Spring Spectacular,” Liukin is trying to keep her head above water in classes at NYU. This week on the show, Hough and Liukin are dancing the Tango to Calvin Harris’ song “Summer” and the theme of the episode is “Spring Break.” Preparation for the show has had its ups and downs, especially because this week will be the first group dance. Doing a group routine is difficult when some of the cast members are away on the east coast. Hough opened up about this week’s individual routine in a blog with TV Guide, where he wrote:
I won’t say this week is crazy – I’m sure you’re sick of hearing me say that. It’s gonna be a patchwork week. We have our individual dance, the tango, which is looking good. We pretty much have the whole thing down and need to refine everything. Nastia is a quick learner and now that we’re getting halfway through the season, I want to increase the difficulty in the routines, but it’s tough to modulate since we’re not together on the weekends. I try to record and explain as much as I can to Sasha. We spend so much time just texting videos back and forth.
As far as the difficulties with the group dance go, Hough admitted that:
We also have the group dance this week and I wish I could tell you how that is going! Nastia and I haven’t started at all yet. We picked teams after the show and we’re on Team YOLO with Willow and Mark, Noah and Sharna, and Robert and Kym. We came up with a concept before I had to come back to New York. I had envisioned it starting off with Noah beating on a drum and doing his thing, and then Robert would come in. It was all planned out, and then yesterday afternoon, Mark calls and says they changed the whole concept. They’re still working it out, so I don’t really know the specifics yet. Nastia is leaving tonight, so she will learn it this weekend. I won’t learn it until Monday morning! So we’ll see what happens. For the first time, Nastia will be teaching me a dance. Fingers crossed!
Fortunately, Hough seems to be a very quick learner. As for Liukin, in addition to juggling school and Dancing With The Stars, Liukin has to juggle her relationship with boyfriend Matthew Lombardi. While Hough appears to be single, Liukin is very much in love. Do you think she’ll be able to handle school, a long-distance relationship and DWTS well enough to win the mirrorball trophy?
For more Hough and Liukin news, check out the below links: