Young Le?onore dancing [Photo provided to China Daily]

From the pirouette to the arabesque, you've mastered all the ballet steps. If you were one of them, which one would you be?

A jump!

One needs energy to jump – where do you get yours from?

Music. It has always made me dance. When I was a little girl, I used to dance in the living room, listening to my favourite tunes for hours: Brahms' Hungarian Dances and Chopin's Nocturnes. Today, my favourite ballets are those whose music inspires me the most, like The Rite of Spring by Igor Stravinsky – and Pina Bausch's choreography really reflects what I hear in this music. I also like to listen to jazz, Charleston and swing.

Tell us your ballerina secrets – what's your feel-good ritual backstage?

I love massages. It's a professional care that I indulge myself with.

What would we see in your private dressing room?

A lot of snacks: cereal bars and almonds everywhere! We don't always have the time to eat a proper lunch, so it's very important to keep energy sources at hand. I pay a lot of attention to what I eat. Not to restrain myself, as many people think dancers do, but on the contrary – to eat enough of everything. Diets without protein, carbohydrates or fat are a catastrophe when you have to dance eight hours a day. I would like to tell young dancers that if they want to have a long and beautiful career, they need to eat well – otherwise they run the risk of injuries. Anorexia is a real plague in the world of dance and it's such a pity to see young dancers broken because of it.