Ryan Lochte Previews ‘Dancing With the Stars’ Week 8 And His Halloween-Themed Tango

This week on Dancing With the Stars, Ryan Lochte and his partner, Cheryl Burke, will take on a Halloween theme, complete with a powerful Disney antagonist. In his blog for Yahoo TV, Lochte talks about his intense Halloween dance, his face-off fears, and how he plans to use his place on the leaderboard to his advantage on the celebrity ballroom competition.

This week we’re dancing tango. It’s going really well, actually. Usually, the process for me has been Tuesday through Friday I’m just getting the steps down and I’m not really getting into dancing to the music. And then I have to get into character for Saturday and Sunday. But this time I started going full in. So every step that I did, I did with character, I did with an expression, and I’m just dancing full force and it’s been coming along.

They changed my theme, so I’m not going to be the werewolf (pictured above). Instead, Cheryl is going to be Maleficent, the queen with the wings, and I’m going to be some kind of prince. Our song, “Howlin’ For You” by the Black Keys, hasn’t changed, just the theme. I’m really excited for Halloween week because I’ve always liked dressing up and I can’t wait to see what the show has with everyone’s different costumes and everything like that. I think it’s going to be fun.

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This week we also have a face-off dance, but we don’t know who we’re up against. We won’t know until the show starts. For the face-off wild card we get either salsa, cha-cha, or the jive, so I have to know a different routine for each dance style. So that’s going to be a hard one. Hopefully, I get lucky and I get to pick the dance, and I can pick salsa or something I’ve done already.

I haven’t rehearsed the face-off styles because we’re still working on tango. It’s crazy. I mean, salsa I know some steps just because of what I remember from when I did it before on the show. Cha-Cha I hardly remember any steps because it was during Week 3 when I did it, so I kind of forgot about that. But jive I’ve never learned, so I have to learn a whole new dance. It’s gonna be hard.

If I had to pick which couple I wouldn’t want to face off against, it would probably be James and Sharna. James is improving each week, and he’s one of the best male dancers ever to compete on the show.

Last week was a little hard to have act sexy for the rumba — just because I don’t try to be sexy. It naturally happens — from what my fiancée says. So to try to act that way, it’s hard because I’m not really used to it. This week I don’t have to be sexy, I just have to be intense.

Last week there were some parts of my dance where I was a little lost but I think this week, because it’s more of an intense thing, I’ve been practicing it in my rehearsals and doing certain moves more intense. Like when I do a kick I imagine that I’m frustrated, that I’m trying to kick all these people down. So hopefully that will change for this week.

We’re at the bottom each week, so there’s only one way I can go, and that’s up. So I could use that to my advantage, because when people are already up and they go down, they get discouraged and wonder what happened. For me, I’m already at the bottom so all I have to do is just keep working my way up.

All my fans out there, you’re the reason I’m still on the show. All of the love and support that you have been showing for me, and all the votes you’ve been casting for me, keep it up! And stay tuned for a Halloween night on Dancing With The Stars. (As told to Victoria Leigh Miller)

Dancing with the Stars airs Mondays at 8 p.m. ET on ABC. Watch clips and full episodes of DWTS for free on Yahoo View.

Ryan Lochte is a competitive swimmer and 12-time Olympic medalist. He is currently competing on the 23rd season of Dancing With the Stars.