I'm back on the show this season, after taking a season off. Last winter I opened another dance studio, then I traveled a lot for both business and pleasure. This summer my brother and I sat down and said, "You know what? There are a lot of things we want to do that we never got a chance to before like hiking, white water rafting, rock climbing." So this summer we'd go and camp out somewhere. We had a big list of things and we got to do a lot of them. So it was a very cool summer. Then I rehabilitated my body. You know, after 24 years of dancing at one point you have to take care of yourself. My knees started to tweak and shoulders started to hurt. So I went in and worked a lot with my therapist and fixed everything up. I'm not going to say I'm an old man, but now I feel like I did ten years ago.

Now I'm getting geared up for the new season of the show, with my partner, Olympic beach volleyball champion Misty May-Treanor. I'm really excited just because she turned out to be a really cool person and somebody really easy to deal with. She's very not Hollywood-like. This one is fun.

I watched her on the Olympics before I knew she was going to be my partner. But then when I found out, I was looking at it differently. I was nervous when they played the Chinese team. Like there's no way they can lose. I want to dance with an Olympic gold medalist not silver.

Everybody I speak to says, "Oh you lucked out because you have an athlete." And then at the same time they go, "Oh, you have an athlete like a beach volleyball player. She's the furthest from dancing as you can be." I'm going to sound as conceited as I possibly can, but this is where I come in and help the situation. The point of the show is that hopefully whoever signs up to do it doesn't have any background in dancing. And I think this season all the celebrities are pretty even as far as their abilities and talent is concerned.

Everyone is going to be surprised by Misty. She practices nonstop. When she gets what it's all about she starts to criticize herself. And this is something I have to tell her. I was like, "Listen there is only one critic in this couple. Because with the two of us criticizing everything we wouldn't last. I mean you have to give yourself a lot of credit, which you deserve, and let me criticize you." I know how to play up her strengths and not her weaknesses. If she doesn't know how to do this, or how to do that, or if she doesn't know how to do a split, that's fine. There's a bajillion and one other things we can do that make her look good.

The last couple of days we've been bumping into other couples, whether we come to the studio and they're leaving, or we're leaving and they're coming. Everybody is friendly and we're all like, "Hi. Nice to meet you. Show us your mambo and we'll show you ours." And from what I see, Misty is doing so much better than some of the people that are "supposed to be" good.

I'm not necessarily looking at it as a competition though. I think Lance is supposed to do amazing. I think Susan Lucci is going to do pretty well. And I think she is such a loveable popular persona on the show that she'll go far. I also think that Maurice Greene is going to do amazing. Cheryl Burke and I are very close friends and we all went out together and Maurice danced for about four hours. He's got moves. Cheryl will play up to his strengths too. She knows how. Cheryl says that Maurice is like Emmitt Smith but younger and a lot more fun. She won with Emmitt. So it's good.

For me it is more about the experience though. I remember the first season on the show and how uncomfortable everything was and it was a bit weird to have the camera in rehearsal and following me. I think that's why Mel and I had so much fun. Because I was finally cool with everything.

So I mean how can you top having that much fun? You can't. This season there's going to be Misty and Maks fun instead of Mel and Maks fun. I'm just having fun and I want people to be happy Maks is back and I don't want to disappoint them.