Crossword Genius

Hands round stimulant before start of exhausting dance (4)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

reel

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'dance' is the definition.
(reel is a kind of dance)

'hands round stimulant before start of exhausting' is the wordplay.
'hands' becomes 'RL' (abbreviations for left and right).
'round' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'stimulant before' becomes 'e' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'start of' says to take the initial letters.
The first letter of 'exhausting' is 'e'.
'e'+'e'='ee'
'rl' placed around 'ee' is 'REEL'.

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for reel that I've seen before include "Rock" , "Scottish/Irish dance" , "Lively Scottish dance" , "Wind" , "Drum - dance - music" .)

I've seen this clue in The Independent.
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