Axel Problems

I had landed my double axel for about 2 weeks, and then I start losing my landing. I try some more, and I end up wiping out on the ice on my back.

The problem was my anxiety and self confidence was getting worse and worse and I started taking it around and not stepping over, and letting my right shoulder come in front, and screwing everything up, and I was hurting myself badly.

After trying it on the ground, things took a turn for the worse. I started doing the same mistakes on the ground.

I am going to pull my hair out from depression of this...Anyone help?

All I can say is - that's skating! You get a skill, you lose it, you get it again, you lose it again several times before it's yours for good. You must have noticed this as you worked on everything else up to the double axel.

Have you started triple salchows yet - that might help with your axel?

Good luck.

Oh, and if you've seen any spins lying about, they belong to skaters at our rink who have lost them, including me! We think there may be an Evil Spin-eating Monster on the loose....

Axel help

Cindy

Even though I only do axels they are my favorite jump. About six months ago I lost them at least the feeling of how good when it works. I suggest if someone can take a video of your basic axel or double maybe you can find if it is shoulders or some basic mechanics. I fought with mine for two years off and on. I went to my old competitions to see if I could understand what I was doing wrong. I am finally doing them very naturally. Matt Savoe 's coach actually complemented me on my axel when Matt skated our annual ice show. Good luck to you and just hang in there.

I'm not sure if this will help, since I'm no where near your level, but when I get frustrated in my skating, I find that taking a break from it helps lots. Even if it's a short break. When you keep practising and practising you'd get so close to it that you don't even know what to do to help yourself. I also try to envision the jump in my mind a lot and try to be aware all the time of what I have to keep in mind -- the position of the shoulders, legs, head. Just running through the jump over and over mentally helps me. Maybe it'll help you.

MsLutzy said:

I'm not sure if this will help, since I'm no where near your level, but when I get frustrated in my skating, I find that taking a break from it helps lots. Even if it's a short break. When you keep practising and practising you'd get so close to it that you don't even know what to do to help yourself. I also try to envision the jump in my mind a lot and try to be aware all the time of what I have to keep in mind -- the position of the shoulders, legs, head. Just running through the jump over and over mentally helps me. Maybe it'll help you.

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I totally agree with this - when i've been doing things wrong over and over i think your muscle memory is the thing that takes over and learns the wrong way and recreates it over and over. Taking a break from doing an element let's you forget the bad muscle memory so that you can go back and work on getting the right muslce memory to stick!

Ant