Propelling/Bad Smelling Lessons & Practices 11/10 - 11/16

Let's get started on a new week with some stellar performances.

Tell us whether you make skating breakthroughs and your skills really move forward (propelling) or perhaps you do a little less well (bad smelling).

Either way, hope you still enjoy!

Bad smelling - Pretty much everything. I've had it up to the eyeballs with my synchro team, I can't wait till we go to nationals in 2 weeks so I can then leave for the year. I guess that sums up how much I'm enjoying it. Irritatingly unworkable choreography, people with attention spans no longer than 5 seconds, bleh. I used to love skating with my team but these last few months have been a chore and a bore. My ankle still hurts too, another bad smell there.

blurrysarah - oooh, stinkaroo. So sorry to hear about your frustration with the synchro team. Excuse my ignorance, but will you seek out another team or just not do synchro any more at all?

DUCK!! Here comes the propeller: WOW, today's practice was just energizing! I had taken a skating break yesterday AND gone to bed a little earlier. So when my coach told me to forget putting on my oldie moldie skates and to strap on the new ones (both boots and blades are new), I was surprised, but I was up for it.

She started me off with some simple stroking and forward and backward crossovers, switched to a two foot spin, one foot spin, back scratch, sit spin, camel spin, camel/sit/back sit -- and basically, everything was in working order! Stiff, yes, but nothing that about 50 repetitions each won't cure.

Then she used the "J" word and asked me to work my way through the jumps. Waltz, waltzes in a row, salchow, toe loop, loop, flip. Again, everything was pretty strong. Then she rewrote my footwork for my program and asked me to work on that for the rest of the session.

I wound up skating for almost 2 hours!!! She now has forbidden me to ever put the old skates on again, preferring that I bite the bullet and get these broken in within the next week. She set goals for me -- by the end of this week, I have to be able to do waltz jump/loops and to have my lutz back. On Monday, I have to try my first axel.

I am so excited. I can tell that part of my problem has been the total lack of support from the old skates. So I'm going to work really hard tomorrow and Friday to try to get as close back to normal (or better?) as possible.

Stinky poo - absolutely nothing. I couldn't be more pleased!

Bad Smelling - the only "bad" thing about today's practice is the fact that my poor feet and ankles were still tender from yesterday's ice romp.

Vrrom Vroom Forward - despite the nagging pain, I had another great practice this morning. Ran through all the spins and jumps up through the lutz. Nothing is lovely, but it's all workable and just needs more repetition. Tomorrow is my skating rest day, so I have high hopes for progress on Friday. Perhaps I will even try an axel!

Yeah Cinder on the new skates!!!!! If you have problems with achiness on the outside of your ankles, try Bunga Pads if you are not already using them. I found that they helped me a lot when I was first in my new skates.

Bluurysarah - hang in there. Do you do any singles? Maybe you could look forward to doing that for a while. I've never really team skated - it must be hard, especially when the team dynamics are out of synch, so to speak.

I haven't posted much, because I hadn't been doing much that is new. However, this has changed recently.

Propelling: Landed my first double salchow in 20 odd years yesterday. It was cheated, but it was on one foot. Came awful darn close to landing a couple fully rotated ones too. Working on the check out timing is challenging - either I check out too early and under-rotate, or I check out too late, over-rotate, fall, and spin on the ice like a top. I've only been at them for 2 weeks now, so I'm pleased with the progress so far.

The double toe is basically in the same shape as the double sal, but I haven't done many because I'm focusing on the sal right now. I worked on the toes on and off this past summer, and got stuck. I figure if I get the sal under wraps that will help my toe.

On the double loop (which we also started two weeks ago) I've gotten up the courage to pull my leg in properly (I was afraid of kicking myself), but my arms are not in synch so the jump is wimpy and only 1 1/2 around. It will come.

Bad smelling: You know, it's amazing. I have been in competition and test ready shape, but these doubles are exhausting! Yesterday after my lesson all I wanted to do was curl up in a corner and sleep. I need to make sure that I don't do anything stupid like push too hard and injure/reinjure anything.

I do have lessons by myself, but the private lesson cost is just too much to do it more often, compared to what I pay with synchro. Hoping to join a senior team next year, although I'm not quite up to standard, I'll do some intense skating over the summer holidays and try to catch up.

Propelling - Basic skating, footwork, both felt very secure today. I felt more awake than usual. Also found out that massaging a tendon in my leg eases my ankle pain. The chiropractor said I have an "impingement of the lateral ankle", which is basically a tendon in my foot getting pinched under my ankle bone, because I have weak, lax ankles which move around forwards, backwards, sideways and all that. It helped so much I could even start practicing my loop jump again. Also found my Ina bauer moves straighter than it ever has, and my boots have flexed enough to allow an easier outside spread eagle. Coach gushed about my spiral, and my back felt more arched. If only skating was comprised purely of edge moves.

Bad-smelling: Spins. I. Hate. Spins. It seems no matter how hard I push, my scratch spins are not fast enough to let me hold up the free leg. Sit spin was atrocious. Camel, don't even go there. It is officially my most despised element in all of skating. Jumps were no better. Salchow has gone on holidays. Loop felt strange, I have this problem where my left heel rises in the boot during take off, it's very off putting. Might need an insert in that boot.

bad smelling - I was being tested in FS4 on tuesday and i failed on my sitspin. on wednesday i totally lost my sitspin right when it was time to test again.

propelling - even though my sitspin was gone, my teacher said i should pass anyway because he knows i would get it back anyway. so now i'm in freestyle 5! at my private lesson, i got to learn the beginning of the axel. it looks pretty hard, but i'm sure i can land it sooner or later.
My teacher from my FS4 class said that i was the most improved skater at my rink of 2003. i guess its true because i was in Freestyle 1 in the beginning of the year and now im in freestyle 5! yay

Icedream - congrats on moving up so quickly! Are these ISI test levels? They sound so familiar to me, but I tested ISI over 30 years ago, so my memory is a little faulty.

The axel is a big, important and FUN step. Have patience with yourself if it doesn't come as quickly as some of the other elements, and always just keep plugging away at it. It will be here before you know it!

ZOOM ZOOM ZOOM - Wow, today turned out to be an excellent practice. Grimaced a bit at the ankle pain (just pressure points), but otherwise the new skates/blades are really shaping up. Wound up with about 3 very nice camel/sit/back sits, so that was encouraging. Worked my way through the single jumps and did some nice flip/loops. I "think" I'm doing better on the toepick jumps, taking out 50 cent-sized craters instead of the 4 footers I seemed to be whacking out on Wednesday. I think the problem will resolve itself as the skates get more pliable and I have some kind of forward bending motion in them. Also whaled out 3-4 good lutzes.

But then, the most exciting thing -- after trying 4 axels and getting closer and closer, I then went on to land EIGHT MORE! And they were nice ones, with some height and some speed. Yippie! I had quite a few nicely centered back spins, and overall was very pleased with all the elements.

BUT - the only drawback so far is that I'm really struggling with my footwork, as the stiff boots seem to make me very clunky out there. When I thought I'd have to leave the ice because of pain, I decided to strap on my headset (I was alone) and do 10 minutes of power skating. I worked on my extension and changed direction every 2 minutes to try to get some CW work in as well. I think if I do this a few more times, I will feel more steady in the new boots.

Now I'm just wiped out, so I'm going to grab my People magazine and veg out on the couch.

Well, Thursday (Nov. 13, 2003) was my first day skating on the Pre-
Sectional/Sectional ice. All the skaters and the coaches were very
friendly. When I ran through my program and the kids and the coaches
saw the speed and accracy I had in my program (didn't do a flip,
loop, backspin or camel spin though), they were surprised and were
cheering me on from the moment they saw how I handled the first part
on my diagonal straightly footwork to the fast part of When You
Believe where there are kids singing in Jewish. As the music got
faster and faster and louder and louder, I got faster and faster
doing open mohawhs, 3 turns, rockers (yes, I just learned them in my
last lesson last Friday.)and backwards Yagudin toe picking crisscross
footwork into (what do you call them) things where you are constantly
turning spining and traveling on two feet and sort of jump with each
turn into a one foot forward spin. I had everyone sold that I could
skate good enough to be on their ice even though I have yet to pass
my preliminary FS test. My coach didn't show up because she had a
previously made appointment before I was switched to the Presectional
ice.

Friday (Nov. 14, 2003) wasn't as great. I had to restart my program
because right out of the gate someone was in my path and it threw
off my opening alternating back crosscuts into my toe loop. Second
time was better but at one point I was a smidgen behind my music but
somehow, I'm always too far ahead at the end of the piece and have to
through in an extra spin. I need to get working on a layback for the
last spin on my interpretive (When You Believe). My coach didn't show
up Thursday because she had a previously made appointment before I
was switched to the Presectional ice. I found this out when she came
in to my work place to shop and to set up a tape saving thing at my
store for Club Tecumseh. Friday, I don't know why she was late and I
didn't get a lesson. I'm thinking that my coach might need to drop me
and switch me to another coach because I'm her only skater on the
presectional ice. Maybe Marylin? She's a friend of my friend, Marj
who I hang out with alot.

Actually, Marylin taught my stroking session today in place of Brook
Coatsworth who at the moment is in 4th place at the WOS Sections in
Senior Ladies. Marylin saw my forward swing rolls and said that they
were to die for. Now if I could just get my backward swing rolls like
that. I've been cutting corners on the backward ones and really
messing them up. She worked on them with me. If I can get those fixed
soon, then I can work on the Swing Dance and Willow and maybe pass
those in addiction to Baby Blues and Fiesta Tango.

Then, I got to teach my choreographer's students because he wasn't
there on time. One was a no show, so I only had two of them. One was
a preprelim skater and one was an upper level CanSkater. Both were on
the Junior ice that on which I use to skate.

With the preprelim skater, I worked on her forward spirals, forward
outside 3 turns, waltz jumps from a stand still, waltz jumps
preceeded by LFO 3 turn to backward two foot glide into the waltz
jump, then forward inside 3 turn, then toe loop jump.

Then it was time to move onto the CanSkater. With her I worked on
forward crossovers around a hockey circle trying to get her not to
lean over too much and to keep her skates parrallel. Then we worked
on backward crossovers. She needs lots of work. She kept on crossing
her foot over and putting it at a 90 degree angle. Then I had her
work on alternating forward two foot turns with closed mohawks down
the length of the ice. She had no idea that she was doing the
mohawks. I just told her to step forward after every turn to get to
the next turn. Then I had her do two foot guides into jumping from
forward to backwards and then from backward to forwards on two feet.
She had a little trouble doing the backwards to forwards because she
kept spreading her feet too far apart. It was then that I found out
that the last lesson wasn't there so I went back with the CanSkater
and worked on her two foot spins (She's a CW skater, so I had to spin
CW. What a challenge with me being a CCW skater.) It took several
tries but she finally got two rotations. Then I asked her if she
wanted to learn to spin on one foot. First I tried to get her to do
just the one foot spin but found out she wasn't ready for it. So then
I went back to the two foot spin and asked her to lift up her left
foot. I did it too, CW. One time she got one rotation on the one
foot. Wonder what Sean will say when he finds out what I was
teaching them? Last thing we worked on were outside edges after
having her find them around the hockey circle. I had her try
alternating outside forward edges down the length of the rink. She
got about halfway and then was tuckered out. I think she's never
worked that hard before.

You know assisting coach has made me realize all the stuff I already
can do in skating and took for granted. Never realized I could do so
much before. Ah, I love to teach skating. Just got to get all my
jumps up to an axel, flying sit, layback, skating skills 6, intro
interpretive FS and junior dances and I will have my CanSkate
Coaching thingy. Yeah, I know I have to do the two day siminar too.

Brigitte

Back on the ice after a week off (I really want to try and skate 3 times a week). Anyway I took it slow in the beginning. I wasn't going to do any jumps, but I couldn't help myself and worked on getting the waltz jump perfect (or at least close to perfect). I had the instructor look it over and after some corrections I can say the jump is very light and smooth with more height The toe loop is coming along too.

I did some pretty good camel spins and I think that that spin might become my favorite one. It is easier for me to get in the camel position then the sit position. I did do one good sit spin, kept it spinning pretty long.

Anyhow not too bad of a skating day.