Up-Down practices/lessons

Jumps were UP Spins were DOWN .

I can't seem to get my sit spin center. I travel all over the place making it hard to hold my position.

It felt like I had good height with my waltz, salchow & toe loop.

So how is everyones skating going?

First lesson in 5 weeks!

With my Dad being seriously ill and all, ice time has become a premium, plus I have lost about 8 pounds and am down to 168 for a 6 foot frame.

DOWN: I am amazed in how quickly you can get out of shape!! I have been doing a lot of walking plus I have gotten out on my inline skates but as I sit here and type this, my legs are sore!! Looks like I will have to do a lot more inline skating plus grab some extra ice time if I am going to be in any kind of shape for Adult Week at Lake Placid in August.

UP: I am also equally amazed on how my muscle memory kicked in. We havd been working on the Preliminary Moves crossovers in a 8 pattern before my hiatus and she had corrected a lot of things. I was gratified that my muscles have retained what we had corrected. Coach did make a point that sometimes a break from the ice is good too. Thinking back, I think this is the first time in at least four years that I have been off the ice for more than a month. It really did feel good to get out on the ice again!!

Up, up, up (to the Russell Hotel...oops, skating, Yaz, not "Cats"...)A very good skating day today. Coach helped me fix that "knee up but no foot through" on my waltz jump by using bunnyhops (which I LOATHE!!!) as an exercise. Hate the hops, but it helped. She is very pleased with my sals--she had me use power 3's as an exercise to get my opening edge better and it worked like a charm. We did toeloops in harness and out and I finally got the hang of getting my weight back on my "pick" leg and I finally did some nice, solid, good ice coverage toe loops. WHEEEE!!!! A great day, no downs. I'm off ice now for some R and R and won't be skating for a couple of weeks, so it was a great sendoff to skate so well.

Another good thing was a heart to heart about my skating with hubby's coach, our program director. She has judged me in ISI competition and coach and I wanted another perspective. She felt I needed improvement in my speed and needed to vary the tempo in my music instead of skating to faster music all the time. She also noted that while my presentation is good in my in betweens, I tend to look down and get tense when I have a jump or other big move coming up, like I'm thinking too much, and it takes away from my program. She noted that I'm already improving speed and basics and jumping, and that will help. I'm VERY glad I asked. Criticism is never easy--its not necessarily thrilling to hear where you have flaws, but I feel great about it. Now I have an even clearer idea of what I have to work on, and that's great.

since the nice weather has hit us here, its been harder to put my skates on

up: the rotations on my spins, i have boughten a spinner which has helped to work on balance in different spin postitions (sit and then into the "grab leg" spin, mushroom spin, etc). bckwd crossovers going right, that direction has always given me problems. i have also been jogging a lot each night which has helped maintain the muscles in my legs as well as stamina.

down: my jumps, since my club only offers summer lessons during the day and i work full time, i have resorted to working on my stuff at public skating, which in turn is ok because i know the guy who runs the rink & has ok'ed me doing spins, and as long as i am the only one on the ice i can practice my jumps. as you can imagine, that doesnt come often enough. so my jumps have suffered. since i wasnt able to continue lessons during the summer, i was forced to drop out of the adult competition in aug.

i absolutely love skating and learning how to figure skate! i wish all those figure skating the best of luck!

No one else skating this week? I'll just continue in this thread rather than start a new one at the end of the week.

Down and Up Again: My leg is slowly getting better. I pulled it badly about two weeks ago and have been barely able to skate (walking has not been painful at all- it's a hip muscle that's very specific to skating). I'm still afraid to put much power into skating or get very far down in my legs, but I can move on the ice again! As long as I don't push it too far, it's good to get the muscles moving. Group classes have started again (really the only way to get ice time in the summer- all the regular figure skating and public sessions have been taken over by the kids camps)- and the classes are VERY crowded (lots of new faces who skate in other rinks that must close for the summer). And the ice has been a little better- they may have figured out how to deal with summer heat and humidity! As for my skating- usual report from me- spins good (not so low on the sit spin, but didn't push it this week because of my hip), jumps tentative.

Hi Icer! I'm skating this week.

Between the hockey camps and kids off for the summer the ice has been extremely crowded. My rink has also canceled the adult sessions so I have had to skate on the public sessions. On Tuesday I got to share the ice with about 30 little kids. One was so cute. He came up to me and my coach and as my coach was demonstrating a move for me he said "you guys are really good".

Tuesdays lesson went really good. Worked on spins, scratch, sit, & camel. I haven't been doing the camel so it was like learning it all over again. I get going good, then after about 3 rotations it just falls apart. The sit spin is getting more centered and it helps when my coach can talk me into the right position, then I can keep spinning.

Happy skating!