Hello, and please kick me in the right direction if this is not a good place to ask for skating technique advice! 
TL;DR: I can do all the USFSA-regulated basics, but can't consistently jump up off the ice. I blame my boots and blades! Or maybe I just suck. Halp plz!
Long story:
My boots are Edea Overture, 305mm, although they should probably be 295 or 300, as I can easily stuff a bunch of cotton stuffing in the tip of the boot, but the 295 that I tried on were just too narrow for my foot. Even the ones I have give my foot's arch a painful squeeze when I start skating, every single time, but it passes after a while. So, I probably have an oversized boot.
My blades are Wilson Excel, of a series that went out of stock 15 years ago (I actually surprised a Wilson employee with a photo of the blade). The drag pick was too flat to bite into the ice at all, so its underside/base had been filed a bit to have more "catch room" there and stick more downwards - not sure if it really helped.
I've been skating for a year now. I can spin (if 5 shaky rotations counts), I can do all kinds of 3-turns, cross-rolls, some slow twizzles, spirals, mohawks, a very poor man's hydroblade if I'm lucky, I'm frantically working on my spread eagle.
What I can't do is jump. Okay, I can make a simple hop, getting me 5cm/2in off the ice, but that's it. I can make a rickety waltz jump this way, but there's no "flight" moment to speak of. Whenever I'm supposed to push off the ice with the toe picks embedded in the ice, I... don't have the picks embedded in the ice at all. Whenever I push down with my toes and lift my heel to get the picks in the ice, my foot sliiiides out backwards, enough for me to lose my balance a bit, and - if I'm in the middle of attempting a jump, my other foot swinging forward - the swinging foot gets planted firmly down to save me from falling. It feels as if at every jump I try to perform, I step on a banana peel and try my best to take off as my foot starts to slip. Okay, sometimes it does work, sometimes my picks catch some traction and let me lift up, but 9 times out of 10 there's a "whoa, slipping!" moment that breaks my concentration completely.
This is especially irritating since no-one (and I've scrubbed the net quite extensively!) explains the mechanics of digging the picks in. Everyone just stands on their tip toes and the picks are in the ice, done, move on. I may be the slow kid requiring a printed manual on how to hold a fork, but hey, if that's what it takes...
I can blame my boot - it's definitely too long, so the picks may be too far forward, requiring weird balancing on my part.
I can blame my blade - the picks weren't terribly sharp or "bitey" to begin with, but it's a beginner's blade, I guess. Maybe I should move to a CoronAce or something.
I can blame my lacing(!) - if I don't lace REALLY tight in the middle, my heel moves in the heel space. Could this be affecting my ability to tiptoe?
I can blame my upper body posture - but so far I couldn't find any advice that would explain how upper body affects the ability to stand on my picks; this skill is just assumed to be obvious.
I can't really blame my leg strength - i can jump pretty high (40cm/15in) off-ice, I have pretty decent stamina, my BMI is just fine, I can do dozens of double-unders on my skip rope in a row.
I can probably blame my foot flex ranges - my Achilles' tendon isn't very long yet, I can't do a straight squat on a flat surface without a tiny bit of help balancing. I can do a pistol squat, though, sometimes.
So... What obvious thing am I missing? I don't have a gold mine to burn on equipment, so I'd rather not replace the boot or the blade if I don't have to, yet. And if it's the equipment that's faulty here, then what should I replace - the boot, the blade, or both?
Thanks in advance for helpful advice, and sorry for a wall of text
TL;DR: I can do all the USFSA-regulated basics, but can't consistently jump up off the ice. I blame my boots and blades! Or maybe I just suck. Halp plz!
Long story:
My boots are Edea Overture, 305mm, although they should probably be 295 or 300, as I can easily stuff a bunch of cotton stuffing in the tip of the boot, but the 295 that I tried on were just too narrow for my foot. Even the ones I have give my foot's arch a painful squeeze when I start skating, every single time, but it passes after a while. So, I probably have an oversized boot.
My blades are Wilson Excel, of a series that went out of stock 15 years ago (I actually surprised a Wilson employee with a photo of the blade). The drag pick was too flat to bite into the ice at all, so its underside/base had been filed a bit to have more "catch room" there and stick more downwards - not sure if it really helped.
I've been skating for a year now. I can spin (if 5 shaky rotations counts), I can do all kinds of 3-turns, cross-rolls, some slow twizzles, spirals, mohawks, a very poor man's hydroblade if I'm lucky, I'm frantically working on my spread eagle.
What I can't do is jump. Okay, I can make a simple hop, getting me 5cm/2in off the ice, but that's it. I can make a rickety waltz jump this way, but there's no "flight" moment to speak of. Whenever I'm supposed to push off the ice with the toe picks embedded in the ice, I... don't have the picks embedded in the ice at all. Whenever I push down with my toes and lift my heel to get the picks in the ice, my foot sliiiides out backwards, enough for me to lose my balance a bit, and - if I'm in the middle of attempting a jump, my other foot swinging forward - the swinging foot gets planted firmly down to save me from falling. It feels as if at every jump I try to perform, I step on a banana peel and try my best to take off as my foot starts to slip. Okay, sometimes it does work, sometimes my picks catch some traction and let me lift up, but 9 times out of 10 there's a "whoa, slipping!" moment that breaks my concentration completely.
This is especially irritating since no-one (and I've scrubbed the net quite extensively!) explains the mechanics of digging the picks in. Everyone just stands on their tip toes and the picks are in the ice, done, move on. I may be the slow kid requiring a printed manual on how to hold a fork, but hey, if that's what it takes...
I can blame my boot - it's definitely too long, so the picks may be too far forward, requiring weird balancing on my part.
I can blame my blade - the picks weren't terribly sharp or "bitey" to begin with, but it's a beginner's blade, I guess. Maybe I should move to a CoronAce or something.
I can blame my lacing(!) - if I don't lace REALLY tight in the middle, my heel moves in the heel space. Could this be affecting my ability to tiptoe?
I can blame my upper body posture - but so far I couldn't find any advice that would explain how upper body affects the ability to stand on my picks; this skill is just assumed to be obvious.
I can't really blame my leg strength - i can jump pretty high (40cm/15in) off-ice, I have pretty decent stamina, my BMI is just fine, I can do dozens of double-unders on my skip rope in a row.
I can probably blame my foot flex ranges - my Achilles' tendon isn't very long yet, I can't do a straight squat on a flat surface without a tiny bit of help balancing. I can do a pistol squat, though, sometimes.
So... What obvious thing am I missing? I don't have a gold mine to burn on equipment, so I'd rather not replace the boot or the blade if I don't have to, yet. And if it's the equipment that's faulty here, then what should I replace - the boot, the blade, or both?
Thanks in advance for helpful advice, and sorry for a wall of text
