Re: Ideal Skater's Body
Linny,
As Sally said re bowed legs, it's primarily genetic unless somebody starts doing something that bows the legs at a very young age while the bones are still soft and the growth plates still developing. Also, arthritis and other degenerative diseases can affect the shape of the joints. But mostly it's genetic.
As for the ideal skater's body, according to Christy Ness, Kristi Yamaguchi's coach, and Sandra Bezic a skater's body is best served by having or being: slightly bowed legs (helps stablilize ladings on jumps and rotation in the air); narrow hips and waist (think Tim Goebel); naturally slim and lean; full 180-degree hip rotation (for spread eagles); longer thighs relative to lower legs (helps get a good deep knee bend); flexible spine for layback spins; "shallow" spinal curves (think Kristi and Michelle, helps stabilize rotation for jumps); low center of gravity (technically, center of mass), which also helps stabilize rotation (think gyroscopes)--men's center of gravity is lower than women's, which is one of the reasons men have an easier time with multiple rotation, there or other reasons too of course; and being short. There are probably more, such as the angle of the feet, tibial rotation, orientation of the femur, and others I can't think of offhand.
The excerpt from the following link has some biomechanical info:
btc.montana.edu/Olympics/...her03.html
"Body Shape"
Generally speaking, one would expect, smaller athletes with slightly shorter than average limbs to excel at figure skating, since this would allow them to obtain a smaller moment of inertia while spinning and jumping, and thus spin faster. Obviously not all figure skaters fall into this category, many other components go into making a champion skater. Strength and power are very important for jumping and for holding tight body positions against large g-forces during spins. Many skaters are concerned with developing sufficient strength without developing muscle bulk. Muscle bulk would tend to make the skater larger, which would mean his or her moment of inertia would increase. However, with proper weight training skates can develop strength and power without increasing muscle bulk and this problem can be eliminated.
Another link to biomechanical info on skaters:
alumni.engin.umich.edu/~g...pphys.html
Rgirl
I assume you're in America, so would want a NTSC tape? Well, I checked Amazon and they haven't got it, although it's available on the British amazon site, although that would be PAL format. <a href="
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