Hellish or Heavenly Lessons Oct. 19-26

[luna_skater]

Guess I'll start this week off!

Heavenly: Thankfully, almost everything! It wasn't all perfect, but progress was definitely made since Friday, and that's what I was shooting for. American is getting there; still working on fitting the pattern in properly. Rocker and Keats are both picking up speed and feeling quite strong. Even the outside mohawk feels better!

Hellish: Although the American is improving, it's still frustrating. But since the other two dances are feeling so good, I'll live with it!

[jazzpants]

Heavenly: I had a good practice tonight! I asked primary coach if he noticed me going a few rounds on the program. He said "Yeah! I sure did!!! And I liked it! Let's finish it!!!" :D
Hellish: Just looked at the schedule for Skate SF 2003 (http://www.scsf.org/skatesf/ssfsched001.html)!!! I have to compete on a Sunday at 9:55pm!!! WAAAAAH!!!! http://smilies.jeeptalk.org/kao/otn/pcrying.gif Guess I better start skating nights to get used to the late hour... :(

On the bright side, my coach won't be far off if he skates Artistic...his event is right before me!!! This will be weird...having him coach me on the sides in his skating costume. :roll: :lol:

ask8ngcat and Ashley, you guys lucked out!!! You'll be skating at a "sane" hour!

[icenut84]

I skated yesterday - public session only.

Heavenly - the spins I did weren't quite as bad as usual. :) One was almost what you could call centered! <faints> They weren't all stellar, of course, but I wasn't seething in frustration at them, so that's progress. My turns were good, especially BO3s - my left one was great!! Good flow into it, balanced turn, glide and good balance out. :) I like doing them. Forward crossovers were good too, and played with progressives.

Hellish - really bad ice! Very rutted and skated-on. Wasn't enough room to even think about doing my dance exercises, and i would have practiced some jumps if the ice wasn't so bad. Didn't do any spirals either. BI3s were not as good as usual either, but I blame the ice :)

[tidesong]

Heavenly: I did one good flying camel spin, it felt fast and i could hold it long enough for it to feel like a spin. When i got out of it, i saw that for once, the tracings were circles instead of big loop the loops!

Hellish: I keep killing my ankle, I keep landing on the inside edge for some reason which makes killing my ankle too easy and with mushy ice it makes things worse... double salchow just plain inconsistent

Neither one: Working on lutz and flip again, trying to get height on those jumps :) Hoping that maybe those may turn into doubles someday.

[Mrs Redboots]

Hellish: Having arranged that Robert and I would skate together and then give our skates in to be sharpened, of course he rang up just as I was out of the door to say he couldn't make it, so I was late to get my hair cut, which I'd arranged to do just before going skating, and also in a filthy mood!

Tried out some footwork I'd been thinking of to put in my "funny", and of course I can't do it! There are times I reckon I'd be better off bashing my head against a brick wall......

Heavenly: So I stopped doing any work, and had fun instead. There had been tests in the morning, so there were very few people there, and we were "jamming around" to music from "Grease", and generally *rsing around. Which was fun, but I did try to do some exercises while I was at it. Then for the last 15 minutes I joined my coach and his "girls", who were doing some quite interesting exercises. Like pushing off into a double 3 and holding the exit edge back round the circle, which I certainly couldn't do without cheating. Then we had to push on to an outside edge, cross on to an inside edge and hold that round the circle, which I could do quite well - not quite as well as the girls, of course. Then the one which nobody could do - not even the coach at first, which was to hold a FO edge as long as possible, and then do an axel. I don't do axels, but I was surprised to find that this was actually a really good exercise for 3-jumps, and it was fun to watch the others struggle. They mastered it eventually (one young lady cheating frightfully by doing double 3s into it instead of holding the FO edge), but not without a great deal of complaining and joshing - and teasing the coach, who needed several tries before he could do it! So that was fun. And then my skates ran out of blade again, so I called it an evening. Goodness knows whether I shall be able to skate tomorrow, with new edges.....

[CanAmSk8ter]

HEAVENLY:
Lesson this morning went well. Partnered two full patterns of the Tango with music for the first time and was told it was "excellent". My coach was surprised when I said we'd never done that before. American must have been good too, because I got away with only a couple of patterns and we never did put the music on today.

I saved the best for last: I tried partnering the Argentine Tango and got through the twizzle in the partnering! I'm just starting to hit the twizzle consistantly when I solo, but I hadn't tried partnering the dance in probably more than a year. This was the first time I got the twizzle partnering! After the twizzle the dance goes downhill pretty quick: I lose most of my speed and whatever's left I lose on the cross-behinds. But six months ago I couldn't get through that twizzle to save my life and now I can do it partnering! :D

HELLISH: My knee is still bothering me quite a bit. Once I'm on the ice for a little while the pain goes away, but then it usually starts up again within ten minutes of leaving the rink, and it hurts anytime I keep my leg in the same position without moving around. That's a real pain in the butt at school.

[Mrs Redboots]

Heavenly: Our skates were beautifully sharpened - you could feel the difference, but not enough to slow you down or anything, and only took a few minutes to get used to. Robert skated for a bit, but because I'd forgotten to look up the dances we need to work on for our next competition, we decided just to do exercises, and anyway, he needed to get off to work. Then another friend joined me for the latter part of the session, which was fun.

In my lesson, I did some reasonably good changes-of-edge, and forward cross-rolls, but the rest was Hellish, including my back inside edges (I think that was partly because of the fresh sharpening. In the cross-rolls, I seem to trade off speed and technique - the side I had better technique on, I had less flow.....

Turns were dreadful (didn't work on them so much in my lesson, but before it), no flow. Figures even worse - couldn't draw a circle on the ice for love nor money. Friend by this time had given up all pretence of skating and was watching and making rude comments (no, I didn't mind - she wouldn't have done it if I had). Then I tried to show them the footwork I was thinking of for my funny piece, and how I couldn't do it. Coach agreed it would be the perfect steps, though.

Was told to practice long, flowy edges, so spent the rest of the session doing just that, and the exercise of holding the FO edge into the jump. Which I like - it does make me jump better! Also turn, also..... Anyway, friend had much more flow than me, which annoyed me, but not her fault! Then she came back to mine and we went out to lunch together, so I'm a bit sleepy now....

[MissIndigo]

Heavenly:

Just my coach and me on the ice this morning! All to ourselves! Awesome!


Hellish:

I got only 30 minutes of sleep all last night--my writing muse was working overtime (as she usually likes to between the hours of 12-3 AM). I told this to my coach this morning, and she was highly amused. :D So what do we do first? The move I hate the most, power 3's--oh you know 'em.

What made me laugh was her comments...my left forward 3 turns are really good, and she was very complimentary about my control and ability to make the entry and exit lobes equal. However, and I do quote, she said, after searching for the words..."Your left one is so good! But your right one...just sucks!"

I love being coached as an adult. ;) And I love the honesty my coach has, really. I'm being serious. She can be so blunt sometimes it's funny. One of my favorite things she said to this hockey player she does power skating with was, "Hey! If you said words like that in my house growing up I would have washed your mouth out with Tide and you'd be blowing bubbles."

Love ya coach. Keep them lines coming. You're inspiration for the coach in my story.

[Keely]

I've only had 2 lessons so far... everything's heavenly just because I'm having so much fun!

My forward crossovers are pretty good now in both directions. I've totally lost my snowplow stop, but who wants to stop? ;) Also I had the rink all to myself at yesterday's public skate! I love that. (The woman walking around the ice with the baby in a stroller only stayed 20 minutes) Whoo-hoo, that was fun! I only feel safe skating backwards when I'm the only one on the rink ;)

[blurrysarah]

Ankle bothering me more, coach says I need to see a chiropractor asap, but until then I'm not going to jump as that is what stresses it the most.

Heavenly: It seems I either have good jumping sessions or spinning sessions, today was a spinning session. I did a flukey good scratch spin, sit spin, and camel spin all with waaaay more rotations than I'm used to doing. Of course, I couldn't repeat what I did with any of them. :lol: I also felt a lot faster than usual that session, made me more gutsy.

Hellish: I tried a loop jump, it went absolutely nowhere AND I cut a big hole in my pant leg with the back of my blade. Pretty much all jumps are out of the question until I do something about this ankle pain.

[quarkiki2]

Had synchro practice last night. And I was on the first day of a cold -- where everything hurts and you have absolutely no energy, right?

Well I practiced anyway because last practice there were eight people gone and I didn't want to contribute to that, LOL! I didn't do any of the footwork, but wanted to be there for spacing purposes. I was truly winded after every run-through of our partial program and it took a few minutes after each to get my breath back. I hate feeling like that! I'd rather be in pain than be exhausted.

Hopefully I'll feel better by my lesson on Saturday!!

[Mrs Redboots]

Just in from Dance Club. Very tired, so mostly propped up the barrier and pretended I was dancing.... did a Foxtrot with Robert, but he doesn't know how to help me do the Mohawk, and just stood there and tutted at me. Tried a 14-step with him, similar result! But that was a bit better, although you wouldn't believe how off-pattern we got.... so who cares, when there's virtually nobody else doing it? Tried a Willow solo, but covered less than 1/2 the length of the rink. Fiesta Tango solo okay, but forgot the steps and put an extra edge in (I knew I was doing something wrong, but couldn't work out what), then realised I did a beautiful Mohawk, stop, THEN push into the back edges..... gack. Oh well, it was better than it used to be, and doesn't frighten me as much solo as it used. Decided not to push hard, but to concentrate on lots of tango expression....

And we are off now for ten days or so, at a skating camp. Will be in touch when I get back.

[Black Sheep]

Heavenly: On Tuesday afternoon, my long-program run-through was a complete success, with everything fast and cleanly landed--right up to my 2sal.! :halo:

Hellish: This afternoon, I couldn't seem to get enough oxygen flowing through my whole body. Therefore, nothing seemed up to par. When I tried to run through my long program, I messed up my axel and 2sal. (both of which I've been rather consisitent with recently) and started over. No one else on the ice seemed to mind, but I was ashamed of myself for doing that because one sure can't do that in a real competition! When I was done with practice, I even had trouble driving home because I really needed to rest! :evil:

8-)

[Terri C]

Heavenly:
The alternating 3's that I will compete in Washington in January have gotten better- even that God awful RFI3 that I have!

Hellish:
Last week, my program was starting to come back. This week, it disappeared again! At least it's only late October- if it was late December, I'd really be worried!

[batikat]

No more competitions coming up so decided go back to basics to try and get me off my toepicks when going backwards and to learn how to get my weight in the right place for back 3's. Practised lots of back outside edges and swing rolls and concentrated on NOT hearing those toepicks scrape! Also back to learning jumps and spins to eventually test the lowest level Free skating.

Heavenly: did a lovely sit spin, fast and centred - though it still needs to be lower.

3 jump felt good - plenty of height and good landing position.

Hellish: Salchow needs work again - am too much on the toepick on take-off. Toe-loop better but have to remember to check after the 3 turn and then vault. Coach says I tend to stop with my pick in the ice so the jump never really takes off.
Back 3's - how do I get my weight back on the blade to make the turn? No idea!

[icenut84]

Originally posted by batikat
Back 3's - how do I get my weight back on the blade to make the turn? No idea!

Don't think about "getting the weight back on the blade" as that could make you feel unnerved or not balanced properly - think more about lifting your toes/the front of your skate a little, just for the turn, and think about the rhythm. Like when you're in shoes and you "turn on your heel" to turn round - that kinda thing. Remember you can use your body/shoulders etc to help the rotation. And don't forget the down-up-down movement. Hope that helps

[Vicki]

After being off the ice for almost two months, it was heavenly just to be at the rink and have a lesson. :)

[Debbie S]

Hellish: Because of my b-school exams, Wednesday was my first practice in 2 weeks. My coach told me that given my circumstances, I didn't look too bad. I felt all out of sorts. I haven't had much time to practice in the past 2 months, and it's discouraging because I feel myself regressing. The good news is that I'm finished my exams (and Acctg and Econ classes are over, replaced by the less time-consuming Marketing and Leadership classes) so I'll have more time to practice.

My coach's coach came to the rink to look at the blade alignment of several of her skaters, including me. I thought that the right blade might be too far inside, b/c I've been landing jumps a little to the inside and feeling wobbly. I learned that it was me and not the skates. :( Oh well, I guess that saves me the trouble of having them re-mounted. Now, I've just got to learn how to land properly.

Heavenly: My coach told me she saw progress in my lesson and she likes my salchow. We ran through my compulsory moves "program" and she changed the entry on my half flip - I'm now doing it from a mohawk rather than an FO three. She thinks that will be best for me on my full flip also - when I finally get around to practicing it, that is.

I also had the chance to see bits of South Atlantic Regionals last week in between my exams. A skater from my rink competed in Inter Ladies and did very well, skating-wise (those darned judges!). And another skater from my rink now "has" a 2 lutz - she's been working on it for a while.

[96.23??]

Heavenly: Passed the passo today! :D

[luna_skater]

Way to go!!

Heavenly: Ice was really empty today; most of the skaters are away at Reigonals. However, that also meant I had no lesson. Nevertheless, the stuff I practiced went really well. I was finally able to fit the American pattern in correctly numerous times. I didn't get a chance to practice it with the timing, but I think I was pretty close to tempo in my head! Rocker and Keats felt great at the beginning of the session. The Keats has a lot of speed and flow to start out, and kind of loses it a bit on the mohawk. But the mohawk was improved today, so that's a plus! Rocker, on the other hand, was really smooth going into the progressive the mohawk. I think my coach will be happy next week!

Hellish: Was feeling quite frustrated by the end of practice, and I'm chalking it up to dull blades. I thought they were OK to begin, but after things seemed to be going worse and worse the longer I was on the ice, I felt my blades and they did seem dull. So I got them sharpened after practice, and I'm hoping that will improve things even further next week!

[mousey]

heavenly: jumps were ok. they were pretty normal, so thats good.

hellish: still cant do outside spread eagles:( i tried a lot, but my ankles started hurting.

[garyc254]

Originally posted by 96.23??
Heavenly: Passed the passo today! :D

WAY TO GO!!!!!!! :D :D :D

[singerskates]

Before today, I didn't have a sitspin. I had a milli second thought of sitting and then getting up out of the sit position right away.

so you can say, my lesson today was sort of Heavenly.

The first attempt had me pull out right away. Then coach took me to the boards and showed me what to do with my freeleg and when. so then I tried again and got one slow rev with arms out of position and leg not extended at all. Then I tried again and got two slow revs of which I fell out. I tried again and then got two revs but exited correctly. Then I got two fast revs with proper exit. Then fixed arms and sqweeked out 3 fast revs before standing up and doing the forth rev in forward upright position to exist.

Then, it was time to teach Learn to Skate. My coach has given me my own group of kids to teach. Got two newbies to learn to fall and get up in less than 5 minutes. One of them seems to not have his balance very much but just keeps on going. He doesn't understand that he needs to skate slowly at first to gain balance and then speed up later. I even had a helper. One of the kids could skate but refused to participate no matter what I did. Had to leave Learn to Skate 10 early because I had to drive to church to lead youth group.

Well, it's 2:40 am EST and I'm dying for some sleep. I teach Learn to Skate and CanSkate tomorrow. Wonder how many will be in my groups tomorrow. I always get the newbies because I get them skating on their own faster than the other coaches.

Brigitte

[Elsy2]

Oh gosh, I have got to start skating more than once I week...Just being out there was "Heavenly"....Spins were pretty darn good today.

Hellish.....jumps not so hot. Coach yelling for everyone to "get out of the way of the Geriatric dance couple"....that would be me and my partner :roll: We must have been looking a bit stiff out there!

[dbny]

Originally posted by 96.23??
Heavenly: Passed the passo today! :D

Congratulations on passing my favorite dance of all time! That is one of the few dances that I still remember every step of from roller skating. I even remember testing it, and the debate over whether to do the RFI Mohawk with the swing or without - it was optional on roller skates.

Heavenly
Not much. Haven't had a lesson in several weeks, as either I was away or my coach could not make my regular lesson time due to family circumstances. I have been working with the other mommy & me coach though, giving her tips on the PrePre MIF test and she giving me tips on spins and three turns. Both are starting to come back. Power pulls are starting to be decent. When they are right, the shift of weight is truly heavenly.

Hellish
Why oh why can I do beautiful, controlled, checked FI and FO threes with the lightest of spots (literally at touck of the fingers), but totally chicken out without it on the FI threes, and turn early and out of control or chicken out on the FO threes.

[Jess-ka]

Heavenly had a good practice, i worked on my extensions and the little things. My lesson went well did moves for the first half and then worked on the foxtrot some more after. I was told to sign up for a test session in November wheee its about timei test these moves! oh and i got to skate with the hot guy on the ice twice ::drools:::
Hellish it was a tad bit crowded today on both sessions so it made dancing and doing moves alittle hard, but it's been worse...i think

[singerskates]

Heavenly:
Well, my coach is getting tired of my choreographer (her brother)
taking so long to choreograph my interpretive program. So today we
worked on it together and got some things moved around a bit. He will
be shocked when he see what we did it the program. ROTFLOL Anyway, we
were about 10 seconds into the program and I covered about 3/4's of
the NHL size rink and she wanted a spin. I didn't want to do the same
spin every time, so I tried to do a sitspin. That was the end of us
choreographing the program for the session. She saw that I was
getting down trying to get a sitspin going, so she switched to the
sitspin lesson. I really tried to get her to demo it for me. Nope,
she said on the ticket ice next week she'll do one for me. yeah, she
wants time to show me up. LOL Anyway, after she showed me the very
very basics at the boards, I went to try and try and try. The first
time was not pretty, one rotation, bad arms and didn't stay down.
Second time the same. Then something clicked. I was able to get my arms in the right place when down and got 2 slow revs. Then I did it again and got 2 fast revs and finally just before it was time for me to coach Learn to Skate, I got 3 fast revs before getting another in the upright position before exiting.

Now I only need to get my backspin to be 3 or 4 revs (OK, I want 5 to
9 like my forward upright spin) and I need to get a camel going. I'm
having trouble getting into the camel spin. Seems I'm not leaning
onto my left outside edge enough.

Hellish:
Flip and loop are still at the football game. LOL
Backwards inside and outside swing rolls getting cleaner slowly.
Still a bit of scrating. Back alternating Crosscuts getting cleaner
too. Funny my coach wanted me to do 6 of them to get to the other
side of the rink and I had to cut them down to 2 to fit the ice. LOL
Who's got power on ice?

Heavenly:
If I haven't already told you guys, my coach is lining me up to
become a Skate Canada CanSkate Coach. Hellish:
That's why she's getting really
picky on my backwards edges. She wants that Sprint sound; nothing.

Almost Heavenly:
Group Stroking Class was good today. Brook Coatsworth, who coaches my
stroaking class, liked my forward and back crosscuts but had to get
after a skater working on her junior bronze for her slopy posture and her execution. This skater has her prelim FS but is slopy in her
general skating skills and is about 12. I wish I would have had group
stroking classes from the start.

Hellish Coaching: I got this kid that wouldn't stop crying in Saturday Learn to Skate who was 3 years old and was taking a fit hyperventilating(sp) who would not stay up on his skates and kept pulling at my leg while I had another child on my right hand who was also a beginner. I had to stop, get down on my knees and talk right into the whiners eyes telling him that no matter how much he crys that he wasn't going to get off of the ice and that he was there to skate. I then worked to get him breathing normally and to stop crying before going for a short 20 minutes around with him and the other child in my hands around the rink. I was soaked with sweat from nerves head to toe from this. By the way, no other coaches could ever get this kid to stop crying and try to skate. Hopefully, he does better next time.

Heavenly: Saturday's CanSkate session. I got my own group to teach, 10 of them working on level 4 and 5. Yes, I got movers who wanted to try to improve. What a relief from the session before (Sat. Learn To Skate)! My coach came about with only 10 minutes left before freeskate with the CanSkate page of elements. Before that, I just had the kids do what ever came to my mind. But as it turns out, the stuff I was having them do was on their level on the sheet. So I didn't have much more to teach them before freeskate time. One thing I was having trouble teaching them was to glide on their outside edge of the circle's inside foot before crossing over with the free foot. they totally just skipped it no matter how many times my assistant and I showed them. Then, there was also my coach's daughter in my group who just didn't take anything seriously. She thought everything was a joke.

Hellish after Sat. CanSkate: Couldn't find anyone with the coach's change room key to lock the door. I was the last one out but being a coach in training, I don't have a key to lock the door. I went upstairs to the Club Tecumseh office to find out that the lady doing the office work, didn't have a key. Then I went to find Shaun who runs Tecumseh arena to see if his master key worked to lock the door. Nope. So that means that the door is not locked and the club will have the door unlocked all weekend. Hope our sterio equipement is still in working condition by Monday. I think my club should give a key to the Club Office so that whoever is last out of the coach's room can lock the door. I know I would have if I could.

Brigitte

[plinko]

Hellish *and* Heavenly:

I had an Adult group lesson on Saturday. It was mostly stroking and I got a heck of a lot of information and a set of rubber legs. I couldn't do it without my teenage Program Assistant who would translate the coach's instructions "okay everybody, Russian Stroking, let's go" and I'd say in a whisper "what's that" and get a quick demo and off we'd go. I could do it, I've never been good at putting names to things. I'm liking this. I need my skates sharpened, the ice is terribly hard at the rink.

[CanAmSk8ter]

I've been at Skate America and didn't have a chance to post this efore I left. This is for last Wednesday and Thursday morning before I left.

HEAVENLY I had the ice to myself for almost forty minutes Wednesday afternoon, so I decided to wrok on the Argentine first. The Arge is my newest dance; it's two levels ahead of where I am test-wise (it's Gold; I have two Silvers left) but I really want to skate Junior at the non-qualifying competitons this summer so I've started working on it now. Anyway, I was having my usualy problem- after the twizzle I had zero speed and wasn't pushing through the cross-behinds so my step forward for the repeat was about six feet short of where it needed to be. But I was finding that every time I did it, I was pushing more and getting farther down ice. I decided my goal was to get to the edge of the hockey circle, and I did it on the next pattern. So then I decided that I was going to try to get the enxt one far enough down to do a second pattern- and I did it on the next one! With more than nine months to go until Lake Placid, I did my first full run-through of the Argentine, with music, on pattern and on time. It needs depth and power, but my goal was to be doing full runthroughs in December, and I'm doing them in October! Thursday morning wasn't quite as good, but it was close.

HELLISH The hours in the car to Reading, and then the hours sitting at Skate America, have stiffened up my knee considerably. I did bring the ice pack with me and ice it in the evenings, but I have a feeling it's going to hurt when I try to skate in the morning.

[rinsk]

Heavenly:
- my microscopic axel decided to be not-so microscopic today (the tracings went from backtracking to almost 2 bladelengths between my take-off and my landing - yay!).
- one really good layback that arched, leg got nice and high and just went on and on.
- choreographed almost my entire skills creative program (I'm debating working towards StarSkate triathlon) this morning.
- a couple of really nice Romantica end-patterns (the choctaw, back twizzle bit) during my dance lesson today.

Hellish:
- after that beautiful layback spin, my spins decided that they'd done their work for the day and could go home: couldn't center ANYTHING from then on.
- can't take what I can do really well in sections and put it into the whole dance: the part of the Romantica that went so well on it's own was HORRIBLE in the actual dance: I could feel my butt sticking way out, my freeleg bend at funny angles, my edges flatten out...
- really bad fall on rhumba yesterday: caught skate blade on my pant leg (too bad: I really was enjoying skating in my yoga pants) on the change of edge at full speed and kicked my own skating leg out from under me... think both wrists are now mildly sprained.

[jazzpants]

Heavenly: First hour of practice... started out okay but got better after the half hour mark... Spins and jumps where coming along well. But still need to get in even more speed going into them.

Hellish:Well the getting more speed part. It's not that I can't stroke up to it. It's just doing mohawks and transition stuff that I don't go fast on. Coach is NOT happy about it, since he wants to fit in FOUR jumps (well 3 jumps, one jump combo) and two spins (a sit spin and a scratch spin... coach originally wanted a camel spin but settled for scratch since it's my best spin.) And this is an ARTISTIC/interpretive program (not a technical program.)

And because of the fast trasition between each jumps and spin the coach wants me to do, I've been having A LOT of trouble with practice keeping to the music. I'm very tempted to drop out of the competition now (given I keep the program as is), but everyone tells me to stay with it since I've put in a lot of work into it.

HELP???? :cry:

[garyc254]

HEAVENLY: Saturday lesson, as always, was fun. Once I remembered to keep my nose-over-toes on the one foot spin, I got a couple of revs out of it. Still a long, dizzy was to go though.

Worked on a footwork sequence of back crossover, tap-toe forward, step behind, mohawk, repeat in other direction. It's not too difficult, but challenging enough for me. I've always admired a good footwork sequence more than jumps and spins.

HELLISH: Nothing really, just glad to be on the ice. :D