Learning to spin?

[Casey]

Okay, so I posted this drawing of my single- and 2-rotation spins yesterday. I went again today, and I only managed one 2-rotation, mostly I was only able to do one. I found it easiest to go back and forth between the directions...I'd try a CCW a couple times and then if I kept trying it would get worse, but I could stop and do a CW a couple times and the same thing. So I went back and forth between the two, and only really managed to do single-rotation spins. As a result, they got closer together in competancy level...but after a while it just seemed to get harder instead of easier.
http://casey.shobe.info/images/artwork/skating-spins-january2005.png
What I'm doing is going into it in the position to do a forward outside 3-turn, arms and all, then lifting the free leg up a bit bending the knee, and finding my balance after coming out of the 3-turn - enough to spin around once or twice...trying to stay off the toepick. My arms don't like to stay out, they want to pull in at this point. It doesn't seem to make much difference which way I try.

Any advice for getting more rotations? I feel sooo close...

[icedancer2]

Can you do a two-foot spin?

[skatemex]

I think bending the knee when you begin to spin then stretching it also really be aware of your arms being in the correct position and not moving incorrectly, that is very important. And practice a lot i think it takes like 1 month to start to get a lot of revolutions.

[Casey]

Can you do a two-foot spin?
Yes, but getting more than 3-4 rotations is rare - it's hard to get the balance right with two feet, as the weight will shift back and forth between them and screw it up if I'm slightly off going into it.

[skatemex]

Then you should practice more 2 foot spins, and practice them with both the arms open and closed in the correct position then do a 2 foot spin and lift your right foot so it becomes a 1 foot spin and practice the entry of the 1 foot spin a lot.

[Scarlett]

I am having the exact same problem. I can't spin to save my life. I do have a little drill that is starting to help...I go into a spin from a T stop. I'm a CW skater so I push off onto my R foot with my right hand touching my shoulder and then opening my arms up. It seems to help. Good luck!

[Casey]

I am having the exact same problem. I can't spin to save my life. I do have a little drill that is starting to help...I go into a spin from a T stop. I'm a CW skater so I push off onto my R foot with my right hand touching my shoulder and then opening my arms up. It seems to help. Good luck!
That's what I'm doing...starting from a T-stop position, pushing off onto an outside edge, then going into the 3-turn. I do it both directions.

[DressageChica]

Hey! Now, I don't know anything about skating, honestly. But the class that I started in is doing two foot spins..so maybe I can tell you what our instructor told us to do. Because I started skating so young I can't really remember "how" to do a two foot spin..it just kind of happens because I learned so young. But anyway, he taught us the arm motions first, because they are really important for the maximum number of revolutions. He had us start out standing still with our toe pick in the ice and then spinning from that position. Kind of like doing a pivot..except you don't stay up on the toe pick the entire time (obviously). But I think I should refrain from trying to explain the exact way to spin to you, because like I said..I'm not sure about the technicality of it myself! I guess my point is that you should learn it slowly at first you know. You should learn exactly the proper posture, and what to do with your arms, and where to put your weight on the blades. Then you can focus on getting into a two foot spin from a moving entry. I'm sure there are other skaters who would be happy with providing you with the correct information! But until you learn exactly what to do with your body, you will never get multiple revolutions. Good luck!!!

[dbny]

Go into your two foot spin from a pivot. Do not push yourself around, but instead, wind your arms (and shoulders) in the opposite direction of your spin to create torque between your shoulders and hips. Get your momentum by bending your pivot knee and rotating your arms (and shoulders, of course) in the direction of spin, let your hips follow. Bring your foot in to the one you are pivoting on and balance evenly on both feet holding them closely together with knees straight. Tighten up your belly as in sit ups, and press your shoulders back. Try to think of yourself as a very straight and stiff vertical. Keep your arms out for at least three revs, then bring them in slowly, increasing your speed. If you pivoted on your L foot, exit on your R (RBO edge) with bent knee and extended free leg. After you have got this down pat, you can try lifting your R foot (if spinning CCW, L if CW spin) while your arms are still out. Don't try to pull your arms in on one foot until you are comfortable spinning on one foot with arms out.

Pick a direction, CW or CCW, and focus on that. This will be the same direction you will jump in.

[backspin]

How has your instructor had you do it? You are having similar problems to any beginning spinner. Remember that a correct spin will encircle the point of your 3-turn--see how you're doing the turn, travelling a bit on the outside edge before the rotations start? This is common; spins are hard & take hours & hours & hours of practice. Travelling into the spin is usually the result of not getting the free leg & hip snapped around quick enough as you enter the spin. You may have some of your free side weighted which is pulling you a bit. Ask your instructor to watch you--it's hard to tell exactly what the problem is without seeing it. Also a common error when learning to spin is dipping a shoulder, which will result in a travel & also will tip you over (& out of the spin).

A spin entrance is all about timing & every little thing happening in exactly the right sequence. It takes a long time to put it all together smoothly.

[Mrs Redboots]

My own spins are dire, but beginning to happen now. One woman posted a little rhyme, and I've only just remembered all of it, but I'm going to take it to the rink with me tomorrow:

"Bend your knee" (the skating knee on which you enter the 3-turn)
"Hug the tree" (pretend that you are hugging a tree with your arms as you pull in)
"Have to pee" (bring your legs really close together - crossed is ideal, but not for beginners!)
"In front of me" (where you should be looking).

By the way, I find spins work much better (for now) if I enter them from either a standstill or a back outside edge - do an inside 3-turn on the other foot, or even back crossovers the "wrong" way so that you finish on a BO edge, then step out of that circle perpendicularly into the next with a deeply bent knee. I sometimes - but not usually - get the required 3 revolutions if I do that. These days 2.5 is standard, which is progress.

[EM_skate]

I could never spin, until I learned the salchow (I think) And that taught me to bring my free leg around (left leg- I spin CW) and snap it to my side. I got more revs this way and i think it was more centred.

Try bringing your free leg around (out far enough, but not to far) and pulling it to your side. Kind of like the same idea as a corkscrew (or scratch spin), just not as dramatic.

[sue123]

my problem was always dropping my elbows. that's what my instructor tells me. once they're up, you go faster and get around more.

[flippet]

As you can see just from this thread, everyone has a 'different' problem with spinning. For one person, it will be dropping elbows (and probably shoulders too), for another it will be not getting a deep enough knee bend on the entry, etc, etc, etc. Spins are often just downright hard, and can take months or even years to 'get', let alone 'perfect'. Take me, for instance...it took me nearly the whole three years that I was consistently skating and having lessons to manage to get a scratch spin from a 3-turn entry (or any entry at all, really) that didn't travel to China and back, and had more than 2 revs. And I was practicing the darn thing all the time, too. Apparently I'm more of a jumper than a spinner--I had up through the salchow, and was working on the loop by the time I was finally able to spin. And I've still never been able to 'get' a backspin, and haven't managed any other positions, either.

There are just SO many little things that can go wrong with a spin...any ONE of them will throw you off, and you often have multiple things going wrong at once. This is why it's so hard to 'help' someone with spins on a message board. You need help that's targeted to exactly what YOU'RE doing wrong, and at that particular point in time, since it will probably be different on different attempts.

There are some basic things, though, and you've had some advice on those already. Judging from your drawings (which are cool, btw...how did you do and post them? That could be really helpful here for the future.), one of the basic problems you're having (common to any beginner) is not holding the 3-turn long enough before the 'snap' into the turn. You want to hold that sucker long and deep enough that when you do snap around, your spin tracing should be within the second lobe of the 3. In fact, just look at the 3 right here. If you're spinning CCW, you'd trace the bottom lobe of the 3 with your LOedge, hit the center, and come right back around the top lobe of the 3 with your LIedge. The spin should wrap back around towards the middle, where your turn was, so that the space within the top lobe becomes your circle-on-circle-on-circle spin tracing.

There are many things you can do to help hold that edge...what you'll do depends on what you're NOT doing to get it wrong. This is where an experienced pair of eyes comes in SO handy. Ask your coach, or befriend another adult skater at your rink.

But I agree most with another poster---practice your two-foot spin until you're blue in the face, and then practice some more. Then work on lifting a foot from that. Doesn't mean you can't throw a few 3-turn-entry attempts in there somewhere, but the bulk of your spin practice should be on two-foots right now, until you have those going very easily, well-balanced, with many rotations, and centered.

Good luck! :D

[Casey]

Wow guys, thanks for the loads of helpful advice.

I really do need to get a coach, but I'm not going to get one before I have a stable job (and I've just been informed that the company we contract for has decided to terminate our contracts on the 15th of Febuary, making the other problems seem trivial).

And well, it's not like I'm really competitive, so the good training can wait a few weeks - mostly I just do this for fun and exercise, though it would be great fun to be able to compete in adult skating some day.

I think the key point is that I'm trying 1-foot spins too early - I need to focus more on 2-foot spins which I can't do well at all yet.

dbny - I know you say to pick one direction, and everybody else seems to say the same, but my goal is to learn spins and jumps in both directions, even if it takes longer and I don't get as far as a result. I'm pretty ambidextrous by nature anyways, and I think mastering the abilities in both directions would allow some really impressive-looking combinations later on. My skating is slightly (less than before, to be sure) stronger in the CCW direction simply because I've done more of it that direction, but after the spin attempts yesterday it seems to be a toss up between which direction might be better for spins. Ideally, it'll stay that way and both directions will progress evenly. :)

[flippet]

Actually, if I were you, I'd pick a direction and stick with it first....and then, once you have the basics (basically!) mastered, go back and translate it to the other direction. Because it does require what I call 'translation'--if something works better for me on one side than the other, I often have to break it down, and find out exactly why, and then 'tell' the other side how to do it in reverse.

The problem I see here has a couple of components...1) you seem to want to learn everything so fast....not a bad thing, all in all, but...2) you don't have any instruction at the moment. Without instruction, you're going to pick up quite a bag full of bad habits. (Not may...going to. It happens.) Do you really want to complicate yourself even further by doing things incorrectly in two different directions?


I suppose it's kind of like trying to learn French and Spanish at exactly the same time, when you've never tackled a foreign language of any kind before. You're very likely to get all sorts of things mangled and confused. You may end up speaking both languages passably in the end, but it will be so much more difficult (and may take much longer overall) than if you learned at least the basics of one language before trying to throw a second one in there.

There are a number of people who can do at least single jumps in both directions....(who was that guy a couple of years ago who passed ISI 10...didn't he have many things in both directions? Anyone who remembers, help me out here), but I'd be willing to bet that they learned these things in 'steps'...i.e., master a level in one direction, and then master it in the other. I don't know for sure, but it's what would make sense to me.

[CanAmSk8ter]

Flipper, I think you're thinking of Rohene Ward. I heard he's skating for Puerto Rico now (I think it was Puerto Rico anyway).

[fadedstardust]

Yeah pick a direction and learn everything that way first. Logically it may not make sense to you, but if you learn everything and get real proficient at everything in one direction FIRST, it will be much easier to learn the second direction LATER. So, when you're starting your doubles going in one direction, is when you might consider doing singles in the opposite direction if you really feel the need to do it (I never saw the point). When you're doing flying spins in one direction proficiently is when you can start doing spins in the other direction. You are not JUST slowing yourself down. Okay, see, skating is based on muscle memory. When you're a beginner, you need to hammer the same things into your body and brain repetitively for a good amount of time before it sticks. By going both ways right away, you are going to confuse your brain and you may never actually GET the skills at all. Learn them one way, then do them the other way for fun when you become a proficient skater, right now you're just gonna make this impossible for yourself, and there's really no rush in learning stuff both ways- you can do it when you're comfortable with the first side.

Meanwhile, looking at the drawings, I can see that you're not hooking your spin, and you don't have a grasp of where your center of gravity is yet, because the curl of the spin is far away from the three turn, and it should be snapping into place and coming back into a circle at the three turn. I would work on two foot spins, and I don't know if you are doing the spins from a backward crossover entry, but I would seriously consider doing them ONLY from a standstill position for a while. Backward crossovers can throw you even more off your center. You don't need to have your arms out if your goal is just 3-4 revolutions. Put your arms in a circle, hold your hands together in front of you, it'll help with your center. And as always, I think it's a bad idea to learn more advanced skills like one foot spins without a coach cause you're going to pick up bad habits that'll take twice as long to fix as it would to just teach you the spin in the first place, but I can understand the temptation, so good luck.

PS: I was thinking about this.....you don't wait til you come out of the three turn to spin. You do the first half of the three turn, and then the spin snaps into place right as you switch the edge- that's how you hook it. You don't...do a three turn, hold the back edge, and then try to spin. You get speed from the first half of the three turn and then snap as you switch edges. Hope that helps.

[fadedstardust]

I could never spin, until I learned the salchow (I think) And that taught me to bring my free leg around (left leg- I spin CW) and snap it to my side. I got more revs this way and i think it was more centred.

Try bringing your free leg around (out far enough, but not to far) and pulling it to your side. Kind of like the same idea as a corkscrew (or scratch spin), just not as dramatic.

Make sure you're not spinning into your salchow- sooooo many people do this. You actually don't want to bring the leg around, you want to do the three turn, check with the leg slightly to your side but mostly back, and then kick it THROUGH. I know you're not the one asking for advice but I see so many people spinning into a salchow and their instructors not correcting it and it's a pet peeve of mine, so make sure you're not picking up this bad habit. :)

[pennybeagle]

Hi cshobe,

Count me in as another advocate of "learn things in one direction first." You will start to do moves in the field in both directions, which might make you feel more "balanced," but DO learn to jump and spin in one direction first. Flippet's analogy to learning French or Spanish first is a good way to put it.

Concerning the spin (and I will describe this going in the CCW direction):
Yes, work on 2-foot spins first, and try to feel yourself balanced over your left foot. Then, start working on picking up your right foot for a forward one-foot spin, or pick up your left foot for a back spin. Make sure your 2-foot spin tracings look like nice "spin" circles and not small three-turns on your toepicks.

fadedstardust mentioned that it looks like you aren't "hooking" the spin, and so it's traveling. Basically, when you are doing a 1-foot spin in the CCW direction, you should feel like you are going BACKWARDS (even if the spin is called a "forward spin"). If you don't hook the spin, it may feel like the spin is actually travelling forwards in small, consecutive three turns.

I remember working on one-foot spins for a long time because I didn't understand where on the blade I was supposed to be spinning. Only when someone told me that I should feel like I'm going backwards did it make sense to me...before that, I felt like I was spinning forwards (the result being that, while I had a "one-foot spin," the tracings looked more like small three-turns on my toe instead of nice concentric circles).

Good luck.

[kayskate]

Photos of my spin tracings:
www.skatejournal.com/feb01.html#spintracing

You will see one w/ the 3turn off-set from the revs of the spin. This is an error, although I centered it after one rev and held it. The objective is to spin directly atop your 3turn, as someone else mentioned. Hooking the spin allows you to do this. Get the Lussi spin vids. Expensive, but worth every $. The most common problem I see in beginning spins is insufficient knee bend on the initiating 3turn. You cannot pull the free leg around in synch w/ the turn and spin on top of it w/o deeply bending. Most beginning spinners will do the 3turn, *then* try to spin. Wrong. The 3turn becomes the spin.

More of my spins:
www.skatejournal.com/oct01.html#spin2

Also view drawings of correct tracings and errors at
www.skatejournal.com/spin.html

Hope this helps.
Kay

[NCSkater02]

Apparently I'm more of a jumper than a spinner--I had up through the salchow, and was working on the loop by the time I was finally able to spin.


This is so ME!! I've been trying to learn a scratch for at least a year and a half. Since then, I've learned waltz, flip, toe loop, lutz, and salchow. My coaches both say I'll do doubles, but I'll be doing them in Pre-Bronze because I don't think I'll ever learn to spin.

And since I broke my ankle (spinning :roll: ) yesterday, it will be even longer now.

[Casey]

And since I broke my ankle (spinning :roll: ) yesterday, it will be even longer now.
Oh my!! I'm so sorry to hear that :( . I hope you heal up soon!

[NCSkater02]

Oh my!! I'm so sorry to hear that :( . I hope you heal up soon!

Thanks. My doc says 6-8 weeks in the splint, then we'll see after that. My goal is to be back on ice (very carefully) by my birthday (April 11)

[Shinn-Reika]

This is so ME!! I've been trying to learn a scratch for at least a year and a half. Since then, I've learned waltz, flip, toe loop, lutz, and salchow. My coaches both say I'll do doubles, but I'll be doing them in Pre-Bronze because I don't think I'll ever learn to spin.

And since I broke my ankle (spinning :roll: ) yesterday, it will be even longer now.

Wow you're coaches sound exactly like my coaches.

I honestly have no Ideah what's wrong with my spins, but I guess I'll have to keep working on them.

I have the entry down pat, but I always fall apart. Rarely I've done maybe 5 revs, and it felt like I was spinning mostly on toward the center of the blade at that time. Mostly though, I can feel my toe go forward, and that's when I buckle.

[Hann]

This is so ME!! I've been trying to learn a scratch for at least a year and a half. Since then, I've learned waltz, flip, toe loop, lutz, and salchow. My coaches both say I'll do doubles, but I'll be doing them in Pre-Bronze because I don't think I'll ever learn to spin.

And since I broke my ankle (spinning :roll: ) yesterday, it will be even longer now.

I've have been trying to learn like spins for ages now. i've moved on a lot further with my jumps than my spins.. i've done, 3 jumps, cherri, salchow, loop, and im just learning the like the lutz...

I spin really oddly... i seem to end up looking over my right shoulder, i didnt notice it till my coach pointed it out to me, which now has started to hurt my neck... I also put my arms in the completely wrong place. They just kinda end up going onto my toe... but when i went today, i focused on the top row of seat and thought about my arms, which kinda started to make my spins better, as they were more like centered, but i still ended up spinning on my toe...but like if i went into a wrong spin, like if i put my arms in the wrong place, i just came staight out of it.. i really need to get out of that habbit.

i rarely get like 5 revs, it just really annoys me. because like all my other mates are really good at spinning and then its just me, who gets round like 3 times. i have no idea what is up with me and spinning, we just dont seem to get on. but im just going to keep working on them. it doesnt really help, when we are moving on to sit spins in my private lesson... but ya know, just got to keep working on them.

and im sorry about your ankle, i hope it gets better soon.

[fadedstardust]

This is so ME!! I've been trying to learn a scratch for at least a year and a half. Since then, I've learned waltz, flip, toe loop, lutz, and salchow. My coaches both say I'll do doubles, but I'll be doing them in Pre-Bronze because I don't think I'll ever learn to spin.

And since I broke my ankle (spinning :roll: ) yesterday, it will be even longer now.

I am sure your coaches are teasing you and that they know you will be able to spin someday- because there's no feasable way you could ever begin to learn double jumps unless you had a SOLID backspin, and usually to have a solid backspin you need to have a good scratch spin because that's how you learn the basic concept of spinning on a blade. I'm sure it's not a lost cause. And one day you'll be forced to learn them because once you've got your singles, your spins will stop you from moving on in jumps anyway. From axel on up, you NEED your backspin. But I am sure you will learn them and then realize they are a breeze. Good luck and don't give up!!

[Casey]

I would like to jump back in on this thread and say that this is one area where blades definitely make a difference.

I pulled out my old skates that I said I would throw away but couldn't bring myself to do, and took them to the rink the other night, and it was an interesting experience.

After a bit of adjustment and uncertainty, I found I could do pretty much everything I could on my new skates, just not quite as well or as fast. However, I could not spin in the slightest - if I tried the blade simply refused to rotate properly on the ice, and I ended up on the toepick every time. When I first got the new skates, one of the things I noticed was how they seemed to lend themselves to spinning...it's just so easy to find the right spot. The skate guy said that the rocker on the old skates had been oversharpened increasing the length of the rocker, so this probably has something to do with it.

[mikawendy]

You know, my skates/blades are very weird in one respect. I LURRRVE my current pair (Jackson 2700s with MK Pro), which I've had for a year and half, but I have always found it much harder to find the sweet spot on this pair than in my old pair (Riedell 275 with Wilson Excel). The old pair had a flatter rocker, so perhaps it's that I have to be more precise with my new ones than with my old ones...