Discipline,level,and how many years it took you to get as good as you are.

[FSWer]

Say,we all know it takes years sometimes to get super good in Skating. But I was just wondering how many years it took all of you personally to get as good as you are? Please name level and Discipline(s)

[kander]

I'm at the age where I'm getting worse over time :( Most of my progress was made in a relatively short period of time (maybe a few years). What takes a long time and is never-ending is consistency.

Kevin

[Muskoka Skater]

Sr.Bronze Ladies and it took me 7yrs. It took me 5yrs to get my best jumps which are double lutz and double axel. Here are tests I'm working on that took me 7yrs to get to: Gold skill, Gold artistic, Sr.Silver dances, Jr.Silver freeskate, and Pre.Novice freeskate.

[RinkRat321]

I've been skating 2 years
i haven't done much testing, i'm only at preliminary but im working on pre juv moves
and i'm working on all my doubles except lutz & axel

[skateskate]

Sr.Bronze Ladies and it took me 7yrs. It took me 5yrs to get my best jumps which are double lutz and double axel. Here are tests I'm working on that took me 7yrs to get to: Gold skill, Gold artistic, Sr.Silver dances, Jr.Silver freeskate, and Pre.Novice freeskate.

sr bronze ladies and you have a double lutz and a double axel??

11 years- jr silver program, sr silver elements, sr silver skills, sr silver dances
my talent really isnt in jumping (i can do everything up to double lutz consistenly, although recently i've been unable to practice flip or lutz due to injury so i have no idea how those are doing.) but i'm an excellent spinner if i do say so myself lol ;)

[ibreakhearts66]

i have only tested pre-pre, but i have clean, consistent doubles through double loop, and my double flip and lutz are good considering my toepicks are too small and they slip...

i started skating 5 years ago, but between january 05 and august 07 i skated fewer than 10 times, so i basically took 2.5 years off and am starting again

[Morgail]

Hmm...well, this is embarrassing.

I've passed USFSA Adult Bronze Moves & FS, and ISI FS 4.
And I've been skating for 15 1/2 years, total. :oops:

But for the first 14 years, I skated at a seasonal rink and socialized more than I practiced. Plus I spent far too many years taking only once-a-week group lessons.

Still, it's very embarrassing to say that I've skated that long and am just beginning work on the single axel.

[SynchroSk8r114]

Discipline: Freestyle
Level: Intermediate
I've been seriously working on passing this since 1999! Bummer, I know. I devoted a lot of time during that period to getting my USFS Gold in Moves in the Field, so I guess I can't be too upset. But still, I'm hoping to test this in December (and pass this time!) I've taken the test three times before and have failed each. I deserved to pass one of those times, but I kind of got robbed. Eh, it happens...you just gotta keep at it, right? ;)

Discipline: Moves in the Field
Level: Passed Senior
I passed my Senior MIF in May 2005 at the age of 19. This is one of the most fulfilling achievements for me knowing that all my hard work, time, dedication, and money paid off! :D

Discipline: Dance
Level: Gold
Technically, I still have one Pre-Gold dance to pass (the Blues), but I'm so close to being done that I'm just going to say that I'm working mainly on my Golds. I began ice dancing at 9 yrs. old, a year after I started skating, put it on hold to work on getting my USFS Gold in MIF, and didn't pick it up again until age 21 when I got with a new dance coach. In the last year, I've passed all my Silver dances and three Pre-Gold dances. I'd love to be done with all my Golds by the summer. :D

[Kim to the Max]

I started with group lessons when I was in the 5th grade (9 years old), continued with that until I passed freestyle 4 (before they added all of the additional LTS levels), then moved into private lessons, skated up until I was 18, went back to it the summer between my freshman/sophomore year of college, then stopped. Just came back to the sport in September! I am sooooo happy to be back on the ice, and am happy that I am pretty much back to the level I was at before I stopped skating.

Freestyle: Preliminary...I passed that test way back in 1998, but I pretty much stopped skating for about 9 years (skated maybe once every 6 months if I was lucky...just enough that I didn't lose everything). I am currently working on my pre-juv freestyle test, then landing my axel for the juv test...even when I was younger though, I wasn't able to land an axel if my life depended on it, so we will see... (I'm 27 but want to continue on the standard track for testing).

Moves: Intermediate...again, I stopped skating for a while, but these are actually getting quite good. I'm hopefully going to test these soon, so that I can move on to Novice.

[rye]

SynchroSk8r114, oooh, congratulations, I think moves and dance are the most beautiful part of skating. I used to think about getting to that level, I think it's now more fantasy than dream though and letting myself be happy at whatever level I am, which is dreaming about someday having a flat enough 3-turn that I can do the waltz eight on "large circles."

Level: I'm in ISI FS1, and expect to pass the program sometime in the next six months. 8 years of group lessons, and about a year of privates, with some big chunks of time off in between.

Someone I skate with said it took about 2 years of privates to get her 3-turns and mohawks to a good level, so sometime when I have more money I may start privates again keeping that kind of timeframe in mind. My downfall before was that I would get so frustrated working on 3-turns, but I think I've learned to be a bit more patient with imperceptible progress since then.