Breakdown or Breakthrough? Practice Thread, 8/31 - 9/6

[doubletoe]

Breakdown
Yesterday my car wouldn't start and I had to have my husband come rescue me so I could make it to the rink in time for my 2nd to last practice before my competition this Thursday. I got there later than I wanted to, so didn't have time for the pre-competition warmup routine I had been planning to do before getting on the ice.
After 3 weeks of no sitspins (my left knee was bothering me), I tried the camel-sit-pancake-upright spin in my program. I got into the pancake but could not hold onto it and stand up into the upright. I have just one more practice to get it back!

Breakthrough
I have a new spiral position that I am debuting at this week's competition and it was still kind of mediocre, but yesterday I tried the new hand hold I'd come up with on Friday and apparently it looks great now! :D Just in time! Woo hoo!

[ibreakhearts66]

Looking forward to seeing you compete, Doubletoe! I'll be volunteering Friday and Saturday and otherwise plan on living at the rink :)

Breakthrough:
-Lots of nice changes to my program. Took out the 2lutz+2toe for a split lutz-2toe combo. I've been reworking my 2lutz, so it's either really on off of a perfect outside edge, or a wonky flutz. Replaced the second 2lutz with a 2sal+2loop from scotties/helicopters. I'm actually amazed with how much control I have on that combo! Originally was doing split falling leaf into 2sal+2loop, but switched the two (scotties into combo, split falling leaf into solo).
-With the exception of the first few 2flips I tried, jumps were very solid in general today. Combos were working beautifully and other doubles has nice height and delay.
-I now have 2 level 4 spins in my program (well, in theory :P) Flying sit into broken leg, back sit for 8 revs, pancake for the flying spin and Camel, broken leg for 8, layback, edge change. Now I just need to come up with a CCoSp that's at least a level 3.

Breakdown:
-I'm a little disappointed that I'm not including a 2lutz in my program (although I have 2 months til regionals, so I may get it down by then).
-Stamina is pretty much non-existent right now. But I'm giving myself a bit of a break since I was on vacation for a week and am still kind of sick.
-My hardest jump combination (2flip+2loop) is RIGHT after a spin AND I do traveling 3s into it. I'm either going to have to get used to the world spinning while I go for a double double or am going to add at least a few steps before the jump entrance.
-I'm currently not strong enough to do my CoSp as I'd like it--I've been ditching the layback and just going into an upright then a change of edge. It's a level 4 without the layback (position for 8, difficult variation, change of edge and all 3 positions), but I'd really like to get the layback or haircutter back in.

[Morgail]

Breakthrough:

-Definitely an axel breakthrough! I've been hung up on the jumping out of the circle but jumping up, not across, while turning the hip. I'm sure that makes no sense! Anyway, I could never put it all together, but it clicked (finally!!) last week, and it was still there today. I landed a bunch on one foot and squeaked out the last bit of rotation on the ice. I'm not going to count it landed until I have it actually rotated...but I feel like I've made SO much progress.

-Spiral sequence for program is much better since we tweaked it in my last lesson.

Breakdown:

-Double sal feels like it should be easy. But it's not happening. I have a single sal with a backspin rotation tacked on.

-Ice that crackles and breaks when I toe in for a flip or lutz is not nice.

[jazzpants]

Breakthrough: My FO3-BI3's and FI3-BO3's!!! I managed to get thru the pattern once on the FO3-BI3's and TWICE on the FI3-BO3's!!! It's not perfect (it's VERY SLOW!!!) and certainly NOWHERE near testable for Silver Moves, but it's definitely recognizable and definitely somewhere near the pattern!!! YIPPEE!!! After a LOT of practice on this particular move, I'm getting closer on this move!!!

I also watched a fellow skater doing her back cross-strokes and I tried to mimic her up down motion and watched her edge curve on the BO edge before she steps behind. I got a teeny-tiny bit more speed b/c of the timing of when and where to step behind. We'll see if this carries over 'til tomorrow. :D

Breakdown: Not enough time to get to spins!!!

Still working on back power pulls and 8 step mohawks! I may have to pool together enough money to take another lesson with my choreographer to go over the 8 step (at least the FO mohawk part of it...) and the back cross-stroke so I'll have homework to get through those tough spots!!! :D (NOW I *REALLY* want to see if I could get my Silver moves together by this time next year to test!!!)

Spirals still suck!!! Free leg is definitely above hip level, but the knees are not locked straight and the turn-out is still CRAP!!! I've been working on this for QUITE a while on AND off ice!!! I was hoping to get this move to the point where I can get higher scores for it to balance out the other moves, but now I'm not sure if I could get that 2.7 mark on this particular move, so I'm now forced to rely on the other moves to balance this out. (There's no way I can get my hip and feet to turn out to the point whee the toes are pointing up! Just NO WAY!!! :frus:)

[liz_on_ice]

Breakdown - reality has set in and aiming for testing Bronze free in October is just crazy.

Breakthrough - testing just moves, on the other hand, is realistic. Wheee - new stuff to work on! Winter Coach had me doing moves 1 and 5 as warmups for ages now, so they just need tuning. I've learned the others from the charts, and worked on them today with Summer Coach. I've got a whole page of corrections and notes on them to work from, now I just have to do it. :D

[doubletoe]

Ibreakhearts - Looking forward to seeing you Thursday night! And I am confident that you will do well at Regionals without the 2Lz, especially since the split lutz is a very cool jump and can get you +GOE. :D Can't wait to see your spins, too!

Morgail - Congratulations on the breakthrough! I know exactly what you're talking about! What got me landing it was thinking, "Arch, straight, UP!, hip!, arms!" (my coach said when I pulled my arms in, my free leg would automatically pull in at the same time and he was right!).

Jazzpants - Woo hoo on the BI3's! If you want some extra help troubleshooting the spirals for your Silver MIF test, PM me!

Breakthrough
Well, my left knee doesn't hurt, even though I did sitspins today! Yay! The 3 weeks of no sitspins must have given it time enough to heal.

Breakdown
- Though the sitspin is fine, I still can't hold onto the pancake spin and stand up out of it. For this competition I will probably have to do a plain sit instead. :(
- I hate my stiff 6:30am body. In this morning's lesson, I didn't get my usual stretch on the first Y spiral I did, and it got me off balance and pulled me off of my edge. I fell 3 ft. straight down onto my right hip. This bruise is gonna be a doozie, and I know I'm going to be sore in all sorts of weird places tomorrow.

[Kat12]

Breakdown: Have not skated lately! As I said, two Sundays ago I didn't get to the rink. The Monday after that was our last summer class. This past Sunday I was at my mom's house (and naturally the rink up there doesn't have weekend public skate in summer...WHY do they do that??? Do rinks schedule extra hockey on the weekends in summer or something? It can't be a financial thing because surely they get more people on a weekend session than a daytime session).


Breakthrough: Nothing on the ice, but at the thrift store today I found a couple pairs of tights; neither skating tights obviously but one pair is made by Pearl Izumi, who apparently does running/cycling/etc. clothing and they feel thick like they might be thermal. Who knows, if I love these I may never give UA another glance and stop drooling over Frosty tights. :) The first pair has a stripe down the side, which is always fun, and make my butt actually look small; the Pearl Izumis have rubber grippy stuff at the bottom and I found they're stretchy enough to go over the heel of my boot if I want (I have yet to figure why people do this--is it just fashion or does it serve a purpose?). I also found a cute black skort--it's pleated and cute, but doesn't scream "cutesy" or "wannabe-schoolgirl-look"--it's just got two box pleats in front and two in back. Go me. Now to find a toasty top (I might have to go with UA for this one); the long-sleeved t-shirt I usually wear is a bit thin when I first start out but wearing a hoodie over the top gets me too warm later, so I figure a Coldgear top might be just right.

[Terri C]

Breakdown:
As of this week my home rink is no longer my home rink. The management there has decided to eliminate all freestyle sessions from the rink schedule. It's a long story and there are bits and pieces of it on some of my older posts, but what it may end up being is that because of her children's schedules conflicting with her availability to teach at other rinks, I may be losing my primary coach. While my secondary coach (who rocks!) is prepared to step in as my new primary coach if that situation arises, it's still going to be heartbreaking. :cry:
So now me and other skaters from the ex home rink and their coaches are going to other rinks to skate. Most of them are at the smaller rink near my house, which was bedlam last week as the ex home rink had ice conditions so poor it was dangerous to skate. Today I escaped to the regulation sized rink on the other side of the bay and shared the ice with high level skaters which was motivating and intimidating at the same time.

Will my freeskate be ready to compete in three weeks???


Breakthrough:
Making progress on the backsit- even fell on it today and it was not that bad.
Lots of room to skate for a change, instead of trying to dodge everyone!

[PinkLaces]

Breakthrough I landed the flip tonight :D:D:D:D:D It was the very last jump of the night. I could feel it was almost there. In fact, I was about 2 minutes over on my session :halo: but I wasn't getting off until I landed it. ;) Loops - I started out not so great, but ended up with some good ones. I practiced my waltz jump, salchow, and toe loops with more speed. OMGosh! It is so much more fun with some speed - that's the feeling I remember loving as a kid. Backspins - I could get the foot crossed and held for about 3 revs. Ice fairly empty so could work on the backwards edge pattern.

Breakdown Only had time for one 45 minute session so no time for spins tonight. 5 step mohawk - I'm rushing the left mohawk (2 count) and holding the 3 count too long. I'm also sad that there is no skating until next Tuesday when the fall session starts.

I may have a breakdown after this test session is over. I'm the test chair and we have a session we're hosting tomorrow. I thought I was done with stuff, but remembered that I have to print out some signs and schedules for the Asst. Test Chair and myself. This isn't even a big session (last year's was huge), but it seems to be more work than normal.

[ibreakhearts66]

Breakthrough:
-Almost landed an almost clean 3loop 8O I've worked on them in the past with very little success, but lately I've been working on a new entrance to 2loop. LFI choctaw, then just put the left foot down and jump. I was amazed by how my height I was getting, was in a good jumping groove and decided to just go for it. First two were 1/2 turn cheated, but the last was right on the quarter and I SO could have had it if I hadn't been in shock over how much I'd rotated. Then I decided I should probably spend my time working on jumps I can actually compete :cry:
-Making progress on my program. Landed both of the doubles I actually went for (granted, there are 4 more I didn't attempt and the two I landed were the easy ones, BUT they were also two of the hardest in terms of stamina/directly following a spin). Footwork is moving better.
-Nailed the spins in my program.
-Split lutz is splitting more

Breakdown:
-I keep sitting down on the 2flip I do from a traveling 3 entrance. It's getting quite frustrating, especially since it's going to be a 2flip+2loop combo. BUT it is getting better in terms of my control and "plantment" :lol:
-I hate how inconsistent my back camel is when I just enter it without a fly. When I hit it, it feels like I can spin forever. If I mess up the timing, I'm on my butt or close to a fall. :frus:

[aussieskater]

Breakthrough I landed the flip tonight :D:D:D:D:D It was the very last jump of the night.

Wow! Loop last week; flip this week! Way to go, PinkLaces!:D

[PinkLaces]

Wow! Loop last week; flip this week! Way to go, PinkLaces!:D

Thanks! Did you hear anything about your dance tests?

[phoenix]

Breakthrough: Despite being sick last week & not skating at all, I had a good lesson today! Totally ran out of energy halfway through, but I was happy I made it that long, and that was with working on Paso patterns with music. Go me! I was proud of myself for going for it & not asking to just do smaller slower things since I wasn't feeling all that great.

Breakdown: I'm getting a little discouraged with how long it's taking me to get a dance ready to test, and therefore how long it's taking me to work my way through the tests. I really really wanted to be done w/ pre-golds by the end of this year, and that's unlikely (I have 2 left). At this point I'll be lucky to get through the Paso. If it takes me a year or more per dance, I'm afraid my body is going to give out before I make it through gold.

[doubletoe]

Breakthrough:
-Almost landed an almost clean 3loop 8O

Cool!! That was the first triple ever landed (Dick Button), so maybe there's a reason for that! :D

[Kim to the Max]

[Breakdown]
*sigh* my axels were completely horrid last night...I figured out that I was leaning too far back on the take off, and temporary coach has said that I have a weird hesitation on the take off that messes with the timing (which also messes with my ability to get it clean) and I can't figure out how to fix the timing issue...

My camel/back sit has gone back to the gutter and I am getting way frustrated with that spin. I know I can do, and I have done it...many times...but it only shows up when it wants to....

Power pulls need a lot of work....and by a lot, I mean A LOT...they were going so well those mornings I was skating and I don't know why....I wonder if it's because my brain wasn't awake enough to think about how dumb it is to turn backwards to forwards and then backwards again at top speed....

I think my pre-testing freak out is starting way early and this is not a good thing...and regular coach isn't around to help calm that down and neither is one of my friends who graduated and now lives in Ohio...

[Breakthrough]
I am back on the ice....and really, in the long run, that's all that matters to me...and my ankle is feeling SOOOOOO much better....even yesterday felt a lot better than Sunday.

I have until September 26th to get my axel back to where it was before I sprained my ankle and to get those power pulls where they should be. I am trying to be optimistic....

[kimberley801]

Breakdown:
As of this week my home rink is no longer my home rink. The management there has decided to eliminate all freestyle sessions from the rink schedule. It's a long story and there are bits and pieces of it on some of my older posts, but what it may end up being is that because of her children's schedules conflicting with her availability to teach at other rinks, I may be losing my primary coach. While my secondary coach (who rocks!) is prepared to step in as my new primary coach if that situation arises, it's still going to be heartbreaking. :cry:
So now me and other skaters from the ex home rink and their coaches are going to other rinks to skate. Most of them are at the smaller rink near my house, which was bedlam last week as the ex home rink had ice conditions so poor it was dangerous to skate. Today I escaped to the regulation sized rink on the other side of the bay and shared the ice with high level skaters which was motivating and intimidating at the same time.



I heard about this today!!! It's so sad. Ice is so scarce here already! Good luck with the transition, and I hope that things work out with your coaches. I skate at the regulation rink and its worth the drive. Public sessions in the AM are virtually empty and the rink just dropped the price on public sessions. 8-)

Breakthrough: Making progress on spins, and after much practice ended up doing a nearly perfect scratch spin at the end of my lesson - surprised both coach and myself! Also progress with loop jump, and polishing my waltz jumps.

Breakdown: Fell off a couple of edges today - must be overdue for a sharpening. Tried an alternating crossover pattern and realized following patterns is NOT easy!!! Also found out my toe-loops are toe-waltzes. 8O OOPS!

[luckykid]

Breakdown: Knees hurt from doing lunges and shoot the duck. Hmm I'm not old though. But yeah, getting down into lunges, falling on the ice, and getting back up again repeatedly for many times might be making my knee hurt.

Breakthrough: I finally got my double three turn half right. At least I don't keep falling anymore. Had an early morning session, there weren't really many people, didn't have to worry about banging into people. Since here in my country lessons are held during public sessions. Private ice time only comes early morning or late night.

[LilJen]

Breakthrough: -I actually tried and did an ISI3 change-foot spin (fwd spin 3 revs-backspin 3 revs-fwd spin 3 revs). I'm sure it was ugly, and it only happened once, but it happened so I feel more confident that I can get it into competitive shape by February.
-FI-BO3 and FO-BI3 patterns for Silver moves continuing to improve. Although I have some ugly (lazy) subcurves on the end of the forward 3s, the fact that i can get all the way down the ice on the patterns, usually without touching down, is encouraging. Whole lot better than the total non-entity that I was doing in April/May.
Breakdown:
-Wednesday, spin lesson day. Entry into the spin is sloooooooowly getting more consistent and I can feel much more often when (and what) I've done something totally wrong. HOWEVER--back XO prior to this? A total nonstarter at this point. So simple, and yet so impossible at this point for me to do!!
-Backspins, blah. Not happening, at least not during the lesson!
-Still don't feel like I'm getting anywhere on the loop. I don't know how people get this one around so easily; I stabbed my left (jumping/landing) leg (not badly) with the back of my right blade in my stupid attempts to pull everything in. . . Luckily my tetanus shots are up to date.8O

[doubletoe]

[Breakdown]
*sigh* my axels were completely horrid last night...I figured out that I was leaning too far back on the take off, and temporary coach has said that I have a weird hesitation on the take off that messes with the timing (which also messes with my ability to get it clean) and I can't figure out how to fix the timing issue...

I've been there! It's a vicious cycle of fear that makes you pull back just before takeoff, and of course that will make you waxel, which makes you afraid again next time, etc. etc. etc. FWIW, what finally fixed it for me was telling myself to arch my back as I stepped out onto the takeoff edge, then holding that position and gliding straight for one more beat before taking off. When you arch your back, that pushes your chest out over your takeoff knee, which puts you onto the correct part of the blade while also keeping your right shoulder back. Holding that position for one more beat before taking off forces you to resist pre-rotation and also gives you just enough time for your weight to transfer onto the ball of the blade before takeoff. So I literally tell myself, "Arch, straight, up!" and that gives me the right timing and position.

[Skate@Delaware]

Breakdown: my skates...we leave tomorrow to 1) visit my daughter who is stationed near Mike C. and 2) pick up my new skates (Saturday)!!!!

Breakthrough: I had a discussion with a close friend and he said some things that really helped to straighten out my mood. I'm going to stay & skate (yes, on my new skates) at Capital clubhouse (if I don't miss the session from my boot fitting & blade swap). Hopefully, that will help clarify some things.

[Terri C]

I heard about this today!!! It's so sad. Ice is so scarce here already! Good luck with the transition, and I hope that things work out with your coaches. I skate at the regulation rink and its worth the drive. Public sessions in the AM are virtually empty and the rink just dropped the price on public sessions. 8-)

Kimberley, one of my coaches is on staff at said rink that you skate at- you may very well know who he is!! I take my lessons from him at the Virginia Beach rink.

Speaking of the smaller rink, it was bedlam again today. I made it through both my programs on lesson with no issue though, except that my freeskate is a mess, period. I told Coach that if I get through this program with a decent effort at the competition in three weeks, that would be a accomplishment in itself.
Artistic program is a cakewalk compared to the freeskate.

[dbny]

Breakthrough:
Have finally resumed my ice dance lessons today, as coach is back from his month long trip to Russia. I was worried about stamina, but had no problem, and we worked hard. Thought I was down in the knees pretty low on FXO's in kilian hold, but coach said I need to go lower because he is taller than me, and could see that we were at eye level, so, I did get down lower than ever before. I could hardly believe it was possible to have my knees bent that low and still manage FXO's, but not only did I manage, but we moved faster too (duh). So after a few such exercises, we moved on to the Prelim dances, which I am now scheduled to test on Oct 13th. It took me a few iterations to feel comfy again, but then it got to be fun. I was especially fun watching the faces of some of the kids when we headed straight for them on the public session :twisted:. (Not really, I wanted to stop and tell them all to just freeze and let us avoid them, but we were going too fast. No collisions and no falls in our wake.) I have hated the Dutch Waltz from the start, but today I was surprised to discover that the Rhythm Blues is my favorite! That's in spite of nearly doing a face plant on the LFI swing roll, which was coach's fault.


Breakdown:
Still haven't heard back from regular coach as to whether or not she can make the first session this month. I desperately need to get back to work with her.

[singerskates]

Breakdown:

As of yesterday Summer Skating School came to a close at 9:00 PM EST. I will miss all of my adult skating buddies who skated with me on the StarSkate 2 session this summer. It was great being with them and getting inspired to try more. 'till next time my local adult skating friends. :cry:

Breakthrough:

Almost everything. Ever since my coach fixed my skates which I only got back fixed this week on Monday, things instantly improved for me.

Here goes the list of improvements;

Balance has finally arrived. No longer do I feel like I'm on a tight wire fighting at every instance to stay upright. That's right ever since making my comeback to skating, I had skates that made it tough for me to balance and I just skated that way and competed that way. I'm sure there are many of you who had issues with their skates too and toughed it out. I have my coach to thank for my balance because he fixed my "totally warped", according to my coach, skates.

Camel has come back on the first try since the fix. Now I just have to work on getting more rotations, which means strenthening my hip muscles.

Sit Spin is so centered that my coach is jealous of it. I am spinning directly on top of each tracing and getting up to 8 revs before switching to the broken position where I can do another 4 revs. The only thing he wants is for me to get lower so that it's below the 90 degrees.

Corkscrew (scratch) forward spin is now even faster than before and now my coach says that I'm drilling a hole in the ice it's so centered and tight.

Backspin is almost at 2 revs. Somehow in the back of my mind, my mind is playing games with me sabatogging me from getting the 3 or 4 revs I need to pass both the Prelim and Junior Bronze FS tests. Need this spin so bad! But it's only been a week since the skates have been working for me, so I expect to beat my mind and get my backspin back.

Flying upright spin is so far a novalty spin as I can only muster 2 revs after the tiny flying part. But heck, I don't need a flying jump for quite a while yet. So for now, I'll just keep playing with it once in a while.

Forward Layback (head not back yet but will attempt soon) has a good arch in my back, good free leg position and I'm able to generate speed after initial position. I'm also able to grab my freeleg and almost do the haircutter again. Once I feel comfortable with leaning my head back again and I get use to spinning that way, I'll add the hair cutter to the layback. By the way I'm almost centered the way I want in this spin too since getting my boots fixed.

Waltz jump is now floating over the ice and lands easily.

Toe Loop is a very reliable jump and now has air to it again.

Salchows are now on except when I squeeze in my arms too much in the air and then rotate one and half revs to land completely forwards. I have to remember not to squeeze in so much on these.

Loops are all the way around landing first on the landing foot and then the stupid free foot hits the ice for a millisecond. Oh so close. Need to work on the ab, hip and leg muscles to get the freeleg to come up when I land so that I can check out clean.

Flip has the same thing going on as the Loop but at first I had to correct my breaking at the waist on the left side. That's now corrected.

Lutz take off edge has been made stronger (saw some training video online on the Lutz where it says to take the skating leg, when you pick in with the free leg, and sort of kick it forward to the side of you so that you wrap to that leg in the air). Because of this I don't Flutz anymore unless I forget to do what I said in the backets. Like the Loop and Flip my Lutz has my free leg touching the ice momentarily for the most part.

One thing that everyone has said who has seen me skate this week is that I've been jumping my Loop, Flip and Lutz about a foot and a bit off of the ice and the other jumps are not far behind in height.

My split sometimes is not getting the legs extended as I want it all the time but I'm getting some serious height in this jump.

We started working my elements to put into my interpretive program and maybe use in my freeskate. One of the moves we worked on is a move that I've only seen Jeffrey Buttle use when he did his Ava Maria program. To do the move you are skating forward, glide on 1 foot, bend at then knees and then extend your right free leg to the right and your head and arms to the left and then come back up on the free leg while trying to move straight down the ice as you are horizontal except for the skating leg. The move looks like a top heavy short T. Need more core strength to make it all the way down the ice to match my interpretive music "Held" by Natalie Grant on the word "saviour".

Coach is already making me think about in what competitions I'm going to enter and tests I'm going to take this coming year. And now that he sees that I have potential he is is getting increasingly tough on me. Even picking on my skating when it's cool down time and I'm ready to die on the ice from tiredness just before I get off of the session at the end, he's telling me stuff. It's like I have to be perfect now all the time. It's nice that he thinks I can do stuff now but whoa, I'm not going to the Olympics!

[PinkLaces]

Breakthrough:

Almost everything. Ever since my coach fixed my skates which I only got back fixed this week on Monday, things instantly improved for me.



YAY!!!! You must be soooo excited!

[aussieskater]

I expect to beat my mind and get my backspin back.

(Hee hee!) What a wonderful week you've had!

Breakthrough

After weeks and weeks, I finally managed yesterday to do a BI to BO change of edge the way the coach wants (free foot glued to the skating foot, no swinging the free leg wide to "help" the change :oops:, and no touchdown - which started happening as soon as I tried to do the change without moving the free leg!) And I repeated it...and repeated it...and repeated it! So excited - I know it's not a big thing in the overall scheme, but it is sure big for me.

Breakdown

So I tried to repeat it on the other leg. 'Nuff said, really :twisted:. I foresee many more weeks on this *&^%$* exercise - this time on the left leg! :P

[LilJen]

Breakthrough:
-Coach is thinking ahead to ISI3 and watched me run through (sans music) my pre-bronze FS program today for the first time. It's rough, but anyhoo: yes, the change-foot spin is THERE! Probably the backspin portion isn't on a true outside edge--really it's just a spin 3 revs, change feet, go around 3 times, change feet again, go around 3 more times. BUT it's a good start, and the fact that I can in fact balance on my backspin foot is an advance.

Breakdown:
-Coach is really pushing the loop jump (because it and the backspin go hand in hand, in terms of position/alignment/weight). I'm chicken. I think it's because it's taking off AND landing on the ankle I broke 2 years ago. Maybe? I dunno. I'm feeling very uncoordinated with: free leg placement, bringing arms in, aligning the whole body, feeling the outside edge, NOT looking down--one of these days I'll manage to remember all these things at the same time!

[Morgail]

Breakthrough:

-Double sal - feel like I'm getting the hang of it. It's nowhere close to being an actual double, but I feel I'm getting more than the single + backspin now.

-Double loop - just started working on this a couple weeks ago. It's at the single + backspin stage, but it's fun, so I'm putting it in the "breakthrough" category. :)

-Spins - did some good camels and sit-backsits.


Breakdown:

-Axel - It was SO good all week until my lesson. Lesson arrives and *poof* it's gone. So irritating.

-Catch-camel - still trying to figure out the secret to this. I keep dropping my right hip, which makes it impossible to do the catch.

[liz_on_ice]

breakthrough - worked bronze moves, paying attention to notes from lesson, things coming together. Didn't fail to keep working on the pre-bronze moves. worked on the FS4 16-step sequence (and they lie, it is 18 steps!) it is almost memorized.

breakdown - jumps were awful - low and slow, it is just a low energy day.

[Skate@Delaware]

This is for yesterday:
Breakdown: old boots are done...blades were put onto new boots (saving me some $$$) and sharpened.

Breakthrough: after skating and a slight re-adjustment of the right blade (again, moved to the inside cause my body is just that way) my backspin is ok and I could land a solid jump (only did a few waltz jumps) which is weird doing so with someone I didn't really know watching hehehe!

I couldn't really tell by gliding forward because my right blade at first kept me straight, but Mike moved the whole blade over 1/8" and I was good.

Now I just need to break them in a bit.

And on another note: when my son and I were over there visiting with my daughter, we messed around shopping and tried out some beds at a mattress store-big mistake! We both fell in love with the Tempurpedic beds then had to go back to the hotel (Navy Lodge) and sleep in those really bad beds LOL!

[dbny]

And on another note: when my son and I were over there visiting with my daughter, we messed around shopping and tried out some beds at a mattress store-big mistake! We both fell in love with the Tempurpedic beds then had to go back to the hotel (Navy Lodge) and sleep in those really bad beds LOL!

Tempurpedic mattresses are amazing! You can get almost as good with a memory foam topper, and they are a lot less expensive.

Breakdown:
My R leg/ankle/foot. Since I came back from camping, I've been having trouble with RFO edges, in particular holding one long enough to complete a figure 8. I kept feeling my weight shift to the arch as soon as I got to the mid point of the circle. I had this same problem about 2 years ago and new boots took care of it, so I went back to Klingbeil twice to have him work on my boots, but no luck. Then, yesterday, when I was shopping and trying on dresses, I realized that I could balance just fine on my L, but not my R. I tested this and it looks like the problem is with my R leg, ankle, foot or all three. I'm not at all sure any boot can fix this. I'm going to do a simple balance exercise as often as possible and hope that helps.

[Skate@Delaware]

Tempurpedic mattresses are amazing! You can get almost as good with a memory foam topper, and they are a lot less expensive.
I do have a memory foam topper on my regular mattress and it was nice at first BUT that was a few years ago, maybe I need a new one (and a thicker one at that?)