Our club had a program practice today, since I'll be competing next week and the kids the week after. Had a good program runthrough and actually did a sitspin in program!!
Now, I need to clean up my ending (funky sal landing and a woknly backscratch) and I'll be set for next week!

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Adult Nationals, 2009 "The Time of My Life"

To everyone driving/flying, a safe trip and I look forward to seeing everyone!

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Adult Nationals, 2009 "The Time of My Life"

I will most likely be withdrawing due to illness. I have a Dr.'s appt today, we shall see what he says. I may try to do my lesson tonight and see but it does not look good.


I have not slept the past 5 nights.....up all night coughing!

Have fun everyone! I will most likely be in BED!

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Why are you skating so slowly? Get out of my way!

If you skate faster, it makes everything look better!

Sorry to hear that, MSF. Get well soon!!

I'm sorry you're sick, MSF. I hope you feel better soon!

AWWWW!!! Get well soon!!! (I wouldn't go to the rink if I were you! It will make it worse...)

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Cheers,
jazzpants

11-04-2006: Shredded "Pre-Bronze FS for Life" Club Membership card!!!
Silver Moves is the next "Mission Impossible"
(Dare I try for Championship Adult Gold someday???)

Thank you for the support, you guys!!!

Just got back from Cr-Ashburn.
Terri C was in da house!

Loops and I skated decently, considering our ailments (she has an injured back, and I have a sprained wrist--sigh).
We finally decided to do our program, but then the monitor stopped our music midstream. Grrr.

Best of luck to everyone and safe travels as well!

__________________
Doubt whom you will, but never yourself.
"Do what you love, and you'll never have to work a day in your life."
-Haha, I've *arrived*! I am listed as a reference on Wikipedia.

WOOF WOOF WOOF WOOF.... (Raising fist like Arsenio would do...) GO TERRI!!!! Remember your theme for this year!!!

Be careful, you two!!! And yes, all of you who are still en route to NYI, please drive carefully!!!

__________________
Cheers,
jazzpants

11-04-2006: Shredded "Pre-Bronze FS for Life" Club Membership card!!!
Silver Moves is the next "Mission Impossible"
(Dare I try for Championship Adult Gold someday???)

Thank you for the support, you guys!!!

Jazz,
Since you are probably on the hunt for NYI gossip, please clean out your mailbox!!

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Adult Nationals, 2009 "The Time of My Life"

I just did and I got your PM already...

__________________
Cheers,
jazzpants

11-04-2006: Shredded "Pre-Bronze FS for Life" Club Membership card!!!
Silver Moves is the next "Mission Impossible"
(Dare I try for Championship Adult Gold someday???)

Thank you for the support, you guys!!!

Mika, congrats!!!!
How did everyone skate?

__________________
Recycle Love - Adopt a homeless pet

Any results for Silver Men?

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Tim David's Website

...and the Pre-Bronze Ladies events too please!!!

Terri, want more NYI gossip too, please!!!

__________________
Cheers,
jazzpants

11-04-2006: Shredded "Pre-Bronze FS for Life" Club Membership card!!!
Silver Moves is the next "Mission Impossible"
(Dare I try for Championship Adult Gold someday???)

Thank you for the support, you guys!!!

Pre-Bronze ladies skated this morning (Sunday morning), but I wasn't able to go watch--one of my husband's regular customers gave us symphony tickets they couldn't use.

But I enjoyed seeing sk8pics and Terri skate their interp programs yesterday!

__________________
Ask me about becoming a bone marrow donor.
http://www.marrow.org
http://www.nmdp.org

Got back a couple of hours ago from Ashburn. It was great to see everyone - everyone skated well. NoVa and Loops did a great job skating in Gold Pairs (with a great CoP-friendly death spiral) - I imagine it must have ben hard for the judges to pick a winner as both pairs were awesome. Some friends of mine who will be skating Silver Pairs next year were very impressed. Sexyskates skated another beautiful program and NaomiBeth1, sk8pics, NoVa, MusicSkateFan, Terri C, Ellyn, coskater, and mdvask8r (who was very busy volunteering in the event, too) had great skates in their respective events, as did several "lurkers" (you guys know who you are! ). I also got to see a friend have a great skate and win her FS comp (Bronze III/IV/V).

As for Pre-Bronze Ladies, the quality of skating has definitely improved at this event over the past 3 years. I shudder to think how my (no-test) program of 2 years ago would have looked next to this field. If any of the organizers are reading this, I do think they should consider offering No-Test FS and CM events in future years, like Peach and Halloween do. I didn't see the IV/V group, except for sk8pics, who skated great - I was getting ready for my event. I didn't see most of my group, although I am told the woman who won did singles through loop and a camel spin (and I assume other spins, too). While I was pleased that not all of the judges had me last this year (actually, the majority had me 3rd - I continued my tradition of losing tiebreakers), I felt a bit let down about the results. I was thrilled to have landed a loop in competition (finally!) although I'll have to wait for the video to see if it actually looked like a jump and not a hopped 3-turn. I know I've done that jump better in practice, but after messing up on the backspin , I think I got a bit tentative when it came to my next "scare" element.

After I skated, I had the chance to talk with a couple of the judges (jenlyon60, thanks so much for your help with that), who said I had good speed (now there's a comment I thought I would never hear about my skating - lol) but that I looked a bit awkward and my transitions and stroking were weak. Hey, at least I've got some speed now. But I know I have a lot to work on to be more competitive.

I was pleasantly surprised not to finish last in Bronze MIF, but I'm kind of annoyed at myself that my crossovers on the BO edge glides were so scratchy. I'd been working really hard to improve that - hopefully the new skates (which I start breaking in tomorrow) will help (and if they don't - uh oh! ). I also suspect that I didn't extend enough on the first push on the back crossovers. As for the 8-step - hey, I stayed vertical, 'nuff said.

I'm not sure when I'll compete again. May Day is a possibility, as is the Chesapeake Open. But my priority is to get my Bronze moves passed and improve my freestyle skills. We'll see.

Congrats Debbie.
What were the pair elements/results?

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Recycle Love - Adopt a homeless pet

Debbie, I feel the same way you do regarding results and the fact that Pre Bronze free is getting tougher by the year. The winner this year did a camel, and a sit spin, as well as awesome loop jump, while the second place winner had a loop loop combo and a good circular footwork sequence.
I felt let down about the results because up until the final spin in the program, I was skating a clean program and this was in spite of the fact that I had the Competition Warm Up From Hell.
Lessons learned here: Practice and warm up do not mean anything, what you do when you compete in front of the judges does, and do not let your guard down when you're skating a clean program.

Lastly, my "Up Yours" moment of NYI: 5 revolutions in a sit spin that the one judge I spoke with considered a recognizable (sp?) sit!

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Adult Nationals, 2009 "The Time of My Life"

Hey flo, I guess you're back from Atlanta? I hope you and Rob had a productive weekend - when will you be practicing up here?

Lee/Andrea won and Loops/NoVa got 2nd - it was close though, a 3-2 split among the judges. Loops and NoVa could probably tell you more about the specific pair elements - I'd probably get the names mixed up , but I know Lee and Andrea did their back press lift (that's the correct name, right?) and Loops and NoVa did a spread eagle type death spiral (I've seen Inoue/Baldwin and others do that). Both pairs had good side by side jumps and spins and good pair spins and lifts and throws. It was great to see both teams skate so well and make it difficult for the judges.

Hi, I'm back from a great weekend in Atlanta. Our main limitation is time, I can only imagine what we could do if we were in the same area. We'll be in Atlanta next, and back in Balitmore in a few weeks.

__________________
Recycle Love - Adopt a homeless pet

Loops and I technically do not do a death spiral: I never achieve the pivot position while Loops is in the arched position. One judge that we spoke to correctly dinged us for that.

I was astonished by the amount of progress that A&L have made in the past year or so. They skated with an incredible amount of speed, and they even boasted pairs bracket moves. They also had a lutz lift (I think), sbs lutz jumps, some type of sbs spins combo, throw loop, a half back-press lift, back outside death spiral (with him in a true pivot), pair camel/alligator spin, as well as some other moves.

Loops and I were happy with our performance. I made a slight error in the spiral sequence. Usually, the hard part is switching edges; after that Loops does an Ina Bauer, then I swoop by her, and we do catch-foot spirals. I forgot about her Bauer, so there was a little stumble/loss of cadence there. I think she may have made as light bobble on footwork into our split twist?
And I made a technical glitch on the split twist: Instead of catching Loops in thr air, I pretty much just broke her fall and she fell back down to Earth. That slight difference--catching her in the air vs. letting her fall and placing her on the ice means the difference between a twist lift and a throw jump. One judge either downgraded our twist or credited us with a throw lutz. That was interesting/surprising to hear.
Another interesting note is that Loops and I are a silver pair team who skated up to the gold level. We never really adjusted our program to meet the well-balanced gold pair team requirements. One of these elements is a side-by-side solo jump; we only did a sbs jump sequence. So one judge dinged us for that. D'oh!

Overall, we skated pretty tentatively. I was a bit apprehensive because I had suffered a sprain in my right wrist the week before, and we had been unable to practice throw jumps or any lifts. I decided to just do these elements and deal with the pain and soreness later. My brain is happy, but my wrist is now angry.

We spoke at length with a few of the judges (and some coaches who watched--our coach was not there) and we learned more than ever about pairs elements, how they are judges, what our strengths and weaknesses are, and what we need to do to progress and clean up our basic skating and some program components and technical issues. We are forever grateful to those judges who took time to speak to us, even though we knew they had a long day and that sometimes it's hard being approached and explaining your marks.

I can't speak for Loops, but I was happy with our skate. We fixed a few synchronicity problems that snagged us at Halloween Classic. And a judge told us that we looked like we belonged in the gold pairs event. That was incredibley nice to say, and I feel like we can comfortably move up to the gold level next season if we want.
And thanx for all the kind words that many of you told us about our skating and our program. It really means a lot.

Oh, our elements were:
axel lift, pair spread eagle into throw salchow, sbs sit-change sit spins, footwork into split twist, full-rink pair spiral with change of edge and catch-foot variation, forward inside "death spiral" where I am in an inside spread eagle position, footwork into toe/mazurka/salchow, pair camel-switch-alligator spin.

__________________
Doubt whom you will, but never yourself.
"Do what you love, and you'll never have to work a day in your life."
-Haha, I've *arrived*! I am listed as a reference on Wikipedia.

NoVa, I heard you two did a great job. What's an allegator spin?
Do you know where the lifts are valued/grouped? We're deciding our lifts, axel, twist, loop and lutz.
congrats to you both and thanks.

__________________
Recycle Love - Adopt a homeless pet

What??
I'd think that a SBS jump sequence is harder to do in pairs, but I'm a singles skater, so what do I know??

__________________
Adult Nationals, 2009 "The Time of My Life"

We needed to do a sbs solo jump AND a combo or sequence.

__________________
Doubt whom you will, but never yourself.
"Do what you love, and you'll never have to work a day in your life."
-Haha, I've *arrived*! I am listed as a reference on Wikipedia.

Alligator? I think you call it a catch-waist (or, er a crocodile ) spin?
Basically, we're both in the camel position, but we face in different directions and we hold each other's waist and free leg.

Here's the gold pairs judging list:
http://www.usfsa.org/content/Acc_F-36c-AdG-Prs.pdf
(so you cann we lost 0.2 for the missed sbs jump.)

I don't have the USFSA sheet that lists the lift groupings, but you can see them here:
http://sk8stuff.com/f_recog/pairs/re...ifts_index.htm

ETA: Check out pages 2 (Rule 313, paragraph 5), 6 (Rule 321, paragraph 2), and 10 for the ISU definition, groupings, and points values:
Communication 1319

__________________
Doubt whom you will, but never yourself.
"Do what you love, and you'll never have to work a day in your life."
-Haha, I've *arrived*! I am listed as a reference on Wikipedia.

Hi Terrie, for gold pairs you need a sbs solo and combo or sequence. We tried throw flips- I'd not done them - they were fun.

__________________
Recycle Love - Adopt a homeless pet