Footwork:
*All done in both/all directions

• Mohawks
• counters
• rockers
• brackets
• serpentine footwork in my program
• straight line footwork in my program
• Swing rolls
• slaloms
• power pulls
• edges
• russian stroking
• Chasses

Moves:

• Juvenile Moves
• Intermediate Moves
• Novice Moves: Quick brackets, spiral sequence, and back inside/forward inside 3-turns

Spins:

• Forward scratch to back scratch
• Sit change Sit
• Camel change Camel
• Back camel/sit/forward sit
• Layback (all variations)
• Back scratch by itself
• Back scratch into loop or double loop

Jumps:

• Warm-up: Waltz, Waltz-toe, Waltz-loop, Axel
• All singles
• Double Sal
• Double loop
• Double Flip
• Double Lutz (alone and out of footwork)

Jump Combos:

• Everything followed by a loop
• Everything followed by a toe loop
• Axel-half loop-double sal

Dances:

• Willow Waltz
• Fourteenstep
• Foxtrot
• European Waltz
• And just for fun, with my coach, Starlight Waltz, Killian, and Quickstep

While I don't hit ALL of these everytime, I get pretty darn close. Only thing that I may let lapse is some of the dance.

__________________
"Without a struggle, there can be no progress" ~ Frederick Douglass

At this point, since my doc has limited me to no small circles on my left (formerly broken) ankle--spins--and no jumps, I mostly focus on moves and basic skills--as well as getting my strength and stamina back.

Right now:
-mohawks
-all forward 3turns
-pre-bronze edges
-stroking
-forward and backward crossovers
-transitions
-lunges and spirals (no height yet)
-that new 3turn pattern for pre-bronze testing


I go back to the doc Jun 16. I hope he'll let me do more.

If you change the arm position in a spin, it's just a variation of the same spin, it doesn't change the name. So no matter what you do with your arms in a scratch spin, it's still a scratch spin.

My coach defines a corkscrew spin as an upright spin with the free leg crossed *behind* the spinning leg.

__________________
Where are those knives when I need them?
----------------------------------
I need a detachable left foot!

Following my decision to test later this summer, I'm now practicing whatever moves there are on the first test... Skate Canada, preliminary elements or however it's called.

Stroking: my coach seems to be finding new things that are wrong with it every time... I need to practice more, but the problem is space: I feel I need a lot of space to do my stroking properly, and especially to hold the edges as long as I should.
Spirals: looking quite good, must work more on the "left" one, as it doesn't feel comfortable enough
Jumps: have to learn the bunny hop jump, which terrifies me after I fell very hard and bruised myself on my second attempt; other jumps are going well, with the exception of my flip, which has been on vacation recently
Spins: sit and forward spins have improved immensly, back spin still needs a lot of work, and I have to work on locking my free leg when doing camel

Other than practicing for my test I am doing...
- mohawks: I absolutely hate them, but I started practicing them religiously each session - I tell myself to go so many times down the line; only forward inside mohawks for now, and my left one needs a lot of work
- backward 3-turns (never mastered those...)
- (trying to learn) loop from backward crossovers
- lutz (again, all kinds of problems with it... when I fix one, another appears...)
- starting to work on axel, just waltz-loop and waltz-spin for now
- working on flying camel and flying back sit spins

Generally, I have a pattern to my session. First I do stroking, forward and backward in both directions if only possible at the session I'm skating at. Then start with a waltz jump and a forward spin, then do some more stroking and then I go through all my elements, one at a time, working from the easiest to most difficult ones. I repeat my better moves about 3 times, and my worse ones about 5 to 7 times and I alternate jumps and spins. Once that is out of the way, I start working on combinations.
At some point my coach calls me for a lesson. After that I practice some of the things she tells me to, and do some mohawk and backward 3-turns exercises (line or circle). And then I work on various elements again, but this time I'll do all jumps, or one jump for a few minutes, before moving on to spins. I spend a quite a bit of time working on my lutz and loop from backward crossovers, but I stop those when I get too tired to achieve anything.

Right now I'm happy to be skating 3 times per week, about 3 h 20 min total.

We haven't learned back 3-turns yet. At what point does a person learn those? We kind of jumped around the USFSA book but most of my class got signed off on Adult 4 in April. We have learned some advanced elements from the freestyle sections (loops, flips, rockers) but not the back 3's.

And she did try to teach us backspins.....and sitspins (mine is more of a hunchback squatspin......ugh!

I will say that adult classes are---interesting!

I only get on the ice about 2 times a month now but that's fine. Last summer I didn't go at all and it took all of September to get back up to speed.

__________________
Skate@Delaware
Ah, show skating!!! I do it for the glitter!

In this order....
One lap of stroking in each direction, to warm up

Bronze moves, to warm up and practice (the crowdedness of the session determines the number of moves that I can get in)

Jumps (and related exercises at the boards and on a line):
Waltz
Sal
Flip
Loop (my flip is more secure than my loop, so practicing it first helps get my weight on my skating side)
Backspin (because it's easier when I'm used to having my weight over the skating side)
Half-lutz and lutz entry
Toe loop
Falling leaf-toe and other sequences and combos

Spins (and related exercises on a line):
Scratch
Sit
Camel
and experimentation with sit-change sit (not much success on this yet)

Interspersed with this, especially if there's traffic, I usually do isolated turns and footwork:
Back power pulls
Back cross thingies (skating leg becomes free leg and crosses in front--I don't know what these are called)
Crossrolls, forward and backward (not very pretty )
Swing rolls, forward and backward
BO3s
Pitiful attempts at BI3s and double threes
and sometimes I'll throw in a Waltz-8 (I don't know any other figure-like exercises)

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

I'm envious that you're going to test Preliminary Elements. Eventually I'll test Preliminary Elements & Freeskate, I can do all the elements, sort of, if we don't talk about sit spins, but coach has told me that I have to pass preliminary skills and have most of Jr.Bronze skills down before I'll be allowed to test any freeskates. Says that the ability learned through the skills will give me a better prelim test. I'm on senior bronze dance as it is, which I point out every time we have this conversation doesn't that prove that I have speed and flow??? , but what goes for my coach's kid students also applies to adult students. So I'm stuck on stupid stupid waltzing whatevers. That's part of my problem, I don't really take them seriously and practice the timing.

all the stuff i usually practice....

Footwork:
*All done in both/all directions
footwork in my program
edges
normal stroking (forward and backward)
back 3s

Spins:
Forward scratch to back scratch
Sit change Sit (ahhhhh... *thud*)
sit (lower!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
Back scratch by itself
camel
layback (sometimes)
camel-sit

Jumps:
waltz
salchow
toeloop
loop
flip (im a cheater! ahhhhh...)
split
1/2 lutz

Jump Combos:
toe-toe-toe (if i wanna)
salchow-toe
waltz-toe
waltz-loop
back 3-mowhawk-salchow
flip-toe
loop-toe

at least its all gettin better!

__________________
~Dreams Can Come True~

Have returned to more edge work and improving posture. Am trying PPMIF elements again - still having trouble with those darn back outside edges!! Also work on forward spin, 5-step mohawk, power 3's especially my bad side. inside 3 turns with more distance and bigger lobes. Then when properly warmed up I try sections of my program and isolated jumps.

Am still rehabing my right shoulder from surgery 9 weeks ago so can't really check hard with right arm back, but it is slowly improving.

I always work on the following things or most of these... it depends on whether I'm feeling more motivated or reserved and how many people are there.

Scratch spins (need work)
Backward & forward stroking (pretty good)
Mohawks / mohawk sequence (good)
Waltz 3-turns (good)
3-turns, inside & out. Insides need improvement.
Backward spirals (need work)
Forward spirals (spiral with my right leg extended is good; the other needs work)
Crossovers, F&B. My left-over-rights need improvement; my right-over-lefts are good.
Waltz jump (ok)
Half Flip (needs work; I'd like to achieve a full flip soon )
Bunny hops (ok)
Ballet jump (needs more work)
Camel spin ( )
Power pulls (ok, need more speed)
Lunges (good with right leg trailing, but needs work w/ left leg trailing)
Shoot-the-ducks *sigh*
Edges, F&B (pretty good, except BO's need work)
Pivots (ok on LO, but RO/RI and LI need work)

__________________
Andrea

After warmup stroking & edges......

Free dance only for one more week until the competition's over! I usually start with the last 3rd of the program, which is the weakest. Then the straight line footwork, then the spins, then the very beginning, when I tend to scrape my toes a lot.....then the whole thing.

Then I'll do twizzles a few times around the rink (back cross rolls to BO twizzles on each foot which is how it's set in the dance). Then go through the footwork pass that ends in the twizzles. Then the whole thing a few more times.

Once the comp is over I'll go back to my normal existance, which is killer exercises for about 1/2 hour, then pieces of my dance, then full patterns. Blues will be the first pre-gold, I think (**did I mention I passed my last silver??!), so will be lots of backward edges & big FI swoopy edges with variations on arm positions & knee bend. Or possibly Starlight, will probably find out tonight in my lesson.

Then when I get too tired or bored w/ all that, I'll run through my moves (intermediate). Which explains why they aren't ready to test yet! Half hearted practicing when too tired to work on anything else.......yeah, that'll get them done.