This is for those of you who skate pairs, or, indeed, dance as a couple - but I know we have more pairs skaters than competitive non-solo dancers on here.

How do you control your lifts despite the excitement and adrenaline rush of competition? As I said in my rather lengthy post about Bracknell, we had a disaster in our free dance yesterday caused by just that - the lift went too high, the husband overbalanced, and we went SPLAT!

We have never, never done that before. In our last dance, the lift was at the end and from more or less a standstill and was our final pose. This time it's an integral part of the dance and has a proper dismount (huh!) and straight into the step sequence.

So how do you control your lifts "on the day"?

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Mrs Redboots
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I love my computer because my friends live in it!
Ice dancers have lovely big curves!

I can remember doing pairs at Bracknell for the first time, our rink, how shall I put it, well its not always that great, although it is due refurbishing.

We arrived at Bracknell the day before and soon discovered that our lifts covered 3 times the amount of ice than at our home rink, due to the fantastic ice that Bracknell has, fortunately we had time to get used to it and re-arrange the following moves slightly as we were no longer on the same landing spot on the ice.

I dont know what the ice is like at your home rink, but if it is anything like ours then that could be partly the reason and also the ice is made particulalry glassy for competition, so less effort is required for lifts.

I think the lift went too high because you were going faster than you were used to, which made the lift so much easier, so Rob was prepared for a more difficult lift, but was taken-aback by the way you probably just flew up.

Controlling the adrenaline rush, well that's another thing, I think you will have learnt from the experience anyway and will probably tone it down a little next time.

But never mind Annabel you and Rob are still stars.

Hi Red,

I've been giving your question some thought, and I think the key to this is to control the adrenilline rush before you step on the ice, because it will not only effect the lifts, but everything else in your program, too.

In other words, if it effects your timing, for instance, and even something as simple as your cross-overs and set up into the lift are not right, then the lift is never going to happen.

I spend a lot of time getting the adrenilline under control both for testing and competition, so that I even have a chance at all, and this process begins to take place a couple of weeks before I even step on the ice for the competition, or test.

Hi Red

There are a lot of angles to approach your question. The biggest thing is practice practice practice until you are your partner have the lift movements down to muscle memory and your bodies will be programmed to do nothing else. Do you practice the lifts out side the context of your program? Doing so with a lot of repetition will go a long way towards setting your muscle memory. As the man, I approach all lifts as a 'job' that has to have a 100% success rate. The 'unpredictable' is unacceptable. Failing in a side by side spin is one thing, but failing in a lift has significant consequeces for my partner if I don't come through...so there is also exit strategies because problems when they do occaisionally occur are usually not an immediate crash. Have your coach work with you to increase your lift practice time as well as your lift technique. Dance lifts require just as much core strength as other lifts.

Hi Mrs. R.
Lots of repition and trust in yourself and your partner's skills. Also, realize that with even the most consistient practice, if you're in this for any amount of time,things will go wrong and there will be a fall in a lift. Work with your coach and ask about what you both can do when this happens. Those pesky dance lifts can be tricky - I've had worse falls from them than overheads!!
Keep them in your run thoughs and when working on segments, do the element before and after the lift. Also, if you're going to be performing your program in other than practice conditions, such as scenery on the ice, spotlights, fog machines....make sure you get to practice under those conditions as well.

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It could have been the ice - which was fast, and rather hard. Or it could have been over-excitement. We are the sort of people who respond to an audience, and I do know we have never done that dance better, despite the fall!

And yes, we do practice the lift in isolation - as we do all the elements. Usually if it goes wrong he drops me and then falls on top of me.... This is the first time I've squashed him!

We'll leave it for this week to give him a chance to heal, and start work on it again next week. Or maybe Friday, we'll see.

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Mrs Redboots
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I love my computer because my friends live in it!
Ice dancers have lovely big curves!