Hard to believe that it is mid May already!!

Gold: Practice on Friday was all gold, getting steadier on the figures

Lead: I have three niteshifts in a row until Tuesday morning. Figure skating really takes a beating since I get really exhausted, and I try to stay off the ice during these periods.

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Keeping School Figures Alive!!

Oh, don't, Figureskates - only 2 more couples' lessons (3 more solo) before the June competitions begin - and only 3 more before our qualifier for the British Adults! Yikes.

Gold: Wonderful run-through of our Free Dance this morning. Coach2 liked almost all of it, except the last 30 seconds, which, although I've kept some of the stuff from last year, is basically new and we don't know so well. She transformed our "dip" by pointing out that Husband needs to hold me before I dip, and not bend forwards while I'm doing it!!!! We got both lifts working, although they are still both very iffy.

Lead: Me. Chicken, basically..... Coach2 said "I could tell you were about to do something you hate at least 3 strokes beforehand". Coach1 said "I can't make you push, but if you do, it'll be easier!" This was about the step to forwards in the Swing Dance, which I hate, and tend to put the brakes on about 3 strokes beforehand.... Oh dear, why is it such a scary step? He (Coach1) pointed out that now that the basic dance is much better (which it is), my feebleness is spoiling it. Sigh.....

Plus also lead were our legs after 45 minutes' solid of lessons. Even Husband admitted he couldn't go on skating. And my legs still ache now, some 5 1/2 hours later!

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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 wish I could have 45 minutes solid lessons. That'd be cool. Annabel, how many private lessons do you take a week, and what is the charge per 15 minutes in Streatham?

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http://www.yourphotoalbums.co.uk

Today, I was skating away and decided to practice some spread eagles. I'm not terribly good at them, as my knees are always bent and I can't straighten them without killing the spread eagle, so sometimes in a futile effort to get better even though I haven't been stretching, I practice them on ice. ;-)

Well, I didn't get my legs straight, though I did work on getting them closer to straight. What I did manage though was to lean back a bit and try hard to turn the opposite direction, and I managed to hold the position for....well as long as I wanted to. Not only that, but I could steer left right fairly okay...the outside edges are new and I can't get a good turning radius on them yet, but it feels really good to be able to hold the spread eagle-ish position for as long as I like. If I get enough speed first, I can do nearly a full lap around the rink in spread eagle position, going straight down the side or weaving back and forth.

Yep, I've got a long ways to go until I get a proper outside spread eagle, or even a really good inside one, but this seems great to me!! I guess it means that my flexibility *is* improving, at least a bit, because I've never managed this before. I remember early on when I tried some crappy spread eagles and falling painfully on my backside out of them, or sometimes managing to carry one a good 3 or 4 feet around a very small circle.

I still haven't learned anything else though :/

By the way, why are spread eagles in the opposite direction so difficult? I think an opposite-direction salchow is easier to manage.

__________________
Casey Allen Shobe | http://casey.shobe.info
"What matters is not experience per se but 'effortful study'."
"At first, dreams seem impossible, then improbable, and eventually inevitable" ~ Christopher Reeve

Normally I take 30 minutes' solo lesson on a Wednesday & 30 minutes' couples lesson on a Sunday, and Husband has 15 minutes' solo, just before our couples lesson. But because we have so much to do at the moment, Husband has kindly abandoned his solo lessons for this month, so we are having 15 minutes with his coach (our other coach's wife) on our Free Dance for the UK competitions, and 30 minutes with our normal coach on our compulsory dances, mostly the ones we need for Europe, as the ones we need for the UK are much easier, thankfully!

Most of the coaches at Streatham charge £7.00 per 15 minutes, although one coach, who is a higher level (most of our coaches are Level 3, although one or two are still Level 2; this one is the highest level you can be - is that Level 5?), charges 50p or £1.00 more.

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

Lead: More Tango in my future... got 1 pass and 2 retries. Comments basically were focused on needing more flow, and especially from the promenade through to the restart.

So I said to coach that I need to do more solo work on that bit to make for more controlled flow.

Comments overall were better than 2 months ago when I tested tango, so there were improvements. Pattern was bigger than last time, definitely.

I'm not upset. I got off the ice figuring that it could have gone either way, hoping for the best... but not upset when it didn't fall that way.

And the result will be better in the long run... working on the flow can only improve my skating overall.

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American Waltz... Once, Twice, ???? ...

Q: How many coaches does it take to fix Jen's Dance Intro-3 Problems
A: 5 and counting...

I'm sorry, Jen! But am glad to see that you're not upset over this...

Gold: The last half hour of the public session at my weekend rink! The b-day parties cleared out, leaving me with a good amount of ice for me to practice my power 3's. Except for the intro-3, which is still slow as molasses, the rest of the power 3's on my LFO side getting faster now... and I'm correctly the nasty foot turning habit using my primary coach's tip. We'll see what happens the next time I do them in front of him.

But overall, I'm quite happy with the progress on the moves. If I could fix a couple of other minor things (*cough*occasionally hopping FI mohawks*cough*Faster Intro-3's*cough*back Xovers on end patterns*cough*) I'm confident that this time around I'll be ready for the test!

Forward spins and backspin were pretty good today too.

Lead: My eyelids!!! Am not getting enough sleep and am very tired!!! Didn't have any juice left for jumps today. Gonna turn in early tonight so I can make sure I get enough sleep for tomorrow.

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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!!!

Lead: Our rink closes for the summer after next weekend's show. Now comes the hunt for the rink trek. I am sooooo spoiled since I live literally around the corner from my usual rink (and there is a Starbucks on the way too). The perfect recipe for skating. A Grande dark of the day to develop the shakes then hit the ice.....shakes and skates

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Keeping School Figures Alive!!

Lead: I can't do 3 turns and I can't do backwards crossovers to save myself. Basically its the fear kicking in. Oh well I will keep trying. Any tips?

Gold I finally can do outside edges for the dutch waltz, it just clicked last night. We also learnt how to do change of edges on one foot last night and I can do those as when I was learning to do outside edges I ended up doing inside edges so I knew how to change over. I also remember the dutch waltz now so I don't have to keep looking at the piece of paper while trying to dance.

3-turns & back crossovers - On both of these, you'll be much safer and more secure if you think of keeping your seat low to the ice. The only time it comes up is the moment you actually execute the turn on the blade on the 3-turn. At that moment, you lift up a little. But don't try to surprise the 3-turn; they don't like to be surprised. Take your time approaching it and try to do it smoothly, using the curve of your edge to help you start your turn. Try them on 2 feet until they're smooth, then go to 1 foot.

With back crossovers, just think of keeping your seat low to the ice the whole time. Reach into the circle with your inside foot, grab some ice and pull. . . Transfer the weight onto the outside leg (the one crossing over) then push. . . Then reach into the circle with the inside foot, grab some ice and pull. . . Keep your seat low to the ice and your back slightly arched with your chest lined up over your knees. Also, make sure your torso faces the inside of the big circle you are creating, i.e., if you're doing Right over Left (clockwise) back crossovers, your right arm is extended in front of you and your left arm is opened out behind you so your chest faces the inside of your circle. Finally, your balance will be more secure if you lean your upper body slightly outside of the circle, not to the inside.

Hope this helps somewhat.

Lead: I was very slow in tonight's show group rehearsal. I keep missing 2 or 3 parts. Without my own copy of the music, I can't rehearse by myself. Wouldn't work anyway -- a lot of my timing depends on having other skaters in certain places.

We have a 10pm practice coming up, which I think I'm looking forward to ... Another coach is joining us and he did a great job last year with finishing choreography touches. Hope I can keep up. Or at least stay awake!

Gold: Nailed several of the problem areas. Did a few wicked backspins, which I have to do instead of a regular scratch spin. The skaters nearest to me spin in the opposite direction, which cuts off my scratch spin entry or leaves me all by my lonesome down the end. Hmmm, maybe a regular scratch spin from a back outside entry might work better.

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Lead: The heating was either switched off or not working, and it was co-o-old!!!!!

Gold: Managed a couple of run-throughs of our free dance to the music. Lifts still not quite working - the final time, we actually got me off the ice at the right moment, and then he dropped me! Duh....

Compulsories OK, although the Willow Waltz took some warming-up! Didn't do any of them to the music, but stepped through all of them.

My friend arrived, and watched the short version of my Interp and, gratifyingly, giggled.....

Lead again: I skated my Interp so badly - the change-edge 3 doesn't work 90% of the time.... and how come I am doing inside 3s to die for, properly checked, in the programme, and can't begin to do them as an exercise?

Quite a lot of the time in the long version of the interp, I feel I am just standing still.... oh dear.... I suppose it'll be all right on the night, as they say - it'll just have to be!

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

Gold: I got a skating dress today and its my birthday on friday. I just went to try it out and its so good, i love it. Im on study leave, no school and i never have to go back again, which means i can do as much skating as i like, inbetween revision and exams but im sure ill find time to fit skating in.

Lead: I have hurt my ankle, i just hope its better for my lesson tomorrow. I aslo have my GCSE's starting next week and im not looking forward to them one bit.

Hannah

GOLD: Woo hoo! I just completed my first full rotation jump!! Wow, never thought I'd see the day. My coach taught me the toe loop, and said I did it pretty good for only just learning it. So now I have 4 jumps, LOL. The bunny hop, waltz jump, half flip, and now the toe loop. I'm so excited! Also, I was messing around and have sorta got the Ina Bauer on a straight line. Not a real pretty one, but almost straight. And I've also been working on stepping into a outside spread eagle. I have been able to do the outside spread eagle for a long time, but not enter it properly...I've always just skated foward, then put the right foot forward and then just kinda flip the left foot out. But I've been working on entering it properly from back crossovers. Woo hoo. I must have open hips naturally, because it's really not hard at all for me to do. I credit it to all the horseback riding I did as a kid.

LEAD: I *still* can't get the entry edge into a one foot spin. I'm challenged when it comes to that. Guess it's something to work on, for sure. Once I finally master the entry into the spin, it will be fun to actually spin and go faster as you pull in tighter. I've been goofing around with the spin trainer (got one for the mere entertainment of seeing people, including myself, go flying off of it!), and sporadically I've gotten centered to where I start to pick up speed. How fun that was! I can only imagine how cool that will be to do on ice!

So there ya go, the good and the bad. And have I said how great it is to have a coach you just "click" with? Life is grand!

Suz

I've just done a GCSE - Spanish speaking - and I start study leave on Thursday at lunchtime. I'm planning to skate on Friday morning to make up fo last weeks unfortunate event, but nothing more than usual during study leave.

If anyone's interested (Annabel perhaps, as you drilled it into me that I wasn't to let my schoolwork suffer!) I haven't let my spanish suffer, apparently I was excellent in my speaking exam this morning and I'm aiming for a 'B' at GCSE level.

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http://www.yourphotoalbums.co.uk

Well lead is one of the other metals they put in to cut down the purity of 24K gold. That said:

18K gold, while not purely great things continue to slowly get better. The double sow roll continues 10 days and counting. Also impressive since I have a terrible cold, phlemgh, everywhere...yuck. Strangely, my double loop continues to get better and bigger. Today I managed a dozen w/ good speed and a small cheat, next full speed....

10K gold- 3rd test loops, gads, I knew there was a reason I did not pass this test as a kid.

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Who me? Couldn't be....
http://www.youtube.com/bouldersk8r

Lead: Ice rink is still closed for the summer.
Gold: I dug out my rollerblades and managed not to kill myself, although my balance was non-existent for the first few minutes as I tried to remember that the rollerblade push is significantly different from forward stroking (i.e., pavement is not ice. wheels are not edges. your rollerblades are not rockered.)

Congrats Mel!!!


Gold: My program is working a lot better than last week, spins are more centered than usual.

Lead: the dreaded salchow!!!
I'm almost always doing something wrong, and then my coach gets annoyed!!!

But oh well, Wish me luck for my Competition this FRIDAY!!!

~kittie

Why do I always, consistantly, skate better when I don't sleep the night before? Work emergencies kept me up last night and then this morning I was too awake to sleep .

Went skating this afternoon, and it was pretty good. I started working on the flip straightaway...did a bunch of half-flips and walkthroughs of the flip. Tried the flip a bunch of times and couldn't ever make it around more than a half revolution, which made for stumbly forward-facing landings. :/

I then discovered by accident how to cheat a flip, by keeping the other foot on the ice longer. But at least it was a jump that landed in a correct position! Small progress anyways.

Later in the session, I did several salchow-toeloop combos and some with an extra toeloop or two on the end for fun.

I've found that I am starting to be able to hold positions for longer, though my stamina is not what it was a couple months ago. For example I did several spread eagles for more than a full lap, held a sit the duck long enough to go around in a big full circle 3.5 times. That makes me happy.

I also figured how to do hydroblade backwards. practiced outside spread eagles and getting the legs straighter, and other stuff.

Then right as things were nearing the session end time, I was trying to do a flip from backwards crossovers, and figured out how to cheat it and land in the right position too.

So, cheated flip and cheated loop, both in the same day! Now just to work on removing the "cheated" part...

Spins were still the usual crap.

__________________
Casey Allen Shobe | http://casey.shobe.info
"What matters is not experience per se but 'effortful study'."
"At first, dreams seem impossible, then improbable, and eventually inevitable" ~ Christopher Reeve

Gold:

• Did some good forward spins, backspin, sit spins. Tries on the camel is consistently about 1-2 rev. (Okay, so that's a 14K gold)
• Moves are as good as they can on a Monday night. (14K Gold too)

Lead:

• Loops and flips landings are royally cheated (Minor toe tap...technically two footed landing.)
• Trying to get the intro-3 to the power 3's even faster in case secondary coach wants to see it!!! Needless to say...
• Back Crossovers

__________________
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!!!

Gold
Our club ran an informal adult competition last night with the opportunity of getting feedback from our main judge, Jane Brown. There were only a handful of us competing and with being the only level 2 adult I was in a class on my own. Anyway it didn't make it any the less nerve-racking though. I was determined not to mess up like I had done at Streatham and thankfully I pulled of all my jumps and the only bit I messed up on was when I came out of my sitspin a quarter of a rotation too short. Still I corrected the steps as best I could and focussed on landing a clean flip which I did. This was important since I completely missed this jump in my last competition.

Anyway I felt pretty pleased with my skate and watching the playback on my friend's video camera, it didn't look bad at all. Anyway when the judge came to give me feedback she was very positive, saying there wasn't a lot to tell me since I was really good, but that I must remember to finish things off, stretch and extend etc.

Lead
My pre-comp warm-up. Having done a half hour patch a little while before in which everything worked really nicely and felt great, I got out for my warm-up and struggled to land anything. I hate the way nerves affect me and I was so determined not to let it happen last night, especially with it being such an informal event.

Nicki

Gold - for many months (not saying how many) my coach has been *trying* to get me to not stick my backside outside of the circle when doing back XO's. On Monday, my better half (a better skater than me too) decided to try to help. We ended up skating in circles with him facing forward and me facing backward in front of him holding each other's elbows in a "relaxed" (hold-of-death in my case) grip. What do you know, my hip stayed neatly under me and not stuck out to the side, and it felt marvellous. What's more, the coach saw it!!

Lead - (a) The hip was neatly under me while I was facing the better half and skating backwards (ie: not looking where I was going - he did that for me). When I tried to replicate the feeling by myself, guess where the hip ended up as soon as I twisted the torso around the circle??

Lead - (b) The coach, while admiring the hip not stuck out, commented wryly that he didn't like diamonds. We both looked blankly at him. Apparently, we were both bent neatly forward at the waist (him going forwards and me going backwards) and the gap between our torsos was therefore a beautiful diamond shape.

Lead - (c) When said coach skated next to me today (he was giving a group lesson), the next thing I knew was "thwack" on the offending hip. Ouch! Guess it still sticks out.

Nicki, I am so-o-o-o-o envious! I'd kill for feedback from Jane, who is one of the judges I most respect!

Melzorina and Yorkie - GOOD LUCK!!!! And to anybody else with public exams looming. Keep skating as much as you can throughout the exam period, without neglecting your studies - you'll be much fresher and study better if you exercise regularly!

Gold: I think my new dress has come - a parcel from the US is being held for me pending payment of import duty & VAT.

Lead: Payment of import duty & VAT! This dress had so better suit me.....

Gold: Another marathon today - 3 hours on the ice! I did take a 20-minute break, mind, but still. Husband and I ran through all our compulsory dances, and then worked on our free dance. Our lift was just not working, so in the end the elite dancers showed us an easier, but more spectacular one, and we are going to try to incorporate it.

Getting a bit more flow on my BO edges now, which is good. Don't mind so much about power & speed at the moment, but I do want flow!

Lead: The first time we tried the end pattern with the new lift, husband picked me up - and promptly dropped me! Not a bad fall, and he stayed upright, but it was COLD on that ice! Second time, he had me and was stable, and I was like, "You can put me down now, I've counted 8!" (the lift is on 5-6-7-8, if you see what I mean), but he didn't....

Interp is awful.... parts of it are great, but parts of it are just not working. Sigh..... I hope it's about "the darkest hour being just before dawn", which it so often is..... Willow waltz was dire, too. The other dances were okay, though.

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

I know. We are very lucky. Sue very kindly arranged for this with Jane and like you I have the greatest of admiration for her. It really has given me a huge boost in the confidence department hearing her positive comments.

Gold
Back to the rink for my lesson this morning. We decided to change around my spins as I have been struggling to pull off a decent camel-sit at the end of my programme. I now have just a camel earlier and finish with a sit/back sit. I ran through my programme a couple of times with the new spin arrangement and it went OK both times so hopefully I've made the right decision.

Lead
Nothing really!

Nicki

Gold: Made it through the ISU FS program - barely but made it. It's stripped down to only the skills I'm sure I can do and I feel as if I'm chasing the music instead of just following it but at least I know I can get through it standing up.

Interp was fun again. I need to practice the end more; I keep forgetting which hand does what and end up tangled in my prop. It's funny but it doesn't suit the music that way.

Lead: Figures - still. I will be lucky if the judges don't fall over laughing when they see how bad my loops are. I try to tell myself that they will be better done on good ice (i.e.: clean, level and not blindingly white) but I'm afraid all good ice will do is make my errors more obvious. Plus there's the issue of not having patch ice now that group lessons are done. Trying to concentrate on position and tracing isn't easy with people whizzing around me all the time.

Two weeks to Mountain Cup.