Congrats Batikat!!

Peaceful: The ice was very empty today! Only three girls and one caoch on the first contract and two coaches and four girls (one was a group of 3 in a very low level small group lesson). The group girls were very wall corralled by their coach off to one area of the ice so I pretty much had empty ice.

Noisy: My coach was gone today. There's a comp (thus why many girls weren't here today...) and she decided to take the morning off to prepare (she didn't have any morning skaters).

Peaceful: I worked on my double 3's and there are getting very good. I also did my x-strokes and got some speed on them. My backwards still needs a little work. I did the power 3's and they were really nice, especially since I just started them during my last lesson. In my rotation direction, they are really good; the other way, I'm still working out the kinks or the steps, much less the push...

Noisy: I did the FS6 dance seq./footwork again. It's coming along nicely, but I have several major flats. Mostly on the last 3turn-bracket-pivot and RFO rocker. I did fix my LBI counter though; it now is mostly on edges...

Peaceful: I think I'm getting my 2sal back and more consistant. I did a few today and they worked out nicely. My flying camel and back camel also were very nice today.

Congratulations Batikat!!!

I'd be curious to know what the Canasta variation is, I'm a sucker for unusual difficult things.

At our rink the usual procedure at the beginning of freestyle sessions is to treat is as if it is your competition warm up. A lap of stroking, do all spins, do all jumps that are in your current program. Do one of everything ugly or not and move on. It takes about five minutes and is great practice for actual competition. We're assumed to have warmed up off ice so as to be able to step on and go, no fussing with gloves or water bottles. Then, it's whatever you want. That way, at least you've done everything you had to, crappy or not and don't regret that you've forgotten to spin

Peaceful:

I demonstrated moves for another coach who is doing a seminar and she asked me to run through them. She'd thought I'd already passed them. This was an amazing ego boost as I've struggled with skills for a while and hit a plateau, so I might test next month after all.

Bothersome:

The above mentioned spins. I've been working on edge changes, and they're not spins, they are big ugly traveling loop things. Which don't translate into loops when I work on loops. Sometimes the 1% finicky part of the sport make me 100% crazy.

Noisy and Bothersome: When I first got on the ice, I was having a bit of a rough practice...or so I thought (see below).

Peaceful and Calm: I think what actually happened was that my body just needed a little bit of warming up after not freestyling all week because when I finally got on lesson, I skated awesome!

We were planning on choreographing my program today, but my coach's back was really hurting to the point where she could barely move. So, we listened to the music and tried to plan out some areas where we could put the elements. Oddly, for a Novice freestyle (that is roughly 3:00) there seems like there's so much music and not enough required elements. Yes, we can always include extra (up to 7 jumps max.), but my coach really doesn't want to overload the program. (She knows I'll just die of exhaustion that way.) We decided to add an axel (warm-up for those doubles) and a spot where I can fill in any jump if I miss one of the required, in addition to the required double sal, double loop, double toe, and double-double. I only need three spins, one of which--the combo spin--is going to be my opening element. So, yeah...I have like, 10 random seconds done. LOL! Thankfully, my coach took the CD home to listen to the music better.

Spent the rest of my lesson working on double sal-double loop, double loops, and double toe loops. My double sal-double loops were decent; I [nearly] landed 3 in a row, which is way more than I usually do, or as my coach put it, "one out of the whole practice."

And, best of all...I almost, so very, very closely landed three double toes. My coach thinks I figured out the actual technique to help me land clean, which involves me rotating my right foot/toes in toward my left skate. I didn't even realize I was doing that, but it helped, so we went with it. Now if I'd only quit reaching for the ice, they'd be clean since reaching for the ice = falling/sitting down. I bet next week I get 'em clean on one foot. That's my goal! (OK, I'd take a clean one by the end of summer.)

Noisy and Bothersome: Double loops, on the other hand, have issues...still! My arms suck and they throw me off of my axis so bad. I'm supposed to work on single loops since they're so good they're nearly a different jump and try to mimick the feeling of how my arms work in them. (Damn muscle memory...)

YAY!!!!!!!! Now you can have a wonderful weekend resting on your laurels!

Peaceful
In spite of not getting enough sleep last night, I somehow managed to skate a clean run-through this morning on the 6:30am session! I'm hopeful that this means I've fixed the mistakes I made in my competition last Friday.

Noisy
Why is it that the element you most need to try out in your program is always the one you have to abort due to interference? An ice dance couple stood there like deer in headlights as I came toward them on a spiral and I had to pull out of it. Is it that hard to figure out where a spiral is headed?

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"You don't have to put an age limit on your dreams." - Dara Torres, 41, after her 2nd medal at the 2008 Olympics

Bothersome: I spent the whole day at a skating seminar with Elizabeth Manley. With only 4 45 minute sessions, I thought it would be an easy day but the off-ice was no easier than the on-ice and I spent the whole day trying to keep up with a bunch of 6 to 12 year olds (I'm 59) - OMG AM I STIFF! Had planned to finish packing (leaving for vacation tomorrow) but that ain't gonna happen tonight!

Ya'll be good while I am gone

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Dianne
(A.O.S.S.? Got it BAD! )

very very peaceful and calm: I passed my dance test! No more Harris Tango for me I have no clue how I passed, seeing as I almost fell flat on my face at the end of my second pattern right before doing a swing mohawk, but luckily my partner held me up lol and things went pretty well after that

noisy and bothersome: I failed the "expression" aspect, even with it choreographed into my dance

Congrats jenna D!


Basically you take the standard Canasta Tango and insert somewhere in the middle 12 - 16 bars worth of your own steps (or coaches steps usually) then return to the original compulsory steps to finish. You have to repeat this twice round so by the end you have done the entire Canasta pattern twice but with your steps in the middle which you have also done twice. Absolutely ridiculous idea in my opinion.!

Judge told me I had too many bars worth of my own steps (but wouldn't penalise me for doing too much!) but coach and I were pretty definite that we were right as we had had trouble trying to make the steps we wanted fit with 12 -14 bars but then found the rules allowed up to 16 bars worth. Judges sheets however stated 12 -14 bars.Typical NISA confusion.

My variation started after the first slip chasse - did a step behind, left mohawk, back swing roll, quick right mohawk, change foot, step to forward, chasse, run, left inside edge posey step, right step, left mohawk, cross front, step, chasse, cross roll, step, swing roll with knee lift down to 4 beat drag and quick knee lift up at end to inside edges to LFI3 turn and then rejoining the original steps on what would normally be the second swing roll. The extra steps meant that the pattern took up the whole rink and you do it twice.

Congratulations! And, don't feel funny about nearly falling over. I've known several people who have actually hit the walls on this dance...and they failed.

As for expression, keep working on it. I'd like to say it gets easier, but as you get higher up, the judges expect even more. I'm not much of an expression person, which is pretty bad considering I'm on my Gold dances, so my coach also choreographs expression into my dances. We also really work on making the techincal aspect as perfect as can be to make up for the lack of expression.

Enjoy the rest of your dances!

For Friday July 18, 2008

Peaceful Pamchenko:
After almost three years of not even being able to fully rotate the loop consistantly, I'm not just rotating it. I'm landing my loop on "1 foot" again. Now part of the time it's being landed on the wrong edge on one foot but that's only when I mess up with my arms. I'm so happy that it's all starting to come back.

I'm also starting to get my backspin back. I'm no longer falling out as soon as I get it started. I'm now upto 1 full rotation and a bit. I think I'll get more rotation when I chase away the fear factor of spinning on the back outside edge.

My split jumps are getting higher. Before they were pathetic and barely recognizable. This is also another issue of killing the fear.

Toe Pick:
I had such a good skate on Thursday but that made me be so stiff today that I couldn't do my Camel as well as I did on Thursday. So this meant that I couldn't do the Camel/Sit/Corkscrew properly either on Friday.

I also had trouble getting down as low as I did on Thursday in my Sit spins because my quad muscles were extremely tight. My coaches muscles were tight too.

What I found interesting was that when I was done my session, I took the time after stretching to watch the higher level session and found that I wasn't the only one having trouble holding up the forward camel for as long as I would have liked. The session that comes after mine has skaters who are working on Junior Silver (Intermediate in US ) or higher freeskate on it. It was funny to see them do their flying Camels (spinning on the back edge) with the greatest of ease but when it came to their forward Camels they were falling out of them as soon as they would hook them. To say the least, it wasn't a good day for forward Camels for anyone during the day sessions. I can't say anything though about the evening sessions. I think it has to do with the fact that everyone's muscles were stiff.

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"It's not age that determines but the heart." "Skating is not just a sport for the young but it's a passion for the soul of the young at heart." Brigitte Laskowski

I am a nomadic adult skater who is a member of Windsor FSC (Skate Windsor) WOS SC again since Sept. 1st, 2008.

http://eastcastlemusic.tripod.com

Singerskates Sports Music Editing

Yes, usually "terrified" isn't exactly the expression the judges are looking for - but too often it's what they get! Many congratulations, anyway!

BatikatII, I missed the part where you said you now have a full level 2. That is totally awesome, well done! So what will be your first level 3 test?

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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!

Well I actually have level 3 free dance already and level 4 field moves so guess I should do the level 3 compulsories next (but I hate compulsories). I can't see me taking level 3 free skating any time soon but I might work on the level 3 OD next.

I only skated for like 20 minutes today between assisting, but it was still nice.

Peaceful and calm
-I got to start assisting today! I assisted an ISI Freestyle 3+4 class, a beginners class and a tots class. The beginners and tots were too cute.
-I did a really nice flying camel that just kept spinning and spinning and spinning.
-I only did a couple of each of my jumps, but they were all there through 2lutz.

Noisy and bothersome
-laybacks were NOT working
-took another one of those 2loop falls of my heel or the edge or whatever it is you trip on. I hate those. They always come across as such a surprise. You expect to be in the air and you're on your butt!

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Youtube Videos

I'm mentally skating this in my head, it's more tango'y than the Canasta. The variation you did was much more difficult than the set pattern, did you have to make it more difficult, eg having 3 turns, or you just wanted to?

Canada has something similar, Bronze Variation dance based on the ten-fox, I don't know if it is still something that can be tested, my dance coach had done it, because his coach made him ridiculous idea indeed!

I think the actual NISA rule book probably says something like ' simple steps, skated well' but the coaches never want to do that - they like a challenge and to give their skaters one!

As far as I know there are no requirements for it at all but it makes it much more interesting to have various turns and drags etc. It always seemed a bit odd to me that for Dance you dont even have to skate backwards til level 4 compulsory dances (UK - Swing dance) while for level 4 Free skating you need several different spins, turns and jumps up to and including the Axel

Hence why I've always thought of my dance tests as being worth about half my free tests.

Until recently you had to do a level 3 variation based on the foxtrot ( a level 5 dance in UK) before you could do an OD to test but now they have taken that requirement out I can do an OD for the next test at level 3.

Noisy:
Awful skate today Jumps felt cheated, spin wasn't happening, and no lesson at coach is on holiday. Rink was eerily quite, no one put any music on for the first half hour, and I left after fourty five minutes.

Peaceful:
I did one kinda good spin...

Saturday 7/19!

Peaceful and calm: I've been working on getting a lower sit spin (or more like thinking about how nice it would be to get a lower sit spin but I keep injuring my L knee so it hasn't helped the mission much). Yesterday on my session though, it was one of those days where something just sort of clicks, and with me, it was lowering my sit spin quite a bit! Sit-change-sits also getting much better (the back sit resembles a back sit and I'm holding it about 4 revs in position consistently, getting lower each time I work on it), and I can also now do a somewhat ok back sit on its own! Hitting nice clamshell and broken leg positions too (amazing how much easier those are from a strong, low, centered sit spin). Also did a sweet camel spin, some pretty decent back camels (getting 3-4 revs more consistently on those), and in general all my spins were centering nicely. As for my MIF test: the power circles are good, rockers getting there, and the last time through the power pull/quick rocker pattern was ok. Did some really nice solo patterns of a few dances (silver tango and blues), it was the first time I'd done any dance since about April and it felt good. I'm also working through my program replacing some crossovers with other steps and adding arms, etc...beefed up the first 30 sec a bit. Also tried a few back scratch-forward scratch using a half loop between spins to change feet...it feels horribly stupid and probably looks just as bad at this point but it's something I can certainly work with (maybe I could do it out of a back camel since I'm not spinning as fast when I come down from that position, and hop to a sit spin on the L foot? That would be cool).

Noisy and bothersome: The axel attempts. Didn't have as good a day as my previous session on Wednesday. And the choctaw pattern on my MIF test was pretty much ick on one side. Lutzes not so great either, but I think by the time I got to them, I was getting pretty tired. I wasn't pointing my toe and reaching back enough, and coaches working with young beginning skaters in both corners a R handed jumper would use to set up a lutz didn't help much. That really annoyed me, I think it was almost a bit rude because they had to have seen that I was working on lutzes, so were other skaters on the session, and it's not like the session was particularly crowded that they could not have moved to the other corners or along the boards somewhere else. Coaches should know better. If this were my normal rink or at least coaches who are out of my normal rink, I would have felt comfortable saying something (although stuff like this doesn't happen at my rink), but I didn't know either of them.

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2010-2011 goals:
Pass Junior MIF test
Don't break anything

Peaceful:

• I am landing my loops clean more consistently... and can land them going in with a lot more speed too!!! The flip is also going thru a similar transformation too!
• Sit spin is coming along. It's definitely getting longer and I've had one try that actually sat pretty well and long. (Well, at least 3 revs in the lower sit position...)

Noisy

• Can't do the BI3's on the line yet. I could do the BI3's but coming back to the line was a problem. (Yes, I know i need more speed going into the BI3's... )
• After about three successful tries at the flip, I couldn't land any again. Why? Kid getting in my path for the setup to the flip!!! (Or rather I was more afraid I was gonna end up kicking back onto the crowds...)
• Didn't try the lutz!!! WAAAAAY too crowded!!!
• Didn't try the camel... WAAAAAY too crowded!!!
• ...and did I mention that the public session I was in was WAAAAY too crowded?

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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!!!

My coach is helping us with our Level 1 Variation, and he said that once the judge asked him why he'd put no backwards skating into it, and he just looked at her, and went, "At level 1?"

Our variation will probably finish with a Mohawk and step to forwards, but the rest of it is very simple.

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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!

Have you ever tried it figures style? It isn't really a choctaw then, because you are letting your skating foot "flip" onto the line, and then doing what is pretty much a T push. That works great for me on the FI threes on the line, but gives me fits most of the time with the FO's.

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That's the way I was taught to do them...and even the way I did my intermediate brackets in the field...it's the only way I got a good enough push..plus that way I KNEW I wasn't toe pushing...it also helps you make sure that you are coming back to the line perpendicularly (think about geometry and 90 degree angles ....I'm a math nerd...that's how I think about things!)...

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Skating Dreams

"All your life you are told the things you cannot do. All your life they will say you're not good enough or strong enough or talented enough; they will say you're the wrong height or the wrong weight or the wrong type to play this or be this or achieve this. THEY WILL TELL YOU NO, a thousand times no, until all the no's become meaningless. All your life they will tell you no, quite firmly and very quickly. AND YOU WILL TELL THEM YES." --Nike