After you test, tell yourself you're not allowed to go anywhere near the ice. Don't watch any skating, don't think about skating, don't talk about skating, don't get near your boots. It's kind of like telling yourself you're not going to eat sweets when going on a diet. Pretty soon you start obsessing.. and it's all you want.... at least that's how my brain works. And it helped get me excited about skating when I hit a low point a couple years ago.

And good luck on your dance tests!

This is for yesterday...

Winter Wonderland:

Sharp blades with rockers are very nice. Mohawks are almost effortless and spreadeagles are easier.

Definitely skating differently - I can feel that I carry my weight when stroking on the ball of my foot rather than the heel. (Probably the shorter blades as well. Imagine that a 1/4" could make that much difference!)

Jumps were easy as pie - even the crappy flip attempts I made (with thoughtful 3-turn entries) felt RIGHT! Ice was really choppy (zam was down all day) so I didn't get too fancy, but waltz jumps really flowed and flew and fled! lol

Blizzard:
I have to "think" about three turns and brackets, focusing on rolling up to the rocker without going all the way to the toepicks. Twizzles seem much easier now. Back 3-turns, etc. will take some getting used to, but they weren't my strong suit anyway. Decided to stop risking my neck on the uncut ice.

Spins on both feet are traveling and scratchy. Can't do a back scratch spin, but I can hold a one-foot backspin position as I head for parts unknown, lol.


This morning, I just couldn't stand to put my skates on - they had been in the car all night; I didn't sleep well, and my neck/shoulders hurt. Instead, I put the kids on the ice for their freestyle and lessons and I worked the treadmill for a half-hour. It was really nice - the machine room overlooks the rink, so the kids were waving at me from time to time and they stayed on the ice without me.

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Yesterday - I managed to leave for my lesson before the snow started coming down too hard and I was done skating by the time it was finished. Good timing.

So for my lesson - we worked on my extensions for my 3 turns - I tend to bend my knee in an ugly fashion. Funny thing when I straigten my leg, tighten my buttuck and flex my foot - I have more control in the turn!

Winerwonderland - worked on arm placements in my gala program - and I was able to cross my arms - right arm on left shoulder, left hand on right hip during my spin that looks kind of interesting.

blizzard - she tried to start on falling leaves and we only got as far as holding the back edge. same problem with my shoulders - I just don't stretch them out enough....so we ended with me holding on to a hoola hoop while holding the back outside edge.

Wonderland: I LOVE unsolicited praise from my coach, like her comment on my upright spin ("Wow, those are coming nice!") and the Sit spin ("Wow, that's FAST!") Really?

Blizzard: ?? Not today

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

Winter Wonderland:
CCW forward crossovers nice.

Blizzard:
CW forward crossovers.... NOT so nice!!! Gotta get over that "public session"-itis. (I should Google "public session"-itis and see what I come up with. ) Need to coordinate the ankle bend (never mind a deeper one) to come before the push.

Winter Wonderland:
Got to do SWING ROLLS today!!! Yes, me with the primary coach that doesn't want me going into ice dancing b/c I have too much on my plate!!! (Sorry! Choreography coach overruled you and says I need to work on my edges to look "less awkward" on the ice overall. That means SWING ROLLS too!!!)

Blizzard:
Too bad I can't coordinate the arm change with the knee bend/edge push very well!!! Drove choreographer coach BATTY...LOL!!!

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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!!!

Blizzard:
It started last night when I set my alarm for the time I have to leave the house instead of the time I have to wake up - and left my phone (alarm) on vibrate only! The only thing that saved me was that I have an alarm set on the calendar event for an hour in advance. I slept through the first 15 minutes of vibrating on my night table, virtually right next to my face. Luckily, my student was later than I was. I had intended to practice after giving the lesson, and it started OK with (Winter Wonderland) FO figure eights and a few FO and FI threes. After that it was all blizzard. I was too tired and started to feel a bit queasy. Only got a few real one foot spins in, and nothing else really worked. Everything felt super klutzy, so I packed it in and headed home. I have to go back to give a lesson tonight, and I just hope I can hold it together till I'm done with that. Worried about my own lesson tomorrow - must get a better night's sleep tonight!

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That's exactly what we look like!

Bring a hair dryer in your skate bag. When you get to the rink, set the hair dryer on high and put the nozel into the boot for 30 seconds to 1 minute for each boot just before putting your boots on. Nice toasty feet for an hour.

Had to do this when I left one rink and then went shopping for 4 hours before going to the other last week. Worked like a dream.

Brigitte

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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

This was taken before I got the blades mounted. I got Ultima Dance blades.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/9210915@N05/3083521112/

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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...

Jazz, swing rolls are also great for warm ups. My partner and I warm up with them and cross rolls up and down the ice.

Winter wonderland - Had a chance to skate today. We played with me throwing him - it took a bit to get each other's part, but I got him off the ground. Pair spins are getting better and we're going to try a new death spiral.

Blizzard - getting a cold or something.

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Recycle Love - Adopt a homeless pet

Blizzard: Woke up with another bloody (not swearing it actually was filled with blood) nose and sinus which gave me a huge headache and nausia. Took all the meds I could and it started to go away but...

When I was at the rink today coach asked me to do my spins and by the time I got to the 5th rotation on both the upright and the sit spin, I was ready to throw up. Let's say we left the spins out of the lesson today.

Winter Wonderland:

Waltz jump was good and high with a nice landing even though I'm just using the Waltz jump now as my warm up jump. It's not in my freeskate program.

Toe Loop was had a nice enterance and landing with good flow.

Loop was all the way around and on one foot but I had trouble keeping my freeleg crossed in the air until I landed making for a messy look on the exit.

Flip was all the way around and had my free foot pretending that I was doing football as it passed by on the landing. Touch Down.

Lutz first was done with my picking leg not extending all the way back but once I was corrected I got the free leg stretched out straight behind me and rotated the Lutz all the way around and played football again with the free leg on the landing.

It's coming.

Then did the beginning of my program with the change I did to start it. No more posing for an eternity before I start skating. I started with a pivot with one arm up and then went to a BLI edge to do a BLI3 into a FO Loop to a RFI twizzle into Xs RFI Mo to Salchow/Toe to RFI Mo to RBO3 (repeat) to Spiral Squence and so on.

Got to leave. I'm late for choir practice. Yikes!

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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

Funny you say that, so did the choreographer. In fact, he says "When you're not stumbling in late to a lesson (which is the other "blizzard" I had), I would like you to warm up with these!!! " SUUUURE, along with the million and one other warm-up exercises that you've given me the last 3 weeks... AND secondary coach's... (Primary coach is infamously BAD about warm-ups... )

Hope you'll feel better...

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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!!!

If only, if only. . . Well, I'd be shot if I just up and quit synchro!! I should probably take a few weeks off, and I probably won't take my skates with me when I go away for Christmas. . . but there's just always something more to learn. . . I have all the ISI FS2 elements EXCEPT the spin! Gotta get that spin before mid-February (the big comp in Oxford), so time is starting to run out. . . .

Dance tests went fine; passed all three prelim (Dutch waltz, canasta tango, rhythm blues) but I wasn't expecting to have a problem with them.

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"Go wash an elephant if you wanna do something big." -Baby Gramps

? Your arms don't change with swing rolls. Upper body stays still.

Joelle

We had an exercise where we brought our arms/hands together for the cross and then open wide with a flourish for the swing. Of course now they are attached to the partner.
Thanks Jazz - having some hot tea and brandy by the fire and a pup in my lap

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Recycle Love - Adopt a homeless pet

Oh, those look so cool!!!!

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

And they would go SO WELL with those construction orange color belts that we use in FS session at our rink to indicate we're doing a program runthru.

(You just topped me in unusually KEWL boots!!!)

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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!!!

I just looked at your photos, and OMG !!!

Can you choose any colour combination you want? I had thought of getting beige suede like a Russian who coaches here sometimes, but you just opened up a whole other world of individuality.

What will you do if you perform/compete? How many pairs of OTB tights will you need to wear to cover that colour?

Wednesday night was an absolute Blizzard of kids practising their routines for the upcoming ice show (Nutcracker, and if I ever hear that music again I will have difficulty restraining myself from screaming). Practise ice dance? Not easy.

Last session with the Senior ice dancer who has been helping me (she returns to her state next week), so we worked hard on Fiesta Tango and Swing Dance (yes, Swing Dance on a 1/4 size rink). She said I've improved heaps, but I suspect that is not saying much .

Other than dance, really didn't get much done this week. Some okay sit spins, Camel, well, says it all. Jumps were okay, though still not getting waltz/loop reliably.

Ah well, tomorrow morning I get to skate again.

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Katz

Saved by Synchro!
I was over it, now I'm into it again !

Good point! I had forgotten you skate synchro. Yes, don't stop that type of skating. But maybe withdrawing from the other things while you're on Christmas holiday will make you more enthusiastic about the rest of it... and then your rekindled energy and love of skating will make it easier to get the rest of it. And I know JUST what you mean about "always something new to learn".

Speaking of which, how was your dance test? Will you be working on new dances when you are enthusiastic about skating again?

I'm a long way from being able to compete or test again. But if I do, I'll either wear OTB tights or leave them uncovered. Most of my dresses except for the raspberry fuschia dress will actually go with the boots pretty well

They're custom boots (not only because of the color but because my feet are 1/2 size different, plus I had orthotics built in to the boots. Harlick offers numerous choices of leather color, especially in the suede. I need to treat the suede with waterproofing spray, so in the meantime, I've been pulling my leg warmers down as much over the boots as possible to protect the suede.

I had actually thought about skating this afternoon after work (I can't skate before work because I have a 90 minute workout session with my gym trainer), but the session times don't work out well, since I need to be somewhere this evening and have to allow for rush hour traffic.

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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...

It depends - you can do them either counter-body or with-body. With-body is much harder, especially on outside swing rolls - guess what we're made to do!!!!

You'll certainly see her coming on a dark night! They are rather gorgeous, though.

Weirdest I've seen - although not on anybody's feet, only on the display stand - were leopardskin-print! Chav city..... and also silver ones. I wouldn't want silver - who settles for second-best?

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

I know someone with leopard print boots. They look really neat.

I also know someone with pink and black zebra striped boots.

My former coach got dark hunter green with his initials in yellow on the outside above the heel. I've seen pictures of the boots, they're really neat looking. I thought the initials would look distracting and tacky, but it's not.

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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...

My coach (who is married to George Spiteri (aka SP-Teri)) has a pair of blue suede with gold trim, a gold pair with silver trim -- which she wears mostly for holiday shows, a zebra pair, a red, white and blue suede pair, a mauve and plum suede pair, a pistachio and pale pink suede pair and a gold pair with black patent trim. She wanted just black patent.. but the patent creases too easily and looks "icky" -- her word, not mine. I guess you can tell George makes his demo model skates in her size, when he wants to try new ideas for boots!

One of the other coaches at the rink has a pair of light grey suede... with a wine glass in dark purple on one heel and a bunch of grapes on the other heel.

Dance tests were fine and pretty casual. At this level, I didn't expect to see much in the way of comments or criticisms--from waht I can remember from the judge's sheets, it was "nice waltz feel" "nice tango expression" and the like. Through the summer I had worked very hard on (1) feet TOGETHER after everything (2) pointing the toes (3) good strong arms in the holds and (4) posture, posture, posture!!! as well as getting the patterns better so I knew the dances were in good shape.

I'll definitely start right in on the pre-bronze dances. At one point I knew the cha-cha, and dance buddy showed me fiesta tango once (ew! drop mohawk!!??). We're really fortunate to have dance buddy around--he just wants everyone to love ice dance and teaches everyone who shows the least amount of interest (FOR FREE!!)!! He got me nearly up to passing standard with all three prelim dances, and my coach needed to just tweak some things. My coach is very big on dance, and dance is certainly less terrifying (usually) than freestyle for me and tends to be all nitpicky (like me) so it's a good fit and feels more doable at times than freestyle. And "they" all say working on dance will only help your freestyle!

Hoping also to test bronze moves in February--they're getting very close to good.

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"Go wash an elephant if you wanna do something big." -Baby Gramps

I've always taught my dancers that their arms/shoulders remain facing the same direction down the long axis while their hips and lower body do the work or create the actual swing roll. You'll only look as though you're moving the upper body, so what you end up with then is a more natural position of the upper body without any jerking, swinging, switching, etc. of the arms.