That reminds me, after I did my program for an exhibition a week or so ago, random parents kept coming up to me and saying how good it was, and today somebody told my mom that I'm really graceful. Graceful? I am the farthest thing from graceful. I run into walls on a daily basis, for pete's sake.

Sad. I wish the skating community would respect adult skaters for what they are. Overcoming fear of injury, which would mean not being able to work, care for kids, possibly not even be able to drive, all for the love of skating!

After this competition, I'm not doing a half flip for the next ten years which is when I will have to teach it to my poor, unsuspecting skaters.

Is it bad that I giggle silently to myself when the people doing this sort of thing fall because they're being stupid and reckless? That probably makes me a bad person but sometimes I just get so fed up with being mocked that it's just fun to see karma in action.

It's cute because they assume because you're older than them you should be doing triple axels because that's what they see on tv. I was asked when I started taking learn to skate (for basics review) by one of the parents if I was a coach! Apparently I dress like a skater (tight pants, tight jacket, all black lol) and look like a coach haha. It's flattering but then I have to admit that I am, in fact, not a coach.

Though I'm thinking about talking to my instructor today and seeing if there was a way I could help with the LTS classes, because I genuinely like seeing how excited people get when they get something right. I like helping the adults because I can explain it to them easier, but little kids are fun, too.

I saw a man skating at the rink last night doing the most awkward-looking forward crossovers. I could tell he had skated/played hockey because he knew what to do, but he wasn't keeping his shoulders on the curve and something looked "off" about how he stepped down onto edges.

His skates looked like giant, thick sneakers that had slip-on shiny white plastic skates over them. He came off the ice and started to walk past me and I just couldn't stop myself from asking about his skates - they just looked so odd.

He said "You're such a figure skater! They're goalie skates." The plastic parts protect the skates from getting beat up by the pucks. I guess because they were new and shiny, plus he wasn't wearing pads over them, I never noticed they had the plastic shields before.



Even more fascinating, he showed me the blades. They're almost flat, heel to toe, and have a sharp angle at the front, which explained the awkward crossovers. Hockey skates normally have a big curve at each end of the blade, which is why it's so difficult for beginners to use them. (They have to balance side-to-side as well as front-to-back. Backward falls are very common and scary.)

He told me that he's been talked into returning as a goalie in our adult league. He introduced me to a guy who works at the rink that I've never met before - turns out he's the adult league coordinator.

It always pays to chat someone up, you never know what you'll learn.

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Those are some strange skates. But you're not alone, I always thought hockey players all used the same style skates. But I guess at a hockey game the last thing you're focused on is what their blades look like!

That was really interesting! It can be my "learn something new" for today!

Those goalie blades have a similar look to speed skate blades (without the excessively long heels obviously).
I'd never appreciated that they had different blades for the goalkeeper. Makes sense, but I wonder what percieved advantage there is to having the flat blade. The hockey blades were designed for maneuverability and speed, so what's the goalie blade designed for?

Well, except for when you have to do it to test pre-pre free...

It's way better now than it was when I started back in 1978. I've lost count of the number of times I was told that adults can't learn to skate, that it's too hard, too dangerous, and should be left to the kids. Or that adults don't jump and should stick to dance if they absolutely have to skate. Or that adults can't compete or shouldn't compete because it's too painful for everyone else to watch them. Now I haven't heard any of that in a very long time. So the attitude has improved toward adult skaters. Just because one child had a hard time with the concept (and I get parents who assume I must be a coach all the time), it doesn't mean that everyone equates adult-wearing-skates with coach automatically. It just means that the person making the assumption hasn't really been around skating all that much or paid much attention for the last 20 years.

When I used to skate in Jersey City with Renatele, a parent would come up to me at every session to ask if I was an instructor. That was because the rink had no LTS/Figure Skating lessons other than the huge hockey programs. People whose kids wanted to learn jumps and spins without traveling were out of luck. I looked into offering lessons, but the JC Parks department wasn't receptive or cooperative, so I handed out brochures for Bayonne's programs, lol.

I think the perception of adults as skaters depends on how many visible adult skaters are at a given rink. Adult skaters are much more common at my current rink than my last one. Here, I've often had people assume that I'm a skater, not a coach if they see me practicing or working on choreography without a student. It's an honest mistake.

What you wear is sometimes confusing. Some of the adult skaters wear fleece jackets (some with non-skating logos) and are mistaken for coaching staff.

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Oh, no...

*wail*

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Right Brain: In the distant future, I will land all of the doubles.
Left Brain: HAHAHAHAHA
Left Brain: You can't even do a backspin.
Right Brain: ...

figurekb on YouTube.

Perhaps because I look like a storybook grandmother, I get a lot of attention from the little kid contingent at any rink I skate at. I mean kids under 9 or 10. The real littles who are just learning to skate will come up and demonstrate their skills, especially spins. The more experienced littles will catch my eye then deliberately demonstrate something--lunges, teapots, and spins usually--and without a word skate away.
I've never figured out if they're showing that they're a superior skater than I am (always an exciting thing for a kid to make an adult feel inferior) or if they're demonstrating something to me because I'm the only adult out there who understands.
Anyway, I give them a big smile, applause or a thumbs up. Doing my bit to make kids feel great about their skating.

Older experienced kids will sometimes try to intimidate me by spinning or doing a hockey stop in my path of travel. As I've written elsewhere, I don't tolerate that and just yell "In a pattern here!" at them.

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Great forum quotes:
On Falling: '...it doesn't matter, it's what you do AFTER you fall that's more important' ISK8NYC

The blades are long and flat with few openings between blade and boot to prevent pucks from getting through. I imagine it would take a tremendous amount of skill to put a puck there, but it would happen and it would be a stupid fluke goal like that that would win the Stanley Cup for my least favorite team...

I used to be friends with a goalie before I lost him in the divorce.

Today, a little girl told me the toepicks were there to push with.

Patiently showed how the toepicks are there for toe jumps and to launch off of for edge jumps..

Also, my mother said she once heard public skaters tell their friends the toepick was to stop with. Would have liked to see them try to stop with the toepick..

Oh, and a little girl (a different one) stabbed my hand with her toepick by accident. No blood, but it still hurt.

And let's not mention my splat on the ice when I caught the free foot's toepick in the ice right before trying to jump a waltz jump.

We should have a forum entirely about toepicks. toepickforums.com.

They work delightfully well for stopping - I use them for that purpose rather frequently. Well, if you're going backwards first, anyways.

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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

Ohhhh those toepicks......

Tuesday morning the de-humidifier had been left off, the owner told the zam driver not to zam before the early freestyles, and there were about a thousand bumps on the ice. Coach said "Watch out for the bumps, if you hit one you will fall" just as I hit a bump with my toepick and went flying...... It didn't hurt, I was laughing so hard I could hardly get up The timing was incredible.....

ok. - how about a forum entirely about us continual beginners - you know, where we don't need to feel embarassed, posting what our particular challenges are, & what's the next thing we can practice to progress.
And
while we're at it, where people don't assume that just because we are beginner skaters, is no reflection on all the other kewl awarenesses, skills & success we've helped other people gain
.

I heard that a lot of beginning skaters, use their toepicks like that, and also on fxo's, both of which are wrong. - Fortunately, I have never
fallen into that trap. plus I have been told: "You have the most amazing balance! - Just when it seems
(because of baaad posture), that you're gonna go splat, you manage to save yourself at the last instant. Good for you!" - Well yeah,
but what I really need is to straighten UP, lol
I have tried remembering to Look OVER the barrier; & "the ice isn't going anywhere; & I want to look people in the eye (like I usually do); &
I'm showing off a diamond around my neck", & all the other tricks, but alas, until I feel comfortable on (whatever), my posture drives me nuts. - Then, I read here, that all kinds of skaters, wayyyyyyy ahead of me, still have trouble with it too., sigh.
.

I use them going backwards all the time, it's great because it doesn't wear down the sharpening

I am like this.. but I do it the way where I hop all over and look ungainly and clumsy, to where I'd have rather fallen in the first place just to look more graceful..

Re: stopping with toepicks: coaches and judges HATE hearing that scrraaattttccchhhhh. It's not a sign of being skilled, let's put it that way. A backward snowplow won't wear down your sharpening any more than the dig-in-and-scratch wears down your toepicks. Just fyi.

Here's my best story:

One of my nieces was a crybaby as a child. If she scratched herself with a rosebush, she was in tears! On the ice one night, she skated off with the coach to start her lesson...and fell. More significantly, she didn't cry.

I was off-ice, retying my skates, so the laces were hanging out. I knew she was hurt badly, so I raced onto the ice to keep them from moving her and promptly belly-whopped. Figuring I had stepped on my laces, I tried to get back up, only to fall again. I had the guards on. I tore the skates off and ran across in stocking feet. My niece's leg was broken, but fortunately one of the ice dancers was an MD, so she sent me off and took charge herself. (She actually said "Are you crazy? You'll get frostbite!" It was an outdoor rink and it had to be 20 degrees that night.)

Most important lesson: if you're taking someone else's child on a trip, make sure you have a signed, notarized letter from the parents that authorizes you to make emergency medical decisions. Since I took the girls to competitions in Lake Placid and other places, I had one in my skate bag. The EMT's and ER staff were relieved to see it because it meant they wouldn't be challenged by the parents later.

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