That reminds of one my coach gave me when I'm scratching my toe picks while stroking...

"I should put you on hockey skates! Then you won't be so tempted to go on your toe picks."

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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 have a class of rather rambunctious girls. Once I was going over some things they'd done wrong on an exercise. After I finished w/ the first point they all took off skating to repeat the exercise & I heard myself yelling, "Come back here! I'm not finished yelling at you yet!"

My other favorite is from an off-ice dance coach, yelling at a student in mid-dance: "Stop! Stop right there! I could throw a cat, AND a dog, FIGHTING through your legs & you'd never even know it! Now do it again & keep your legs TOGETHER!!"

Aliens have stolen my axle...really

"You skated that swing rocker like a butcher." (eastern European coach's way of saying I'm butchering the Westminister Waltz again).

"Your (Romantica helicopter/Westminister mohawk/Rhumba choctaw/whatever else you want to use...) is constipated this morning."

"I can't do (fill in the blank) today 'cause I'm a chicken. See? (flaps arms in chicken-like impersonation as proof)."

"I'm not sticking my butt out. My pants just make it look that way. But don't worry, it doesn't show in my test dress, so why fix anything?"

My coach makes fun of where i hold my arms beacuse i pair skated with a guy for 4 years who was 5'11 and im 4"8. so im used to holding my arms extremly high to match his so now that im not pairs skating any more my arms look really funny. It literally looks like im trying to fly away.

A few I've saved from the past. You may recognize your own here.


on forward crossovers "stop looking around, you're not walking on Broadway"

on axel takeoff "you act as if you're going into space"

on axel landing with toe tapping "you're not in Swan Lake/Nutcracker"

on spiral position(head resting on arm looking sideways) "you're not supposed to fall asleep"

on sitspin (before we changed the arm position) "you look like you're relaxing on a sofa"

just after running into a little girl and going flying "you never been so fast before, why did you have to lose all that speed falling?"

"Split falling leaf? Harumpf! Looks like the whole DAMN tree fell!!"

"WHAT'S THE MATTER YOU? YOU THINK YOU CAN DO JES THIS PART OF THE PATTERN CLEAN, YA? I GONNA KEEL YOU! I GONNA KEEL YOU!!!!!"

"That's ok. I don't expect miracles."

"Let me tell you someting. Vy alvays you running vith such a big speed. You don need to make such a big speed."

"Ha! I can FART higher than that!"

"Hold on, let me get the ulcer medication" (frequent response when I've just demonstrated that I can do something perfectly adequately but can't do it on pattern)

"If you do that again I'll have to beat you with my guards" (usually reponse to the same kind of thing, or when I've gotten something right on like the eight millionth try; now when I do that I race to the boards and grab his guards first).

"You look like a dog on a hydrant" about a scratch spin with the free leg turned in instead of out.

"What, exactly, did you think you were doing there?" (when I messed up my changes of edge)

"I was standing here thinking I don't remember that being in the program before".....when I forgot an entire section of a program.

"I feel like I'm driving a Greyhound bus! Driving the bus, driving the bus, for God's sake SKATE!!"....to an older woman at my rink taking dance lessons

"This is not brain surgery".....said when I have an unexpected blonde moment.

"Sharp heads!! I want to see sharp heads!!".....anyone that has ever skated on a synchronized team has probably heard this.

LOL Gary! That's my wonderful Russian dance coach! I had forgotten all about that! Update: I FINALLY learned the dutch waltz and passed the baby dance test. Now he's helping me with the Adult Gold Moves. You should hear the comments when I do what I call the "evil threes"!
LOL. But I love every minute of it!

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Warm Regards,
Kathleen

"It is never too late to become what you might have been."
George Eliot

From russian coach...

You luke like tertul vhen you do seet-speen like zhis. No, cahmelle...BACK STRRRAIGHT!!!!!!!!!

she used to always compare us to animals

Must be a Russian "thing"..... One Russian coach at our rink was reported to say..."You skate like dead horse!"

At least you have an excuse for why your arms are that way!! Mine are pretty high too, and my instructor laughs at me and says it looks like I'm trying to hold myself up with them. I think it's because when I'm doing something hard, I'm subconsciously afraid of falling and my body must think that if I raise my arms, then I wont' fall (which isn't true, of course...)

"What are you doing with those arms? Driving a motorcycle?" (scary thing is to get the exact some comment from 2 different coaches...).

On my horrible camel:
"...No, what you're doing is like a glorified arabesque...bring your shoulders down..."


Coach: You're banned from practising your doubles until further notice (or something to that extent).
Us: *shocked silence*

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Instant burglar...just add pants!
Pants?
Well, it took him five hours to find them.
Really.
Yes, really.
You should have stuck with Gloria Mundi. Then you couldn't make crude jokes.
Sure I...wait, how was that crude?

--My muse and me

While saying hello to an old skating buddy, primary coach sneaks up behind me and says in his half-serious coach tone: "Jazzpants!!! Less talking, More skating!!!" (He's cracking down on me alright...)

__________________
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 have a tendency to talk to others when I'm at skating, and the one day my coach came past me and a few others and said to us, "Ladies, this is an arena, not the Russian Tea Room. Please put your cups away and get back to work." I laughed really hard at that one.

"That sit spin was SO fast that I could count every eyelash"

"Your jumps were SO good yesterday, today you look like a whale trying to get out of the sea"

"Take it towards the barrier, I said TAKE IT TOWARDS THE BARRIER ..... THE BARRIER IS THAT BIG WHITE THING AT THE SIDE OF THE RINK"

"You donkey"

"That spin was SO fast that I could hardly see you move"

"Well, yes, there's hope ..... please note that I DIDN'T say that there was potential!"

This is a 'Danielleism' (my 15 year old niece), she hasn't met Madame but I rather suspect that they'd get on well!

"Aunty Lynne, you're disturbing me, either that or you're just disturbed"

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The best whisper is a click

A few comments that I have used when teaching....There's no money on the ice, (and when they look blank, I reply: Your head is down...look up!).

When the kids are all in the middle or by the boards talking. I skate up and ask why I wasn't invited to the tea party.

When a kid trips on toe picks (and laughs about it or seems ok and needs a laugh) : The line tripped you huh? OR Have a nice trip?

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Montreal, QC, Canada

Lol! This is a great thread!
My coach says (on dances)

"Nobody wants to see your b**t"
" OrOr if your legs were any straighter you would be walking on stilts"

Oh and nice one jp1andonly!!

warming up for a show " i can jump higher then you and I DON'T even have my skates on"

my off ice trainer when i totally baff something "i going to pretend i no see that"

when i used to jump, coach"are you a special olympian?"
me"no"
"then stop jumping like one"

after and attempt a a dble loop " i know i broke(bent at the middle)"
"so drink some glue maybe it fix you"

"you have to pee on the ceiling" my mom trying to help with how i should hold my hips when i dance

"you must to open you legs"
"oh gosh no one has ever said that to me before!!" learning some jumpy 3turn move thing with my dance coach for a show

oh gosh there is so much more i used to have the nickname loser b/c i left my skates at another rink...45 minutes away...twice, so when i would fall he would be like "need any help loser"

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Waffles & Vodka

Breakfast of Champions

"Oi, Buddha butt" ...... guess I shouldn't wear shorts in future!

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The best whisper is a click

i remembered some more...

"when you do that could you come up with your back not your butt"

"stop sticking you butt out""but i thought the judges might like a closer look....i think it's pretty"

"i can't help it, it's a ghetto booty, it has a mind of it s own" (in reference to another 'why are you sticking your butt out" my nickname is now GB1...ghettobooty1 b/c we have another ghetto booty at our rink and she is GB2 lol )

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Waffles & Vodka

Breakfast of Champions

This is probably the funniest series of posts I've ever read. Though I'm not a skater, I can relate to the situation of the hapless being at the mercy of the witty coach. I think a collection like this would make a great little book... something like a "Chicken Soup for the Coached."

Also, it's a great educational tool. In a very humorous way you reveal the trememdous amount of work it takes to become a figure skater... even just to remember to uncleanch the fist.

It's also fun to hear from the coaches who find themselves suddenly amazed and amused by the stuff that comes out of their mouths.

Well, you all have great spirit and wonderful resilience! And great senses of humor!

These are priceless.

I remember I had a bad tendency to leave my legs loose and bent in the air, so my coach would say:

"You're not Tony Hawk!" or "Pretend you have to pee!"

She also hates cheated jumps, so she'd say:

"TARABLE! TARABLE!"

in response to my tendency to pre-rotate about 1/2 turn and pretty much take off forward on a toepick during a salchow.

Or in preparation for an outside Ina Bauer:

"Ok, this time pretend that there's a limbo bar heading toward you at 60 mph and will knock your block off if you don't bend back!"

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Polly Pooperak Move of the Month:
flying llama spin: a flying camel w/ loogie spitting


June: Atkins revolution: axel with a burger in each hand (which spatters grease everywhere) May: hip-hop flop: like her falling tree, but her hat's on backward (props to Darrell H) April: shoot the seal March: camel-toe February: the breast popper (the "Janet") January: gyno squat November: split falling Christmas tree October: double bielmann spin (both legs above the head)