AND???????? Its now tomorrow!

Ha ha! Yes, it is! I will be testing at 6:30 this evening (6-1/2 hours from now). I'm going to leave work at 2:00pm so I can go warm up at a different rink from 4:00 to 5:00 first.

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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

Ah ok forgot the time difference - stupid me!

GOOD LUCK!

Doubletoe, good luck on that Intermediate moves test! Kudos for taking on the challenge! GANBATTE!

(Jazzpants biting nails for doubletoe on her test in about less than an hour... )

Friday:

• I'm finally getting around to doing more jumps at a more casual and relaxed pace... though not by much!!!
• Jay introduced me to two new nemesis: The lutz and the back-sit!!!
• Waltz: Jay likes the lift and the new kick thru that secondary coach had me working on.

Monday:

• Couldn't he wait 'til I get my camel at least to start me on the backsit??? (Or even more importantly, an honest to goodness backspin that spins on a BO edge???) EEEEK!!! (I only eeked out about 2 revs. on the camel now... barely!!!)
• Jay introduced me to two new nemesis: The lutz and the back-sit!!! *GULP*
• No clean loop landed
• Only landed one clean flip , but the height was wimpy!!! (He drilled me on getting more lift on my flip jump!)
• Showed him what I have of the forward power pulls. He said "I see the outside edge but where's the inside edge????" (Meaning outside edge-flat, outside edge/flat...)

__________________
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!!!

Monday....definitely a Monday as there was only 1/2 day of school somewhere so some kids decided to crash my rink! There went my peace and solitude and back edge practice!!!! I worked on other things and by the time I got off the ice, some skin had rubbed off the front of my ankle....ewww!!!!! Tried to run through some elements of my program...breathing was a problem as the chest is congested. Almost got knocked over by our resident "oldest figure skater guy" as he was skating backwards and not looking (he was doing routine stuff with headphones on)-when i said excuse me I was told "there's plenty of ice. You know where I'm skating" "Ok, yeah like it's a public session," I said. Whatever.

Friday....hit the rink in the form of some very good fast centered spins! Of course, taking some decongestants helped...and not rushing! Managed to actually KICK through on some waltz jumps and got up the courage once again to attack some toe-loops at speed, but they were wimpy (maybe because I still can't bend in these boots). The new boots are good for crossovers though! I can "feel" where my feet are on the ice and can feel my edges! Although there were a few "toepick" moments... but no crashes to report!

Helped a young girl with her back swizzles....she forgot what she was supposed to do, poor thing! Then I forgot which foot I'm to take off on for that 3-turn pattern....I had it down now I'm forgetting. Oh well.

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Skate@Delaware
Ah, show skating!!! I do it for the glitter!

Not that this will specifically apply to you, but I learned a flying camel (many years before, in fact), the back camel, and back sit long before I was able to do a decent back scratch spin. As someone who LOVES to spin, the back scratch was always my spin. (But I'm glad to say I conquered that bugger many moons ago. )

__________________
Doubt whom you will, but never yourself.
"Do what you love, and you'll never have to work a day in your life."
-Haha, I've *arrived*! I am listed as a reference on Wikipedia.

Monday. . . early morning. . . and it's tax day! :

Well, this evening I got my very first "retry" on a MIF test!
My coach told me on Tuesday that everything looked passing other than the back power 3's and that my strong power circles would make up for it. But I had 4 forces working against me this evening:

- Hard ice (temperature just dropped 10 degrees today)
- Dull blades (sharpener was gone last week, then I couldn't go this week)
- Nerves (especially on the back power 3's!)
- Our 3 toughest judges (they were there for someone's Senior FS test)

I don't mind the "not passing" part so much; it's the "retry" part I don't like! I am sooooo sick of these moves I was just hoping to never have to do them again after tonight!
But thanks for your good wishes everyone! I'm glad you guys are always here for the disappointments as well as the victories. You're the best!

Lauren

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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

(((((Doubletoe)))))

I'm so sorry, Lauren!!! I was really hoping that you'd have something to bring back. It doesn't sound like Int. Moves are that easy to pass from what I've been reading here on the boards and stuff...

How many points were you to passing that test, if you don't mind me asking? If you weren't that far off, get signed up for the next one as soon as possible. Sounds like you had a lot working against you and maybe the next time around wouldn't be so bad.

If it's any consolation, I was warned that the back power 3's is probably *the* "b****" move of all the Int. Moves elements. Don't know how true it is but that's what I've heard. And... you got LOTS of notes from the judges, so you know what you have to work on and you'll kick ice booty the next time you take this test again.

__________________
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!!!

Talk about a Friday being a Monday !!!

I got up at 5.40am this fine Friday morning - and I am not a morning person - bolted down breakfast and drove off to the rink. Get there, get the skates on, down to the ice to find .....

it hadn't been touched since last night's public session. Hockey skater spray frozen into lumps everywhere. I got on, did a couple of strokes then a 2 foot glide, well at least I didn't glide it was so rough. Bad enough when it is like that for a public session. Worse when it is like it for a skating club practise session. But this is a specific, private session for 6 skaters. It is the one time we can really work on our jumps, spins etc without having to watch out for the little kids or beginners or whatever.

So we complained to management who agreed our payment will carry over to next week's session. The lady was nice about it, and it wasn't her fault.

Ah well, that's my Monday of a Friday for you. I suppose the good thing is that I got to work way early and built up some flexi time.

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Karen

I skate - therefore I am

Oh no! I'm so sorry! Take it again as soon as you can and be rid of those moves!!!

Oh, bad luck, Lauren! Poor you - I know what you mean about being sick of moves.....

Definitely Monday: Even though today is Friday, I had one of those nightmarish days when nothing, but nothing, worked! You'd think I'd never done my level 3 Dance Moves in my life before, I simply couldn't get the cross-cuts to work at all. I dropped down to the level 2 Moves to work on the changes-of-edge (my coach thinks I need to revisit them), and my shoulders wouldn't do what they were supposed to do, which was the whole point of revisiting them! When I worked on the end pattern of the 14-step I wasn't getting the extension my coach wants and kept bottling the Mohawk, and on the Fiesta Tango end pattern I wasn't getting off my toe-rakes at all.

With Husband, I felt that when we were skating round in Reverse Kilian hold, I couldn't get a decent LFO edge to save my life, I'm sure he was pulling me off-balance. Actually, doing runs round the circle did help with that, it was better once we'd done a circle and then went off down the rink. In waltz hold, he kept trying to push me far too much to one side of him, and my right/his left shoulder kept flying apart. In shoulder hold, I couldn't do a LFO swing roll at all, don't know if that was him or me; it felt as though it was him, because I normally don't have trouble finding my balance like that.

And we forgot, or ran out of time, or both, to do any work on going backwards together, or in Foxtrot hold together.

Monday: Well, I suppose I did manage to do a fast, clean lap of back inside edges (I like those!). And earlier I managed nearly half a length of one-footed slaloms on my right foot going backwards - and I can nearly do all four feet (if you see what I mean!). No edges to speak of as yet, but at least they move.

Husband and I managed to skate round in both Kilian and Reverse Kilian holds (including going round the circle in Reverse Kilian, as mentioned above) with the star between our shoulders, and didn't drop it once. My aim is to be able to do the Novice Foxtrot and/or the Dutch Waltz and the Canasta Tango with it in place! It really does help with keeping our shoulders moving as one.

But by and large, it was a ghastly skate day! We all have them, and I suppose I was overdue one.....

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

Hey 2toes, sorry to hear about the retry but THANKS for posting about your experiences, makes us all feel better about our "retries".
Lyle

doubletoe,
So sorry to hear about your retry. But hang in there and you will get it next time!

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August 22, back on the ice!

Thanks, everybody.
Well, the only move where all 3 judges had me passing or above was the backward power circles and the only move that was nowhere near passing was the perimeter back power 3's. On the second CW pattern of back power 3's I didn't get my pattern angled quite right at the start of the first one and I ended up going into the boards on turn #3. I hadn't done that in awhile and thought I had fixed that pattern problem, but we all know how tests and competitions all make our skating wacky! I was also a little shaky on the CCW ones due to nerves.
So on the back power 3's I only got 2.9 (passing is 3.2). The back power circles were 3.2 - 3.3, the forward power circles were 3.1, the back double 3's were 3.0 - 3.1, the brackets were 3.1 and the slide chasse was 3.1. I am not too worried about the forward power circles and slide chasse because the problem on both of those was blade slippage, which can be fixed with a sharpening. And the little spot I got stuck on the brackets was just due to nerves, I think, since it was not something I normally do.
For the first time, they actually cared about presentation. For example, I always extended the free leg and pointed my toes on my back double 3's and that was considered fine on my Adult Gold test, but that was inadequate on this test. I was told that extension isn't just in the free leg but in the whole body (so now I'm going to have to figure out what the heck "extension" is). And it looks like the 0.1 below passing on most of the moves was due to overall impression/presentation rather than any specific mistakes ("looked cautious" or "did not look confident" were comments I saw), which were comments I never saw on my adult tests.
In summary, I can now say for sure that--at least with our judges--they are serious about that 0.2 point difference between passing Adult Gold and passing Intermediate, and that 0.2 feels more like 0.5!

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

Yes indeed. I think on this test judges start getting really serious about seeing you use the whole body line and skating the test with the "eat your heart out" kind of look.

I have plenty of tips and suggestions if you're interested - just PM me!

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Keep Evolving. "From this moment forward, every voice that told you - You Can't - , has been silenced." - Freedom Writers

Okay, I'm all ears! PM on the way. . .

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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

This manual on the USFS website is very informative. http://www.usfigureskating.org/conte...hoolManual.pdf

If you look at the chart at the end of the document it delineates the progresson of skating skills the judges are expecting to see demonstrated.

Lauren, knowing what a hard worker you are, I'm sure you'll do fine the next time you test!

Monday Morning:
The nearest rink had a very inexpensive series of public sessions. Since my cold is finally on it's way out, I went there but only had about 20 minutes to skate. Now my feet hurt because my skates were cold and I tied them very quickly and badly. Oh well, any ice time is better than nothing, right?

Still struggling with those threes-on-the-line, but I'm getting better. I don't know what my block is with these things.

I have to do about five sit spins before I start to center the spins on this ice. Tried (and failed) to do my new cross-foot spin. Probably needed to actually warm up, LOL. (ETA: Wait! It's probably because I can't keep my legs crossed and straight WITHOUT skates, either! teehee)

Friday Afternoon: (Which it IS right now!)
The rink wasn't crowded and there were only a few PITAs that skated through the middle. Still, I didn't try any camel spins, just in case they were dumb PITAs.

Practiced the new three-turn pattern for adult moves.
Rock-solid when I start on my right, not as good on my left (which is harder to practice against traffic.)

Nailed all but two sit spins, same thing for scratch spins. Ran out of time before I could try any real backspins.

I have very good spirals - need more stretch, but they're still very good and strong.

__________________

Oh yes, I have a heavily highlighted copy of this in my skating bag, LOL!

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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

In one of the best intermediate moves tests I've seen, the young skater had the most beautiful extension on her forward and backward power circles. During the glide after finishing the move, her fingertip of her free arm, her arm, torso, leg, and all the way to the toe of her free leg formed one long, stretched line. She had similar stretch during the power circles, too. Before each move of the test, she presented as though she were beginning a free skate program (gliding on one leg with the other extended and pointed in front and arms raised).

ITA about "figuring out what the heck 'extension' is." In one of my moves tests, one judge marked that I had nice extension my stroking; the other wrote a big X and "no extension"!

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

No kidding! LOL! I find the extension part relatively straightforward on the final exit edges of the power circles and slide chasse, but it's the extension on the back double 3's that confounds me. You only have a second to do that "extension" stuff, so what do you do when you only have a second? In my case, it's pull my free leg up and point it as if to say, "Look! Extension!" LOL!

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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

Maybe they're also looking at extension of the upper body (upright torso instead of hunched over), head up, arms and fingertips extended? (But I've seen your FS videos and you do all that already....)

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

BIG @%#$^%$ MONDAY! After insisting that there would be regular skating tomorrow (Rememberence Day, Nov. 11) I just found out it is cancelled!

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

Heck, I don't know, maybe I don't do it on back double 3's? I'm beginning to feel like I know absolutely nothing!

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