I took advantage of the special holiday freestyle sessions at my home rink this morning. Still very self-conscious about working on this stuff in front of kids I teach. Going back later so the kids can get in some lessons on the public session with their new coach. (Her schedule's changed so she can't teach on Sundays anymore. The twins adore her, and I like her too!)

Dreams:
I can do the threes on the line! Inside and Outside! Yay!
Sit spins and camels were great; didn't try any backspins, though.
Didn't jump; I'll save those for later when no one's watching. LOL

Delusions:
Finally figured out (with help from another coach) the end pattern on the Prelim Power Threes. (Between the LFO and RFO sets)
Still struggling with the RFO side of the pattern - that step forward is killing me; I keep putting down an inside edge.
I hate the inside spiral patterns. I kept getting cut off by the same coach/student every single time while grunting these out.
I've started doing a triple pattern: Inside spirals, Outsides, Insides again. It's helping build the strength I need.

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Dreams:
-Backspin felt better during my lesson today. It works a lot better when I stand up straight
-Salchow and waltz-toe combo are getting better.
-I got some good height on my two-footed flip.
-Scratch spins feel fast and centered.
-Learned some more of the Silver Moves.
-Power 3s felt controlled and not so wild.

Delusions:
-The crowds! Both last night and today. My skate guards pulled disappearing acts twice...luckily I found them again (one was in a hockey box last night - have no idea how it got there). Need to find a new place to hide my guards during busy sessions.
-Crossing my feet on the flip jump is NOT coming easily to me.
-BI 3-turns are scary.
-Couldn't really practice dance or do full patterns of Moves because of the crowds.

Well, these might be all delusions but I am so excited. My husband finally came out to take pictures of me, and tape some stuff for me. With the exception of the lunge, which I already knew was awful- nothing really looked worse than I pictured it in my head. Although, in the video of the toe loop, I can't tell if I jump or not, but I "feel" like I'm jumping.


But the best thing of all- from a 3-turn entrance, I can finally cross my foot over when I spin. Now I really need to work on the glide from crossovers- I can't hold that edge long enough.

Would you be willing to comment on my videos? Unfortunately my husband did not tape the entrance to either spin. The jumps are not my best, but representative of what they normally look like- I think.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFOhAFT9SDc - okay waltz jump, side toe hop, bad waltz jump
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ucWy2BwItvQ - pitiful toe loop
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qCiuMzpyik - spin (entrance is hockey glide, but kevin didn't tape it)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qTdjJD6iGY this is a spin from a t-position entrance- it is slow and sad, but I am thrilled with it. I've been working really hard to be able to cross my leg over in the front, because that is the beginning of a scratch spin.

And a still frame progression of my backwards spiral- http://www.imagestation.com/album/pi...96621488&idx=4

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-Jessi
What I need is a montage...
Visit my skating journal or my Youtube videos (updated with 2 new videos Sept 26, 2009)

Delusional dream!:
One of the local college kids wants to finish her golds/seniors in allllll the skating elements. She was a nationally competitive Jr Pairs until she grew too big and quit Pairs after testing Sr (and her partner quit), working on her last gold dances, passed Senior moves by age 12, figures??, now smashing her way through junior freestyle......
Our pairs coach suggests slighly that I practice some basic pairs stuff with her while my wife is mending. So off we go with stroking, only this woman is just talking away with me in tow stroking along
faster than I've ever skated in my life
giving little tips now wants me to move into Killian on circles
faster than I've ever skated in my life
and keep my head up, don't let the circle collapse etc etc while I'm just trying to stay in contact with the ice surface, whoooooohoooooooo.

Soooo looks like I have a new dance coach and pairs coach/ practice partner - she needs the money and I've got hold of a tiger by the tail
Lyle

Good job on the spirals and the beginnings of a scratch spin! All you need to turn it into a scratch spin is to lift the toes of the free foot and press down with the heel until it's all the way down!

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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

Had my ISI competition today at Gardens Ice House in Laurel Maryland. That place is HUGE!!! I missed my exit and had to find my way back to the beltway (I'm a country girl and not used to driving a zillion miles per hour while looking for exit signs with these stupid contacts ). I got there in plenty of time, but they went from being 20 minutes behind to 20 minutes EARLY and I missed my ice warm-up.....so I got moved to the next group (yeah, my coach freaked). Once again, I skated against the book; got asked which synchro group I was in, etc.

BUT-it was FUN!!! When I stepped onto the ice for warm-up, it was that beautiful feeling of belonging! The ice was beautiful, my toepicks didn't catch, and my spins were centered (the one in practice and the one in my routine).

My coach was especially pleased with my spiral sequence!!!! Now, if she is happy about it, then I know it was really good! My score was 5.0 out of 5.0 (first place) against the book. After I was finished, I sat in the stands and watched the rest of "my girls" skate. THAT was a blast!!!!! I was so proud of everyone, they did so well!

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

I posted this in the other thread.. but I'll post it here too.

Dreams: I went to my first competition where I placed 2nd in FS2 and 1st in Artistic 2. Interesting things happened this weekend, but I'm happy with the way I handled everything, and I'm very proud of myself for going through with my program, even though the world was against me. LOL. If you'd like to see:

FS2- http://youtube.com/watch?v=7zbheGwEajQ
Artistic 2- http://youtube.com/watch?v=HfvcthIXJ-g

Delusions: I'm not allowed to skate for two weeks because of my stupid tendonitis.. it's only been two days and I'm going CRAZY! CRAAAZY! At least I'm getting some quality studying in before my midterms next week, but not skating makes me so sick!

Congratulations! Even a book can't do better than that!!! Excellent job.

Excellent job- and I think I read you other post too- if you're the one I'm thinking of- great job handling a difficult situation!

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-Jessi
What I need is a montage...
Visit my skating journal or my Youtube videos (updated with 2 new videos Sept 26, 2009)

Sounds scary but fun! Enjoy the experience!

Skate@Delaware and xofivebyfive, CONGRATULATIONS on a GREAT JOB!!!!!

DREAM
I had the day off from work today for MLK Day (and what a great thread title, BTW!) and skated the last two morning freestyles. I spent a lot of time figuring out the timing, edge angles and body positions for the new axel setup in my program (axel from an Ina Bauer-RFI 3-turn) and I think I finally pretty much figured it out. Although I didn't land the one in my program, it wasn't a bad effort and I did land the other 3 I tried, for a 75% success rate overall. So that's definite progress. The rounder mohawk on my flip entrance seems to have fixed my flip-toe nicely, and all the backspins from LBI pivots have given my my change foot combo spin back (yay!).

DELUSION
I'm still wiping out of my flying camels. How annoying (and embarrassing!).

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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

You should be proud of these spins! You have nice momentum on the actual spins. (I never have had that much rotational speed until I was confident of crossing my leg over!) I do notice on both spins you drop your left shoulder a little bit, which is making you travel, which is probably making you dizzier than you have to be, and is cutting into how long you can hold the spin. Try to think about keeping your shoulders level and over your hips (they are over your hips already, but sometimes when I have to remind myself to keep my shoulders level, I end up dropping one backwards.. you may not have the same reaction!). Nice job! And how nice that your husband could video them so you could share them!

Dreams:
- Had a pairs lesson on Saturday morning. I like this coach much more than the last coach I had a pairs lesson with, and it was nice to have any pairs lesson at all - it has been far too long. Looking forward to having these a lot more regularly. Still some more coaches to possibly investigate.
- Been skating pretty frequently, and I feel that I've been getting a lot more consistant and am at my skating peak. Yeah, that's not saying too much, I have a lot of issues and bad habits to correct, but it's a lot nicer than the feeling of "gee, I was doing better a couple months ago".
- Bought some Reidells for my son, which should prove far nicer than the evil rentals we tried last time I visited.
- Had an absolutely phenomenal weekend, which made up for the delusions.

Delusions:
- Slept in Monday morning and missed freestyle, so now I'm 10 hours behind on my skating goal...eek. It's gonna be a real struggle to catch up and stay caught up. 1000 hours is ridiculous, and really requires daily skating to stay on top of.
- Friday was no better - I drove to the rink for the morning freestyles, and found it closed due to icy road conditions, same as the day before. That also meant my freestyle lesson with a new coach was postponed AGAIN, so I still haven't gotten to try a lesson with her. I'm hoping she can fit me in this week sometime.
- Realized that I've forgotten a lot of the pairs stuff I once learned, even though it was all pretty basic.
- My flip is most definitely a toe salchow in recent times...
- Freestyle sessions are way too expensive without some sort of flat rate. I'm going to bug the rink and see if they'll make me some sort of deal. I worked it out, and it looks like my cost of session times alone if I keep up this rate is about $850/month. I can't afford that! I may end up moving back across town, or towards the rink farther south, at the end of my lease, depending on what they're willing to do plus a lot of other factors in my life.

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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

Casey --

Several of the rinks in the DC area offer an "intense ice" option where you pay a fixed price per month for unlimited freestyle sessions. It appears to often be calculated based on a skater skating 2 sessions per day 5-6 days per week. You might ask if they have something like that.

The other common option at the rinks I've skated at is some sort of pre-paid punch card, where you pre-purchase either a certain number of freestyle sessions (10 or 20 sessions) at a reduced price, or purchase a punch card with a certain amount of value and based on the initial value of the card, you get charged a certain price for each freestyle session.

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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...

And how much of that time did you spend on two feet, bottom stuck out, trying desperately to put the brakes on???? (been there, done that!).

Dream: Not a bad practice this morning, or lesson either, even if we did spend too long gossiping about the British championships! Coach looked at our steps to forward on both long edges, waltz 3s and the Willow Waltz - he has diagnosed that the problem is mainly my free leg, which isn't really under control, so I'm not getting my weight in the right place. Fair dos.

I'm pleased with our Willow. It's still pants, of course, by any objective standard, and I could list all the things that are wrong with it, particularly my Mohawk, which still tends to be rushed. But I won't, because it's so much better than it was last time we competed it - and we still have several months to polish it before we need to compete it! So I'm pleased.

Delusions: I really do think I'm delusional if I think I'm going to pass Level 3 Dance Moves. Coach2 said she thinks the test will be 20 or 28 February, although that may change, depending on when the Test Chair can get a judge. Actually, someone's doing Level 8 so will need two judges.

Managed to do half-decent cross-rolls today, but the cross-cuts really don't work well once the ice is a bit used. Which means my technique is faulty (obviously), but at least good ice helps! Anyway, I've nothing to lose by trying, and it looks as though I may still have six weeks to polish them. But I am sick of them!

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

Congrats on your placement!!!!! I could not imagine skating at a competition without my music (although I know it happens from time to time to skaters)...my nerves would make me a wreck! You did great!!!
That's sooooo funny!!!! Reminds me of synchro....Just hold on!!!!!!
Yay for you! You will get everything else. Just keep working on it and don't allow yourself to get frustrated!

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

Lyle, you are a panic! Bravo for not chickening out!!!

I'm going to start my students with this exercise and see if I can get the slow ones to pick up some speed. I usually chase them around, reminding them to PUSH!

Delusions:
I actually thought the coach who was supposed to give my kids a lesson was going to show up on time for the public session yesterday. No such luck, so I'm in the market for a new coach for them. Only one of the twins even bothered to skate. They were so disappointed, they asked another coach to teach them next week. (Still working on schedules, though.)

Since I had already given my teenager the day off, the twins ended up hanging out in the ice rink for 4 hours until I taught on the group lesson ice, waiting for one of my private students that they like to play with. That one cancelled at the last minute. (Note twin headbangers.) I'm going to store a roll of game-machine quarters in my car for emergencies like this. LOL

Remember that picture of the russian skaters working out in the snow and slush? I recreated it yesterday - I'm such a wimp, I could barely skate for all the snow and slush. I honorably "defended the center" and managed a few spins. I was relieved when another coach came into the center to teach!

Gave an impromptu exhibition/lesson to one of my former group students. The girl is dying to take privates, so maybe something will come of it this season.

One last-minute private lesson cancellation. I heard the message on my work voicemail this morning. Thankfully, she's always my second lesson of the session, so I was able to leave early when I saw she wasn't there yet.

Dreams:
Scratched out some forward brackets in the snow that passed as an ice surface. It's actually pretty cool to look at, btw.
I can manage Back Outside Threes on the right foot only. Hey - I'm getting there; only three more threes and I've got all 8!

I have a new private skating student who is really doing well. She's a Basic 3/4 student, which is one of my group lesson specialties.

Nightmares:
Bad ice, lots of bodies; didn't even try to jump.

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Hell, you don't even have to do a Killian hold.... Just catch their hand and force them to keep up with you! That's how my secondary coach does it. I now live in FEAR of that happening again, to the point where I'd rather push myself to go faster (which is to me about half the speed she drags around at), than to have her drag me around. NOW she's trying to get primary coach to do the job too! He's already done it once!!! (But in Killian hold like Lyle's dance partner did.)

Delusions:
I have delusions that I can actually do a backspin... well at least a TRUE backspin. I'm still doing "3 turn" backspins. I can spin myself around on the wall correctly, but try getting me to do them away from the wall and I just go "mental" on them.

Dreams:
Did one camel that at least is getting there in position, but almost decent in spin...

Nightmares:
... until I fell out of the spin! (Hey, at least I'm fighting for that spin.)

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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!!!

xo5x5 - skate arthritis and skate@del:
Congrats to all!!!! Way to go!

Dream: started on the choreography for my new interp - love it!
Delusions: to think I can get to the studio for a final cut, meet with the dogsitter, fuse a couple of plates and pack - all tonight before I head to Orlando tomorrow for an investigator's meeting.

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Recycle Love - Adopt a homeless pet

Dreams:

At least for secondary coach... I showed up at our rink's Club Ice session last night! Yes, you Peanut Gallery guys and others that are "encouraging" me to go FS sessions, I showed up at one instead of my usual social skate hour.

It was VERY nice actually! Only 2 kids, one other adult, and one coach on the ice. (My secondary coach was NOT on the ice when she was coaching...) Ice was smooth. Music was pretty decent... it was WeirFan06 FS program! Apparently, the good part (from my observation anyway) seems to be that there will be MORE skaters joining our skating club just so they can go to this Monday night FS session!!! (Great for the skating club ! Bad for those that want a quiet FS session!!!)

Back sit spin: Secondary coach seemed pretty happy that I was actually doing Jay's back sit spin exercises... and falling on my @$$!!! (Actually on the fall that secondary coach spotted, I wasn't just doing a LBO shoot the duck... I'm not even spinning at this point... just getting used to being on the LBO edge in that position!!!)

Camels: I did semi-decent THREE 2-3 rev. camels last night. Well, decent for me... which means that it's "technically a camel" but I need to get in a better camel position to make it look like a "camel." I need to continue to stay on that FO edge to continue spinning and get more speed!!!

Nightmare:
The loop jump... I had trouble getting them even near the wall. Didn't even wanna seriously try them away from wall. (I did maybe a couple of them away from the wall.)

I also tried a couple of flips. Went "Eh..." and moved on...

Back sit spin: Unfortunately I figured out that it's harder to *get* the back sit spin exercise given that I still have backspin problems!!! (I'm not spinning on the correct edge... Hey, at least I know what I have to fix to have an easier time with getting that back sit spin exercise now and MAYBE then I'll have a chance at getting a back sit spin. )

Lower back still giving me problems!!! Thank goodness my chiro appt. is tomorrow!!!

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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!!!

Wow, that IS a lot of money. I'd say cutting that time in half but adding some good coaching would probably achieve the same improvements in your skating while taking less time and less of a toll on your body.

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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

I agree Doubletoe, Quality versus Quantity. I guess Casey prefers Coffee over Espresso. ...although, when you make coffee in a french press, you actually get the best of both worlds.

Dreams:
Aaaahhh. After passing Bronze MIF yesterday, todays lesson was pretty low key. Even while coach and I goofed off a little, we did work on spins. Scratch, Camel, Back spin, Back sit well, at least an attempt at one anyway, ..
Pairs lesson went very well. Team A, I know EXACTLY what you mean:
Casey skates much faster than I do. so it is a good thing he challenges me and I can also compliment that by exercising control in the process.

Delusions:
I'm with you Jazzpants on Back spin. I'm beginning to wonder if it isn't fantasy that I could ever do one. -- I mean a REAL one with legs crossed in front and 3 + revs.
Morgail, BI-3's . They scare me too. we shall conquer them together!

Well, I do have them crossed in front and 3+ revs. I just don't do them on the correct edge, which is probably a lot more important than crossing the legs.

I'll join ya guys on conquer the BI3's too! Scary, scary!!! (Oops! I forgot to remind secondary coach to work on those! Oh, well! We had more "pressing" matters anyway!!! )

ETA: ISk8NYC - excellent topic for this week, given all the puns I can come up with...

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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!!!

EXCELLENT TITLE!!!

Dreams:
-Managed yet another clean loop out of about 4 tries.
-Camel spin has reappeared. Well my version of a camel at least.
-Coach and I agreed on a test date that both of us are confident about.

Delusions:
-Still can't manage to find the center on my new blades so my upright spin is non-existent.
-My flip and lutz are looking very consistent in that they are fully rotated but landed on two feet or my personal favorite...the wrong foot.
-Coach mentioned putting together my first program

Dreams:

Unexpected side effect of all this work on moves is that for some reason my loop and flip suddenly improved and I was able to land a couple of each, first go both yesterday and more importantly today in front of coach. That was a nice bonus. Also did a great spin - loads of revs - not perfectly centred but not bad so that it made a lovely small flower shape on the ice - or as coach put it - a woolly sheep!

Succeeded in getting both sides to work in the back 3's/mohawks circle pattern. Still not big enough but it's the first time both sides have actually worked and I got round on both. Still 8 days to perfect them!!!!!

Delusions: that I might actually pass this Field moves test!

Broke the head of one of the blade screws yesterday and when coach replaced it I could swear the blade is in a different place and suddenly my outside edge is harder to find - not sure if it is a delusion or whether it really was moved but it feels weird.

When's the test? Good test vibes on the Board recently are bringing in results! (Knock wood)

Dreams:
I worked my group classes (and myself) on three turns and mohawks. Gave myself a workout. It really does get easier if you practice them letter-perfect every time.

That inside spread eagle's getting better for me, and I'm very proud that my student managed three shaky outside eagles tonight. (I love teaching this kid - can you tell?)

One of my private students skates CW and I skate CCW. So far, so good, although I usually have to resort to "doing it in my direction" for demos. Then, I mentally reverse everything for her direction.

In going over test requirements, she mentioned that she didn't know how to do a half lutz. So I did a few my way, trying to memorize the correct directions for her way. Then, after I had thoroughly confused her, I accidentally did a half-lutz in her direction. Very unnerving to really JUMP in the opposite direction. (I know some Board Member recently changed their spins to match their jumps - smart move!) She managed a few, but she two-footed the landings. I'll lay odds she nails it next week - kid works so hard at everything.

Delusions:
This is almost entirely off-topic, but I just had to share the story. There's a skater that has been taking lessons on the freestyle session. He wears hockey skates and he's a large man over 6' tall. Tonight, he was making a turn when one of the figure skaters (not on program) ran into him. Like a freight train! He was so brave in trying to save the other skater from harm, but they both went down. The figure skater had gotten up quickly and started to stagger around, so I scooped her up and had her coach check her out. I then helped him up and off the ice. She complained about her head hurting, he was holding his side in pain. (She rammed him, head-first, in the side.) Fortunately, neither was hurt badly and both returned to the ice a short time later.

It's funny though: here's this big, strong hockey skater thinking he's safe skating with the dainty little figure skaters and he gets laid out by a nine-year old girl!

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