Amen. I feel like I am going to be stuck at silver level forever because of that pesky jump!!!

__________________
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.

Hot and Done: Had a great session tuesday night. Landed everything well, including (FINALLY!) a good axel.

Another Hour: Had an equally crappy session the following night. I'm not too bummed out beccause I wasn't very motivated, the ice was terrible, and I was tired. There was a fog bank on the ice that went up to my eye level. It was eerie skating.

It is good to know that I am not alone in my struggle with this jump...I have struggled with it since I was a kid.....it has gotten better since coach has been a bit more diligent with working on it in lessons (there were a few months there where I felt like we didn't touch it at all and coach was surprised -not in a good way- at the state they were in when we worked on them again....oops....) ...I swear, I'm going to land my double sal and double toe well before I land an axel, and all three of them are related!

__________________
Skating Dreams

"All your life you are told the things you cannot do. All your life they will say you're not good enough or strong enough or talented enough; they will say you're the wrong height or the wrong weight or the wrong type to play this or be this or achieve this. THEY WILL TELL YOU NO, a thousand times no, until all the no's become meaningless. All your life they will tell you no, quite firmly and very quickly. AND YOU WILL TELL THEM YES." --Nike

Thin-Ice: Sounds like your coach also has the need... for SPEED too!!! That sounds brutal!!!

Hot and Done
Went to coffee club for the first time in a while, visit the old coffee club crowd, some of the skater during the noon session, a skater that hasn't been around for quite a while b/c of her 3 surgeries, one skater that I've roomed with at AN last April,one freestyle skater turned ice dancer b/c she had knee and hip surgery done and she decided to take up ice dancing b/c it's less jarring on the joints. (She's an older woman... I think by now she's hitting 60?)

No donuts! No pumpkin pie either, but we had Costco muffins, coffee cake and apple pie. I was a good girl though. Then again, it was easy to resist when you have the ice beckoning you.

Give it another hour:
WAAAAY too crowded!!! I was trying to setup my jumps but had to abort quite a few times. My flip is gone again and I had to force my lutz to show up. My loop was a struggle too. (Just too tired, I guess! Probably will take it easy for a few days to get my strength back and my sleep caught up!)

__________________
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 wish I could go BACK to Silver this year because the axel hasn't progressed like I thought it would this year. Unfortunately, I took my Juv free last year and got a mercy pass, the axel wasn't great but the judges knew I was taking the test just to have it. I wouldn't have if I knew it would stick me in Gold this season!

__________________
"Where are we going and why are we in this handbasket?"

hot and done - jumps all over the place, I was a turkey fueled jumping machine in practice Practiced backspins relentlessley - I still can't do them well, but I can do more tries without getting sick so that counts for progress!

another hour - loops are loopy, fell on a back 3, fortunately landed on well padded bits so no damage.

__________________
It's all about the dress!

Well, our Thanksgiving has been Hot and Done now for almost a month and half. Yup Canadian.

Let's start with the frozen Turkey:
The ice was a zoo today with all sorts of level of skaters on it during our figure skating City Ice (ticket ice everywhere else). We had skaters on there that could barely skate forwards (CanSkaters; must have been a little brother or sister of a figure skater), were low level StarSkater kids, were mid level StarSkater kids, were high level StarSkater kids, were Juvenile to Novice level skaters, was a Junior Competitive skater working on becoming elite skater (Ashley Simond; she was looking really good too. Man, she's become a really good looking nice young lady since the summer when she looked like she was only 12. She's filled out and grown about a foot at least. She's competing at the Skate Canada East/West Challenge soon trying to make it to Senior Canadians (has Junior and Senior skaters competing for the National title.).) and there was one adult skater (me). Next to no one was able to go through their freeskate or short programs as there were just too many skaters on the ice for the size of the ice.

My legs were extremely tight today, so I didn't do my spiral sequence ( like I could have gotten through it with all the other skaters in the way.)

Again too many little skaters on the ice and so I didn't attempt a Camel spin in fear that I would end up chopping off some little kid's head off. Not a good thought.

Hot and Done:

Forward Upright spin had more than one position (4 revs in basic with leg out to the right infront and another 6 revs in corkscrew position). One upright had 3 positions but I'm not sure if the third had at least 3 revs.

Forward sit had a lower position today with 6 revs in the basic position and another 3 or 4 in the broken position. Next I want to and a 3rd position to the sit. Maybe I'll do that blade grab from behind with the oposing hand with a body twist. That should rack up points for Adult Canadians.

Waltz jump has never been so solid. Sad thing is that I won't be using it in my program because of the low point value.

Toe Loop is higher, smoother on take off and landing.

Salchow is reliable again with no swinging off of the axis or late cheated jumping.

Loop has improved immensely. I've got a longer take off edge which is actually on a proper curve now with a nice flag on the ice. It's higher again. And I'm landing on one foot 90 percent of the time. One thing that I must watch for though is that I check fast and hard enough so that I don't swing my left arm around on the landing because either I end up two footing the jump or I don't flow out on a back outside edge but rather I end up changing directions and doing a forward inside edge. Need to get my arms faster for the landing. I'm starting to believe that I can get all my jumps back up to 2 Salchow (never tested for various reasons even though I wanted to test).

Split is higher and more controlled.

Flip is almost clean (barely a tap of the freefoot as it goes by).

Split + Flip + Toe has a good rhythem to it now. Just need to keep that free foot off of the ice 100% of the time during the flip portion.

Left overs (or not even skated and/or thought of):
Lutz was not attempted. No time or space on the ice to try one.
Camel
Spiral Sequence.

The reason I'm thankful: My skating has improved dramatically over night since I fixed the inside of my skate boots this past week. Last week, I was even having troubles with landing on a clean edge just doing my Waltz jump and I couldn't get a true outside edge to save my life for anything. I was also ripping my hips apart trying to do my change edge spiral sequence. I'd try to change from the inside edge to the outside and found that even when I could manage to change to the other lobe, I was still on an inside edge slowing down little by little with mini side stops as the inside edge was catching. I was in pain with my hips since I got the skates last March (08) because of the defect inside of my boots. I added some support where it dipped too quickly inside of my boots in between the floor of the boot and my orthotics to make the inside more like a wedge shoe. I also put a bit of padding just under the heel of my orthotic too to raise my heel. Now my skates feel great. Skate shop tried to tell me that my skate boots were fine even though they were not. Orothtics guy had not a clue what to do until I started brain storming with him and I came up with the solution and did the change. Yup, I'm thankful that the change has been done and now I can start believing that I can regain all my jumps and spins and start winning again.

__________________
"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

Our main ice surface is being repainted, so the sessions were all on the second, way undersized surface today. Lots of crazy kids. There was one kid using an EZ Skater who I KNOW can at least skate around, because I've TAUGHT him in classes! Anyways

Hot and Done
-Made some more good progress on my moves. My coach said I was too far forward on the second half of my 8-step, so once I concentrated on staying a little further back on the blade, it had a lot more flow, and she said I LOOKED much more confident. My right ankle was really hurting, so we concentrated on the LBO power 3s, which was OK since those are the weak side anyways. Those are starting to feel pretty good too.
-2flips were feeling good again. They had taken a mini vacation. I hadn't really lost them, but they just weren't as strong as they had been, but they were good and solid today, which actually really surprised me.
-Flying sits are getting really strong and consistent.
-I did ONE decent change edge back sit. Everyone else in the rink has a hard time getting over onto the OUTSIDE edge on their back site, but I have a hard time getting it to change to an inside edge (when I want it to).
-Messed around with some back sit variations, and they weren't too bad for not ever working on them.

Give it another hour
-Starting to get nervous for my test. One more week! The frustrating part now is that my ankles are holding me back. Back cross rolls and the power 3s are painful. But I think (hope?) I'll be OK for the test. We'll see...

Over all, even though today started out really badly (we started with power 3s which killed my ankle and I was afraid that was going to set the tone for the rest of the session), I felt good about how I skated and the progress I've been making. I take my victories where I can, but I think I may finally have some stand out attributes to my skating, which is not something I've ever felt before. It feels good!

__________________
Youtube Videos

Hot and Done:

Got to the rink this morning at 8am only to find that we didn't have ice due to a hockey tournament (in retrospect I probably knew this but just love dragging my butt out of bed at 7am on Saturdays to go skate that I forgot). BUT no one even had the ice on the one ice surface until 9:15pm, so the rink manager let me skate anyway.....I had the ice to myself for the whole hour.

Worked on my step sequence, which I keep the same in my free, compulsory, and interp. I changed it up a bit so it has some more flow and difficulty (added a swing roll before the LFI twizzle, which I'm hoping to get up to a double now that I have more momentum but my LFI twizzles stink. Took out a chase' mohawk after that and put in a RFO counter that leads nicely into the power-3s I had there).

Re-worked a bit of my program--moved my loop jump later so that I'm not so rushed in the middle and have time to relax and think about my axel-toe and flying camel-forward sit....this leads into the revamped step sequence. I didn't have a chance to run it all with music but I think it will flow much better and I wont' feel so frantic trying to hit the music cue for my footwork on time. I don't think my coach will like it that way, but too bad

Spins were good, centering really well today. Also worked on keeping the skating knee bent on my flips and lutzes, and not coming up in the knee too early (which I totally noticed I am doing in videos from Buckeye). That, of course, leads to much better height.

Also put together my gold compulsory for the Holiday Season competition in Columbus next month!

Give it Another Hour:

Didn't get to axels today. I was very hesitant because I was the only person on that side of the arena, so if I fell and hurt myself no one would realize it. (The ONLY downside to having the ice all to yourself and no one around.)

__________________
2010-2011 goals:
Pass Junior MIF test
Don't break anything

...Shouldn't have posted that. Now it's not give it another hour but give it another MONTH. They couldn't get a third judge and I am not testing until January 10th At least that will give me time to break in new skates, skates that WON'T kill my ankles.

__________________
Youtube Videos

Sorry for the Country specific thread title...being the one who skates at 6 am on Mondays is a heavy burden...

so I drove to Omaha for a dance lesson for dd and I. The hot and done part of that is that a) it cost less than $20 to fill the tank these days and b) we made it home before the snow began in ernest.

Decided to work on something other than the Swing and look at the Cha Cha with it's cursed cross behind. Coach took a look at my pathetic two footed attempt and decided it wasn't terrible and if I could do the rest of the dance well enough it might pass. (although I know that once I get the rest of the dance up to snuff she is won't be able to help herself and will not put me out until I have that blasted move -it's all a ploy to just get me working on this dance)

Hot and done - Reviewed my stroking and prounounced my knee bend much improved.

Give it more time - that said, I need to bend more.

Had a dance coach that stressed to me the first step in the Cha Cha was "Crossover, NOT a progressive" That didn't seem right to me at the time, there are no crossovers in dance...but I let it go. Coach caught that right away - Yes we've had this discussion before but what we call progressives around here is about the timing ...outside, inside, outside edge...and this is only outside, inside...but as in both steps, the foot is placed on the ice along side the foot and then slid over on the ice. Some here would call it a "run" but we don't use that terminology in these parts. What's important is to slide the foot over on the ice, not set it down over the foot.

The good part -- is that I'm capabable of doing it correctly - especially that direction...as long as I know what to do.

And former dance coach had neglected the wide step in the chasse...why I don't know, it's very easy...again, once I know what to do. told DD about that and she had taught a student after this coach and said "Oh yea I remember telling her she was doing that wrong"

And we worked on me doing the slalloms better with my feet together, they don't like to stay together - my feet.

So I'm back working on the Cha Cha, a dance I really enjoy.

j

[/B]Haha whenever I see this thread the song "Hot N Cold" pops into my head...I dont know why. I love that song though. Todays practice was alright and once again my last post didn't load, so I have to type this all over..hooray:-( So now you're getting more or less a list of the good and bad things for today:

Hot and Done:

• Power threes- Good speed, good control,
• My custom moves pattern felt more comfortable...I changed some of the elements around and they seem to work out alot better.
• My brand new custom move pattern- For first attempt they weren't bad...I just had to keep looking at my list of what order they were to go in and where. But Im sure they'll get better with time.
• 15 waltz jump in a row warmup!!
• By far my loop is my best jump and is once again the reigning JUMP OF THE DAY! I can honestly depend on landing it all the time,
• Axel attempts are getting better...now I just need to work on getting my legs crossed in the air
• Spins as a whole were going very well
• Camels were actually behaving somewhat today...meaning I wasn't falling out of them. At first they were really...bad, but as time when on and I wasn't really thinking, I started pulling off some good ones. They still need alot of work, but hey at least it moved up to the 'good list'.
• A new spin combo which I'd like to call "Impossible" because according to my coach it sort of is. Its basicly a flying broken leg spin into a sit spin, then up into an attitude or layback. My coach said that going from a broken leg to a sit spin is very difficult and nearly impossible..but I can do it rather easily. I wonder if it has something to do with closed hips, but it's alot of fun to do. I knew 'W' sitting as a kid would pay off someday.
• Corkscrew spins are really fun to do! I attempted them today and could actually do them and had fun.
• Sit spins were actually really good today as well...my right leg is really starting to cooperate and keep straight as I go into the spin. Sometimes I still need to bend, but as a whole my sits are really getting better.
• 'Music Box' runthrough was fantastic as always. I ran through it twice without music and still love it. Even though it's alittle harder to judge without music, I felt that I completed all the elements, kept up the grace and flow until the very end.

Now onto the bad things:

Needs more time:
-Had a 'pretty fall'..I was going into an axel, more or less landed it on the right foot then slowly felt myself falling and falling and falling until my butt hit the ice. I couldn't stop it, but it felt like I was falling in slow motion. hehe
-Flips were 'Hot N Cold' today. Meaning I had a couple good ones and a couple really bad ones. My problem is that I land too far back on the blade and fall right onto my bum.
-Sit change sits were sort of bad too. The change and back sit isn't the problem...it was the pulling up into a back spin. I can do a back spin alone perfectly fine, but after a sit...not so good.
-2sal attempts were just plain bad...they were all warpy and I kept flinging myself into them...no they were bad.

Thats about it for practice notes. My next skate day is Thursday because next Sat I have orientation for my school. Hooray for hard ice!

Later:-)

__________________
[i]Beauty May Be in the Eye of the Beholder
But passion is in the heart of a skater.[/I]

This happened to me yesterday-but I DIDN'T know about it-it wasn't posted on any calendar/poster/board AND they didn't send an email reminder out to everyone [FUME]!!! What's the sense of signing up for notices if they don't utilize the system??? We only have one sheet of ice so there was no skating until public session-and I had another committment so that went out the window.

I did get a lot of errands run and installed my new printer on my home network, so that's something I guess.

I am planning on doing some off-ice training today (Sunday) for my jumps. It's raining outside so I'll have to settle on my living room <g>.

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

Give it another hour: Along the same lines...we had no ice Thursday due to T-giving...and then no ice Friday because the university rented our ice for their men's team since theirs was being used in a b-ball tourney--the head coach couldn't decide when he wanted to practice so the rink reserved the whole day up until high school practices in the afternoon for him. (They originally offered him a 10 a.m. practice but that was too EARLY. Not sure why they don't realize that if they said, "Any time between 10 and 1, take it or leave it," the university would take it since there's no place else to go and they're not going to leave for an away game without having had a practice first...I know the rink wants the $ but gee whiz!!) Couldn't skate Sat. since I refereed a youth game first thing in the a.m. (didn't wake up till an hour after the game ended...halfway through I picked up the puck and instead of handing it off to my partner tried to hand it off to the scorekeeper...no idea what I was thinking--although the mean away team coaches had plenty to say about it!), coached an hour of Learn to Play, and then limped back home to sit around with a heating pad on my back and I was DONE.

Hot and Done: Nothing to report, not having been on the ice in figure skates since WEDNESDAY!!

__________________
You miss 100% of the shots you never take.--Wayne Gretzky

hot and done
tried some 2axels today. they werent too bad considering i haven't oficially learned them yet and i never work on them
the rest of my doubles were really good

give it another hour
i didnt get a chance to run through my christmas program

2axel attempts on video: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=f4QFVwwGA5o

__________________

Give it another hour: I failed my junior silver skills test today It's really frustrating because I was sooo close to passing...but my loops that are normally really good chose TODAY to be horrible lol

Hot and done: I passed 2 out of the 3 skills at least ! And considering that I had spent around 3 months on this skill instead of the year that I usually take per level, I"m pretty happy that I got them decent enough to try at test day today.

JennaD--((((HUGS)))) keep at it and you will pass!!!

Hot and Done: given that my Sunday rink had a shorter session because of the holiday weekend, they did NOT charge for the freestyle session!

Another hour: because the session was shortened, my lesson was supposed to end early...(but we stayed until we were done since they weren't zamming the ice)

Today was "Blast from the Past" for things I've done before but not in ages....1/2 flip, 1/2 lutz, back 3's and a revisit to the loop.

Hot and Done: back 3's were ok, clockwise is so much better than anti....

Another hour: the 1/2 jumps (oh yeah the ballet jump as well); I don't practice them as much, so they stink.

And my loop-just could not get enough knee bend to propel UP....sheesh! At least my left leg does not tap down any longer.

I'm tired.

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

I went over to Doubletoe's rink and skated with her on an adult only freestyle! I felt a little out of place since I'm only 18, but everyone was very nice, and it was a great session!

Anyways.

Hot and Done
-Skated with doubletoe! That was fun!
-Got through all of my doubles quickly. I even did a 2toe 2toe combo, which I'm not actually sure I've EVER landed.
-2flips felt like they had a lot of height. Still not a whole lot of distance though But I think that's just a phase I go through in my jumps. For a while my double loop was just tons of height and no ice coverage, but now it has a nice arc. So hopefully my 2flip will start getting more distance too.
-I actually managed a couple of 2lutzes. I haven't worked on them in a while because of boot/blade problems. I fell on the first two, had to do a double 3 out of the 3rd, but then landed some pretty solid ones!
-I can do a haircutter spin now! I never thought I'd be able to do one, they just freaked me out. I didn't like the thought of holding on to my blade AND leaning back, but they're getting somewhat consistent.
-2axels were the closest they've been, and doubletoe was there to witness! I videoed some at the end, but they didn't feel as good as the ones I was doing earlier in the session.

Give it another hour
-2axels belong here too. I wish I would just stay in and land the darn jump! But I'm getting closer...
-Flying sit needs a bit more tuck. It's not too bad, but I know it could be better
-Layback is traveling. The position isn't bad, but the centering is not too good. It's definitely leaning back more, though.

Here's some video from today http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-eXAo937z4

__________________
Youtube Videos

Yep, Ibreakhearts is definitely getting close on that double axel!

Well and done
My double salchow takeoff was great in my lesson. Coach actually had no corrections and they felt like they wanted to be doubles. I guess there's something to be said for working on it with fresh legs instead of after an hour of intense skating.

Give it another hour
Now I just need to summon the confidence to pull in and turn them into doubles. I need to remind myself that I used to land double sals all the time. . .

Well and done
My program run-through was pretty good. Landed both axels and only made one major mistake.

Give it another hour
. . .but I need to be skating this program completely clean!

Well and done
I had a lot of fun working on a difficult new axel entrance. I hadn't had a new entry to try for a long time so it was kind of exciting!

Give it another hour
Got as far as waltz-loop-loop from the new entry, but didn't feel secure enough on the takeoff edge yet to go for the axel. But for the first time practicing the new entry, it wasn't bad!

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

Good job on the 2 Axel attemps! All you need is a little more height on it and you'll get that extra half rotation to make it clean. From what I saw on the video, (I'm not a skating coach but I do have a good eye even though I'm just an Adult Bronze FS skater.) there are two things that could help to make the jump clean; bending the skating knee more before take-off and kicking your free foot up a tad higher in front of you after swinging through. I bet you'll have that 2 Axel in no time flat. Wish I could land the jumps that you can. Unfortunately, I can't see what I'm doing wrong on the ice as I'm doing it. If only I could see them at the same time I'm doing my elements.

__________________
"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