The Coach Effect / The Inverse Coach Effect

[FrankR]

Hi all,

I was just wondering how widespread the coach effect / inverse coach effect is around the world of skating. I'll start off with some necessary definitions.

The Coach Effect: This is the phenomenon that takes place when you've fixed a problem element or taught yourself something new and run up to your coach and say "Hey! Look at what I can do!" You then proceed to attempt to show off your prowess in front of your coach, who is eagerly waiting by the boards, and wind up taking a vicious crash that makes the Hindenburg disaster look like a minor accident. :oops:

The Inverse Coach Effect: The exact polar opposite of the aforementioned Coach Effect. This happens when you're having a problem on an element or a move and you can't for the life of you figure out what's wrong. You mention it to your coach who immediately asks you to demonstrate the problem so he or she can fix it. You proceed to do the element or move fully expecting it to be AMAZINGLY KRAPTAKULAR as it has been all week when suddenly, magically, the problem fixes itself. At this point you're left wondering if your now thoroughly confused coach thinks you're just being melodramatic or are just completely insane. 8O

I've experienced both quite a bit and have found either phenomena to be thoroughly amusing provided that the crash associated with the Coach Effect doesn't result in bleeding, weeping or surgery of any sort.

Anyway, I just thought I'd ask if others have had similar experiences. :lol:

Take care,

Frank

[LoopLoop]

Hi Frank,
Of COURSE we've all experienced it! Why do you think most coaches watch other skaters out of the corner of their eye even while they're working with somebody in particular? That way they see when you do something right even if you completely blow it during your lesson. ;)

[InsideAxel]

I experienced a perfect example of The Coach Effect this week.

We've been working on an element during lessons for about two months, with good progress, but never getting all the parts together at the same time. During a practice session this past weekend, with no coach, I was working on this element, which was feeling very, very good. Sure enough it all came together. My wife was so excited, she called my coach right then and left a message on her machine. :roll:

Anyway, I show up for lesson Tuesday morning, do the normal warm up and run throughs, then she's like, "okay, let's see it." Of course you know the rest. While the element hadn't regressed any since our last lesson, I couldn't hit it either. Coach says, "I was so ready to see this! I could have slept in, but no, I had to come and see this." :lol: Thursday's lesson was just more of the same...no worse, no better.

C'ya!

Kelton

[NoVa Sk8r]

Happens to all of us.

On a related theme, I can usually not do my program if my coach is watching. I feel totally embarrassed and put on the spot (she doesn't understand this at all).

Also, if I'm not actually *doing* my program, but working as a preamble to my program moves/choreography, say 10 feet away from my opening spot, I can totally get it right and sell it. But put me in my opening position with my coach watching, and I'm doomed! :??

[Terri C]

Oh yeah, I can relate to this one:
As said by my primary coach on lesson Tuesday:
"You will do the sitspin with me in the buliding!"

It seems that the sit will not happen until the very minute primary coach takes one step out of the rink!

[sceptique]

I suggest that The Coach Phenomenon is a special case of Murphy's Law as applies to figure skating.... :frus:

[bladebabe69]

hey everyone!
well what i think of this, is that you are so convinced that you can't do it with your coach watching, its kind of like o yeah i can't do this there is someone watching me and you really can. it is all a state of mind. i've skated for 13 years and i've realized that it is all a state of mind because you have gotten used to o i can't do it because my coach is watching so i can't do it...but next time just remember..there is no such thing as i can't in skating because you can!!!
hope i helped

[Mrs Redboots]

Oh, what you describe is the first two Laws of Skating!

I was doing something - not perfectly, but better than I've done it before - 30 seconds before my lesson. Could I reproduce it like that in my lesson? You guess!

[skatergirlva]

My flying camel this week. I told my coach it was acting up. He told me to do one. It was so/so. He said the reason was because of my "1960's entrance". He told me to go into it a different way and it was really good and fast.

He said, "I'm not exactly sure what you are looking for because that is very good."

My response, "It's just a fluke."

[CrossedBlades]

I'm one with a nasty case of the Inverse Effect. I cannot manage most skills outside of my lesson... Some crazy part of me believes that it is only safe if coach is there to catch me before I bust my skull open (though I think I'd squish her in that event...)

[FrankR]

Hi Frank,
Of COURSE we've all experienced it! Why do you think most coaches watch other skaters out of the corner of their eye even while they're working with somebody in particular? That way they see when you do something right even if you completely blow it during your lesson. ;)

Hi Marna,

Actually that seldom works in my favor. Usually when my coaches watch me out of the corners of their eyes I'm usually having trouble with something. I once had one of them come up to me after I caught an edge on a bracket and say "What was THAT supposed to be?" 8O

My response: "Um...nothing sir." At which point I scurried away to the opposite corner as quickly as possible. lol Thankfully, this was a while back.

Frank

[FrankR]

I experienced a perfect example of The Coach Effect this week.

We've been working on an element during lessons for about two months, with good progress, but never getting all the parts together at the same time. During a practice session this past weekend, with no coach, I was working on this element, which was feeling very, very good. Sure enough it all came together. My wife was so excited, she called my coach right then and left a message on her machine. :roll:

Anyway, I show up for lesson Tuesday morning, do the normal warm up and run throughs, then she's like, "okay, let's see it." Of course you know the rest. While the element hadn't regressed any since our last lesson, I couldn't hit it either. Coach says, "I was so ready to see this! I could have slept in, but no, I had to come and see this." :lol: Thursday's lesson was just more of the same...no worse, no better.

C'ya!

Kelton

Hey Kelton,

I can't even say I haven't regressed with elements under the coach effect. Just this week my coach was saying that he thought we'd had a break-through in fixing my back crossovers but alas, they were not the same this week. In the back of my mind I thought to myself, "Well couldn't we just say I'm having a break-through in my ability to be inconsistent and celebrate that instead?" :lol:

Take care,

Frank

[FrankR]

Happens to all of us.

On a related theme, I can usually not do my program if my coach is watching. I feel totally embarrassed and put on the spot (she doesn't understand this at all).

Also, if I'm not actually *doing* my program, but working as a preamble to my program moves/choreography, say 10 feet away from my opening spot, I can totally get it right and sell it. But put me in my opening position with my coach watching, and I'm doomed! :??

Ditto. Although I will say it helps with the competition nerves. As nervous as I was in Kansas City for my program in April, it's nothing compared to how nervous I was in a freestyle session doing a run-through for the coach just a week earlier. I almost killed myself on each of my axels in that run-through from the sheer terror of having him standing by the boards watching. 8O

Frank

[NCSkater02]

Best waltz jump I ever did was unwitnessed by either of my coaches. The only proof I had was to call my coach over and point to the tracings on the ice. It was early in the session, and my jump was the first in the corner. I could find the landing and thought I had the launch, but it was *entirely* too far away. I'd never done a waltz jump of six-eight feet of air from jump to land. I pointed to my landing spot and asked her to show me where I took off. When she pointed to this spot miles away, I was floored. 8O Of course, I've been unable to replicate it since, and then I broke my ankle about a month later.

I'm also very familiar with the Coach Effect/Inverse Coach Affect. I have to pretend they aren't on the ice and aren't really watching me.

[skaternum]

You know how some rinks will allow coaches to "write" on the ice with big jumbo markers? I've been known to go borrow one and write my name on a particularly good spin tracing. It's so rare that they're tight and centered, and the rules FrankR so eloquently laid out require that no one be watching when I actually do a fast, centered spin! So I want the world to know when I've done one well -- for the rest of the session until they zam again. :lol:

[sunshinepointe]

I got one that trumps them all...

My coach had been working with me on getting my loop bigger and better, and all of a sudden I just lost it. So he was helping me try to get it back and to end the lesson I fell doing a loop and that was that. He skated away and I then proceeded to do a HUGE, perfect loop - nothing was flawed, people said I had enough height for a triple. I had visual confimation from about 10 people, but none of them my coach. When I tried to show him again - nothing.

:giveup:

[pennybeagle]

Um, this happens to me practically every week.

Inverse coach effect this week:
Have been working on outside spread eagle into an axel with NO luck for about 3 weeks since my ambitious choreographer decided I should be able to do it. So, after 3 weeks of nasty falls and lots of bruises, I went into my freestyle lesson with the idea that if my coach saw how awful I was doing this move, she'd take it out. Of course, I nailed six in a row for her with loops at the end. Immediately after the lesson, I crashed on the next three attempts, hit the boards, and haven't landed a single one since (lesson was on Monday). :roll:

Coach effect this week:
My Willow Waltz and Ten Fox were feeling GREAT until I showed them to my coach. All of the sudden, my body seemed to forget how to do a 3-turn altogether. scrape, scrape, scrape....it was like a horror movie. We spent ALL lesson working on that waltz 3. Afterwards, of course, it was not a problem at all.

Last week, it was the camel spin that got the inverse coach effect award and the layback spin that got the coach effect award.

Now, if only I could work out an inverse JUDGE effect... ;)

[The Ice Demon]

Yeah i get it all the time too. The other week I had the coach effect on my camel spin. Yesterday I had the inverse effect on my back spin. Tuesday I had the coah effect on my axel-loop, but then my coach saw a really good one yesterday when I wasn't in a lesson. Also yesterday straight after that, I was working on landing a split jump backwards (split-flip) and went splat and my coach called me over to ask why I went splat on a flip jump after he'd just seen a good axel-loop!! So I had to explain it wasn't a flip jump. At least he saw one good thing and one bad thing when I wasn't in a lesson.

Glad to know I'm not the only one who regularly suffers from the skaters version of Murphys law. :D

[Chico]

Yep, I swear I could have a song written for me on this, like a theme song. =-)

[Mrs Redboots]

You know how some rinks will allow coaches to "write" on the ice with big jumbo markers? I've been known to go borrow one and write my name on a particularly good spin tracing. It's so rare that they're tight and centered, and the rules FrankR so eloquently laid out require that no one be watching when I actually do a fast, centered spin! So I want the world to know when I've done one well -- for the rest of the session until they zam again. :lol:I've often been tempted to take a rubbing of mine! And Husband, on the rare occasions he gets a good one, always calls me over to have a look at it. Downside, of course, is that I also look at the awful ones and say, "Was that you? What was that supposed to be?"

His reply: "Er - Spirograph!"

[mikawendy]

I've often been tempted to take a rubbing of mine! And Husband, on the rare occasions he gets a good one, always calls me over to have a look at it. Downside, of course, is that I also look at the awful ones and say, "Was that you? What was that supposed to be?"

His reply: "Er - Spirograph!"

One time, a friend of mine at the rink took a digital picture of another friend's spin tracing. It was nice and centered, with many revs, and it was about the size of a very small salad plate--very nice!

(The only problem was that there was no point of reference in the photo to tell how small it really was. What was needed was a small ruler to show scale, lol, as some folks do in pictures of items being sold online.)

My problem is that either 1) I'll feel like I have a great position, only to look down and find I've traveled many feet away or 2) I'll FEEL like I'm centered, only to look down and find out oopsy, I guess I wasn't!

[singerskates]

With my loop and flip jumps, I had the coach effect. But with my spins especially the camel, I had the Inverse Coach Effect going. But in the end, it didn't matter whether or not my coach was watching me or not, I got all my spins and jumps. And then the slipped disks took over and I couldn't do a thing on the ice and was in constant pain. I tried to stick it out at work but had to quit and go on comp. I was two days away from passing my prelim freeskate when I had to stop skating. Now I won't be skating for maybe over a year if I get the surgery to correct it. If physio works it will be six months before I can jump again from the time the problem is corrected. At any rate, I won't be competing this year. Thanks Sobeys. :cry:

[PattyP]

The Inverse Coach Effect: The exact polar opposite of the aforementioned Coach Effect. This happens when you're having a problem on an element or a move and you can't for the life of you figure out what's wrong. You mention it to your coach who immediately asks you to demonstrate the problem so he or she can fix it. You proceed to do the element or move fully expecting it to be AMAZINGLY KRAPTAKULAR as it has been all week when suddenly, magically, the problem fixes itself. At this point you're left wondering if your now thoroughly confused coach thinks you're just being melodramatic or are just completely insane. 8O



This happens to me a lot. My coach now just calmly says to me "that's what you pay me for" :giveup:

I think maybe I just focus a little more when I'm demonstrating for her.

[Skate@Delaware]

Coach Effect: happens every time in class when it's my turn to scratch spin-I can't do it and they suck!!!! UGH! I look like Frankenstien, all stiff, forget to bring my free leg up, and they travel (if I even make it all the way around). It's just like test anxiety. :frus:

Inverse-Coach Effect: (sort-of) Once after class I did a beautiful scratch spin (one of the few ever done by me) on the other side of the rink and I could hear my coach yelling at me as I was winding it down "That's good, now bring your arms down"-I was working on them because they had sucked so much in class that day. Go figure! She later asked why I didn't do one like that in class? I still can't (either in or out of class!)

(I usually get my coach-lettes (young skating friends) ask me "what's that supposed to be" when I try something. It's funny! They aren't being mean or smart about it-they can be very helpful when you need help and no coach is in sight! (or I'm too embarrassed to ask :oops: )