Tuesday 21 August 2012

Bad day

Bad day at skating today. Half hour private lesson and half hour practice on freestyle, nothing felt right. I really should try getting up and getting to the rink earlier so I can warm up before my lesson. It didn't help that my legs were sore from playing too much volleyball on Sunday.

Started with perimeter stroking, need to really cross my feet on the end crossovers. Three crossovers minimum!
Crossovers - Remember the transitions!! I did the wrong one on the first attempt, felt like such a fool and felt guilty that I hadn't practiced enough to at least remember this. All four circles need at least four crossovers. More power.
Spirals - Right leg needs to be higher when skating on left leg.
Back inside edges - Dismal. I wish coach J had asked to see back outside edges instead. There is at least some improvement in those. Hold outside arm steady, swing inside arm away from the line then back towards the line. In dire need of practice but I really dislike this move.
Waltz jump - Swing leg all the way through. Gets more distance in jump but it's a little scary.
Salchow jump - Really check the 3-turn before jumping, don't just swing around.
Loop jump - Curve more right before take off. Don't try to spin the jump by rotating the upper body, this causes me to lean over to the right and therefore skidding on take off.
Flip jump - More speed. Push into the LFO3 with right toe pick. I tried this so many times and was really uncoordinated. Good thing I discovered before the end that I need to have left arm forwards first, then switch to right arm forward as I actually start the LFO3.

Coach J wanted to see my Lutz since I was so ecstatic last week that I'd told her already. I seriously doubted I could do it especially since everything else wasn't going so well. Thank goodness we ran out of time. I hope coach J doesn't think that I haven't been practicing at all : (


After the lesson, I worked on those consecutive edges. They really reminded me of back when I was learning piano, I always hated practicing my scales and arpeggios and Czerny. The edges feel exactly like that. Boring, repetitive but still oh so hard! But unfortunately they are a necessary evil.

I also tried the Lutz again but was just so scared of it that I couldn't even jump off, let alone try to land it. Practicing crossovers didn't go so well either. I had initially intended to skate for two hours (which I usually do not have time to do), but I was so disgruntled in the end that I left after an hour. Will be going again tomorrow (unless I refuse to get up in the morning...). Hopefully, everything will be better!

2 comments:

  1. Aw, sounds like an off day. But don't let it get you too down! I've noticed that when I have practices where it feels like nothing's going right and nothing's progressing, the next practice is actually a lot better. It's like my body needs a day to just do things the ugly way and work out the kinks - it feels like you're not getting anything right but I think the muscles are figuring things out. So maybe you'll have a really productive session tomorrow, who knows? Good luck!

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    1. Thanks Sarah :)
      I skated again this morning for an hour, it was definitely much better than yesterday. I'm glad I went (I usually don't skate till Thursday), because my mind feels better now too! The flip jump has gone wonky though, so Lutz has disappeared too.

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