November 22, 2006

5:06p Of spinning and picking a coach.
Skating last night was wonderful. I had an 8:00 lesson, and was so exhausted at 6:00, I went to sleep and told my husband to wake me up at 6:30 so I could get to the session by 7:00- I ended up leaving the house at like 6:40 because I figured I would go to target before hoping on the rink. But, I was wondering if it would be better just to stay home and sleep. This did not look good.

I got to the rink at about 6:45, and there were a good number of people, mostly freestyle skaters- not public, on the ice. Was there a session that took the place of LTS? Turns out they just started Family Skate half an hour early since LTS was canceled. Bummer... I missed 20 minutes of ice. Anyhow, i get my skates on and am on the ice by 6:50. I start with just some laps stroking, trying real hard to glide as long as I can (4 strokes per long axis. hah) and to do crossovers at the end holding my edges for as long as I can. I did a few circles of forward crossovers in each direction. (Since I learned backwards ones my forward crossovers have suffered.) Then I decide to spin. The hockey glide into the spin is working really well. I just want to give Lisa a hug. With that "entrance" I can get 4-8 revolutions consistently. I did quite a few of these because they made me so happy. A few times I spun on my toepick- something I hadn't done before and not a habit I want to pick up! When I first started attempting spins I could barely get into them- "frick" being the word of the night when they didn't work out. Gleeful squealing when they did. The people around me must have thought I was nuts.

After about 30 minutes I took a break to take my skates off and massage my feet. Stupid skates. After 5 minutes I got back on the ice. Worked on mohawks (i hate mohawks), worked on all 4 of my 3 turns, did some edges on the line. Forward are okay, backward I get really turned around about which foot strokes and which arm should go where.

After about 30 minutes my feet were hurting again, so I took another skate off break. By now it was almost time for my lesson, so I didn't want to go into that with my feet killing me.

At 8:00 I joined B. for my lesson. We started by spending 10 minutes at the board, where he explained his coaching style very quickly, told me I had to bring a notebook to each lesson and would be fined a quarter if I forgot it, and then started drawing some diagrams and explaining terms. Long axis, short axis, diagonal axis (why is this not actually the diagonal of the rink?). Then we talked about the position of the body, open, closed, and square positions. He demonstrated and had me do each position. Very hands on about getting me exactly where I was supposed to be. From a ballet background this is something I'm used to and like. It's a good thing.

Then he changed the stereo from the peppy pop music he had put on to some nice soft classicalish music. Apparently, from experience he has seen that during public sessions crowds are much more rowdy when the music is peppy. He was right. The ice instantly became a much slower going, easier to get around place! Interesting. The one who controls the music really mind controls the crowd.

I don't remember the exact order of the lesson or really everything we did. Instead of half an hour, we ended up doing a full hour with the zamboni kicking us off at the end of the session. When we finished we started talking about the last thing we were working on and it seemed as though he wasn't going to ask me to pay for the extended lesson. (Afterall, he didn't stop teaching) but I said "I think I owe you for an extra half hour of your time" and he told me he appreciated that. Paying people for services is just good karma.

Anyhow the lesson was overall good. We started with turns because he told me he had seen me practice them and noticed I was going CW. Have I tried CCW? That's the normal direction. I assured him I have, at this point it will not happen, and if it absolutely needs to happen for him to coach me, I'll give it a try, but maybe that's not the right coach for me. He told me a few coaches at the rink will not let their students skate CCW, but he's a judge, and the manual says skaters can go either way, and as long as I've tried "normal" then we can go with CW if it is really better. He asked to see my spin, and I told him that the only successful entrance I can do is with a hockey glide into it. So I did that. He told me that I can definitely spin around, so now that I have that I have to start doing the correct entrance, and adding an exit to it! The exit I've got down... the entrance.... UGH. So we did the same T entrance I had done with the other coach but instead of the emphasis on a deep edge, there was more emphasis on the kicking of my leg. I did a few with him actually holding my hands and helping to whip me around, and kicking was still difficult, which leads me to believe that strength is part of the issue. I just can't yet pick that skate boot up high enough to go into the spin. The other problem is that I suck. He taught me an easy exercise to do at the wall to help work on spins and "kicking" into them. I'll work on that. I really want to be able to spin.

We also worked on edges, like in delta. My forward edges are not bad, but still need work. I don't have a ton of control over them, which is very apparent when going slowly. We worked a lot on exact body position, which is good. My backward edges are not terrible if I can do them. I get very confused over which foot should be doing the stroking and which arm should be where. But the actual edges are not horrible. The backward outside edges are better than the inside ones.

We worked on mohawk on a circle, forward and backward, inside and outside. Mohawks are hard. And i get really confused when doing all the different kinds in combinations. My feet just don't know where to go. I don't like mohawks.

We also worked on 3 turns. They didn't go as well as I normally think, partly because the size of the lobes was predetermined by a marker, and I actually had to stay on it. My 3 turns are usually quite small, so this was a good thing- but hard. We only did forward ones... thank goodness.

Lastly we worked on arabesque (which is apparently and attitude) and then eventually to spiral. My spiral on the wall is better than my spiral moving on the ice. (duh... it's because I'm not worried about falling flat on my face) My leg height suffers if I am trying to keep my weight on my heel. Due to the fact that I don't want to fall flat on my face, the leg height is just going to suffer. I was told if I can't see my foot over the top of my head in the mirror than it is unacceptable. Considering my leg is just above hip height on both legs right now, and slightly higher on the right side, I think it's somewhat acceptable. We'll work on it. He also had me do a backwards spiral (flat thank goodness) while holding onto his hands. I've never done a backwards spiral, but other than OMG going too fast! my main thought was this was an excellent exercise in not looking down. Looking down while being held onto puts your eyes in a spot that you don't want them for someone you've just met. We ended with forward spirals on edges, which I've also never done. Then the zamboni chased us off the ice. It was a great lesson.

Starting in January I am no longer going to do the LTS classes, just because the age of the kids and the group atmosphere isn't working as well for me. I feel like a lot is glossed over in interest of having things passable instead of good. I haven't had a bad instructor yet, so that's not the issue, just the nature of group lessons. I talked with B. and he is giving me a reduced rate if I can commit to a once a week lesson. It's only about 30% more expensive than the group lessons, but I'll have to start paying for ice time- which is a bummer. If I can pass out of Basic 8, I might ask the skate director if I can interview for a group lesson teaching position. I think I'm a good enough skater that I can teach snowplow sam or basic 1-4ish. Having ice time paid for would be wonderful.

It only gets more difficult from here, But I'm real excited about the prospective of having an actual "coach"