July 2010

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2010-07-20 10:57:00
Still doubting
Skating is so off and on right now. I'm honestly not sure if it's still for me. I have wonderful dreams of just being incredible, of passing my Bronze test, of going to Adult nationals. But I've done maybe 10 total jumps since January. The bronze test is so out of my reach. My backspin, which I finally had, is gone. And what's worse- my interest in going to practice. It's gone too. I think it's mostly gone because I'm so out of shape. Skating isn't fun because I can't do anything. The rink is damp and humid and the fog makes it hard to breathe. My hip hurts on any extension, and jumping is out of the question. My blades slip and slide because it's been so long since I've sharpened them. My heels slip in my boots- but why invest in new ones if the thoughts of quitting are ripe in my mind. (A little girl at the rink had some I thought I was going to buy, then she got them signed by Rachel Flatt and Dorothy Hamill. There go my used boots... oh well.) Nothing seems to be in my favor. I'm just so unhappy skating. And then I finally decide I'm done. But I still have a credit with my coach (I pay her and she lets me know when it runs out. It works fine until I get injured and lessons are few and far between...) So I take a moves lesson. And other than the fact that I will never in my life do that stupid right to left outside mohawk the moves go pretty well. My power pulls lack power- but are getting stronger on my right side. (I lay my body down too far on the backside). But the left side- well as soon as my quad runs out of power, the hip kicks in and the pain begins. But on the right foot, I see improvement, and I see what a power pull should maybe look like. My 3-turns are getting better, though my left (?) back inside 3 is more of a 3-stop. My forward cross strokes rumble, and if I remember to slow down and ride the edge, the back ones aren't so bad. I have no hopes of doing the spirals. But I went home happy about my lesson. This weekend I drive 60 miles to another rink for a figure lesson. Since my blades aren't fantastic, I'm worried about it. I think I have a chance of passing the preliminary figure. But I'm not sure I can do it on infrequent lessons. We'll have to see. I don't even know how much ice costs or what the coach charges. This lesson is a leap of faith- though the coach knows I'm just looking for an intro, so I might try another coach who is a bit closer. But I know this coach has taken another adult through preliminary figure. Figures are really exciting to me. They are a reason I didn't skate as a kid (the other was my sister's great commitment to competitive gymnastic took up Mom's driving time. I didn't commit to much of anything, so I see why she didn't stick me into skating past Basic 1. The rink was too far, the driving time already taken, the figures schedules insane.) Figures started at like 4:30 in the morning- they scared many many potential skating parents away. I wish I had looked up skating again just a few years after I did Basic 1- figures were gone by then. I feel like, injuries and bad jumps aside, I've shown some promise in skating. I wonder what it would have been like if I did it when I was younger. I certainly wasn't fearless, but I didn't have the memories of a hospital stay and spinal cord injury in the back of my mind. I might have been able to get to sectionals at a low level. Who knows... I just have to figure out what the next step is. I need to spend money on a sharpening, and likely on boots. I need to find the joy in this again. (I even thought of joining the synchro team of the 60 mile away rink. They are supposedly slightly lower level than the team I was on, so maybe my inability to turn wouldn't be quite so bad. Other than that giant hitch, I'm actually a fairly strong synchro skater. Then I remembered winter. No way could I do that commute then. I really do miss synchro, as much as it drove me crazy due to the turn thing!)
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2010-07-29 15:36:00
by request...
okay, okay, I've gotten multiple requests to post about my figures lessons. Well- I don't know. First off- the ice in the quad cities was great. I've been reminded how much more pleasant it is to skate when on a good rink, rather than a rink that resembles the ice cube tray in the freezer. It's just so much easier to move without having to dig into the ice on every single push. Our ice is awful. Figures themselves, I don't know what to think. Posture is going to be a huge issue for me, and placement on my blade. The coach pointed out it's going to be even harder because I'm not using figure blades. The figures themselves aren't too bad- they are smaller than I originaly thought, so completely do-able (though left outside, I sometimes run out of steam right by the end). The coach isn't really sure what precision of tracing is expected now that figures are rarely tested. Mine were not very precise at all, but always near the same spot. Setting up each figure a little bit to the right of the previous one is quite a challenge. (For those who haven't done this- in practice, you scribe your first circle and do the FO8. Then, when you finish, you go to your starting point and take a wide step the right, and mark it as the new starting point. For the next figure, you have to judge how far you are from your old middle, and go that far past your old circle on the one side, and stay that far in from the old circle on the other side, and guide off your previous marks. It's tough.) The most difficult part of the test will be the waltz 8. It might be frustrating enough that I don't give this much of a try. Mine is HUGE compared to what is allowed for figures- and I step so far off the circles when I try to stay on the one drawn on the ice. Fixing it is going to be horrible as I've been doing it as a "move" for almost 4 years now. If I do more figures, I think I will check with a more local coach. I'm not sure it's worth 2 hours of driving to go do. There is a coach near me (she occasionally comes to my rink, but is with my old club) who loves figures, and helped me with some at my group lesson this week, so I'm going to approach her, maybe. Okay- so other than the figures, which I am still just not sure about, I am pretty sure I am going to give up skating, at least for awhile. I had decided to go back into ballet, and started researching classes (I'm now thinking tap and ballet...) But I had to teach on Tuesday (HAD to- the co-teacher, my coach, is on a weeklong cross Iowa bikeride. Isn't that awesome!) So I taught, and it went well. Teaching toddlers isn't too hard once they can stand up as long as you can talk to yourself for 30 minutes. They just need constant dialogue. Then I took a lesson. We started with spirals on edges -yuck- but then we moved to double 3s (front then back). I haven't done these in years, but after a few failed tries, I was actually doing both turns. Go me! On my bad side it's ackward because I need my arms to complete the forward turn, but it turns out to not have to shift them around for the back turn, you have to hold the arms countered on the forward turn. On my good side, I c ould do this, on my bad side it just didn't happen. Then we spun. And on almost every single backspin, I crossed my foot. The instructor told me my problem is my arms are too high. When she said that I asked her to email my coach to tell her my foot was crossed. That's been my main problem. Then the girl in the class moved on to jumps and I went to figures. The instructor told me a bit more about the posture my body should be held in, and really stressed to put the weight on the heel. It really sounds like she really loves figures, so if I do them, she'll work with me. We just have to find ice... Now I don't know what to do. I want to go back to ballet, but am worried it too will hurt my hip. Skating does hurt my hip (figures too. I'm not really turned out, but staying that turned in is ackward!), and I know nothing about tap but it sounds fun. I need a life coach. Or an official decision maker.
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