Turns while going fast vs Turns while going sloowww

The Amazing Coach is full of these skating tidbits. Actually, this is one of those 'small pieces of information' that have 'big impact'. Like LIBOR.

Here's the tidbit: initiating a turn while you're going slow is started with the body; initiating the turn while going fast is started with the edge of the skating foot.

Wow! That just blew me away when she told me that. Then she drilled me in starting the turn with the edge by making me scamper up and down the ice as fast as my stubby little legs could take me and turning in tighter and tighter turns.

It was initially hard to get the edge in the turn first, before using the body. I'm used to using my body first in turns because I'm a naturally slow skater. But after 15 minutes of drill in ever decreasing arcs of turns I was doing it consistently.

Here are some mnemonic images.

Slow speed-initiate turn with body

Fast speed-initiate turn with edge

 So where does this fast=edge first, vs slow=body first mean the most to me so far?

Mohawks.

When I'm doing mohawks now with more speed that I used to feel comfortable with, I'm now able to do the switch between the free foot and the skating foot a lot easier by just remembering to deepen the edge on the bit at the end, and bingo the feet switch. Maybe I'm wrong to do this, and everyone reading this will recoil in horror, but this is part of my Learn It Yourself philosophy. I'm experimenting and seeing what works for me. So far it's made my mohawks (always an issue for adults) a lot less intimidating at speed.

Ooooh, and I almost have a hockey stop too!