The lutz jump is a jump where you reach back with one foot, toepick in and pull back your other foot, then leap off the ice/rotate/land.
The toe picking part looks like this (Scott Hamilton)
Less accomplished skaters hammer that toepick in and pop up. I'm told it's not good technique, and coaches should correct it, but given the state of my rink's lutz corners, hammertoe lutzes may be the norm.
The other day I went to public when I passed the first lutz corner and there were over a dozen holes in the ice. Not toepicky holes, but big friggin' cause you injury holes.
Several of them were the size of my palm and a half an inch deep after grooming! I thought, "Is somebody raising these for export? It looks like a divot farm!"
When I told a gold skater at my rink about the 'divot farm', she told me about the time she tripped backwards in a divot and twisted her back. I don't know how long she was off the ice for that.
It used to be common for skaters to go around at the end of the session to go around with a bucket filled with slush and fill the divots in. I've heard about this, but never seen it. I'm not even sure coaches remember it used to be done. Gone away....gone away....the skaters of yesteryear...
Not long after I started skating I saw one of our more senior coaches racing around the rink with a bucket, just prior to the Zamboni coming onto the ice. Took me a little while to work out why. He is the only one I've seen doing this.
ReplyDeleteI think our rink used to have ice buckets, but no longer. We have lutz (and double/triple jump) divots everywhere. I can't tell you how many times I've fallen on them!
ReplyDeleteGuilty as charged! I did that the other day and I looked at the ice and I said to myself, okay, no more lutzes today!
ReplyDeletethey have an ice bucket at our rink. they don't fill in holes every time, but I've seen them do it. they walk around, drop ice, step on it to smoosh it in and then they zam. I will have to thank our zam drivers for our great ice. Now if I could just get them to stop tearing up the ice with their hockey skates!
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