Lake Pacid Skate Camp: Day Five Alternating Spins

I'm skating 4 hours a day, plus a lot of walking around Lake Placid before I start my spin lesson.

Coach and I stroke around while she looks at my edging and posture then we touch on mohawks, 3  turns and crossovers.

In the last half of the lesson we start on spins.

I'm tired, but I'm loose.

I do an entry from the left direct into a one foot spin. Dramatic exit, one foot entry into a right spin. Dramatic exit.

Then I do this over and over for the second half of the less, arms held in, arms in the air,  fast, slow,  talking all the time, yakkety yakkety. Snapping into spins, no hesitation. Moe than three rotations consistently

My home coach once told me that there would come a day when spins would be as natural to me as any skill I'd ever had. That when that day came, it would be like a lock opened in my head and I would be doing spins effortlessly from now on.

That Day Has Come!

But for the rest of the week I couldn't get a decent spin if you paid me.

OR NOT

I guess I now know how much warmup it takes for me to get fancy-shmancy spins. Several hours.

Lake Placid Camp: Day Four-The *Very* ADULT Group Program

Day 4 and I'm in a group number. We are doing a two spoke synchro wheel. I can't find a picture of one, but here's a 4 spoke wheel...ignore two of them.

I'm one of the two pivots. The pivots link arms and slowly rotate counter clockwise facing each other. The male skater, adventurous, enthusiastic, and strong, is supposed to link arms with me and  lean in towards me as we turn the wheel.  On the outside of his position is a strong female coach who is skating fast linking arms with him.

Now once the male skater links arms with me and as we rotate, he leans away from me.  He's afraid that the female coach to the outside of the wheel is going to get hurt. I tell him she's a coach she can take care of herself, but he keeps pulling and leaning away from me more! At this point I'm afraid he could  snap my arm because he's so strong and the female pivot skater and I are locked into position by linking our elbows through each others' with a death grip.

Now the program coach is yelling at everyone "Slow Down!"  And the pivot skater is yelling, 'LOOK AT ME" to keep us centered. And I'm yelling at the male skater to lean inside towards me. Because God forbid he leans to the outside and pulls the pivots apart--or breaks my arm.

What the other freestyle skaters hear is ;

SLOW DOWN! SLOW DOWN! LOOK AT ME! LOOK AT ME! and again,

SLOW DOWN! SLOW DOWN! LOOK AT ME! LOOK AT ME!

Then finally me yelling at the top of my lungs,  "DON'T PULL OUT! DON'T PULL OUT!"

It must have sounded very naughty because the whole rink of skaters burst into laughter

Anyway, the male skater had developed this bad habit of leaning out, so to stop him from doing that, I yell dirty talk in his ear 'OH, MY GOD YOU'RE SO AMAZING, YOUR HOT BODY, YOUR MUSCLES OH TALK DIRTY TO ME...'

Yep, he's at the right pace and got his ear almost on my shoulder. 

What a relief this is an ADULT SESSION.

Lake Placid Day Three: The Ambulance Cometh

One of the skaters in our group fell and had an injury serious enough for an ambulance trip to the hospital and is waiting for major surgery and family to arrive to care for her. Because of the confusion of where people were last night and who was doing what, I got to the hotel late and didn't post yesterday.

After this happened a number of us had discussions about poor safety and medical planning stories for skaters who are injured in serious falls.

Important Safety Tips

People who are 'wishful thinkers' have a belief that "Oh, nothing will happen to me." These are known in the  Disaster Preparedness, Risk and Safety professions as "dead people with an attitude".  My version of this for figure skating is "unconscious people with an attitude."

1. When you skate, injuries can happen necessitating ambulance transfers to the hospital.. Have an emergency contact who can be contacted and have a second backup contact--just in case. Don't name someone who who can't be reached.  You may be on painkillers and unable to make rationale decisions.  I've been rather astonished by people who don't have cell phones, or email, or even turn off their cell phone when they get home in the evening. Every one has the right to cut themselves off by not being reachable, just don't pick that person as your emergency contact. 
2. Don't rely on strangers--especially medical personnel-- to help you out without having information on you. Keep your medical information -- doctor, insurance, medications up to date.  The older you are, the more important this is. You can buy USB key drives at your pharmacy just for this or in your skate bag, andf your contact should have a copy of your medical records. I have an app on my phone called an I.C.E card. It puts your In Case of Emergency information on the lock screen of my phone to include emergency contact information, medications, allergies, and other important information. You might feel this is overkill, but for those of us who have no local family when the crisis occurs, it's important to make information available to EMTs. 

 

Just don't trust on luck. Plan for emergencies.

 

Lake Placid Day Two: Onset of Exhaustion and Pain

Skating total number of hours--no idea. Started at 7 ended at 5. Break for lunch and various off ice moments.

Lessons
Private: Stroking. edges. and mohawks to stop that awful scraching noise, and skating with a partner as he changes positions in a pattern.

Group:
Endurance Skating: The coach told me, "That's a kid's class, I'm not going to put adults through that on the first day." So we did checking and stroking improvement. My ability to do forward crossovers facing out of the circle really came in handy. I was not the slowest person in the class.
Understanding Turns: Mostly about figuring out how you're messing up your turns.

 Group Number: So far a wheel, spins, and emoting, plus this thing we do like a wave--trust me, it will look fantastic when it's finished.

At the end of the day

Then I did a 20 pose yoga class ending with 'Happy Baby'

And Tylenol

I feel much better.

Lake Placid Day One: The Power of My Blades

My Blades are so magnificent they 

attract the attention of

of a powerful government agency

Well, I got a good laugh out of it.

I guess when TSA x-rayed the luggage, the metal

in the blades produced an image like a forest fire.

I pack the skates behind a mesh cover in 

the suitcase to hold them in place. 

It was a professional inspection, TSA didn't

even disturb the mesh cover. I guess they

saw the skates though the mesh and that was that.

 

Packing for Lake Placid Adult Skate Camp Week

Plan

Reality

 

Figure Skaters at the Doctor's Office

When the Doctor asks "Do you fall often?"

 

When the Doctor looks at the knee X-Ray and says

"I don't even seen how you could get that injury."

When the Doctor says "You know, you're my fittest patient."

When the doctor says, "You do not look your stated age."

 

Group Classes at the August 2019 Lake Placid Adult Camp

The early announcement of next week's adult skate camp group classes. Note that there may be last minute adjustments. Most are on ice, but a few are off ice.

CLICK ON THE IMAGES TO GET A BIGGER PICTURE

 

 

I know you are eager to find out what I plan to take. 

Back spins, basic spins, endurance skating, back 3 turns, checking, hip alignment, figures loops, edges, counters and rockers. Alicia Walters and Marc Fenczak both hit my skating interests dead center, so they will make a small fortune off my group lesson fees. If I thought my feet could take it, I'd take every turn class, except for brackets, brackets can go to hell. 

 Brackets are the Devil's Turn

Facing inside, turning outside....shudder

When Spins Go Bad

Too Much Toe pick--

Also travelling--just sayin'

When skaters cheat..

I called up a skating friend of mine from years ago, and as  we were chatting I mentioned I was skating LTS at two rinks at the same time.

He cried out, "You whore!"

 We had a good laugh and I said,

"But you never told your primary coach you had a second coach."

"Yeah," he said, "I had a wife coach and a mistress coach"

 You bad boy....