Click of Death

A few days ago, I was practicing back crossovers in the center when I had the dreaded 'click of death'. My back toepick had caught on the heel of my front foot.

I fell backwards and had to do some quick twisting to keep my head off the ice, then slid a bit before I came to a stop and ended up staring at the ceiling.

The next thing I know there's an 8 year old girl leaning over me with concern.

"Are you okay?"

My humiliation complete, I get up and start back crosses again.

Ice Doesn't Care--2nd Year Blogiversary!

Can't believe I made two years!  I thought I'd run out of topics after a couple of months, then I realized I  could  cover things so trivial no other skater would touch them…and, of course, pictures of cats.

So, what were my most popular posts of the last year (based on page views) ?

The Six Stages of Adult Figure Skating thanks to Lori over at International Adult Ice Skaters for mentioning it.

Judges--Thinking Positive. Apparently a coach at Bowie Ice Rink (I don't know who) posted it on Facebook. Thanks!

My favorite posts of the last year?

Types of Coaches

The Great Skate Bag Debate,

The most popular posts involving cats…

When I'm the tallest skater on the ice.  I have to admit, the punchline on this was a lucky find.

String Theory for Figure Skaters

So, do you have a favorite post? Waiting to hear about it!

My motto for every lesson is as follows:

Falling....while back stroking

How I feel, when I start to fall backwards while back stroking, catch myself, do a turn forwards during the fall....and stay upright.

(Sorry for the bad language, but I felt like this Monday)

So Much To Look Forward To....

I'm able to get back on ice! I know I should feel excited, but after a month off Ice I know what I have to look forward to.

Falls.

Sadly, getting up from the ice is a little pathetic. I have to roll on to my stomach, dig in a toepick, then push myself up from the ice by grabbing my knee.

All I need is an emergency button....sign.

I once had another skater tell me, "You're still getting up like a 5 year old in Snow Plow Sam. Let me teach you how to get up right."

I narrowed my eyes, "Sweetheart, I'm 40 years older and 40 pounds heavier than you are.  I got one way to get up. This is it."

But getting up from a fall is rewarding for me. After 20 seconds of struggle, I finally get back on my feet, there's a sense of triumph! How many of you younger skaters feel like that?

And when I get home after a freestyle I get to snuggle up in a nice warm blankey!

Ah, a snuggle and a nap...and Advil!

Looking forward to getting back to skating,  even with all the falls!

I Love It When a Plan Comes Together

This week was totally what my skating excursion two weeks ago had not been: This was my grand entrance! The president of the skating club gave me a hug, the rink manager who was working the register asked where I'd been, and the skating director told me they'd missed me. People came up and complimented my outfit. Then I got on the ice and I was solid, smooth, and graceful.

Okay, let me rephrase that.

I was solid smooth and graceful--as long as I was going forward. Going backwards: Meh.

Back crossovers. No enough curve, but crosses okay. Back stroking....sigh.... I fell.

This kind of fall.

 And what happened?
1. I rolled on my hip.
2. I hit my wrist guard.
3. I got my arm up to block my head from bouncing on the ice.
4. I got up immediately.

(Pandering to my U.K. readers)

I love it when a plan comes together.

Forward Inside 3--Lessons Learned

I thought I'd write some notes about the FI3 and some things I figured out about learning new skills--well, new 3 turn skills---from the experience.

1. It takes a lot more kneebend that I thought it would. Coaches would tell me 'deeper in the knee' and I'd do it right once, then go back to 'not quite deep enough in the knee kneebend'. So, my bad (also, maybe 'my age'). Anyway, now if something doesn't work--GO DEEPER IN THE KNEE!

2. Coaches would hold my hand to keep me from falling. This was useful at the very beginning. I needed to put together a lot of stuff physically and not worry about falling. The hand holding in the long run, I felt kept me from getting some of the rhythm of the turn.  I needed the freedom to move my arms and shoulders. At some point, I wish a coach had just flat out said, "Put some pads on and get over it."

 3.  There was a certain kind of rhythm to me getting the FI3. Push off, pull the freefoot to the heel, do some fiddly stuff with the upper body (more about that later), turn. I really had to work on the order of occurence of all the fiddly upper body stuff in coordination with bringing the free foot to the heel of the skating foot. This was essential. Once I realized that the sequence and the pacing was critical, and I could duplicate it over and over, I was finally able to get what are honestly beginner FI3. The FO3 didn't seem to be as dependent on the rhythm of the turn (maybe I'm more of an intermediate with FO3 as I can do it pretty much from any position now) and I had not anticipated how sensitive to pacing the turn the FI3 was.  So it wasn't until I put some pads on and started falling that I was able to get the FI3.

4. Every coach had a slightly different technique for teaching FI3. Right now I'm definitely beginner, and I found that I needed more arm movement to get the turn. For a LFI3, one coach put a glove in my left  hand, and then while doing the turn I was to pass the glove from the left to the right hand in front of the body and turn. This actually worked pretty well. It doesn't give pretty turns with still arms, like people want, but it helped me get the turn.

5. I can't remember stuff from lessons perfectly so the InterTubes is a godsend. I particularly found Robert Burgerman's 3 turn video the most helpful in jogging my memory. Notice how he holds the free arm ahead of the body for the FI3. Now imagine holding the free arm in that position, then using the technique from para 4 (the passing of the glove in the skating hand). That's what worked for me. As I said, that gives me beginner FI3. See how he uses quite a bit of shoulder action? I need that, but as I'm just a beginner, I use arm motion to get me there.

Three Turns

(For my UK readers: What is that accent? Mancunian? Estuary? Geordie?)

So these are some things I learned in my FI3 journey. I still have quite a bit of beginner arm swing, but I'd rather work to suppress that and have FI3, than I would to work fruitlessly on FI3 in the hope I'll someday get them with still arms. I'm willing to skate with compromise rather than perfection.

[No, I've not returned to the ice. I'm scheduling an MRI for first week of January. Determined to find out what is going on.]

The Amazing Coach

"You're starting to skate faster and you're skating backwards around the rink. You're bouncing between Intermediate and beginner skater," the Amazing Coach said, "You need to learn how to fall better."

I balked, " No, no , no , no, no"

Nooooo! Please don't make me do fall training!

"You've got your pads on. It's time to fall."

Her goal was to train me to roll when I fell so I ended up on my hip pocket. So for the next ten minutes she had me falling and rolling onto my hip pocket on both sides.

Jeremy Abbot falls on his hip pocket

Shudder.

Even with bones as fragile as china, I learned to fall safely (source)

Two hours later I caught a toepick (this never happens!), sprawled forward and reflexively rolled onto my hip pocket. The Amazing Coach made it across the rink in a heartbeat. I want to think she pointed her finger at me and said, "See! See!" But that would be a false memory.

What she actually did was tell me "Get up! Get up!"

This is part of the Amazing Coach's training. She says that if you fall and don't get up right away, you're training your mind to failure on that particular skill. So I have to get my legs under me and stand up as quick as I can ---- which is pretty slow. I look like an arthritic cat trying to go up the stairs. Another skater said I got up like a 5 year old in CanSkate. Then she demonstrated the correct way to get up. Hello sweetie, when you're 60 then we'll talk. Right now I'm happy to get up at all!

A Danger to Life and Limb

Apparently my accidental  kicking of Dance Coach's boot out from under him has become rink legend. I am now "The one who caused Dance Coach to tell all his skaters 'Don't kill your coach.'" So, of course, I nearly 'killed' him again in a lesson.

Twice.

The lesson started normally; forward stroking followed by the usual routine of chasse' and swingrolls alone and in hold. We're really zipping along now, and while my posture may not be of Olympic caliber,  it's awfully good. I occasionally get glimpses of us in hold in the glass, and while I still look like an elderly lady skating with her grandson, my dance posture is good.

Extension..meh..I look like an elderly lady.

See this? The only way that level of extension will happen for me is with a full body replacement--or a personalized time machine.

Hope Schroeder SFFSC

But Dance Coach and I got through all the exercises in hold, covering the ice in four strokes a side, with nice edges and deep knees. The first thirty minutes are filled with ups and downs of the rink, insides and outsides. This thing and that thing without cease or desist. Finally we get to the Canasta Tango.

Since the Tango is not fun to do on public ice, we're fortunate this is a light session. We start. My power isn't enough to get us into the corners, but it's not awful either. When I do the crossroll on the end pattern, Dance Coach actually makes happy noises. Then during the presentation glide I see my posture in the glass. If I drop 40 lb, I'll look mighty fine.

When we finish our second run through, Dance Coach tilts his head to point down the rink. Two little girls are trying to ice dance together. Apparently, he has fans.

It's in stroking in waltz hold where I get into trouble. As usual, we start with me stroking forward, with him stroking backwards. This goes okay, and we turn so I'm stroking backwards. Only now, I don't really do a good job of turning on the curve. I can feel Dance Coach's hand pushing on my back to get that curve.  Once, twice down the rink. We're 30 minutes into the lesson and after 30 minutes of non-stop fast skating, I'm out of breath. It's been months since this has happened, so I take this as a sign I'm being pushed harder than ever.

I bend over to grip my knees, heaving the air in, while Dance Coach puts on his 'mean Russian coach' comedy act. It goes something like this, "Zo, leetle skater iz out ov zee breeth. Leetle skater need to work harder like zee ryusshan ize danzer. Ryusshan ize danzer feel no pain," I'm still heaving. Dance Coach goes back to his normal voice, "Okay?" I flap a hand around. He makes a few more of his normal voice comments, yakking about my edges and whatever other things seem handy to talk about. I honestly can't remember what he said after we stopped.  I feel like I've run a mile, hard.

Finally, I stand up. "Again?" I say.

We start with the waltz hold stroking with me going backwards for the fourth time. Thinking it might help with the 'not having enough curve' I really get extra deep in the knee for that first stroke, and as we hit the glide I start to roll backwards just as Dance Coach strokes forward....I don't know what happened. I know I caught him off guard and did the unforgivable, I gripped his shoulder and took him with me. We both start to go down. I know he dug in his skates and we didn't hit the ice.

Save me Dance Coach!

Geeze louise, did I get a lecture I deserved. Then we start the exercise again. And it happens again. Only now he was ready for it.

I didn't get a second lecture. For the first time since I started to skate, a coach tells me, "Don't go so deep in the knee."

That seemed to work, I'm still not getting the curve, but I was able to stroke backwards in hold without any problems.

But...

          there's always....

                                    next lesson.

Backwards Falls

So, I sat down to Sunday lunch with my friend the Big Guy, who used to figure skate, and during a recitation of my week, I told him how I 'almost killed' my coach.

The Big Guy grinned without any sympathy for my horror. "I once saw a former elite skater at a suburban freestyle take a backwards fall." He tells me the gentleman's name. He had been a team member at Worlds and won at least one Gran Prix gold medal in his time. "He was skating backwards really fast and hit a rut. You know how bad the ice was at that rink. He fell backwards flat on his butt and slid halfway down the rink. You could see on his face it caught him completely by surprise."

I know what would have happened if this had happened to me. In the blink of an eye every coach in the rink would have been at my side solicitously asking if I was okay.

I think for a second. "Did they laugh?" I ask.

"Oh yeah."

Well, I don't feel quite so bad now.

You can stop laughing now