Pretty Forward Stroking

Coach Cruella has been working on smoothing some things out in my mohawks, FI3, and backwards mohawks (turn forwards) so I didn't have anything really new from this week's lesson. So, I decided to write about the approach she took to get me to get better posture in forward stroking. (Although one other coach tried to fix my problem stroking, I forgot her lesson. I'm not made of memory!)

My tendency was to put my free leg so it was behind (trailing) my skating leg. I thought this was the proper way to do it. In trailing my free leg behind my skating leg, that made me ever so slightly turn my hips so they were canted off from the line of travel.  Anyway, with my hips out of line, I couldn't get upright posture.

This is how I forward stroke now based on what I learned from Coach Cruella.
1. Take a strong forward stroke on a deep knee.
2. Bring the free leg to the '7 o'clock position'. This is, not trailing my skating leg, but off set just a little to the side. The thighs may be slightly separated. (Well, my thighs are like easter hams, so there's still touching. You may be genetically luckier than I am)
3. I make sure my hips are square to the line of travel
4. Now here's what I found. If I'm not careful during the stroke the knee of the free leg is pointed directly to the ice. What I have to do is keep the free leg straight and gently rotate it in the hip socket, so the knee sort of turns away from the ice. (Not so much that the knee points forward, just a tiny rotation so it points less down). I don't move the hips, just slightly rotate the leg in the ball joint of the hip.  Oh, and point the toe.
5. At some point in the rotation (it's doesn't take very much), I find my upper body popping into good posture, and I stop the rotation. I think this motion rotates the top of the pelvis back. It seems to gently pull the butt under, tucking the abdomen in and BINGO! the chest and shoulders pop up.
6. After I do a couple of these both sides, my body settles into that as my normal stroking method. But I have to do it a few times and concentrate every time I start a session.

I think I look nice in the glass--not perfect, but the posture is good, and my dance coach doesn't bark anything worse than "Bring the free leg higher!"  Sorry, Dance Coach, that's a Y.O.W.L issue. I need to be younger or weigh less.

Anyway, Coach Amazing taught me a nice stoking exercise last year that's helped improve my balance. Stroke. Bring the skate of the free leg to the ankle of the skating leg. Extend the free leg to the clock positions, one at a time.  So, stroke, tuck, extend to 1 o'clock. Stroke, tuck, extend to 2 o'clock. etc. Sometimes I can get two in: stroke, tuck, extend, tuck extend. Three o'clock is a bear to do without leaning over. The challenge is to do this slowly so I stress my core muscles, and my balance, as well as the free leg.

I Get Taller. It's a Miracle!

A coach I hadn't seen for almost a year spotted me skating at one of my rinks the other day. I got a message from her over on skatingforums. "Have not seen you since last August -- how many inches have you 'grown' since then? All the hard work you have been doing on your dance posture has made you TALLER!! Good work dearie -- Lookin' mahvelous!"

I only have to work at it every minute of every day.

Thirty+ years ago I was thrown off a horse at the canter depart. It resulted in three crushed vertebrae. "You'll have arthritis when you get older," the orthopedic surgeon warned.

He was right. In my fifties the back pain started bad and got worse. Then I took up ice dance.

It wasn't that the skating itself made the back pain go away, in fact I used to ache from head to toe after an ice dance lesson. My on-ice posture wasn't getting any better, no mater how hard I tried. And trying to hold dance posture resulting in eye-watering pain.

One day at work while I was hunched over my keyboard a pain shot through my back. In response, rather than go to the doctor and get some painkillers, or contemplate surgery, I decided to sit up straight. I forced myself to do all those things that the posture nazis recommend. I adjusted my chair, fixed my keyboard, and got up to walk around (even if only to the printer) every hour. I stopped IM'ing or emailing people. I got up and walked to their desks. I threw my shoulders back, sat and stood up straight, and kept myself moving. I also started doing 40 minutes of stretching and flexibility exercises every day during lunch.

Bad Posture

Good Posture

The first six days were pretty miserable. The pain actually grew worse. Then slowly, over a period of about six weeks, it gradually disappeared.

When I started taking lessons from Coach Cruella, she was able to give me techniques to translate good off-ice posture into on-ice posture.

IT TOOK TIME. But it worked. I now have no pain in my back when I skate. If I hold an awkward position for a long time I'll feel a crick, but not pain. My dance posture is pretty good for an elderly recreational skater. In Killian I have my shoulders touching my partner's supporting arm. In waltz, not only is my back straight, but my butt is tucked down so it doesn't stick out (and I've seem some recreational skaters that are better than I am, that don't do that).

A few weeks ago I saw Dance Coach coaching one of the freestyle girls in Fiesta Tango. She had that lean forward freestylers tend to have. I realized I had better posture in hold than she did, even though she was a much, much better skater.

Then in my last lesson Dance Coach put me in Killian and faced us toward the glass to look at our reflection. "Looking good," he said.

All it takes for me to get good ice dance posture: I work at it every minute of every day.

Vivid Language

NOTE: *THIS POST HAS BEEN EDITED FOR LANGUAGE!

I notice that Coach Cruella and Dance Coach often tell me the same thing. The difference is that Coach Cruella uses what I will call 'vivid language'.  Dance Coach is limited because of the male coach etiquette thing. No one's ever said anything, but my experience (limited) with male coaches is that they seem to go out of their way not to use bad language, maintain proper professional distance, and are vigilant about their professional reputations. Under restrictions like that, it's difficult for a male coach to use vivid language.

But Coach Cruella is able to use vivid language to get me to exhibit good posture. So far, I've remembered Coach Cruella's technique as a 3 step process: a. Shoulders back and down so 'the girls' rest 'on the table', b. Deep in the knee-bend the ankle, c. Use my abs like I do in the sitting trot. What the other coaches think when Cruella yells at me across the rink, "Dressage, dressage!",  I don't know.

But while the vividness of Cruella's language is useful in learning the skill of improved posture, at some point, I should do it automatically, without having to mentally step through a-c.

Dance Coach's approach is more organic. He seems to want to shape me so that everything comes automatically. His instructions are detailed: shoulders back, back slightly arched,  kneebend, but delivered in a pragmatic professional way. Then we skate--and he would yap at me.

What I needed was something simple. Something that would organically result in some physical response to an emotional, or physical memory. Something short and pithy.

So one day, Dance Coach was fiddling with the CD player in the hockey box, while lecturing me on my posture for the Canasta Tango.  It has to show 'Tango Expression' and ...... at that point my mouth moves before my brain can stop it.

"So I need to skate like a slut*." I say.

Dance Coach gasps. Then he starts to shake with suppressed laughter.

I take up a slutty pose and skate back and forth in front of the gate. "Hey, boys," I say in a wispy Marilyn Monroe voice, nose up in the air, "Look at me I have a rack*." I look at Dance Coach, "So like this?"

Dance Coach is now grasping his knees, bent over and heaving with laughter. One hand raises from a knee and makes a "Please, Stop" gesture. 

Let's go to some visuals please.

 

 

Good Girl Posture--no Tango Expression

Slutty Posture--Tango Ready

So we go out to skate the Tango, and I think "Skate Slutty". Shoulders goes back, chest goes up, back arches, my head snaps into "Queen of the Ice" position. I've found a mental cue that kick starts my body into the right position without me having to go through steps a-c. Eventually, the Tango Expression will be second nature and I'll be able to dispense with even that cue. If I ever need it again, say in a test when I'm nervous, I'll have that mental cue to draw on to kickstart me into the right posture.

Making Dance Coach laugh so hard he was out of breath--that was just a bonus.

The Strike

In my old figures books, what we now call a push off or even just a push, used to be called 'the strike'. Doesn't that have a powerful sound?

"Set up for your strike." the older coach said, "You can absolutely dominate your opponent with the quality of the strike." He paused drawing on his pipe, while his eyes darkened with memories of figures past, "Do it for America."

So begins the never to be written figure skating novel dealing with with the vicious competition at the 1960's Olympics cold war fought on the figures ice. Yep---that's a best seller.

Dick Button

 Anyway, Coach Cruella is not the only coach to lecture me on my strike, but she's the only coach to keep after it and get me doing it correctly.

I know how to do a strike. You set up in the T push position, then put all your weight on the inside edge of the back foot. As little weight as possible should be on the front foot.  Bend your knees and push off.

Only, it never worked for me. I would be hunched and bend forward, or my kneebend wouldn't be enough. Good posture is necessary so I can get the weight on the back skate. Hunched over, or bent forward meant no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't get my weight solid on the back skate. So in previous posts I've discussed Coach Cruella's rules for getting good posture:

1. Put 'the girls' on the table
2. Shine the headlights (in my language 'assume the position of the sitting trot')
3. Pinch your shoulder blades towards each other

Good kneebend is necessary to get a good push. She introduced her one rule for kneebend with the hyperbole:

1. Bend your knees so you can hold a basketball with your legs

Unfortunately, I'm naturally more of a bend your knees so you can hold a whiffleball girl myself. What she's trying to get accross to me is that I need a lot more kneebend than I think I do. It's been hard to make the basketball mindset a habit, unless someone is there eyeing me. I know it's the right thing to do, but my body forgets.

Not long ago I had a bad fall doing a mohawk. The kind of thing where I thought I wouldn't get up from without two coaches lifting me.  But after I stopped sliding on the ice, I clawed my way up, and skated away from it.

"You fell," Coach Cruella told me, "Because you didn't have enough kneebend on that first push."

Right. I'm permanently motivated. That fall was scary. BEND THAT KNEE! EVERYTIME!

Now I have the upper body positioned so I can put my weight solidly on the back skate, and the kneebend so I can hit the sweet spot when I straighten the back leg. The strike is looking good!

Power and control together. Perfect.

Don't.Slouch

I can't tell you how many skaters I've seen, young and old, amateur and elite, slouching while they skate.  As an ice dancer I am sometimes forced to look at video of myself skating and I occasionally see myself as bad as everyone else. Slouching is a terrible posture problem for both young and old, and it's easy to fall into bad habits. It's also bad for you.

Let me describe the kind of slouch I'm talking about.

1. The shoulders roll forward so the chest is narrowed.
2. The upper part of the back curves so the chest is collapsed
3.  The head is pushed forward

This posture has a lot of effects. It can impede deep breathing since it compresses your internal organs and rib cage into your lungs, it can affect the angle of the pelvis causing back pain, it disrupts your balance,  the angle of the head can cause pressure on the brain stem raising blood pressure and most critical of all....

It makes your boobs sag and your stomach pop out!

MO-TI-VA-TOR! Right, am I right? People will ignore the health issues, but talk about looks, and everyone's all standing up straight!

So what do to? Good posture is mostly good habits, stand up with chest out, shoulders back is enough. But you have to do it all the time. Every minute. Every hour. Every day.

Is it hard to be consistent? Yes. I lift weights, do Pilates, and yoga and I still catch myself slouching. Still, there's some simple exercises that you could try to help you straighten up. I found these on  the Women's Health magazine website.

No matter how young and beautiful you are. Slouching is ugly.
(And bad for your health)

Skating with out slouching gives you more breath to skate with, centers your balance, improves your looks. All you have to do is be conscious of it. All.The.Time.

Johnny Wier. Always perfect posture. A lesson for us all.