Skating in circles

I went to another Wednesday night public session at APEX and for the second week in a row they had bus loads full of middle school age kids. Last week it was the YMCA and this week the Boys and Girls club. Hopefully, next week will be empty again. Luckily, the monitors put out the cones keeping the kids at bay and away from the center of the rink. I split my time between moves and free skate test prep:

Movez - So many circles! Yeah, I spent a lot of time on just the RFO part of the circle 8. My goal was to find stability and not drift to the inside of the circle. I was able to get around a quarter of the way but then I did the arm switch and I drifted. However, two weeks ago, I wasn't even able to do that so progress is being made albeit slowly. I spent some time on the waltz 8 and am doing much better on making my way back to the center again. Having sharp blades really helps because I can lean into the edge more and not skid away from the center as I was doing before. I know my mohawks need work so I practiced the five step mohawk on both my good side and bad side down the blue line. Nothing too spectacular but I'm getting the rhythm of it and it's becoming more deliberate and less flail-y. I practiced edges where I could fit them in but I was sharing center ice with like five other skaters so it was tricky.

Free Skate - There were some dead moments where the skaters I was sharing the center with left for a bit of a break so I used that free space to run through the entirety of my Free Skate test, including holding the landings and presenting before moving on to the next element. Everything felt stable with the exception of my lunges which are drifting to the side (for lack of practice) and my two-foot spins which have never been as rotate-y as my one-foot spins. As much as I hate these two elements, I will need to force myself to spend more time on them to get them where they need to be for the test. I have about two and a half more months before test time so I think I can do it :) My jumps are still tiny. I fell a couple of times on my salchow because I'm rushing them....again. I don't mind if they are tiny but they should at least not be rushed. I'll have Christopher take a look on Saturday.

One note of pride: I fell more during this practice than I have since returning to the ice in November. This means that I'm not letting the fear of falling hold me back as much. I always say if you're not falling, you're not trying hard enough. This doesn't mean just fling yourself around all willy nilly, it just means that falling happens and you learn from those mistakes. You're moving around on slippery ice with knife shoes. Falling is a certainty. But skating timidly and with fear will never allow you to make progress. I'm happy that I'm allowing myself to fall again :)