The Colorado Springs Invitational was this past weekend and I survived! I actually did a lot better than I had anticipated given all of the crappy practices I've been having lately. So, I'll do two separate posts (one for the Compulsory Moves event and one for the Free Skate).
Not only have I been nervous for this competition because of my recent practices but also because this was my first time competing at a new higher level. When I was skating Pre-Bronze I felt like a big fish in a little pond and now that I'm Bronze I feel like a little fish in a big pond. I made the mistake of looking up some of my competitors online to see what I was up against and I got spooked. I was seeing lovely jumps and higher level spins that were actually centered and in a proper position. How can I keep up?! I decided going into this that my expectations were going to be low. My goal was to stay upright, don't embarrass myself (or my coach), and maybe do well enough to justify spending money on a professional video and not be ashamed to actually share it with people. I accomplished those goals!
So, the results! I finished first out of four! What!? Gold Medal! Woooo!
Warm-upz - During the warm up I was struggling with the sit spin. It was just a hot mess. I did it so many times and each time it got worse. I told Christopher that I just didn't feel comfortable putting it in at all (It reminded me of the movie The Cutting Edge when they got to the final competition and were all like "we're not doing the Pamchenko!"). I would rather do a one foot spin and have that look nice than do a sit spin that was wonky. I could tell he wasn't pleased but that's how I wanted it. I felt insanely guilty like I was giving up on it. I felt like a quitter. But, it's just that it's so inconsistent and it needs so much more work still. On top of it all, even when I do manage to get the rotations, it's barely a "sit", it's more like a squat. I'm going to keep working on it until it's better but I just didn't feel comfortable putting it in for this routine. Sigh. The good news was that my jumps were fine and the backward 3 turns got around just fine without a foot down. Even though I felt guilty for giving up on the sit spin, I was feeling confident about all the other things. It's a give and take.
The Main Event! I was last to skate in our group of four and as the skater before me was performing, I was doing the breathing exercises that Paul showed me. It was soon my turn and, as I took up my starting position, I took one last breath to ensure I was calm. Everything went as planned except for one thing. I did my first backward inside three turn (RBI) and then didn't set the next one up properly (which never happened in practice so I'm chalking it up to nerves) so I skipped the second one entirely (LBI). BUT!!!! I didn't let it bother me! The breathing helped and I was able to just move on to the next thing and not be mentally stuck in the spot where I made the mistake! The final spin was just a basic one-foot spin, not very impressive. But I think maybe had I done a terrible sit spin, that would have put me in second place given that I had already made a misstep in the routine with the LBI 3 turn. So, it was a good call on my part but I still feel bad about it. I honestly wasn't expecting much in terms of results so I was genuinely surprised to get first place. I had some really good competition. Those women were fiercely good! Here's the video :)
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