Well, it's done! Before I tell you how I did, I'm going to bore you to death with all of the details.
Overall experience - Ugh, it was weird and didn't really feel like a competition. Usually there is a buzz of excitement and hugs when you see your fellow competitors whom you haven't seen since last year. There was none of that! It was a series of check-ins at different places, the awkwardness of putting your skates on in a parking lot behind the rink, and then waiting to be called in while standing out in the 40 degree cold (although at one point my husband, my coach, and myself sat in the car with the heat on biding our time). I didn't have a chance to get excited or pumped up or get my adrenaline going. It was all just...meh. I mean, I'm thankful that the competition happened at all given the current state of public health but I still felt cheated out of the typical exciting competition experience. Sigh.
Warm up - I signed up for a 15 minute warm up session during which I practiced all of my elements and discovered that they all had pretty much left me. Yikes! Not the best feeling right before I skate my program but it is what it is. Christopher did his best to keep me from panicking about it.
Performance - I was the second skater to go on and oddly, I felt less panicky than I did in the warm up. I landed the first combination jump just fine (loop-toe loop) and then set up for a pretty spiral into a flip jump (which I landed! First flip jump landed in competition WOOOOT!). However, the camel combination spin did not go as planned. I think I was a little too far forward and I lost the camel. Quick thinking had me reverting to a basic one foot spin to fill the time. Next up was the choreographic step sequence which went well until I got a little too far forward on the twizzle. I recovered and did not fall (whew!). The rest of the program was lovely! My salchow was nice, the final loop jump was great, and the final scratch spin was nicely centered with arms overhead. So really, the two mistakes (the camel and the twizzle) had me feeling like I didn't achieve my goal - to skate a program I can be proud of. I got lots of complements on my overall skating and gracefulness and one person even commented on how calm I was (both my coach and I laughed at that because we know how freaking panicked I get). The other adults in my group skated their asses off such that I really thought there was no way to tell who should get first. I guess the judges thought so as well because....
THERE WAS A THREE-WAY TIE FOR FIRST!
So, myself and two others had the honor of sharing GOLD! So yeah, I got gold but it doesn't feel like a genuine gold medal winning performance. The twizzle mistake was a fluke as I usually get it right during practice but I know my camel combo spin needs some more time to cook. I have another five or so weeks until my next competition so I am going to go full out working on this spin to get it closer to where it needs to be.
Because of COVID, the vendor who does the videography for the competition didn't have a tent set up to sell videos and action photos. Instead, I have to wait about a week to purchase online. Once that happens, I'll go ahead and post it here.
P.S. - I landed a flip jump in competition, guys!!! Like, this is kind of a big deal for me given how much this one particular jump has haunted me over the past 2-3 years. The technique was still a bit sloppy but I LANDED IT! IN COMPETITION! WHAT!? AHGHGHGHGHGh!
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