Work on ALL THE THINGS

 I'm lumping an entire week's worth of lessons into one post. Hate me later. 

Camelz - After my camel fiasco at Fright Fest, we worked a bit on improving this. I really need to watch my leading arm so that it actually, you know...leads. I have a tendency to "swat flies" with it instead and that throws off my balance. Christopher took some video and in some of my attempts, my free leg was at the proper height so I know that I can do it when things go right. Mostly, I need to remember about a bajillion things in order for this spin to work. I think that's why I struggle with it in competition. I already have so much on my mind that it's hard to remember every detail of how to make a camel spin work. I'm not giving up on it. It will be lovely by the time I compete with it at Sectionals in March. 

Lutzez- Instead of wanting to see my flip jumps, he asked for lutzes! Whelp...I haven't really been working on these too much since I've been preparing for competitions so I wasn't really sure what these would look like. Surprisingly, they weren't the worst. After the first 2-3 jumps, I complained to him that these just feel soooo sloooow. He pretty much said "NO! That's how I want them! You are actually taking your time and not rushing for once!" LOL. He took some video of these as well and I was really surprised to see how nicely crossed in front my free leg is on this jump! Hrrm. He seems to think I'm making progress on these. I seem to think they feel awkward as hell. I really hope he's not tempted to add this to my program anytime soon. It feels gross. 

Dutch Waltzez - I requested that we spend some time working on dance. Mostly, I'm really starting to get burned out on camels and flips. I need a change of pace. I've been working on the DW so I feel like I have the steps and the pattern memorized. I just haven't been able to do on ice with the music. Turns out I've been practicing it at a much slower speed because when Christopher put the music on I felt like I had to hustle. I had the same problem that I've been having in my practices with running out of rink with the last two steps. Again, I need to make those swing rolls deeper. Something to work on. 

Canasta Tangoz - During our first dance lesson, he showed me the basic steps to the CT but we didn't spend too much time on it. I used the USFSA Dance app to learn the steps so that when he put the music on I was able to plow through it for the most part. Even though this dance is a bit more complex than the DW, I was able able to keep up better with the tempo. It's just such a fun dance. I think out of the three Preliminary Dances, this one might be my favorite, especially that cross stroke-swing roll at the end! Weeeeee!

Rhythm Bluez - We didn't spend a lot of time on this. He just walked me through the pattern and talked to me about practicing the lilt action. My brain exploded when he showed me how to do the cross behind steps. I really need to spend some time getting comfortable with those. It just seems like a great way to trip myself. 

2020 Fort Collins Fright Fest

I competed at Fright Fest and oh man was that an experience. Ok guys, it was straight up blizzarding outside the whole day. The drive up to Fort Collins wasn't terrible (mostly because my husband drove) but the way back home was treacherous with whiteout conditions most of the way. Regardless of the frightful weather, a good time was had by all. Here is my recap: 

Practice Ice - I signed up for a 15 minute practice session a few hours before I competed so I could get my legs under me. Unfortunately, my legs were nowhere near under me. I was skating well until I started warming up my flip jumps. I fell on almost every.single.one. Coach Katie was there to talk me through it and thankfully she had spoken to Christopher because at one point she said "what are the two things Christopher told you to remember about the flip jump?" In my anxious panic, I forgot to pick in far behind and draw in and I forgot to keep my chest up. Remembering those things, my flip improved slightly. I'm really thankful that although Christopher couldn't be there, Katie was a lovely substitute. She kept me calm and she coached me well. She was great! I did some lovely camels and scratch spins to finish out the time I had left and before I knew it, my fifteen minutes were up. 

Waiting - There was about a two hour wait until my actual competition event so hubby and I waited in the cold, cold, car and played Uno until it was time to go back in. If it weren't for Covid, I would have happily watched the skaters competing in the events before mine. Alas, car time it was. 

Stations- There were a few stations set up for us to keep our group separate from the other competitors so when we entered the arena, we went to station #1 off ice warm up. I did some dynamic stretching and talked with the other ladies I was competing with before we were ushered in to station #2 locker room skates on. Six of us were crammed in a tiny locker room to put our skates on before getting on the ice for our on-ice warm up. During my short warm up I did some nice camel spins and felt pretty confident that I would get a nice camel when it mattered most. Everything felt great. I was ready to go! 

Competition Time! - I was the second skater out of our group so I was still pretty fresh from the warm up. As the first skater was competing, I had some time to talk to Coach Katie. She gave me a nice pep talk and reminded me of my strengths. I think the biggest boost to my self-esteem was when she told me that I "look like an actual figure skater." I thanked her and before I went on I told myself that "this is for Daisy." I don't think I admitted this here yet but I'm skating this program in memory of a very special kitty I loved and lost. We lost her 4 years ago but I think about her all the time. She was sick and we did all we could to fix her but eventually we had to let her go. I took my starting position and then the music started. Everything went really well. The flip jump landed but I had a bit of trouble on the camel. I got about two revs in before I got a little pitched forward and lost it. The only thing I could do to recover it was to do a change foot into a backspin (which only got two revs because I lost some momentum). Although it was a huge mistake to me, I think the judges thought it was supposed to be a camel-backspin so it might have worked in my favor. My final scratch spin was perfectly centered with arms overhead and had about 9 revs. I wanted to prove to them that I can spin. I ended up getting first place (WOOT!). I feel like there was one other lady who skated better than me but her ordinals didn't reflect that for some reason. Out of five judges, I had 3 first place ordinals. I did better than I thought. My gold medal is pretty! It's Halloween themed and the medal part is a glittery pumpkin! All of us skated so well!

Here is the video. Please excuse the quality. There were no professional videographers so we had to make do: 

Getting There

 Lesson today! Since Fright Fest is coming up pretty soon, we spent the whole lesson looking at the flip jump and the camel and then with the rest of the time we had, I ran the whole program. 

Flipz - I have three years of bad habits with this jump and it's killing me! I really thought that once I got through the fear barrier with this it would be smooth sailing from then on. Oh, how wrong I was! Although I land the jump almost every single time, my entrances are a bit rushed and frantic. We worked on getting my entrance to the flip as good as my entrance to the half flip. It's getting there though. I'm not seeing the progress day-to-day but I know progress is happening. It's still really frustrating though. 

Camelz - I told Christopher that I feel like I am making noticeable progress on this so of course he wanted to see it. As much progress as I think I've made, there is still so much work to be done. Yeah, I'm getting an extra revolution, but my free leg is just below hip height so it's not exactly that perfect T position that I should be getting. He also changed my head position a bit on the windup. Overall, I'm getting it more times than not. I'm on the right path.

Programz - I ran the whole program and guess what? It was pretty good! My jumps landed and my spins spun. I even got some applause from Christopher when I was done! If I skate like this for Fright Fest. I think I'll do well. w00t!

Dancez - Lesson aside, I had some time to work on the Dutch Waltz. I have the pattern memorized and I feel like I'm skating it well enough. The problem is that I feel like I'm running out of rink at the end of the sequence particularly with the last two steps. I'm getting really close to the boards. An ice dancer friend of mine said that that's fine (yay for using ALL THE RINK!) but just make my swing rolls deeper and I won't be so crammed at the ends. Cool. I'm looking forward to Christopher looking at the progress I've made on this and I'm really excited to learn the Canasta Tango. I know this may be a little overambitious but it would be really cool if I could learn and test all three preliminary dances sometime after the new year and it would really really cool if I could get them up to snuff enough to maybe compete with them at Sectionals in March. I'm really diggin' my decision to learn ice dance. It's a nice change of pace and I can already see improvements in my edges, especially my forward cross strokes.

Dancing!

 Lesson today and during my practice before the lesson I did camel after camel after camel. They felt really good today and I was able to repeat some of the success I had when I worked with Coach Katie on these over the weekend. Because I was camel'd out, Christopher suggested learning some ice dance today! Yay!

Dutch Waltz - We began with some basic dance prep for the Dutch Waltz. He had me do some swing rolls, progressives, and get the feeling of the up-down movement on a circle. Once he was satisfied with my progress on these basic movements, he taught me the steps to the Dutch Waltz. I actually did alright! Not gonna lie, I feel pretty comfortable with dance. I grew up as a musician so counting beats is familiar territory for me and I like that I can add movement to the counts. It's all very prescribed and predictable. When you have anxiety as badly as I do, knowing what will happen and when feels very safe. 

He suggested that I download the USFSA Dance app to study when I'm not on the ice. I already have the USFSA Free Skate 1-6 app and I still refer to it periodically when I need a more detailed description of things so I know that the Dance app will be helpful as well. I downloaded it as soon as I got home and OMG, YES! I love it! It only has the first 6 dances but I really like how it breaks down each movement for each dance and has video demonstrations. It also has the pattern diagrams and five variations of cheesy music to select for each dance. It was $2.99 in the app store and well worth it for what you get. Highly recommend. 

I told Christopher that I'm serious about wanting to eventually test in Ice Dance and he thinks this will help my overall skating so he's on board with it. It helps that I have a coach who does it all (he's a triple Gold Medalist in Moves, Free Skate, and Dance) so I don't need to go to anyone else to learn this stuff. 

I'm already looking at dresses for testing! 

EPIC Lesson

This morning I drove up to Fort Collins to meet and have a lesson with the coach I'll be borrowing for Fright Fest. It was a great experience!

First, Coach Katie was lovely to work with! So positive and encouraging while also being real with me about some of the things I struggle with. Before she saw me skate, she had me map out for her my entire program so she could get a sense of what elements I'm doing and where they will go. It was also a sneaky way of getting me to visualize my entire program on unfamiliar ice. And this ice just so happens to be the very ice I'll be skating on for Fright Fest so I now know where the judges will sit, where I get on the ice, which way to face, and where to exit the ice. Really helpful for calming my nerves. I always like a plan. 

The biggest takeaway from our lesson is that she helped me a lot with expression. I confessed to her that, although my music is very emotional, I'm having a hard time expressing that emotion because I'm so focused on the elements. She had me skate my step sequence and noticed that I looked down at the ice the whole time (I know I do this and I still keep doing it, ugh!). She had me do it again but this time she wanted me to look up and out for the entirety of the sequence. DO NOT LOOK DOWN! Not even once! Because I'm so used to looking at the ice, it almost felt like I was skating blindly but I put my trust in my skills and got through it. She said the difference in the presentation was exponentially better! She also pointed out some other moments in my program where I can express my emotions and make eye contact with the judges. 

It was a productive session and I'm glad she made time for me to work on some of these things before the competition. She also gave me some tips for my camel spin and I had a bit of an "ah ha!" moment with it. It wasn't anything earth shattering but it made enough of a difference in my spin that I can consistently eek out an extra revolution. Basically, I just need to twist my torso more on the windup and look opposite of where I'm going right before I step forward on the entry edge. That allows me to get a bit more power on the entry edge and hook. 

I feel different about this competition. Normally, I overanalyze and overthink everything right up until the moment I step onto competition ice. I actually haven't even been thinking too much about this competition at all. Although it's important to do well for the sake of points for the Series, it's more important that I skate my best and I'm feeling pretty good about the progress I've been making these past four weeks. I'm ready!

Lutzes, and camels, and Axels, OH MY!

 It's been a week since I last updated. My apologies. My 17 years young kitty has been rushed to the emergency vet so many times this past week and we still aren't entirely sure what might be wrong with her. Send positive vibes her way if you're reading this. She's my whole world and I'll be wrecked if I lose her. Skating has been a nice distraction and I've been hyper-focused on one thing in particular - the Axel! More on that later. 

Movez - This past week, we mostly spent our time looking at the power pulls and backward 3 turns. The LBO 3 turn is still getting worked on yet it is still not happening. I was able to get some progress on it at the boards. My biggest issue with this turn is not ending up on the proper part of the blade right after the turn so I always come to a complete stop after turning. I'm able to get some glide out by the boards and that little bit of something is better than all the nothing I've been experiencing with this bastard of a turn so far. I'll keep plugging away at it. 

Spinz - So.Many.Camelz! During yesterday's lesson, I was able to get multiple revolutions so that's progress! I'm really not throwing myself into this spin like I should and then when I do, I let my leg drop about one revolution into the spin. So, this camel is just more effort than the spins I've been doing. For example, my scratch spin takes minimal effort and minimal movement. Once I'm in position, I can just spin and spin and spin until I run out of steam. Not so much with the camel! There is just so much to remember. I have to get a nice powerful edge going in. I have to keep my left arm out in front and let it guide me into the spin. I have to make an effort to keep the free leg parallel or higher throughout. It's just...a lot. BUT! It is improving slightly every time I try. 

Jumpz - Flips got worked on. We are back to approaching it with the 3 turn entry since my technique is slightly better that way. We've also been working on the lutz. I started with half lutzes to get the entry right and now I'm doing full lutzes. They are gross but they are happening without fear so yay! In fact, Christopher told me that he thinks my lutzes may end up better than flips. Hrmm. Finally, Axels. A couple of weeks ago he gave me the walk-through exercise to do at the blue line (waltz jump into backspin) and said once I got that down, I could move into the harness. I guess he saw some progress because he strapped me into the harness yesterday for some Axels! I really thought they would be easy to do in the harness since I know how everything works and there is no fear of falling but alas, my attempts were mostly garbage. He said I had one that was an "almost Axel" so I'm getting there. It felt awesome to be able to just really throw myself into a jump for once. I still took some spills but because of the harness they weren't as bad. This jump is terrifyingly fun!

That's about it. He said he was going to start teaching me ice dance soon and I'm looking forward to adding another thing to my already full plate :)