Choreography Day 2: 50% Complete

 Oh man. My coach is a saint for putting up with me. It takes me so long to understand choreography! When he says left, I go right. When he says mohawk, I do a 3 turn. Ugh. But regardless of the struggle, we are now officially halfway done with choreography! What we have so far is the intro, opening jump combo, second jump combo, first spin, and a bunch of steps, turns, and fancy stuff in between! I will say this - if I can pull this program off, it's going to be so kickass! It helps that Christopher is really digging the music himself because he's giving me such fun choreography to go with it. Hard choreography, but fun! 

We started the lesson with a recap of what I already have. I skated it to the music and he liked it! Yay for working hard to get it decent over the weekend! So, then he said he wants me to somehow get to the lutz corner on the other side of the rink to set up for the lutz-toe loop combo. This is where my brain exploded. It's always the simplest choreography that is the hardest for me to comprehend. There's a fancy 3 turn followed by a cross behind step into a mohawk and then some fancy back crossovers and extensions leading up to the lutz prep. I just could.not.even! He pretty much spent the entire lesson on just this! The thing is that I have to skate with real power here or else I won't make it to where I need to be. In total, there are only three back crossovers to get from one end of the rink to the other. It's insane. 

Coming out of the lutz combo, I do some fancy arms into a dramatic (albeit short) inside spread eagle, push under, double 3 turn into a wind-up for my camel-sit spin. I've never done a double 3 turn before. Yikes! So, it's a RBI immediately followed by RFO. It almost looks like a slow twizzle. Tricky. 

Also, he's trying to get me to be less "Ballet Mandi" and more "Badass Mandi." This music is powerful and strong and the pretty arms that I typically skate with could potentially soften the drama a bit. For four years, he has worked with me to have pretty arms (my husband and I call them "Christopher arms" because all of his students have the same really pretty arm movements and carriage) and now I have to rewire my brain to be a bit more sharp with my movements. 

So far, everything in this program is challenging for me, which I know is the point. If he packs my program with stuff I already know how to do, what's the challenge in that? I won't grow as a skater. So, I'm hoping that, by the end of this season, I will have strength and power and be a bit more diverse in terms of expression. But I have a lot of work to get there. So much work!