Y so tired

 I went to the Y today. It was a two hour session but I'm still battling fatigue so I only stayed for an hour. I got a lot done though. 

One of my unicorn sisters was sharing the ice with me and she asked me to demonstrate the Eight Step Mohawk pattern from Silver Moves. My wheels were turning! I haven't done it in a year? It came back and I was able to help her with it but it just goes to show that we should keep our Moves fresh in case a friend needs help, lol. 

Gold Moves - Ugh, my backward Circle 8 is gone again. I feel like I have it at least 50% of the time so that's better than it has been. I worked on forward brackets in isolation. I didn't dare attempt the backward brackets without Christopher there. I don't know why these are more scary than they were before I was benched but here we are. I worked on forward and backward power circles. Again, my good side sucks and my bad side is better but still pretty meh. My double 3s were a hot mess. 

Free Dance - I ran this with the music and it was good outside of a small misstep on the opening which is usually pretty good. The camel spin spun and I ended on time with the music. I feel like I might be able to test this in the beginning of the year.

Free Skate - I really wanted to run it but I felt like it would be greedy since the other four people all stood at the boards while I ran my Free Dance. It's their practice session too so I didn't want to take any more of their time after they were so courteous to me. Maybe next time I'll run the Free Skate and not the Free Dance. It's been a while and it needs running. However, I did work on parts of it. The footwork section looks good and jumps jumped. Spins were gross, though, but that's nothing new. 

Bronze Dances - I ran these without the music and at a slower tempo to make sure the steps were nice. These are okay. 

Towards the end of the hour, I felt tired and nauseous so I packed it in. I know my stamina will come back in time but I miss the days when I could go full out for 1.5 - 2 hours. Sigh.

Four Days, Four Rinks

I'm back! My doctor released me to get back to skating so I went to the rink the first chance I could get so I could start getting my legs back. With the holidays in full swing, that meant that I had to rink hop in order to find a session to skate on. 

Day One: Sport Stable - I'm never a fan of this rink but I had the whole ice to myself which was a relief considering how shaky I felt on the ice. I only stayed 45 minutes out of the one hour session because I was utterly exhausted but I was able to do most things. The first thing I noticed after being in recovery mode the last six weeks was that my spins were really hard to center. Just traveling everywhere. My jumps were tiny but I attempted all of them. I even worked on some Ice Dances. I wanted to at least run my Free Dance but the rink speakers weren't working so I just ran it without the music. It was rough. I didn't feel ready to attempt the Free Skate so I did some cool down laps and then left. So tired. 

Day Two: The Y - I felt dramatically better! I ran through everything I usually run through (on ice warmup, Gold Moves, Bronze Dances, Free Dance, and Free Skate elements). Again, my spins were difficult to center but they felt a little better. I ran my Free Dance with the music and everything felt good (except the spin). I still didn't feel comfortable running my Free Skate so I skipped it and just worked on the individual elements. Gold Moves felt better too! Backward Circle 8 got around on all of the circles and I did all of my FI and FO Brackets. Yay!

Day Three: The Promenade - Lesson today! I told Christopher that I was struggling with spins so that's what we started with. They were slow, difficult to center, and lacked revs. So we started from scratch and worked on two foot spins, two foot to one foot spins, one foot from back crossovers, and finally scratch and camel. It was messy but I did it. Next up, we ran through all of my jumps. Everything is still on the small side but I was able to do all of them. We spent some time on the Flip and Lutz because those were a disaster even before the surgery. Finally, we looked at the Power Circles since the session thinned out a bit. Oddly, my bad side (CW) is better than my good side. It's so weird. Can't explain why that is. At the end of our lesson, Christopher said "That wasn't as bad as I thought it would be." LOL...thanks :) 

Day Four: Apex - Hello Home Rink! It's been a while! Once again, I had the ice to myself and once again, I could not play my music over the speakers so I had to skate through my programs in silence. I finally felt ready to run the Free Skate so I was bummed that I couldn't play my music for it. Ugh. I also spent some time working on Gold Moves. The biggest accomplishment was the fact that I did the Backward Circle 8 very well so I did it again to make sure it wasn't a fluke and it was good that time as well. Yay! 

After four sessions, I feel almost back to 100%. My core is still pretty weak and I have to build back muscle and stamina but I'm getting there. I'll start up with Pilates again in early January and then I think I'll start to see some improvement with my spins. It's good to be back!

Benched

 I'm roughly a couple of weeks through recovery. Surgery went well (although it was more complicated than they initially thought). To be honest, this has been the easiest surgery recovery by far (and I've had a lot of surgeries).  

I have another post-op check up at the six week mark and then I should be cleared to skate again. I'm itching to get back on the ice and back to Pilates and, although I'm not cleared to do much right now, I'm getting my steps in and doing what I can to stay as active as possible. I'm still running my programs at home on the floor but I'm just marking the steps so I don't put any extra stress on my body while it's healing. Ideally, I'll get back on the ice in late December and be able to ease back to where I was pre-surgery. 

So yeah, I'll be offline for a bit but when I come back, nothing will stop me! I'm ready to tackle the new year and gear up for my #RoadToNationalsSLC2023. 

The Lesson of Scary Things

Happy Halloween! It's a scary day, so we worked on all of the things that scare me. How appropriate!

Power Circles - These are usually so difficult to practice during crowded sessions but there were only a few of us on the ice today so there was no reason not to do them. Forward counter-clockwise (my good side) had decent enough power but I tend to get to a certain part of the pattern and stay there without expanding it out. He gave me landmarks to shoot for and that helped. My problem seems to stem from the fact that once I reach my top speed (somewhere around the 8th-9th crossover), I stagnate because my feet don't know how to make bigger circles with more speed. Oddly, the other direction (clockwise - my bad side) was better in terms of size of pattern but slightly weaker in terms of speed and technique. That's frustrating. We moved on to the backward power circles. These always carry a risk of a sudden "click of death" moment. We started with my good side, backward counter-clockwise. He said he was pleased with the amount of power in my crossovers but he would like me to again focus on expanding the circles as I get faster. Finally, my bad side. Again, the pattern was better but the crossovers were weaker. I feel like I can't win. He did say they looked better than the last time he saw them so I know progress is being made even if it's slight. 

Brackets - FI and FO brackets are getting better but I've been avoiding backward brackets like the plague. He keeps saying he thinks these are easier than the forward brackets but I still don't believe him. We only worked on BO brackets but he noticed that I get very much on my heel during the turn and that may be the thing that is making these feel so scary. He gave me an exercise where I am at a standstill and try to turn from backward to forward on one foot to get a sense of where on the blade I need to turn. I was able to do it from a standstill just fine so something is happening in my head while I'm moving that makes me think that I need to work way harder than I need to in order to force the turn. I need more calm in my brackets, essentially. 

Ten Fox - We rounded out the lesson of scary things with my least favorite dance, the Ten Fox. This whole dance gives me anxiety. It's fast, the holds constantly change, and that damn mohawk on the end pattern gives me heart palpitations. We partnered it without the music and my heart rate was elevated the whole time. Out of all of the dances I've done with Christopher so far, this one in particular makes me feel like I'm going to trip him and take us both down. He told me to get used to it because I'm essentially going to encounter this again when I get to the next level and meet the Fourteenstep. Cool. Continued dread. 

It was a great lesson despite all the scary things. Sometimes I need him to push me to work on the things that make me uncomfortable. As much as I hate it while it's happening, I always feel good afterward that I confronted my fears :) 

Twirling

Sunday Practice - Today was Fright Fest and I'm here at the Y practicing instead of competing. I ran my Free Skate program and it was clean and I felt great doing it too. I know I did the right thing by not competing this time since it would have been difficult to tell how I would feel the day of but I'm having some serious FOMO about it. Sigh. Anyway, my practice went well. I'm making it around all of the time on my Backward Circle 8 so now I'm going for consistency, bigger circles, and stronger pushes. I worked on the rest of Gold Moves before moving on to Dance things. I ran my Free Dance (it was lovely) and then I worked on Willow Waltz and Hickory Hoedown (those are okay). I did not even think about the Ten Fox today. I'll work on it next time. I just really hate that mohawk in the end pattern. It feels like I'm going to die. 

Monday Lesson - I was working on camel spins when it was time for my lesson so that is what we started with. We even dabbled in some camel-sit combos which need a lot of work. Ew. Next up were backspins to get ready for Axels on the harness. I'm getting better at crossing my leg over in the backspin (although I get fewer rotations when I do) but my free leg is still too high. We worked on crossing at the ankles instead of up by my knee and man, things get speedy when I do. It's unsettling. After he was satisfied with my progress on these, I got strapped into the harness for some Axels. I'm landing them from a standstill but my snap is just not....snappy. That will come in time when my backspins improve, hopefully. Up until now, we have only been trying them from a standstill and I feel like I'm getting enough power into the jump so Christopher wanted me to try the step forward from a backwards edge. All my power? Gone. This feels totally different. Maybe I would need more speed which I'm sure I would get in the fishing pole harness but I'm not ready for that yet. Anyway, it's progress. There are so many moving parts that go into an Axel and it's not something you can go into lightly. You really have to throw yourself into it. I'm okay for now doing this on the harness but I know someday in the next year, I'm going to have to start doing this unassisted. Yikes. We moved on to Dance to round out the lesson. I've been working on the Willow Waltz so I requested that we take a look at that. You know, I really love this dance. It's so twirly and honestly makes me feel pretty (when I'm not panicking about taking that 3-turn at speed). We partnered it without the music, spot checked some things, and then partnered it with the music for the first time. It's speedy! Oh! And I forgot to mention, I was working on flip jumps in my warm up before my lesson and I did a weird thing that resulted in a right proper flip. Of course, because it was a fluke, I wasn't able to repeat it but I think it was a real flip! Christopher has me doing this exercise where I do 2-3 half flips in a row followed by a full flip. On one of the half flips, I picked in hard for the half but did a full flip instead. It had height and my free leg did the "h" position. So mad that I can't get myself to repeat it so I'm stuck with cheated flips until I can figure out how to will myself to get a proper one again. 

Back in the Harness Again

Sunday Practice - This was quite good, actually. I was able to divide my time equally between Gold Moves, Free Dance, and Free Skate. I worked a lot on Forward Brackets and Backward Circle 8 and feel like I'm steadily making progress with these. I touched on the Backward Power Circles (aka Snails) and finished up with some Double 3s (no progress this time). After moves, I ran both my Free Dance and my Free Skate and those are holding steady. My camels in both programs spun as they were supposed to so that was nice for once. I dabbled in some individual jumps, spins, and footwork to round out the hour. I worked hard to get as much done in one hour as I possibly could. 

Monday Lesson - Feeling like I have more energy lately so I did some off ice warm-up walks and even a six minute run. On the ice, I warmed up with a smattering of everything since I wasn't quite sure what Christopher wanted to work on today. When he got on the ice, we started with Forward Inside and Outside Brackets on the hockey circle. The turns are happening and they seem to be proper brackets so it was a lesson in getting my free leg and arms to work smarter not harder. I tend to whip the turn a bit causing some flailing with arms and free leg. With a little more knee bend, I'm better. Next up, Christopher surprised me and asked if I wanted to get in the harness for some Axels. I mean sure, I always do but I warned him that my Axel preps have been neglected these past few months while getting choreography for two programs under control. He strapped me in anyway and I did a few sloppy Axels (one of them was not entirely sloppy according to my husband). I need to get back to working on my backspin and doing the waltz-backspin exercises. I'm convinced a nice backspin will be the thing that brings this together for me. As of now, I'm landing it on the harness on one foot but because I'm not snapping into the backspin position in the air, it's looking sloppy and too open. Moving on, we had a little time left to work on Pattern Dances. I admitted that these have also taken some time off during the summer and that the only one I think I still remember is the Hickory Hoedown. So, of course, he wanted to work on the Willow Waltz. Sigh. We reviewed the steps and they came back to me enough that we were able to partner it without the music. It wasn't the worst but, yeah, I need to start working on Bronze Dances again. 

So, lots of work on the ice this week. I've been feeling pretty good lately so I'm trying to take advantage of this energy by packing in as much as I can before I'm benched. 

Super Early AM Lesson

I couldn't skate on Monday due to a library staff training day so we rescheduled for this morning at 6:15am. Ew. I don't mind skating in the morning but I haven't done a morning session at the Promenade since probably before the pandemic. 

I had a brief warm up on ice before my lesson started and I tried to fit in as much as I could including Gold Moves, jumps, spins, and footwork. I didn't get very far before Christopher got on the ice. It's a 45 minute session and I usually do a 40 minute lesson. Luckily, he was smidge late so I was able to fit the warm-up in.  

Lesson - We started with the Backward Circle 8. Ok, here's the thing...it's been a year of working on this and I'm finally making it around on all of the circles. My arms are flail-y and the circles are small but I'm doing it. Now, I need more power in my pushes (they get progressively weaker with each push) and I need to expand my circles. So, we spent some time working on those two things specifically. My first circle is my strongest so if I can get a really strong push there, the momentum from that might help carry me through the weaker pushes. Next up were spins. Still working on the entry to my camel to keep my chest up and my left arm in the lead. I also need to work on leading with the left shoulder as well. When I do this, things look a lot better. We dabbled in some sit spins. Same thing - lead with the left and really focus on the entry edge. I had one really nice one so we moved on from there. Flips and Lutzs were on the menu this morning. Lots of time with these but not sure if improvement was made. These will forever be a headache for me. 

Janet Champion Spin Clinic - Our club is hosting Janet Champion once more, this time for a spin clinic. Eight hours of spins. Woot! I signed up right away. 

Fort Collins Fright Fest - It's not in the cards for me this year. I hemmed. I hawed. I ultimately decided that as much I love the medals from this particular competition, I don't want to push myself to make it happen when I'm still trying to take it easy. I just don't want the pressure right now. I probably shouldn't be doing the spin clinic either but I NEED help with my spins. A trip to the ER a couple of weeks ago and a doctor's follow up visit last week showed the cause of my back problems and, although it wasn't what I expected, it's not entirely surprising. I'm scheduled for surgery soon and recovery from that will take me off the ice for the rest of the year. In the meantime, I do what I can and rest in between. Sigh. 

Smells like Team Spirit

Another week went by without practice. The back issues turned into something else entirely so I've been taking it easy so as not to further aggravate things. I skipped last Monday's lesson to rest but I felt well enough today for a lesson so to the rink I went! 

Team Spirit - When Christopher got on the ice he asked why I didn't go to our club banquet yesterday evening. I went last year and it was wonderful but, again, resting took top priority. He said it was a shame I didn't go because he put my name in for the Team Spirit Award. This award is given to a club member who always cheers for others and encourages others to do their best. I'm always cheering for my competition or anyone who takes the ice. It's a hard sport and cheers help. It was super sweet of him to nominate me. Alas, my club has this weird rule that if you don't attend the banquet to receive your award, you just don't get it. Drats. That's fine. I'm honored that Christopher nominated me :) 

Lesson - We started the lesson with some clean up work on the Flip and Lutz. After awhile, they started to look better, but only slightly. We moved on to camels and sits. I still have the bad habit of scooping down and up into the camel. If I just keep my head and chest up and don't swing my left arm, I get a better spin. Bad habits are hard to break. He surprised me by asking to see my sit spins so I reeled one off for him that felt really good. He challenged me to do another one and force myself to go even lower. I did the best sit spin I think I've ever done. It felt like my ass was on the ice. Neat! But when I skated back to him he said he thinks I can go even lower! Aghghghg. Like, that felt pretty damn low. Finally, we worked on Brackets. FI brackets are still my strongest but the progress I made on the FO ones disappeared over the week of no practice. So we spent some time on those and then took them to the pattern (were I immediately ate shit on the first LFO bracket I did). Sigh. But hey, a month or so ago I was too afraid to do them away from the wall so this is progress regardless. 

Even though I was off the ice for a week, my husband said this is the strongest I've skated during a lesson in a while. Maybe resting has benefits. 

Bracket Hell

Practice at the Y today and the ice was lovely. Only 3 of us on the ice too so that was nice. Two adults and an older teen working on doubles. 

I spent half of my practice working on both the Free Dance and the Free Skate. I've noticed that I'm no longer getting extremely exhausted during the dreaded last 30 seconds of my Free Skate so yay for building up some stamina! As always, my camel spins in both programs are a mess so I spent some time working on getting more consistency with those. 

The other half of my practice was dedicated to Gold Moves. I finally feel like these Forward Brackets are getting to a good place. The FI brackets are pretty good so I'm working on holding the exit edge longer and getting my wild upper half to be less flail-y. The FO brackets are doing well too. Now that they are less scary to do, I was working on getting the turn placed right at the top of the lobe. So I chose a hockey circle and just did brackets for like 15 minutes. But that's what Christopher wants me to do - work on them so much that they are a). less scary and b). more consistent. My life is brackets now. Sigh. I touched on the backward brackets too. I started at the wall trying to get a feel for the turn then I went back to the hockey circle and did some two-foot brackets (inside and outside) and, finally, I tried a BO bracket away from the wall and almost died so I stopped there. Christopher says these might be easier than the forward brackets but I hella disagree. These are terrifying! 

I spent some time on the Backward Circle 8 (which is coming along albeit slowly) and the Double 3s. Gold Moves is tough, ya'll. 

Bracket Breakthrough

So, the day after my competition, I bent down to pick up the cat and pulled my back. I was on the couch for two days with Motrin and a heating pad. Figures that I can do all of these amazing physical feats and then I pull my back picking up the damn cat. Stupid. Needless to say, I took a week off of the ice to recover. I still have moments where it feels twingy but at least I don't have back spasms anymore. That was rough. 

Sunday Practice - I was expecting to be awful given the fact that I've been off the ice and my back still sorta hurts but it was a really good practice! I felt fast and capable. All of my spins and jumps were lovely too. I ran both my Free Skate and my Free Dance and those went as planned. Maybe I should take a week off for rest more often! In addition to the program stuff, I wanted to spend half of my practice getting back into Gold Moves. I haven't really touched these since the beginning of Summer so I was expecting trash but, oddly, things seemed to have improved slightly. Weird. I made it around on all of the circles of my Backward Circle 8. I mean, the circles were deformed and my upper body was wonky but I got it done. Also, my Forward Double 3s were nice! I made it all the way down one side without a foot down! Finally, Brackets. I just did these in isolation working on the FI Brackets first and then working on the FO Brackets. But, get this! I didn't do any of them at the boards! They were all on open ice! That's cool. I didn't feel comfortable working on the Power Circles with so many people on the ice so I skipped these. All in all, it was a lovely hour of getting things done and I didn't have any issues with my back. I came home and immediately put the heating pad on just in case. But...yay!

Monday Lesson - We spent some time before the lesson talking about my #OldLadyBack. Christopher has a history of back issues as well so he gave me some good information on supplements and therapies. I actually stopped by his house on the way home to pick up a lower back massage thing that he is letting me borrow to see if that provides some relief. We'll see if it helps. On to the lesson! I told him I need to get back into Gold Moves so we started with the Backward Circle 8. The ice was pretty chewed up so I wasn't anticipating making it all the way around. But more than the bad ice, my pushes are still pretty weak so I don't have the momentum to get all the way around. Ugh. But still, I feel like they are at least a little better than they were. Next, we worked on the Forward Double 3s. It was a lesson in patience. The turns themselves are fine but on every forward turn he said "late" and on every backward turn I heard him say "early." The problem is I take too much time on the forward turn and almost treat like the Silver Moves turns where they are at the top of the lobe. Then, I start pre-rotating the backward turn so that it goes early. Ugh. I really have to focus on timing to get these right. Finally, we worked on Brackets. This is where I feel I had a bit of a bravery breakthrough. I froze up on the FO brackets and was struggling so he had me do 4-5 in a row on each foot. They got a little better each time. We also looked at BO Brackets. In the past, I have had to hold on to the wall or onto him but I just went out and tried them! And I didn't die! They weren't good but they were attempted and that's the first step, right? We wrapped the lesson up with some work on the Camel. Some slight improvement. 

So yeah, I felt good today. Maybe taking a week off was just what I needed :) 

CSI 2022 - Silver Free Skate Recap

AGHGHGHGHGH, here we go! 

Practice Ice - I really hated this. I skated well but it was stressful. I'm not doing this again. It wasn't as bad today as it was yesterday but it was intense and I'm not a fan. 

Silver Free Skate - First time doing IJS and first time skating at the Silver level. I'll keep you in suspense and let you know how I did in a bit ;) I was the third skater to go on the ice so I had some time to wait before I was announced. When it was my turn to go, I was ready! I took my starting pose, took a deep breath, and waited for my music to start. However, the announcer immediately told me to relax (I guess the judges still needed more time). It was only a few minutes but it felt like forever just out there by myself on center ice...waiting. Finally, they were ready for me and I was announced again. I took my starting pose and my music started. My opening loop jump was big and floaty and really set the tone. However, the combo spin didn't go. I got too much under myself and couldn't hook the camel so I popped up into an upright spin and then went for the backspin (which only got two sloppy revs). The spin was gross. But I didn't let that bother me as I still had some big things coming up that needed my focus. My step sequence was really good and everything went as planned. Finally...the dreaded last 30 seconds. I'm happy to report I landed all six of those damn jumps and got the halfway mark bonus for them too! Hell yeah! My final camel spin did the thing and then I was done! Whew!

Results - I got a total score of 19.71! Heck yeah! I also got a BRONZE MEDAL!!!!! Totally unexpected! I was just hoping to not get last place but I made the podium! I got positive GOE on my loop jump, step sequence, and my salchow. The things I got knocked on the hardest were my botched combo spin (of course) and the edge call on my Lutz (which I knew was coming). But now I have a baseline for how I skate this routine and I can use that to improve for the future. I really didn't think I could hold my own at Silver but here I am! Holding it! Woot!

 

 

CSI 2022 - Solo Free Dance Recap

Day one is done! It was a long day but I got to take home a Gold medal so, yay!

Morning Practice Ice - Note to self: 30 minute Practice Ice stresses me the hell out. From now on, I'm signing up for the 15 minute warm-up ice instead. Like, I already have pretty bad anxiety but trying to survive for 30 minutes with a bunch of competition-mode skaters whizzing by me was a bit much. I tried hard not to cry, actually (which is embarrassing to type out but it's my reality so...). But, survive I did. Barely. I feel like I spent more time trying to find a spot to do something instead of working on the things that needed work. Everything went as it should despite the anxiety. My camel spins were fine and my footwork was nice. The last 10 minutes weren't really needed for my dance stuff so I worked on Free Skate jumps and spins. The other thing I didn't love about this practice ice was that it was at 11-something in the morning and I wasn't performing my Solo Free Dance until about 4:30pm. That was a lot of sitting around in between. 

Solo Free Dance Event - As I said, I got Gold. It was a default Gold since I was the only competitor in my event but I like to think I earned it too. I skated well and hit all of my musical cues. The only thing that got wonky was my end pose. I got on my knee and when I reached my right hand down for the pose, it slipped out from under me. I played it off and posed on the ice (kinda like a sassy mermaid pose, lol). I blame my gloves. I normally wear knitted gloves for practice which are a tad grippy but my competition gloves are nude mesh and they are slippery, I guess. I also blame myself for not practicing the end pose during warm-up. It really wasn't anything I was concerned about since I usually hit it but, had I practiced it on competition ice with the gloves, I would have known how slippery they were. Alas. Live and learn. It really wasn't a big deal. More embarrassing than anything. 

Overall, it was a good experience competing my Solo Free Dance. I just wish I had competitors. Honestly, there just weren't a lot of dancers this year. There was only one other Solo Free Dance competitor and she was doing a Senior Solo Free Dance. She didn't have anyone to skate against either. Anyway, my dress looked cool and I got a medal so yeah, it was a good time :) 

Polishing a Turd

I've been working hard this past week putting the finishing touches on both programs for this weekend's competition. Man, I know I've said this before, but I am not ready to be at Silver. I still have not had a clean run through of my Free Skate and that has me stressing out quite a bit. In addition, I shared the ice with one of my competitors yesterday and she was skating beautifully (as she always does). I'm really trying hard not to get in my head about all of this but it's hard to not think of all of the areas in this program where I am not excelling. I'm not even maintaining. I'm just...struggling. 

Solo Free Dance - Okay, I mean, this is fine. But I'm the only competitor in this event so even if I'm not fine it doesn't matter. I'm still treating this event as I would any other and will be giving it my all but I'm still a little bummed that it will be a default Gold no matter what. The good news is that I finally got around to stoning my dress (this is the one I had to get taken in). It's lovely and I think I made some good choices for the colors. I did crystal AB, Blue Zircon, and Capri Blue in various sizes ranging from ss20 all the way to ss48. I just did a scatter pattern along the high neck and along the edges of the front and back outlines where the lycra meets the mesh, if that makes sense. I really like how it turned out although I wish I would have done it a few weeks earlier so I won't smell so strongly of E6000 on competition day, lol. 

Silver Free Skate - You know, at this point I've got nothing to lose, right? I don't have anything to prove. I know I won't make the podium. I think my goal is to just not embarrass myself and maybe do well enough that I can buy the video of my skate and not be embarrassed to show it to people. I'll update this blog after the weekend. Keep me in your thoughts. Send me positive vibes. I'll need all the help I can get! Here's the video from today's Free Skate run through in case you're curious about what it looks like so far. I'm wearing my Free Dance dress in this video since I wore my Free Skate dress for the dress rehearsal last week. 

Dress Rehearsal and Airplane Mode

Today was my dress rehearsal/lesson with Christopher. I wore my new Free Skate dress to get a feel for how it moves in the context of my program. 

Dress Thoughts - First of all, this dress is GORGEOUS! I love it so much and I got a lot of compliments on it. It's so damn sparkly under the rink lights! I discovered that, because of the sleeves, I cannot wear my club jacket or the sleeves will get bunched up and weird. Good thing I have a really cute Lululemon vest. It works perfectly! Also, I really like that my dress designer built some bra cups into the dress. I never asked for this but what a game changer. Awesome. 

Free Skate - When I was working on some elements in the practice before my lesson, I could not get the backspin to work in the spin combo. So frustrating! However, when Christopher had me run the program with the music, the spin was lovely. Go figure. In fact, the first 3/4 of the program was really nice but things started to fall apart in the last 30 seconds. This is becoming a trend. I'm already tired and then I have a total of six jumps (some in combo) and a spin. It's a lot and I'm at the end of my rope in terms of energy. If I can hold it together, it will look nice. If not, disaster. 

Free Dance - We ran this too and it was nice. He made me do the beginning again with a focus on expression. I'm so bad at remembering to emote throughout so he wanted to see it again with FULL EMOTION! Ugh. 

We worked a bit on the camel spin because it's just so inconsistent. He told me to keep my arms out more on the spin (aka Airplane Mode) rather than sweep them back (aka Fighter Jet Mode). That really makes a difference. I'll just have to remind myself to go into Airplane Mode each time I enter a camel, lol. 

Grinding

Sunday practice at the Y! Mostly I just worked on the Free Skate and the Free Dance to get ready for CSI. Here's how it went: 

Free Dance - After working on the ending a bit to get that new twizzle down, I ran the whole thing. Everything went well enough, just a little icky where the spin was because there was a coach working with her student right where I needed to be. They moved, but at the last minute, so my spin was a bit gross. The ending was nice with the new twizzle. 

Free Skate - I worked on some spots before putting the music on. The spin combo didn't go as planned. I'm struggling with the backspin part of this. Other than that, all the jumps landed and all was well. 

Today was the first time I kinda almost sorta felt ready for the competition. It gave me some confidence anyway and I really needed that. 

Skate of Emergency

 Today was my first day back on the ice after a week and a half of very much needed vacation. To say that my programs are a mess would be an understatement. Ugh. 

Lesson from Last Week - I didn't get a chance to write about last week's lesson because I went home, packed, and got on a plane early the next morning. I ran the Free Skate twice for Christopher with the new cut of music and it went okay. It wasn't good but it wasn't total trash. He made some changes to the order of my spins and changed my twizzle in the step sequence. Nothing to get worked up about. As I've lamented before, there really isn't enough time to do a combo spin at the end of the program so he switched that spin with the one I was doing right before my step sequence (which has heeps of time). So, I'll do the camel-upright-backspin before the footwork and then the camel spin at the end. Much better! He also looked at my RFI twizzle in the step sequence and noted that it's very spinny. I mentioned that my LFO twizzle was better controlled and did one for him and he was like "why aren't we doing that one instead?!" So, I'll be doing that one instead :) 

Post-Vacation Practice - First of all, the ice was BEAUTIFUL today! So smooth! I got about 5 minutes into my warm-up when the fire alarm went off throughout the whole Rec Center. The front desk person came and got me and told me to put my guards on and take all of my stuff. And then I stood in the blistering hot parking lot for about 15 minutes while we waited for the firefighters to come and check things out and give us the all clear to go back in. So, clearly, this was not a drill. Anyway, by the time I got back on the ice, I was hot and annoyed and definitely not in the right mindset to have a good skate. They gave me two freestyle passes to use at a later date so that was nice. Once I warmed up (again), I ran my Free Dance. It was okay but had some shaky spots. The spin was wonky too. Christopher also wanted me to change the twizzle in the Free Dance as well and because I didn't get a chance to practice it with the new twizzle, that part was a little gross. I still have two weeks to get make it lovely. Moving on, I loaded up my Free Skate music and ran that. It had some nice moments but mostly it was trash. Again, I have two weeks. 

Colorado Springs Invitational - While I was on vacation, I got the schedule for CSI. I'm the only competitor in the Free Dance (bummer) so I'll get default Gold. It's actually going to be my first ever default Gold. That's not fun. But I'll go out there and try my best anyway. In contrast, there are 7 of us competing in Silver Free Skate and I know all of them except two (and those two are from Broadmoor so I'm confident they'll be strong skaters). I'm....intimidated. And I'm really feeling like I'm not ready for Silver. I know it's the next step in my skating journey but I'm really worried that my skills just aren't Silver-y enough right now to hold my own against these ladies. I'll go out there and do my best anyway. At least my dress will dazzle the judges, lol. 

Somewhere in Time

 Practice this morning was nice. I worked on both programs and then spot checked some things (mostly spins because those have been particularly wonky lately). 

Free Dance - This was nice except I didn't make it as far down the ice as I wanted to during my backward catch foot spiral. That really threw off my camel spin and step sequence after. But I got through it. 

Free Skate Music - A few days ago, Christopher made some adjustments to my music. He shaved off 7 seconds and sped it up a bit. He also made the beginning louder and smoothed out some transitions. It sounds lovely but 7 seconds is a lot. I miss them. When he cut the music initially, he thought it had to be 2 min 10 secs +/- 10 but turns out it's just 2 min 10 secs. So yeah, I had to make some timing adjustments, and speed my skating up a bit to meet the musical cues. Those last 30 seconds are going to be a real pain, though. Ugh. 

Free Skate - Well now. The first 3/4 of this was really nice. In fact, I remember thinking "I'm actually doing the thing!" at the end of my step sequence. But then...the last 30 seconds arrived and it was nonstop jumping. The final spin (camel-upright-backspin) was okay but I ended after the music so that was kind of gross. But I actually think I got 3 revs in each position! So yeah, skating a bit faster wasn't the worst and I made all of the adjustments just fine. In fact, I think the speed helped my step sequence flow a little more. Neat. 

Free Skate Dress! - It's here! My first custom dress and it's so pretty! These are the pictures my designer took before she mailed it to me so that unitard in the back is not mine. But look at it! It's got sleeeeeves. Perfect for Rachmaninov <3 

Registered!

 It's been a week. Oof. So busy! I've been practicing but I just haven't had the time to update so I'll try to sum everything up in one post.  

Practices - I've been running through both the Silver Free Skate and the Free Dance and they are actually not too bad. When I was at Apex practicing, another adult skater commented on how pretty my music was and how lovely I looked (which I really needed to hear because this is the most insecure I've felt about my skating since I came back from the broken leg years ago). Then, when I was at the Y on Sunday, I ran my Free Skate and received applause at the end from the other skaters sharing the ice with me. They may have just been being polite but I needed that too. The good thing is that I'm getting through the program, my timing is good, and I'm ending with the music (just barely). Because my practices have been okay, I went ahead and registered both the Free Skate and the Free Dance for the upcoming Colorado Springs Invitational. Honestly? I'm really anxious about skating at the Silver level. I just feel completely out of my league but I know this is where I need to be in my skating journey. Ugh, I'm just afraid of embarrassing myself, you know? I didn't feel this way when I went from Pre-Bronze to Bronze but going from Bronze to Silver is such a huge jump in skill level. I'm more than a little intimidated. Yikes. 

Lesson - We started with a run through of the Free Skate. It went well enough except for the final spin. Last week we had discussed putting a combo spin at the end. I've been playing around with combo spins for the last two years and they are barely improving. I struggle with basic spins most of the time so combo spins are not really going to happen anytime soon. I asked if I could put a layback as the final spin and he told me it really needs to be a combo. Like, I was feeling maybe okay with how the program was going. Even somewhat capable on occasion but, with a combo spin in there, I don't feel confident that I can end the program on a high note. I started anxiety-ing about it during our lesson before we came up with the plan of doing a camel to upright into a backspin. Okay, I can do that. That's within the realm of my capabilities. So we worked on that a bit before running the program again in its entirety with the new spin in place. The ending still wasn't fantastic but at least this is something that I can work on and possibly improve. The hardest thing is holding each position for at least 3 revs each. Ugh, spins. They really are my weakest element. 

IJS - This being my first foray into a new scoring system, I'm constantly bombarding Christopher with IJS questions. My question today was whether or not I will get a 10% bonus for having two jump combos and a single jump pretty much packed into the last 30 seconds of the program (that's a total of 6 jumps!). He confirmed that, yes, I will. That's nice because I'll need all I can get. I know I'll get an edge call on my Lutz and my Flip technique is not entirely clean. So that will help. This was also the first time I have had to put in Planned Program Content for a Free Skate. It was a lot easier than I thought it would be. For some reason, I thought I had to know all of the codes but it was just a bunch of drop down menus where I could put in my elements. That was nice and easy. What stresses me out though is the fact that anyone ANYONE can look at the score sheet and see what got downgraded and what got +/- GOE. Like, I love that can see exactly what worked and what didn't but I don't love that everyone else can see it too. Sigh. 

Side note - I've been really hot lately during practices and I'm not sure if it's the summer heat, the extreme humidity in the rinks (especially at the Y), or just the fact that I'm working harder. But I'm wearing tank tops and I still get off the ice sweaty and red in the face. Ew. 

Silver Free Skate Choreography Done (sort of)!

Ok, let me preface this by telling you how OUCH I feel today. Everything hurts from yesterday's clinic. But with my competitive season starting soon, I really can't rest. I still went to Pilates this morning and gave my all and then showed up to my lesson this afternoon ready to work. I was running on minimal energy but I showed up. 

Christopher wanted to see the program so far with the music including the new steps he gave me last time. He seemed okay with everything but really wasn't a fan of the "almost" hydroblade he gave me last week so he changed that to a dramatic extension-glide thing and gave me some other connecting steps to get to my Flip-Toe Loop-Loop. Just when I have things worked out, he changes it on me. I guess that's to be expected at this stage of program design. 

We spent the rest of the lesson on finding a way to cram the last three elements into about 30 seconds. After my jump combo, I do a couple of crossovers into a swing mohawk into an Ina Bauer and then step forward into a Salchow. From there, I do a waltz three into a Flip-Toe Loop and then wind up immediately for my final spin. He would really like me to do a combo spin but I'm afraid I might only have time for 3-4 revs total before the music stops. 

We ran the program two more times. The third and final time was me basically clinging to life. I had nothing left to give. So exhausted! So yeah, it's done. We just need to figure out the end pose and see how much time I really have for that final spin. 

Here's what we have in terms of elements: 

• Single Loop (maybe with arms overhead)
• Single Lutz (with mohawk crossover steps leading in)
• Camel Spin
• Straight Line Choreographic Step Sequence from Goal to Goal (Includes Ina Bauers, Mohawks, Rockers, Lunges, Twizzles)
• Flip-Toe Loop-Loop Combo
• Single Salchow
• Flip-Toe Loop Combo
• Camel-Sit Combo (?)

I'm going to need speed, power, and grace to get it done. Kinda scared but also excited to compete at this new level!

Getting a Lift from Brandon Frazier

Our club invited members to take part in an all day clinic with Brad Kleffman and Brandon Frazier. Brad is a local coach and good friends with Brandon so I guess that's how this clinic came to be. As soon as I saw Branon Frazier's name I signed myself right up. There was no way in hell I would miss getting to work with an Olympian and World Champion! It was an all day clinic that involved Sports Psychology, Off Ice Jumps, On Ice Jumps, On Ice Spins, Power Hour, and Stretching. This will be a long post. We covered a lot. 

Sports Psychology - We began the day with a discussion about having a growth mindset and what makes a good winner/loser. It was nice to hear Brandon talk about his experiences with winning and losing and how to grow from that. He was also Nathen Chen's roommate at the Beijing Olympics so it was fun hearing about how Nathan handled the pressures and expectations of competing as well. 

Off Ice Jumps - We jumped right into the hard work. We went through some off ice warm up exercises and jump drills. It was good cardio for sure. 

On Ice Warm-ups - My typical warm up....but on steroids. Yikes. This was intense. 

On Ice Jumps - This was about an hour of jumping on ice with some time to practice after while Brandon and Brad were doing privates. All single jumps and combos. I think this is the most I've ever jumped in one session. I'm glad my skates are broken in. 

Lunch with an Olympian! - Out of the 33 participants, only four were adults so Brandon chose to sit at the "Grown-up" table during lunch. This was such an amazing experience being able to just casually ask him questions about his experience at the Olympics and Worlds, how he gets funding, what it's like working with Alexa and how that partnership came about, and his plans for life after skating. He's just a regular guy and was really easy to talk to. Really cool. 

On Ice Spins - Ok, really bad idea to do an hour long spin clinic right after lunch but I didn't barf on the ice (although I had my moments). We worked on everything! Scratch, Camel, and Sit. Then combos. Then change foot spins. I tried a flying camel for the first time too (it was not pretty, lol). They gave us lots of spin drills to try during our practices so I have plenty to work on. Brandon came around and worked with us individually and in groups. 

Power Hour - This is what killed me, I think. This was an hour of nonstop movement. For the first 30 minutes, all of us were stroking along the perimeter while skaters were called upon to do a jump or jump combo. Imagine stroking for an entire 30 minutes nonstop and just as your legs are starting to cramp you are randomly being called on to go out in the middle to perform whatever jump they command you to do. I can't remember what was asked of me but I was called on 3 times and one of them was a Flip-Loop combo. Sloppy, but I got it done. I was right proper exhausted after this session. One little girl asked me halfway through "When is this over?" It was refreshing that the little kids were just as tired as I was. 

Stretching - Lots of off ice stretching at the ballet barre, stretching on the floor with a partner, and splits. As if I wasn't sore enough. 

Autographs and my Moment to Shine - I didn't have anything for him to sign but my good friend and Unicorn Sister, Cheryl, had asked Brandon to put me up in a lift (Thank you Cheryl!). I've never done a pairs lift before so I left it up to him to decide which one to do. He told me how to get into a press lift and up I went! As he's holding me up, he asked if he could press me all the way so I was like Hells Yeah, let's do this! He pressed me all the way up and I lasted a second before I bailed (Alas, I only have a picture of the first part of the lift). This was by far the COOLEST thing that has ever happened to me. I've been lifted by an Olympian!!!!! AHGHGHGHGHG!!!

Step Sequence Done!

Lesson today and we got a bit more done with the Free Skate. It's so close to being done!

First, he wanted to see me skate it with the music to look at the timing of things and see where the choreography needs to go next. When I was done, he told me that there might not be enough time to add in two more jumps, a spin, and the choreographic step sequence. So he wanted to take the transition steps leading into the jump combo and turn that into the step sequence. That's basically what we worked on for the 40 minute lesson. Luckily, I had parts of it already under control from this past week of practicing so he just built off of that. He gave me some tricky moves and basically the whole sequence is pretty challenging. There are Rockers, Ina Bauers, Twizzles, and an almost Hydroblade. Oh! And all of it moves pretty quickly so I'll need to be right on target with the music for max dramatic effect. 

With all of that out of the way, I'll just tag my Flip-Toe Loop-Loop combo onto the end and then I only have 30 seconds left to do another combo (Flip-Toe Loop), a single Salchow, and my final spin. So much is packed into this program. Aghghg!

I asked him my IJS question and he confirmed that yes, I'll probably get 0.00 points for my not-low-enough broken leg spin. Alas. It might be better to stick a camel spin in there and get full points rather than perform the broken leg and get nothing. So, that's what I'll do. I'm not sure what this means for my final spin. I was hoping to do a layback but what if that's the same problem. Ugh...IJS. 

Anyway, things are coming along and I love that I have a bunch of really challenging elements in this program. I'm just nervous about skating Silver. Little fish big pond, you know?

Sticky Sunday Skate

I arrived at the Y today for a two hour session but only stayed for one hour. It was...sticky. All of the hockey glass was fogged over and there was a low layer of fog on the ice. I finished with my 10 minute warm up and I was already damp. It was kind of uncomfortable to stay more than an hour so I got done what I needed to and then left. Gross. 

Free Skate - I worked on the new transition steps into the Flip-Toe Loop-Loop and, once I had that properly warmed up, I ran the whole thing with the music. It went well but I was just slightly ahead of the music and I'm not sure why. Maybe I was rushing and didn't realize? Anyway, besides that, it was an okay run through. I started thinking a lot about the broken leg spin. I know it's not low enough but I've got the speed and rotations. I'm wondering if this would just be negative GOE or if it wouldn't count at all for IJS. I'll ask Christopher about that tomorrow. I'm all for challenging myself and learning new skills but my sits will likely never be low enough due to the metal in my ankle. I don't want to risk leaving points on the table just for the sake of challenging myself. I would rather do a less exciting spin and get points than do an exciting one poorly and get nothing. 

Free Dance - I ran it with the music and it is maintaining. 

I worked on some other elements on their own and dabbled in Moves but I just had to get out of there. It was so...moist :( 

Double Session

 I decided to skate another double session today. I just really wanted the extra hour before my lesson to clean some things up. 

Practice - Nothing extraordinary to report here. I just wanted to run what I have of my new Free Skate so it looks decent when Christopher and I work on it later. I started the program but right after my first jump, I noticed that one of my unicorn sisters took a tumble and hit her head pretty hard. I stopped to check if she was okay. Satisfied that she didn't bust her head open, I restarted my music and tried again. It went well. Opening with a single loop was a good call since I really don't have time for a combo there with the music timing and all. The mohawk entry steps into the Lutz were okay too. Would I like for them to be better? Sure. But it's not a disaster so I'll take it. I worked on some spins and the Loop-Euler Salchow (which has thankfully returned) and I worked on some flip jumps. I spent some time on Gold Moves, reviewed pattern dances, and ran my Solo Free Dance (without the music because I didn't want to be rude by running a second program when other people needed to still run their first). 

Lesson - We started with a look at my backward catch-foot spiral in the Free Dance. I really don't feel like I'm getting to where I need to be quickly enough. Christopher looked at it and made a small adjustment and it seems fine now. At least he didn't seem too concerned. Next up was running the Silver Free Skate to see how it's looking. He seemed okay with what I showed him so we moved on to the next part of the choreography. He would like for me to exit my first spin and transition to the other end of the ice for a jump combo (Flip-Toe Loop-Loop). This transition across the ice is pretty tricky as it has a lot of mohawks, cross strokes, and a rocker! Yay! My first rocker! With everything in place, this puts me at 1 min 30 sec. I think I might have all the choreography done in the next couple of lessons! And then it will be endless run throughs if I plan on having this ready for CSI in September. Worst case scenario, I'll focus on Dance for CSI and then debut the Silver Free Skate at Fright Fest in October. 

Madness and Mayhem

 I was really looking forward to my lesson today but the rink was packed! There were so many skaters on my session that my anxiety levels went sky high. I couldn't focus on anything other than trying not to get run over. It's one thing if I hurt myself but I'll be damned if I let a child with poor situational awareness break my bones for me. Anyway, I did what I could and then told Christopher to go easy on me today due to the madness and mayhem. Sadly, this meant no additional choreography for my Free Skate but we were still able to work on some stuff. 

Gold Moves - We started with Forward Double 3 Turns. While these are looking a smidge better (or at least they feel that way), I'm still off on the timing of things. I'm always turning the second turn too early. He also pointed out that I'm (once again) not looking in the direction of my turn on the backwards 3s. I'm making it unnecessarily harder. Moving on, we looked at the Backward Circle 8 which is still a struggle. Doing this on rough ice on a busy session was not delightful but I tried anyway. My biggest issue, of course, is weak pushes. I'm okay on the edges but it's hard to maintain an edge (or circle shape) when you are going at a snail's pace. Sigh. 

Jumps - I proposed to Christopher my idea of opening the Free Skate with a Loop jump and then moving the combo elsewhere. He was cool with it (yay!) but he wanted to see the combo. I did one that was pretty mediocre. They typically have no speed so he wanted to see another one with more speed throughout. This is when I lost the Euler completely. Like, I just.could.not. Super embarrassing. After several failed attempts we moved on to some Flips and Lutzs. He gave me an alternate entry into the Lutz (mohawk crossover) and that's tricky but puts me on the right edge going into the jump. I'll work on it. Seems fun. 

Dances - Clearly, I wasn't able to do any pattern dances in their entirety but he had me skate the end patterns for all three Bronze dances making sure to bring my feet as close together as I can on the 3 turns and have soft knees throughout. 

Spins - We finished up the lesson with a look at spins. I'm really struggling with getting more rotations on the camel and my sit could be lower. Ugh. 

So yeah. It was a mess of a lesson. I was a mess, the ice was a mess, and there were just too many freaking people on the ice to get any meaningful work done. Oh well, there's always next week. 

Private ice

I skated an afternoon session at APEX today and it was lovely! I had the ice to myself and I took advantage of that by working on both programs. I think I ran each one 5 times! 

Free Dance - This is back to where it was before I got new skates. My only issue now is speed on the backward catch-foot spiral. I'm just not making it as far down the ice as I want to nor am I able to extend upwards on the catch-foot as I know I can. I blame the new blades but I'm not entirely sure why this one thing is an issue. It's weird. I'll just keep doing it and maybe it will get better with time. Other than that, this is ready for competition in September. I'm just in the maintenance phase now. 

Silver Free Skate - I did as much as I have (about 40 seconds worth) but I tried to do it with expression each time. The one thing I've noticed is that there is a timing issue with the first jump combo (Loop-Euler-Salchow). It just works better with the music when I do a single loop jump. I'll talk to Christopher about moving things around. I'm not opposed to doing the combo but maybe we could move it somewhere else in the program. Besides, it would be nice to open the program with my strongest jump. I also worked on the broken leg spin. I took some video of (what I thought) was a really nice one but when I watched it back, it wasn't nearly as low as I thought it was. However, it had the twist and it was nicely centered. I'll keep working on it. 

So I was sweaty and hungry after one full hour of program run throughs but I think things are really starting to look okay. It's paying off, I suppose. 

Battle of the programs

 I skated at the Y and there were just a few of us on the ice - myself, another adult skater working on turns, and a Senior-level ice dancer working on her programs. Me and the ice dancer basically took turns running our programs for the whole one-hour session. We each had two programs to work through so that was a total of four pieces of music that the other adult skater had to listen to over and over again on repeat. Sorry, not sorry. 

Silver Free Skate - Oof, this is hard. I have the timing right on things but the elements are just difficult to get the hang of. But I plowed through and probably ran it 3-4 times. I just wish I had more than the first 40-ish seconds of choreography. 

Free Dance - Same thing, I ran it 3-4 times and it got better each time I did it. This is in good shape. 

So yeah, it was almost an entire session of program run throughs and I was thoroughly exhausted by the time I was done. I haven't been able to attend as many sessions as I want because of scheduling and being an adult but, when I do, I've really been pushing myself to make up for lost time. but on the plus side, my boots are finally feeling natural. The heat molding helped a lot! 

Broken leg spinnin'

I was busy again this past week (fun fact: Summertime is the busiest time of the year for librarians!) so I didn't get to practice as much as I wanted to. Because of that, I pulled a double at the rink this past Monday. Skating for two hours straight is no joke, ya'll. I'm tired. 

Lesson - During this two hour session, I had my lesson with Christopher. He took a look at how the Free Skate looks so far and then we had some time to add to it. So, after my opening jump combo (Loop-Euler-Salchow) I do some pretty transitions to get into position for my second jump - a Lutz. I have another transition into my first spin which will be a broken leg spin (fitting since I'll be doing it on my formerly broken leg). I've never tried one before so Christopher walked me through how my arms will stretch out opposite of my "broken leg." It's a really weird feeling and I was a bit dizzy but I know the more I practice it, the better it will become. So yeah, that's all we have so far. It was a short lesson today but I have a lot to work on. 

Busy Week

I haven't updated in a week because I've been bonkers busy but I've been working hard. Here's what I've been up to!

Sunday Sport Stable - They had a two hour session and I stayed for the whole two hours. I was not only exhausted but super hungry by the time I was done. I worked on everything! I especially wanted to work on getting the Euler to happen so I did some Waltz-Euler-Salchow combos and they worked but they were just a bit on the tiny side. I really need to work on power but hey, at least it's a start. I did dances and ran my Free Dance a couple of times as well. 

Monday Lesson - Ok, we officially started choreography for my new Silver Free Skate! I only have the first 40 seconds but it's really pretty! For now, my opening jump combo will be a Loop-Euler-Salchow (which I had not practiced!) and then the second jump will possibly be a single Lutz. The music is really flowey and dreamy so lots of pretty arms and extensions! I've got some work to do this week for sure!

Tuesday Morning Practice - I basically divided the hour in half. The first 30 minutes was for Gold Moves and the next 30 minutes was program practice. I worked on the opening of the Free Skate to get it a bit more smooth and then I focused on the step sequence in my Free Dance to try to get some more confidence. I watched my performance from the exhibition and I noticed a lack of speed and power throughout the step sequence. I think that needs a lot of improvement so I slowed it down and focused on my edges and really tried to get some more consistent flow. 

Skates - I had my final appointment with my fitter to get the blades permanently mounted and to get them heat molded. They feel a lot better! I should be good with these skates for the next couple of years (hopefully). 

Creative Ideations

Lesson today! I'm still sore from yesterday's toepick incident but I feel well enough to do a lesson. 

Spins - We started with spins since I told him about the amazing sit spin I had during practice last week. I was able to do one decent one for him but then he wanted to record it so, of course, everything fell apart. We moved on to camels which were looking better (finally) and then we looked at Laybacks (which haven't been touched in a looong time). Laybacks are actually not too bad so that was a nice surprise. Are they good? Nah. But they don't entirely suck. 

Jumps - Before playing around with jumps, we looked at the requirements for Silver Free Skate. Looks like I need to start really strategizing in order to rack up those points in IJS. Enter the Euler! It's been so long since I've last done one that I remember them as Half-Loops, lol. So we fussed around with those to try to get some some different combos done. They need work for sure but I think I can get them back in a session or two. I did a sloppy Salchow-Loop-Loop combo and some Lutzes that were pretty mediocre. 

Pizzazz - There is a required Choreographic Step Sequence so he brought up several possibilities including twizzles and *drum roll* an Illusion! I've never done one before but after the third or fourth try I was able to get the hang of it. Gotta keep that free leg straight and really reach down toward my feet. Eventually, it'll get there. We also briefly looked at split jumps, although my attempts just looked like stag jumps. Sigh. 

The music is mostly done. He sent me the rough cut but told me he wanted to smooth out some transitions so he warned me not to get too attached. It's beautiful! I'm so excited to skate to it!

The skates felt really good today. Normal, even. I have an appointment soon to get my final mount done and get them heat molded and then I should be good to go!

Hickory DOH'down

There was a two hour freestyle at the Sport Stable and for the first 45 minutes or so I had the ice to myself. I used that time wisely to run through anything with music (basically, all of my Dances and Free Dance). 

Free Dance - This was my first time running this with the music in my new skates. It was rough. I'm not sure if it was rough because it's been a few weeks since I last ran it to music or if it was the new equipment but it was hella gross. I'll just have to build it back up to where it was before the new skates. 

Cha Cha - I ran this a bunch of times since this is one of the two required dances for my level for the 2022-23 season. I haven't officially decided on music yet but I'm leaning toward "It's so nice to have a man around the house" by Della Reese. I really focused on pushing the pattern out to the corners and having more expression. 

Willow Waltz - I ran this with the music as well and surprised myself at how well I did. I didn't think I was ready to run it at tempo with the music but, dammit, I did the thing! Neat. 

Ten Fox - I did not run it with the music but I worked on the pattern, especially the end pattern. 

Hickory Hoedown - I was doing great until...TOEPICK! I did one pattern down the ice with the music and the end pattern was really lovely and then I caught my toepick on the first step of the new pattern. It hurt. A lot. I didn't think different toepicks could have different levels of hurt when you catch them but out of the three blade types I've skated in, this was the worst toepick fall I've ever had. Both knees are bruised as is my elbow and my left hip. Luckily, I was alone on the ice because it was a very dramatic fall. It would have been really embarrassing if anyone had seen it. Ugh, and I was doing so well up until that point. 

I got some water and hung out by the boards for a bit until the pain mostly subsided and then I got right back to work on non-dance things. At this point, other skaters got on the ice so it was a good time to stop working on programs anyway. 

Moves - I spent a lot of time on Brackets and Double 3s. Now that I can do both FO and FI brackets, I went around the hockey circle alternating feet and directions. I also worked on the BO brackets by the boards but wasn't brave enough to try it out on open ice. I did the same thing with the Double 3s, just working on them in the context of the hockey circle. I didn't do any in the pattern because I want to make sure the turns are stable and consistent. 

Jumps - Hey, my jumps are back! I worked on all of them. 

Spins - I'm still struggling with camels and sits so that's what I spent most of my time on.

So yeah, It was a productive practice but I left the ice battered and bruised. I cancelled tomorrow's Pilates session so I can heal a bit and put ice on all of the hurty parts of myself. I feel like I've been hit my a bus. A really large bus. 

Gettin' Low

 Afternoon practice today and I feel like I've turned the corner with these new skates. Things are feeling quite a bit more as they used to. That's a huge relief!

Moves - I made sure to work on everything (except I forgot the backward Double 3s for some reason, damn). Power Circles (aka Power Snails) are oddly better in my bad direction going both forward and backward. Not sure why that is but I was able to do forward and backward snails without bailing but on my good side, I struggled. I'll keep working on it. Backward Circle 8 was still a mess with the inside circles. I'm just having a hard time getting a strong push and then staying true to the inside edge. I did my Forward Double 3s on a hockey circle working both directions. They aren't pretty but considering I haven't been able to work on them at all since getting the new skates, I'll take this as progress. Finally Brackets. A skater friend of mine blew my mind last week when she saw me struggling with these. She took me to the blue line and told me to do a 3 turn and keep it as straight on the line as possible. Then she had me look at the tracing and asked me "if you hadn't known you had just done a 3 turn how do you would know that it wasn't a bracket?" Huh...she had a point. So, those FO Brackets I've been too scared to do away from the boards are really just inside 3 turns on the blue line. Little by little start adding the correct edge to make it a Bracket and over time, you'll have a bracket! It's just a 3 turn with a different edge! So today, I was working on FO Brackets on the blue line and little by little was starting to add the curve to it with the proper entry and exit edge. I was able to do several LFO Brackets this way! Away from the boards! Without Christopher holding my hands! Mind blown!

Jumps - I spent a bit of time working on getting my loop jump back. It still feels unstable on the takeoff edge but it's getting there. I even did the opening jump combo from my old Free Skate program (Salchow-loop-toe loop). 

Spins - My scratch spins are so nice and my camels and sits have improved a bit too. In fact, I did the best sit spin I've ever done! I got that sweet spot right away and because the blades have such a pronounced rocker, I was able to push a bit to get lower than I ever have! Unfortunately, I didn't get it on video but my husband was in the stands and he saw it and can vouch that it was LOW! This is promising!

Free Dance - I couldn't play my music because they were piping in music from the outside and I didn't want to interrupt my practice to get off the ice and tell them to turn it off so I just ran my program without the music. It was okay. 

Bronze Dances - I ran through all of my Bronze Dances (without the music, of course) and these are feeling pretty good. These blades are magic for dance. I feel like I can lean back on some of these backward edges. Cool. 

So yeah, it was a good practice and I'm starting to settle in with these skates. And it's only going to get better. How exciting :) 

First lesson in my new skates!

Today is my first lesson in the new skates. I haven't had a lesson in a couple of weeks because of the holiday but at least I was able to practice a bit and be slightly more confident in these things. 

Equipment Check - Christopher had me do some glides on a line just to make sure the alignment of my blades was okay. Everything looks good here. Next we worked on some stops and then moved on to backward glides where I rise up on my toe picks to get a feel for where the rocker is. It's not as easy to rise up on my toes as it used to be in the old skates (this is a good thing). 

Jumps - We went through my entire repertoire of jumps (but no combos) to see how these are looking. I told him I wasn't able to do a loop from back crossovers so of course he made me do one. I was able to to do it! It wasn't my best but I got it done (I'm always a bit more brave when I've got my coach nearby). My jumps are not as bad as I thought they were. He even said I had nice spring on my waltz jump. 

Spins - Ok, so my scratch spins are lovely in these skates! They are so much faster and centered. However, my camels and sits really are gone. When I get in position, I start rocking trying to find that sweet spot and that usually doesn't end well. I'll get it eventually. We did some backspins and while most were garbage, I had one that had what felt like 5 revs. 

Turns - I told him that my backward 3 turns were gone and he held my hands to try one. Turns out, they are not gone, I'm just in my head about them. I was able to do them without him holding my hands after that. 

Free Dance - I ran my Free Dance without the music and it was okay, except I did a splat on the final knee pose. Figures. 

Silver Free Skate - He cut the music and I think he hates me for it. (JK, he just had a difficult time with it since the phrases are so long). He played it over the speakers and it sounds lovely! We didn't have time to start any kind of choreography on it but I'm sure that will come soon. I'll be skating to one of my most favorite pieces of music in the world: Rachmaninov's Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. 

Husband Observations - My husband came with me to the rink  to see how the new skates are working out. When I was done, he told me what he thought. First, he mentioned how quiet I was! I was completely silent throughout my warm up so he couldn't hear me at all! No toe scratching! Next, he said that I was fast. I thought that was weird because I was skating very carefully since I'm still a little unsteady in these skates. Imagine how much faster I can be once I'm comfortable with these skates! A friend of mine has the same blades and she refers to them as little "race cars." I believe it! 

I had to reorder new guards from a different website since the ones I ordered back in May still haven't shipped. I'm tired of walking on my toe picks. They should be here by the end of the week. I ordered the Edea guards since those will stretch to fit most blade sizes. I got them in green (Dinah's favorite color 💓). 

First Week Complete

It's been one whole week skating in the new skates and I'm feeling a lot better than I was last Tuesday when I first put them on. Most of my skills are back now so I'm feeling a bit more confident. 

Moves - One of the things that hasn't come back yet are my backward 3 turns and I'm really sad about it. I attempted a couple and felt like I was going to die so I think I'll wait until Christopher can hold my hands or something. It's just unsettling how curvy these blades are on this move and it really does feel like a disaster waiting to happen. On the flip side, my forward three turns are so damn nice and my forward and backward circle 8s are back as well. But my edges are the nicest of all. Like, they are just so pleasant and part of me wants to just skate around the rink doing inside and outside consecutive edges for the whole session. They're satisfying!

Jumps - Earlier in the week, I wasn't able to do much more than some tiny waltz jumps but now I'm jumping everything. However...my best jump is dead. The loop jump was the one jump that I felt like had strength and power and now I'm just unable. I can do a tiny one from a RFI entry but I can't do it at all from back crossovers. Again, the curviness of the blade makes it really difficult to get the deep edge I need to make the jump happen. I'll keep my fingers crossed that this is temporary. I'd be really sad if I lost the best jump I'm able to do. I can even do it in combo with a salchow, but not on it's own. Sigh. 

Spins - I think I've got a handle on the forward scratch spin and I've been able to do them like I used to but once I try any other spin, it's disaster. Camels and sit spins are gone. Backspins are hopeless. They'll get there though. I'll probably get a hang of those before I get my jumps back the way they were. 

Free Dance - I haven't skated it to the music since I switched skates but I've been able to work on sections and, with the exception of the camel spin, all is well. I think I'll try it with the music next time I'm on the ice. 

Pattern Dances - For the 2022-23 competition season, the two Pattern Dances for my level will be Cha Cha and Hickory Hoedown. These are two very fun dances and I'm excited to get these polished up for competition. The last time I competed with the Cha Cha, I didn't place well (to be fair, I was competing against a bunch of senior level skaters but still). I'm determined to do better and part of that is making sure I fill out the whole rink with the pattern. That requires more power than I'm skating it now so I have some work to do. I also need to figure out what I'll skate to. I have Bonnie Raitt's "Something to Talk About" for the HickHoe but I'm undecided about the Cha Cha. All of the songs I really like are wildly out of tempo. I can adjust tempos slightly using Audacity but not that much. I'll have to find something that has a Cha Cha feel and is at least close to the tempo I need. 

Cup of Colorado is coming up in August and I would like to compete in Pattern Dance and Free Dance. I think next season will be the "Season of Dance" for me since I can't imagine getting a Silver Free Skate put together in time. 

Old Skates, New Skates

I did my lesson on Monday with the old skates because I didn't want to waste our entire 40 minute lesson with me just trying to stay upright. I practiced this morning in the new ones and that was an adventure. Oof. 

Monday Lesson - We started with Moves. I was able to make it around on all four circles of the Backward Circle 8! Except, as Christopher pointed out, it was hella cheated. The RBI lobe was more oblong than round and the LBI barely made it around. There are two issues. Issue #1 is that my pushes are weak and issue #2 is that my arms are moving around a lot. Both of these things are happening on my back inside circles and that's why they are such a mess. However, progress is being made. It's small progress but it's progress nonetheless. Next up were the Double 3 turns. He had me do an exercise where I do four consecutive 3 turns on one foot in each direction. I was able to do it (which was neat!) but they are slow and sloppy. This is now homework to be worked on every time I practice. We looked at Brackets for a bit too. FI brackets are happening but he would like for me to bring my free foot closer before, during, and after the turn. The RBO brackets happened too but I could only do them while holding his hands. We looked at twizzles for a bit and he had me experimenting with other entries. When I tried the LFO twizzle, they were near perfect! In fact, it's better the the RFI twizzle I've been skating for the last 2 years. Who knew! We finished up with the Willow Waltz and that's looking better. We just mostly worked on the partnering aspect of it. At the end of my lesson, I unlaced my skates for the last time. It was a bit emotional. I said a silent "Thank you" for keeping me safe and allowing me to skate great the last 2.5 years. Sigh :( 

Tuesday Practice - First time out in the new skates! Here we go! First of all, I opened my skate bag and the weed smell hit me. Ugh. Not what I want to smell first thing in the morning. Time to invest in some deodorizers. The other thing I noticed was that these are just really difficult to lace tightly. They have these lace loops that go all the way up the center of the tongue and while I understand the point of them, I just kinda hate them. I wasn't able to pull my laces enough to get the tightness in the top part of my skate like I'm used to. Later this evening, I'll re-lace them. The third thing I noticed was that the guards I've been using on my old skates are too big for these. They were so loose I couldn't walk in them so I walked on my toepicks from the bench to the ice. Once I was on the ice, the adventure continued. I did a lot of swizzles and forward/backward edges. The difference in rocker size wasn't as pronounced as I thought it would be but I could very much notice that these blades are different. In some ways, the difference is lovely. For instance, my forward 3 turns were butter and the five step mohawk pattern I did was so silent! No toe scratching at all! On the downside, my spins are gone. It's going to take me a while to find the sweet spot on these blades. Until then, lots of traveling spins. At the end of the session, I was brave enough to do a tiny waltz jump and a tiny salchow. Neither were fantastic but I did them anyway. So, I'll need to buy new guards, change up the lacing, and get two new Bunga pads for my ankles. I was using a Bunga pad for my right ankle in the old skates and now with these new ones, I'll need one for each ankle since it was a little pinchy there. Overall, these are great skates and I'm not regretting my choice to switch so dramatically. 

Alpine Skating Club Exhibition

Today is the day I debut my new Juvenile Solo Free Dance!

I was scheduled to skate at about 1:00pm but we got there at around 11:00am because I wanted to watch and cheer on the other skaters. Everyone did such a fabulous job!

Time to Shine! - I was in the sixth group to go on and they gave us a six minute warmup (but I only used 5 minutes since I was first to skate after the warmup and I didn't want to be exhausted). The warmup went well. All of my spins were centered and twizzles twizzled. I was ready. They announced me and I took my starting pose. It all went as planned except I felt a little slow on my footwork sequence and my catch camel didn't go. I got into the camel and it was so well centered that I didn't want to ruin it by trying for the reach back so I just kept it going as is. All in all, it was a good first time out for this program. I won't compete with it until September so I definitely have time to work some things out like speed and musicality (and that stupid catch foot camel). Oh! And the dress looked nice! It will look even better once I have time to bling it up. Here is a video of my performance. 

Final Practice with my Skates :(

Today was bittersweet. It was my final full practice with my Jacksons. They've been good to me for 2.5 years and I was happy to give them a fine farewell. They will be with me on Sunday for the exhibition and then they will be retired. Sad day. 

Gold Moves - I worked on EVERYTHING! Not much to report except that I find it odd that my "bad side" power circles (aka snails) are better than my good side. Also, I made it around on all circles of my Backward Circle 8! Yay! It was hecken sloppy but I did it. 

Bronze Dances - I worked on all three of them slowly to make sure my edges were nice and that I was sticking to the pattern fully. I'm struggling with the Ten Fox but at least I worked on it. 

Free Dance - I ran it twice with the music. The first run through was really nice. I was relaxed and I forced myself to have expression. I ended about a second after the music stopped but I ended on my knee the proper way so that was cool. The second run through was toward the end of the session and the other skater sharing the session with me kept getting in my way. I was so focused on not running into her that my performance suffered. It was a terrible run through. It wasn't the girl's fault. She was a very young beginning skater and didn't seem to know that the skater running their program has the right of way. She at least apologized which was nice and she said she liked my music. She was cute so I couldn't be mad :) 

So I got through my whole session with grace and poise and then I ate it as I stood at the boards taking a sip of water. I dropped my Yeti which echoed throughout the rink and water went everywhere, including where my ass landed. At least it was the end of the session and I didn't have to skate with a wet butt but man, that was embarrassing. I just kind of sat there and laughed because it was so dumb. Pretty sure I got pushed by a ghost. No other way to explain it, lol. 

Finally, I got an email from my club regarding the exhibition. They informed me that they were not able to secure a dance judge for the event so I'll just skate the exhibition without the critique. I'm the only dancer out of the 30 or so participants so I actually would have been impressed if they brought in a dance judge just for me. It would have been nice to get the feedback but the point is to put it out there for the first time in front of an audience. Maybe I'll do really well since there is absolutely no pressure. Just performance. They grouped me with the upper level skaters which is flattering but also sort of intimidating. I'll do my best. I'm the only adult performing in the exhibition so maybe I'll inspire some skate moms (or dads) :) 

Feelin' Dance-y

 Besides some time spent on Gold Moves, I just focused on Dance this morning. I'm still in my old broken down boots until after the Exhibition so no jumping. These boots are just dangerous at this point and I'm not in the mood to break bones so I'll hold off on jumps until I start using the new skates. 

Gold Moves - The Backward Circle 8, which was on its way to making progress, has regressed. It is back to being a disaster. I was only able to get around on the outside circles but none of the inside ones. I even tried using the Theraband to help my arms and that didn't help much either. Frustrating. Next, I moved on to working on the Double 3s on a hockey circle to try getting the lobe size more consistent. I worked on all of the 8 turns this way. Finally, Brackets. I didn't put them in the pattern but I worked on the FI away from the wall, the FO on the wall, and I dabbled in some BO against the wall. None of it looks good. Sigh. Since there were quite a few skaters on the ice, I did not work on the "snails."

Twizzles - During our lesson on Monday, Christopher worked with me a bit on getting more revs on my twizzles. I was able to get another half rev on my RFI twizzle (for a total of 2 revs) but am struggling getting more than just one on my LFI. So today, in lieu of jumps, I twizzled! I was again able to achieve that extra half rev on the RFI but it feels scary and when I look at the tracings, it's only a legit twizzle half of the time. The other half are just spins. I'll keep working on it, though. It's bound to get better with time. 

Spins - I ran through all of the spins I have - one foot, forward scratch, camel, sit, catch camel, and backspins with the leg crossed. I did not work on spin combos. I just forgot. The catch foot camel is still a struggle but I'm determined to make it work. The others were okay too. Nothing extraordinary. Just average rate spins. 

Free Dance - I was able to run it one time and it was mostly okay with the exception of the catch foot camel not happening (again) and the ending not being entirely graceful. I was able to get down on my knee for the end pose but I slipped and ended up in a splat. Damn. I still have practice on Thursday so maybe I can get it together still. 

HickHoe - I ran this with the music and it was pretty good. Just keeping it under my feet for now. 

WillWaltz - I didn't run this with the music since I just learned it but one of things Christopher really wanted me to work on with this is to make the pattern cover the ice more. I was able to get things a little farther down the ice so that's good. 

TenFox - I didn't work on it. I ran out of time (and also, it's my least favorite so I probably unconsciously saved it to the end knowing I would run out of time). I'll do better next time. 

Weed Skates

 Busy day today! My new skates are ready so I drove down to Littleton to pick those up and then it was up to Broomfield to pick up my Free Dance dress from the alterations place and then my lesson at 3:00pm. I'm pooped. 

New Skates! - Ok, they are BEAUTIFUL! However, they smell like marijuana. Like...a lot. I asked my fitter if he smelled it too and he confirmed that Risport boots just smell like weed for some reason. Maybe it's the material they use, I don't know. All I know is that it's potent. He warned me not to leave them in my car for too long because they will make my car small like pot. I would have a lot of explaining to do if I got pulled over. So yeah, I have weed skates. Appropriate for Colorado, lol. Anyway, he took me down to the ice for a "Meet your Rocker" session. These new blades have a 7 foot profile which will be a huge adjustment for me as I've only ever skated on an 8 foot profile. It's definitely different! He ran me through some exercises to get the feeling of how much to rock up for a jump. Then he had me skate back and forth for a bit down the blue line. They seem aligned pretty well as I didn't drift when I was doing some one foot glides. They are comfy and stable and, although it might take a bit for me to adjust to the new rocker, I think these are going to help improve my spins and turns. 

Dress - I picked up my Free Dance dress just in time for the Exhibition this coming Sunday and YAY it fits! She did an amazing job and it fits me perfectly now! I won't have time to stone it for Sunday so I'll skate "plain" but now I can order some pretty sparkly bits and make this dress really shine for the upcoming season!

Lesson - Today was all about Dance. He wanted to see a run through of the Free Dance. It was kind of a mess but considering I hadn't worked on it all week I'm not surprised. It will be fine for Sunday though. We worked a bit on the catch foot camel because that is still a struggle. He wants one rev in camel position before I reach back and, even if I can't grab it in time, still try to reach for the foot. Of course more expression. I started out with some and then 30 seconds in it was gone again. Alas. We worked a bit on the final knee pose thing and apparently I was doing the arm tornado too quickly because I was having a difficult time getting down on my knee. I kept rotating as I went down and that creates an unstable end pose. If I use the tornado as a moment to quiet things down a bit, the knee thing becomes easier. Next, I begged him to show me the Willow Waltz. It's the only one of the three Bronze Dances I haven't learned yet. I tried watching videos of solo willows and partnered willows but my brain was hurting. He showed it to me and I actually picked it up pretty quickly. It all made sense once I partnered it. It's actually not as difficult as the other two (the Ten Fox will be the death of me). So yay! I can start really digging in on all three Bronze Dances!

Slumming it

 My struggle to find ice time continues. In a rare act of desperation, I not only went to the Sport Stable for a session but it was a *gasp* public session! I wasn't the only figure skater slumming it at the Stable. One of my Unicorn sisters was there as were some familiar faces from the Promenade. But you know what? It really wasn't that bad. I hate myself for admitting this but the ice was nice and it was relatively uncrowded. Obviously I couldn't run my Free Dance program but I was able to work on parts of it without the music. 

That ending, tho - Yeah, mostly my goal was to get control over the new ending that Christopher gave me. You know, the one with the hurty knee pose. I was able to get it worked out and I have the bruises on my right knee to prove it. 

Moves - There wasn't much room to do Gold Moves but I was able to work on the Backward Circle 8 a bit as well as some of the Double 3 Turns. 

The session was two hours but I only stayed for half of that. Sigh.