Author Topic: What did you achieve this week  (Read 630182 times)

physichull

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Re: What did you achieve this week
« Reply #5379 on: April 14, 2019, 08:36:13 pm »
There will have been a time when it wasn't effortless to them, either!  In fact, that time may well be now, but they have what a skating friend calls "their game face". 

Haha! I do that when I almost mess something up completely but pull it out the bag in the last moment...."yeah...I intended that...even the wobbly bit at the start...it was all what I intended to do..."

WednesdayMarch

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Re: What did you achieve this week
« Reply #5380 on: April 14, 2019, 10:32:48 pm »
Haha! I do that when I almost mess something up completely but pull it out the bag in the last moment...."yeah...I intended that...even the wobbly bit at the start...it was all what I intended to do..."

Excellent.  Master the "ta-dah!" and you're pretty much there!  The number of people I see come out of a move that didn't go quite to plan and they look down at the tracing or slouch away, when all they need to do is quickly assume the "landing position", ie gliding on one leg, free leg stretched back and arms out like they just landed a jump.  At least one person will have missed the bad bit but will see the "ta-dah" and assume they actually missed something spectacular.  Smoke and mirrors.   ;)
Returned to the ice in Sept 2017 after a major leg injury in 1999. Skating in Jackson Elite Pro & MK Vision Syncro. Still scary after all these years.

physichull

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Re: What did you achieve this week
« Reply #5381 on: April 15, 2019, 12:48:01 pm »
One of the best things you can do to up your skating standard is to work on your edges in lovely, flowing semi-circles along a long axis, as those edges are the basis of everything.  You want a good, flowing, strong three turn?  You need a good edge going in and a good edge coming out, never mind the turn in the middle.  Speed, flow and control all come from good edges as well as good pushes.  The other really, really important thing is knee bend.  When you're practising those crossovers, you need to bend your knees as much as you possibly can and then when you're right down in the knee, feeling that you're looking utterly ridiculous and must be so close to the ice that it's unreal, bend more...

The other thing that I found helped (in the end) was to not look down to see what my feet are doing. This was REALLY hard at first, but only because putting my feet in those positions was so alien to me (in addition to pushing off the outside edge of the inner foot on the second stage of a crossover). I found that when learning I HAD to look at my feet, purely to avoid tripping over myself, but as I got more confident and used to it I am managing to keep my head up and looking forwards, which ultimately helps with balance.

For crossovers whilst on the move I don't feel the need to look at my feet anymore. However, holding the crossover position I always feel the need to look as there is a world of difference between a fleeting crossover position (always in motion) and holding the crossover position for 3-5 seconds while gliding.

I think I understand your exercise, and if I'm correct, its the Level 1, Exercise 1 in the NISA Field Moves pdf that I've downloaded - basically LFO-RFO alternating - basically a crossover following a straight line axis. I saw somebody doing that yesterday and they had nice tight C curves, mine tend to stretch over 10m as I can't transition between each crossover that quickly (i.e. I can't switch my balance quickly - I need to glide way out left or right to then glide right or left back inwards to that central axis).

Plus, I have serious trust issues with that outside edge!  ;D :-\ :D  My teacher at my last lesson showed me, just taking a gentle one footed glide forwards and lean on the outside edge - simple as that! Hmm!  :)
« Last Edit: April 15, 2019, 12:51:22 pm by physichull »

WednesdayMarch

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Re: What did you achieve this week
« Reply #5382 on: April 15, 2019, 01:12:53 pm »
Aha!  You've discovered one of the Basic Tenets of ice skating - Don't Look Down!  When you skate, ideally, your head (the heaviest part of you) should be centred over your hips, knee and skating foot.  (There are exceptions to this, but not yet!)  When you are centred that like, your weight is in exactly the right place for your blades to glide smoothly and easily, with least resistance.  If you tip your head out of that alignment, ie to look at your feet, then your weight has moved and you won't be gliding as well.  A seemingly tiny thing but it makes such a difference to the success of a move.

And yes, that's the badger!  FM Level 1 Ex 1, continuous curves.  I love 'em and practice them every time I skate.  I cannot emphasise enough how important they are.  Don't worry too much about the size of the curves at the moment, you'll get stronger and more confident and learn how to adjust them to suit as you gain experience.  Just make sure that you push out towards the barrier for the start of each curve and let the edge bring you around to face the other way back at your axis. Just before the axis, your feet should be parallel but still on the one foot edge while you bend both knees and prepare to push onto the next edge, towards the other barrier.

It sounds to me as though you're struggling possibly more than you should with those outside edges.  If you skate forward with both feet parallel and touching (on the flat of the blades), what happens?  Does either of the blades try to take a sneaky dive underneath the other one?  Also, have you tried arch supports/orthotics to help stop pronation...?
Returned to the ice in Sept 2017 after a major leg injury in 1999. Skating in Jackson Elite Pro & MK Vision Syncro. Still scary after all these years.

Leif

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Re: What did you achieve this week
« Reply #5383 on: April 15, 2019, 01:31:03 pm »
Did yet more crossovers yesterday, and I seem to have passed some mile/mill-stones.

Doing forwards clockwise crossovers, my right foot is now riding the edge much more consistently without slipping sideways and I am able to get more power and speed with a good lean. It seems to be something to do with the angle of the boot to the vertical and the direction it points. I think taking it slowly, and doing lots of Russian stroking has helped i.e. crossover one way, then the other and so on.

And I discovered a very important trick with backwards crossovers. My backwards clockwise crossovers were okay, but I felt unstable. I discovered that keeping my shoulders level massively improved stability and hence confidence. Yes I know you figure skaters will be saying "but that's basic knowledge, how could you be so ignorant you hockey skater, oh yes, a hockey skater ... ". Well that's as may be, and perhaps that is the disadvantage of never having had lessons, you learn the 'obvious' slowly.

VisuallyImpairedOnIce

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Re: What did you achieve this week
« Reply #5384 on: April 15, 2019, 04:31:25 pm »
Thanks for all the lovely comments, only reason for being quiet was being so busy :)


On Saturday I did some nice 1 foot spins, can now get 2 rotations from the pepper entry but it's hit and miss. It also ran away when group coach tried to film it to show me  ::)


Also on Saturday I learnt to do a tiny baby Salchow! I think I'm over rotating the entry but at least I'm willing to jump this one (unlike toe loop which just feels wrong)


WednesdayMarch my main coach has taught me the L1 FM exercises, I'm nowhere near testing but we had a go, and I quite like them! Think the continuous edges are Mt favourite followed by exercise 4 :)
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physichull

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Re: What did you achieve this week
« Reply #5385 on: April 15, 2019, 05:28:55 pm »
Aha!  You've discovered one of the Basic Tenets of ice skating - Don't Look Down!  When you skate, ideally, your head (the heaviest part of you) should be centred over your hips, knee and skating foot.  (There are exceptions to this, but not yet!)  When you are centred that like, your weight is in exactly the right place for your blades to glide smoothly and easily, with least resistance.  If you tip your head out of that alignment, ie to look at your feet, then your weight has moved and you won't be gliding as well.  A seemingly tiny thing but it makes such a difference to the success of a move.

When you are a new skater though its too tempting to resist the urge to take a quick peek at your feet! :)

It sounds to me as though you're struggling possibly more than you should with those outside edges.  If you skate forward with both feet parallel and touching (on the flat of the blades), what happens?  Does either of the blades try to take a sneaky dive underneath the other one?  Also, have you tried arch supports/orthotics to help stop pronation...?

I do have weird natural resting position of five to two orientation with my feet - which makes the Mohawk style foot position an absolute doddle for me but pointing my toes inwards slightly hard - hence why I can't be quite as fluent on things like forward lemons - the out stroke is clean but the toes pointing in inwards stroke can be a touch scrape-y. I'm gonna focus on the fact that I'm a fairly novice skater for the moment and my technique, before delving into anything like orthotics. I do a lot of road cycling and so I've been constantly battling with my cycle shoes/pedal positions (I ride with clipped in pedals) and my wonky feet ankles. Its a well trodden path of issues but I'm gonna do what usually works and just train my body to do it properly before worrying about what's wrong with my equipment. Its probably good advice in your post but I'm not ruling out the fault of the human wearing the skates first!
« Last Edit: April 15, 2019, 05:30:58 pm by physichull »

Leif

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Re: What did you achieve this week
« Reply #5386 on: April 16, 2019, 07:16:51 am »
Stretching might help you. Cycling can tighten certain muscles, as can running and hockey.

WednesdayMarch

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Re: What did you achieve this week
« Reply #5387 on: April 16, 2019, 01:40:53 pm »
When you are a new skater though its too tempting to resist the urge to take a quick peek at your feet! :)

. . . I'm gonna do what usually works and just train my body to do it properly before worrying about what's wrong with my equipment. It's probably good advice in your post but I'm not ruling out the fault of the human wearing the skates first!

Everybody takes a sneak peek at their feet from time to time.  Everybody.  ;)

Whether or not the human wearing the skates is doing something wrong, if there is a problem with the equipment, eg a blade is slightly misaligned, or an arch support is required to keep the foot upright, then the human is fighting a losing battle, however hard they try to train their body to cope.  In fact, they can be causing all sorts of other problems and bad habits.  Check that the blades run smoothly when your feet are parallel.  It doesn't take long and rules out something that can be simply corrected with a screwdriver.   
Returned to the ice in Sept 2017 after a major leg injury in 1999. Skating in Jackson Elite Pro & MK Vision Syncro. Still scary after all these years.

WednesdayMarch

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Re: What did you achieve this week
« Reply #5388 on: April 17, 2019, 03:10:35 pm »
WednesdayMarch my main coach has taught me the L1 FM exercises, I'm nowhere near testing but we had a go, and I quite like them! Think the continuous edges are Mt favourite followed by exercise 4 :)

Sorry, you LIKE exercise 4?!  Seriously????  Nobody can spiral properly on the flat of the blade!  Because you don't actually spiral if you're not on an edge!  I will NEVER understand why that one was even thought of, let alone put in a test.  I hate, loathe and detest it!  Argh!  (I'm going to have to learn to like it, aren't I?)

Mind you, today's group exercise was "two-foot power rockers".  I grasped that so the session coach decided to throw something else at me and another skater, "Because I don't want you to get bored..."  She gave us a little exercise with a RBO three turn, a LFO rocker, 2 back crosses, RBI three turn, LFI rocker, LBI cross in front and start again.  Turns out it's FM Level 9 Exercise 2.  Joy.  I got it, eventually, and now all I want to do is get back on the ice and do it again and again until I can get it to run smoothly.  Unfortunately, all I am capable of now is letting the dog take my out for a drag (he's all of 5kgs but he'll be in charge this afternoon) and then going for a nap.  My good leg is tired, my rebuilt leg doesn't appear to be there and my brain has turned to cauliflower. 

But I can still remember the feeling of exultation when I grasped the exercise, even though it wasn't smooth and powerful.   I did it.  Several times.  Please remind me of that when I'm downcast next week because I can't remember it, let alone do it. 

Skating can be fun at times.   8)
Returned to the ice in Sept 2017 after a major leg injury in 1999. Skating in Jackson Elite Pro & MK Vision Syncro. Still scary after all these years.

physichull

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Re: What did you achieve this week
« Reply #5389 on: April 17, 2019, 10:43:18 pm »
Everybody takes a sneak peek at their feet from time to time.  Everybody.  ;)

Whether or not the human wearing the skates is doing something wrong, if there is a problem with the equipment, eg a blade is slightly misaligned, or an arch support is required to keep the foot upright, then the human is fighting a losing battle, however hard they try to train their body to cope.  In fact, they can be causing all sorts of other problems and bad habits.  Check that the blades run smoothly when your feet are parallel.  It doesn't take long and rules out something that can be simply corrected with a screwdriver.

Did what you said and even though I have wonky ankles, I can't say it affected my glide in any way. I don't think its an issue.

Had a good time skating tonight. One thing I find is that it takes me a good 15-20 minutes before I feel comfortable on the ice again at the start of every session. Its kinda weird, for all the forward strides (no pun intended) that I make in skating, it always feels like a couple of steps back until I've got the groove back.

Forward crossovers just make so much more sense now, I think I can fairly confidently tick them off as learnt. They aren't perfect, but I'll always keep the practise up of them every time I go skating, so I've decided to concentrate on other techniques for now.

In particular I've been focussing on my one footed glides, making sure I can balance and hold a nice straight line.  Then I've been practising trying to change direction whilst gliding on one foot, onto either and inside or outside edge. With this I think I have the embers of learning something a bit new and getting more control of my outside edges. CW is always poorer than ACW but with Easter hols at the moment its been difficult to find a decent amount of deserted practise space - something which will be better on Friday afternoon skates when all the kids are back at school. I've managed to switch my directions both left then back to right and back left again whilst doing a one footed glide - which is something new. So I'm pleased with that. Can't wait for my next lessons at the end of next month though - I think they will be so beneficial in my learning new stuff and techniques and drills to try. Really want a quiet rink to practise more going backwards too. I can manage OK  but its still quite an ask in looking where I'm going at the same time as focussing on what the hell my feet and balance is doing whilst going backwards!

A happy skate today - I just hunger for more stuff to challenge me!

One observation that I quite like is that you see the same people skating over and over again - the same families, the same groups of hockey skate lads, etc. There feels like there's actually quite a community out there. Some young lads, maybe around 10 years old,  were messing about on the ice today. They were decent skaters but they cared not one iota where they went, didn't look first before setting out on their course, cutting in front of people and in general being a total pain and getting in the way all the time. These things happen I suppose but they were a pain in the neck! They always look at you as if you were the one in the wrong too!!!
« Last Edit: April 17, 2019, 10:53:25 pm by physichull »



 

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