Priceless skate
Skates like today's don't come around too often so It's worth documenting. I watched the Short Dance and Pairs Short programmes yesterday, and consequently I felt really keyed up full of good intentions when I set off for the rink this morning. The ice was good so I warmed up and got straight on with things rather than just pottering around. I wanted to carry on the momentum I gained earlier in the week with my free dance. Tony and I had finally finished it off and although it's far from perfect, it's skate-able and I can finish on time. I'm sure it will get tweaked many times yet but it all fits and even the twizzles actually happen sometimes. Today I wanted to repeat that but also focus on posture and presentation, keeping my head up and softening the knees. I love this part of the process, when I actually start to skate it and not worry about what comes next. The group lesson was good. We have such an awesome bunch of adults in our group at the moment. We are all quite close in that we're always encouraging each other to try all the new stuff Tony comes up with each time. We've been working on FI rockers lately and they're starting to happen. I can do them on both feet and repeat the exercise down the rink. Backward rockers are a different story yet! FI twizzles and BO 3's are progressing like they never did before in my old boots. Last year was a wasteland as far as my skating went but so far this year everything seems to be clicking into place and bits and pieces of progress are being made. Spins have been working OK. Sit spin is still my favourite. It gets fractionally lower every time I skate. I might even get low enough for IJS one day! Parallel is still my weakest spin although, having said that, Tony asked for one right at the end of today's lesson and I pulled one out of the bag!- that's the kind of day it was today! My lesson didn't start too well. DOI fever has hit the rink and and the session was very crowded. I tried twice to run through my free dance and had to abort due to traffic problems. Tony said it might be better to stick my music on later and work on spins in my lesson. Very frustrating but definitely for the best. He wanted to work on lay-back so we spent ages trying to get my hips lined up correctly. I've been given some exercises to do and been told to practise spinning with my leg at 2 o'clock. Its hard explain in writing but I understand what he wants! My sit spin was actually one of the best I've done ever and the look on his face was priceless! - that doesn't happen often either. I finished with the previously mentioned parallel spin so all told it was a good lesson in the end. The best bit was being told I'd improved a lot just recently. I appreciate the praise when it's given as that also doesn't happen often! I'm convinced that it gave me the confidence to go off and work on some jumps and resulted in me landing several [small] loop jumps from an inside 3. My skating buddy saw the first one so much hi-fiving and shrieking followed. I landed a couple more after that, along with a few Salchows, cherry flips, a 3jump/cherry and a few 3 jumps. I did loads more spins too before my aching legs had had enough. 3 hours of the most enjoyable skating I've done in a long time. I did get to put my music on- my old coach put it on for me. I managed to skate it through, although the twizzles were rubbish today, and got another compliment at the end on how my artistic has improved. I couldn't be happier. I even squeezed in a Golden skaters Waltz (right at the end of the group lesson, we were made to skate right to the end of the music in a bid to improve our stamina!!!) which was poor but enjoyable. Today reminds why I can't give up skating. Thankfully my hours have increased at work for the time being so I can keep ticking over. I won't be taking it for granted though. Roll on Tuesday when I can do it all again!- I hope.