Catching Up
I didn't have a chance to post much last week. Since I didn't skate today (again, tired from travelling to Cleveland over the weekend), I'll use today to catch up with last week's skating.
Tuesday: I got up at my usual time (8am), and started getting ready to go skating. Just before I left, I had the horrible realization that I was supposed to work the morning shift (starts at 8am), and I was going to be at least 2 hours late. Oops! So, I did not get my 1.5 hours of gloriously empty public ice. Instead, I got 45min. on a fairly crowded freestyle with 3 particularly bothersome little girls (8yrs or so) who were playing games and not watching where they were going at all. I hate being the older/larger/better skater - I always feel like it will be my fault if I hit one of those kids, even if they aren't paying attention to what they're doing. It really interferes with my practice, because I spend more time dodging kids than actually skating. Anyway, the good news is that my doubles were a bit more consistent. Not meaning that I landed all of them, but I landed more on my feet in some shape or form than I landed on my rear end. This was progress.
Wednesday: Lesson day! We spend the whole hour on MITF. We did all of intermediate. Coach still didn't like any of my moves, but I guess he thinks they're passing because he signed my test papers. The test session is scheduled for November 7th. I'll be testing Intermediate MITF and preliminary freeskate. My coach has 2 other skaters taking the same tests as I am. I really want to pass. I don't know what I'll do if I'm the only one who doesn't pass intermediate MITF. Coach and I had some extra time after running through the intermediate test, so we started novice moves. I learned the spiral pattern which doesn't seem too difficult. I need more power and extension, but I have good spirals, and coach liked my edges. I also learned the rocker-choctaw sequence - the straight line one. That was fun! I sucked at it big time. I kept forgetting which way I was turning, and I couldn't get any power, so I was moving at a snail's pace the whole time, but still getting lost and confused. I definitely need to commit these to muscle memory. I like these patterns a lot better than the intermediate MITF though.
Thursday: Glorious empty daytime public skating! And, I skated like poo. I was upset when I got to the rink (I swear, I'm going to stop dating and adopt another cat!); I just couldn't seem to shake the bad mood. I was disappointed with my intermediate MITF. They're probably passing, but since I'm testing with people I know, I want them to be really great. I want to make sure that I pass. It would be so embarassing to have an ugly test in front of all of my coach's other students. My jumps had abandoned me. My axel, which was beautiful a few weeks ago, had developed the longest skid on the entrance. Very sad. I'll have to have coach look at it next week. Doubles were scary. Toward the end of the session, I started managing to channel my anger in a more positive way and do some huge double sals, but they were sloppy. Spins were lackluster, and my camel-sit-layback has pretty much deserted me after seeming soooo easy last week. On the good side, I managed to get the rocker-choctaw pattern all the way down the ice without messing up or running out of speed. I'm still at snail pace, but at least I can do the pattern now!
I'll skate for 1.5 hours tomorrow. Hopefully they'll be more productive since I'm in a better mood now. Oh, and in other breaking news... Coach said he's found someone else's preliminary freeskate music that I can use for my test. Supposedly it's from the movie soundtrack from Signs. We're supposed to choreo the program next Wed. I hope I can pick this choreo up fast. For my last program, it took us 4 lessons to choreograph it. I only have 5 lessons left before the test, and I know that I'll need some of those for MITF. Looks like I'm going to have some hard work ahead of me this month.
Tuesday: I got up at my usual time (8am), and started getting ready to go skating. Just before I left, I had the horrible realization that I was supposed to work the morning shift (starts at 8am), and I was going to be at least 2 hours late. Oops! So, I did not get my 1.5 hours of gloriously empty public ice. Instead, I got 45min. on a fairly crowded freestyle with 3 particularly bothersome little girls (8yrs or so) who were playing games and not watching where they were going at all. I hate being the older/larger/better skater - I always feel like it will be my fault if I hit one of those kids, even if they aren't paying attention to what they're doing. It really interferes with my practice, because I spend more time dodging kids than actually skating. Anyway, the good news is that my doubles were a bit more consistent. Not meaning that I landed all of them, but I landed more on my feet in some shape or form than I landed on my rear end. This was progress.
Wednesday: Lesson day! We spend the whole hour on MITF. We did all of intermediate. Coach still didn't like any of my moves, but I guess he thinks they're passing because he signed my test papers. The test session is scheduled for November 7th. I'll be testing Intermediate MITF and preliminary freeskate. My coach has 2 other skaters taking the same tests as I am. I really want to pass. I don't know what I'll do if I'm the only one who doesn't pass intermediate MITF. Coach and I had some extra time after running through the intermediate test, so we started novice moves. I learned the spiral pattern which doesn't seem too difficult. I need more power and extension, but I have good spirals, and coach liked my edges. I also learned the rocker-choctaw sequence - the straight line one. That was fun! I sucked at it big time. I kept forgetting which way I was turning, and I couldn't get any power, so I was moving at a snail's pace the whole time, but still getting lost and confused. I definitely need to commit these to muscle memory. I like these patterns a lot better than the intermediate MITF though.
Thursday: Glorious empty daytime public skating! And, I skated like poo. I was upset when I got to the rink (I swear, I'm going to stop dating and adopt another cat!); I just couldn't seem to shake the bad mood. I was disappointed with my intermediate MITF. They're probably passing, but since I'm testing with people I know, I want them to be really great. I want to make sure that I pass. It would be so embarassing to have an ugly test in front of all of my coach's other students. My jumps had abandoned me. My axel, which was beautiful a few weeks ago, had developed the longest skid on the entrance. Very sad. I'll have to have coach look at it next week. Doubles were scary. Toward the end of the session, I started managing to channel my anger in a more positive way and do some huge double sals, but they were sloppy. Spins were lackluster, and my camel-sit-layback has pretty much deserted me after seeming soooo easy last week. On the good side, I managed to get the rocker-choctaw pattern all the way down the ice without messing up or running out of speed. I'm still at snail pace, but at least I can do the pattern now!
I'll skate for 1.5 hours tomorrow. Hopefully they'll be more productive since I'm in a better mood now. Oh, and in other breaking news... Coach said he's found someone else's preliminary freeskate music that I can use for my test. Supposedly it's from the movie soundtrack from Signs. We're supposed to choreo the program next Wed. I hope I can pick this choreo up fast. For my last program, it took us 4 lessons to choreograph it. I only have 5 lessons left before the test, and I know that I'll need some of those for MITF. Looks like I'm going to have some hard work ahead of me this month.
posted by Jennifer @ 4:30 PM
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