Monday, March 25, 2013

The List

It's been roughly a year and a half since I returned to figure skating.  I decided to take stock of my skill set, such as it is.  Predictably, some skills are fairly good while others range from mediocre to bad to frankly nonexistent.  In fairness some of the items in the "nonexistent" category are "wish list" skills which I've been introduced to in my Power Stroking class but I've yet to have had any formal instruction during group lessons.  The mediocre column includes a few elements which have degraded because I've not used or practiced them since passing which ever ISI level they are part of.  Braking a T-stop with my left foot is an example of one.  My preference is to use the right skate and over time I've become less and less polished with the mirror image skill.   I plan to come back to this list every six months or so to see how many if any of the poor skills can be moved over to the good column.  I'll be a happier bunny when most of these are living under the good column.  Lots and lots to work on...



Good Mediocre Bad Nonexistent
Forward Stroking Back outside edges Back Cross-overs, CW Back Swing rolls
Forward Cross-overs Back Cross-overs, CCW Back Power pulls Back Cross rolls
Forward Cross rolls Forward Power pulls Inside pivot Twizzles (any)
Forward Swing rolls LFO 3 Turn Two-foot spin Connecting Moves
Forward Edges RFI 3 Turn Half-flip jump Ballet jump
RFO 3 Turn Waltz jump

LFI 3 Turn Forward Spiral

Back Inside Edges Bunny Hop

T-Stop (right foot braking) T-Stop (left foot braking)

LFI Mohawk RFI Mohawk


Hockey Stop 




















































































2 comments:

  1. You are off to a solid start (good news). The bad news is that now matter how advanced you are you can always improve the basics. My coach decided she had enough of my ugly, toe picked, inefficient crosscuts so now I start every session with 5 minutes or so of the basics.

    Oh yeah and don't worry about twizzles, they are the drama-queen turns of the skating world!

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  2. Thanks as always for the feedback, Lori. Twizzles are one of the power stroke drills, which like back swing rolls and back cross rolls, are well out of my reach at present but which some day I hope to have the satisfaction of successfully mastering. For now I have more practical goals in my cross-hairs. In particular I've got my sights set on cleaning up my LFO 3 and RFI Mohawk and becoming smoother while on back outside edges and back cross overs. Toe assisted jumps will go nowhere until those entry moves become consistently well behaved. Little by little they are improving.

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