Back to Basics

Group class last night, and a real "Back to Basics" which was quite nice.

As last week, I was the only Level 7 in a group of Level 6'ers. The coach did say I could move to the Level 8, 9 & 10 group (which only has 2 people in it!) but I decided to stay in her group as again, I think it is good for me to build up my confidence with the backward stuff.

So we did quite a lot of backward skating, and backward chasse's. I am definitely beginning to get some speed up now with these (certainly the fastest in the group as I kept overtaking people!) and I think that has to be good for my confidence. Didn't even think about backward crossovers, just concentrated on having my knees really bent, my weight over the balls of my feet and getting more and more of a "push off". One sign that the backwards things stress me out is that my feet always get crampy - when nervous, I clench my toes in my skates! But it started feeling much better, the more I did them.

I also did my forward continuous curves (inside and outside) and skating backward turning to forward - this feels nice and smooth now.

On to the forward inside 3-turns. Hmmmm . . . the good thing is that on the entry "lobe", I no longer feel like I am going to pitch onto my face. I am remembering to lift my free hip and keep my head up. I no longer fear the turn. But the turn isn't happening! Either I skid across the ice, or I seem to do some titchy semi-circle and double back on myself still going forward! I remember something similar happening with my FO3's though, so am not getting too stressed. I will just keep on practicing . . . I can do these perfectly on two feet, why is one foot sooooooo much harder!!!

At the end of the class, the Level 6-ers who had been getting increasingly frustrated with learning their Level asked to do slaloming again as it is fun. The coach then suggested that some of us should try doing it on one foot. BWAAAA-HA-HA-HA!!! Ahem . . .

Not only does Ally Pally hold the record for most mountainous ice rink you will ever skate on, there are now little yellow condensation bumps under all the lights. Sigh . . .