Observation of skaters

On Friday, I skated my last session at Ice House. I mean, last for this trip, of course! I'll definitely go there again when I am back in NJ... but for now, no more beautiful ice and large rink.

In this one week here, I made some observations about skaters.

Adult skaters skate because we love it. We may not be the most impressive, but we are willing to try and work at it. AND we have a tendency to plan work schedules around skating! I also find that adult skating in the US has gained much respect, and more popularity.

I was also on some sessions when Kyoko Ina and John Zimmerman practised their programs. It was a pleasure watching them, but more impressive was how it looked like they were thoroughly enjoying themselves!

There are different types of little girl skaters, from those who throw tantrums, to those who argue with every instruction, to those who obey every word... Oh well, not so different from in Singapore.

I was impressed by one girl. She looks barely 12, yet I dare say she seems more sensible than most of the teens I see at home. I skated on a couple of sessions when she was having lessons. She listened and performed - difficult variations, repetitions of the same moves, improvements to the moves... everything. And she communicated well with her coach, showing an understanding of what was required. It must be wonderful to teach her. :-)

Lessons at Ice House

Still in NJ and skating at Ice House.
Had two lessons with Vladimir Kaprov.

First lesson was yesterday. I didn't know what to expect, and I suppose he didn't either. At the start of lesson he asked if there was something specific I wanted to do. I told him I'm working on some double jumps and would like to work on that.

We started with some rotation exercises, rather similar to what we did with Michael Pasfield during the seminar. Then we went through the Axel, d Sal, d toe, d loop, and even the d flip.

It was a good lesson, and this morning, I had some decent d Sal and d toe just before lesson. We went straight to d loop and d flip. He got out his video camera, and showed me exactly what was wrong. *sigh* yes, I can see what's wrong but its not like its so easy to fix it!

Anyway, he seemed to like what I can do at least...

What did I get from this? Some things I realised I should work on or concentrate on:

• rotational exercises, concentrate on the "right feeling".
• combinations/sequences - loop-d loop, salchow-d loop, salchow-d flip, axel-d toe, 3 axels in a row, etc.
• bring R hand to L shoulder for rotation.
• jump up, rather than turning L shoulder around!

PS: Posted on 4 Oct at 10:00PM EST (that's the time in NJ now!)

Skating in New Jersey

From LA, we flew across the continent to the East Coast. In New Jersey, we are just 10min from the Ice House.

Last Friday was the first session I went to. The ice was beautiful - nice and soft, great for spinning, and yet hard enough for fast speeds and high jumps. The rink, though, is cold... I mean, it isn't too cold, but just cold enough that when I took off my sweater, my arms were freezing!

For some reason, the rink makes me feel small & insignificant, and a little lost. It is normal size - ok, it is larger than the rink in Singapore, but then I had been skating in LA last week, so that's no excuse.

After Friday's session, I decided to get my skates sharpened. I went to the pro shop, and found that I was incredibly lucky. Jim was there, and had time to do my skates while I waited. I hear that we usually have to make an appointment with him to get skates sharpened.

Jim has done a wonderful job with the blades. I went on the ice this morning, forgetting that my skates were sharp. I didn't remember it until an hour later! The blades felt good, not too sharp to affect my skating in any way!

Today's session was fun. Early in the session, a lady came up to talk to me. Turns out, she's from Singapore, and had read my blog. That's sooo cool!
(Hi Nancy, thanks for introducing yourself, maybe I'll see you again tomorrow!)

Later, I tried to lay out my new program (yes, I'm still in the midst of that! argh!). I also tried spiral sequences that Lauren had suggested to me when I was in LA. I think I can probably work something out from that!