Pushing For Power, and a Lunge

I went to coffee club today. Before the lesson I practiced the usual stuff, but mostly the hockey stop, LFO 3-turn, forward crossovers, and backward glide. I only briefly worked on the 2-foot spin and didn't touch the side toe hop.

During the lesson (there were 3 of us) we worked first on power, on pushing more. Cecilia emphasized that power comes from... (wait for it!) knee-bend (I know, big surprise, eh?). So we worked on that a bit, both forward and backward, swizzles and stroking. I still don't generate nearly as much power as I think I should be able to (judging by my leg muscles). And of course my push-off for a right foot glide is pretty miserable. I can do the glide itself okay, but pushing off with my left foot is pretty pathetic. More practice required...

Just before the end of the lesson she taught us the lunge, and she held my arm while I tried one on each foot. It went better than I expected. Skating on the left foot (do you call that a left foot lunge or right foot? Is the name of the move the skating foot as usual, or the lunging foot?) was not bad, and I could get down reasonably well and get up more or less okay. Skating on the right foot was bad for two reasons -- 1) I had trouble getting my left leg to be straight back and not off to the side (I think I have this problem elsewhere as well), and 2) my left ankle is still a little tender from my fall a month ago so that, while it doesn't usually hurt me, bending it for the lunge was a bit painful. Still, I was pleased to have learned a new move. It seems like this has been a pretty eventful week! There's lots to practice.