It's All Coming Back To Me Now

I had my 15th lesson with Anna in our new timeslot. Originally it was going to be 5:15 Thursdays but Anna asked to change it to 5:30, which works better for me anyway so that is what we did.

I had a good 30 minute warmup, including both LFO3s and a couple of RFO3s. The freestyle session was not too crowded, just a couple of kids working on ice dance and a couple of freestylers. This is on the back ice -- Anna commented once that she liked to see Nicole and I on the back ice because "it makes you feisty!" I'm not sure about that, but I'm not so daunted by it anymore. Actually, this was the first time I'd had a lesson at a freestyle session, and it was good.

At the beginning of the lesson Anna asked me what I wanted to work on and I told her I was willing to work on anything except jumps -- I'm holding off on that until I see the orthopedist 6/29 and/or feel like I don't need to wear the wrist guard -- I assume a few weeks.

We had a good solid workout, starting with stroking, then forward crossovers. Anna emphasized a need for better posture; I am tending to drop the inside hip and shoulder on crossovers. She still thinks I'm looking more solid on my edges on these though. Interesting.

Then it was on to back crossovers. The word for the day (she'd told me this last Friday too), is to lead with the heel for the crossing foot. Also, she warned me that it's not really supposed to be a "scissoring" action as I had been viewing it; it's really front-stroke and rear-stroke. She said it's fine for now as it is but that's what I'm working toward. She had me work more on bending the back leg/knee, and that had a very salutary effect on getting me to have the beginnings of a real underpush. It's a start.

Next we worked on edges. The outsides are looking pretty good, although I need to be more consistent in my rhythm. Anna said "No 'Perfect' today!" and I replied that that's okay, I've had one that will last me for the year :-).

The insides, however, are another story. Once again I'm tending to drop the free side (at least I'm consistent :-(); and my circles tend to be more like ovals. Anna also pointed out that as I come back toward the transition I need to be keeping my thighs together and pointing the free foot/toe. That will require some work.

Next we went back to the two-foot spin. This is going to take some time and work. First of all I'm rather slow. More importantly I'm tending to look to the right instead of straight ahead. And finally, I'm tending to drop the left side (see a pattern?). We worked on it for a few minutes and then decided to move on, although I suspect we'll come back to it tomorrow.

Lastly Anna wanted to work on Mohawks. I was rather surprised since I was expecting 3-turns (and Anna said "I was going to say 3-turns, but let's look at Mohawks" :-)). I had not done a Mohawk in 2 months, of course. Anyway, I tried an LFI Mohawk. The first one was pretty awful. The second, though, was probably the best one I've ever done! Wow. I don't know how to explain that. We worked on cleaning up some things, mostly looking up (duh!) and once again dropping the free side (if I can figure out how not to do that, it will fix all kinds of stuff!). She was rather pleased though, especially since it was my weaker side and she says I'm doing them even on only a slightly curved edge. We did a bunch on the left and then went to the RFI. Once again the first one stunk, but the others were not bad. I was really pleased.

With that we were out of time, the Zamboni was coming on the ice and the freestyle time was over. As we went to take our skates off I had a chance to talk to her about my skating goals for the next year. She said the waltz jump by August was not going to be a problem. Skating in the holiday show is not a problem. Testing APB by next May is very do-able also. And doing a program is do-able, although she said I should wait and see how I feel about it after doing the holiday show. I don't know if that means she thinks I might not want to do it, or that I might want more time and preparation. Either way I suspect she's right that I'll have a better perspective on it then. Anyway it was a good conversation to have, and it's good to know that we are on track for where I want to go. She said that I'm very goal-driven and that she really likes that. She asked me what my skating schedule was going to be like and I said that right now the goal is 3 or 4 hours of freestyle (Tuesday and Thursday at 5, and Sunday morning for either 1 or 2 hours), plus coffee club (1 hour) on Fridays, Wednesday night public session (2 hours), and my Saturday afternoon "zoo" with the kids. So that's something like 8 - 10 hours or so a week. Whee! I'm really psyched.