A New Trick

Prior to today's lesson I had some time to talk with one of the new skaters, Angel. I met her on Tuesday; she's an absolute beginner -- takes me back! Anyway, gave her a couple of small tips and some encouragement. She's skated at least 3 times this week so clearly she's got the bug...

Today's lesson:

• holiday show review -- Anna wanted me to show her what I'm doing for the holiday show, so I stepped through it for her. I managed to do something I've never done before, namely, step on my blade when doing a T-stop. Fortunately I didn't fall, but it was the weirdest feeling! Anyway, she had a number of helpful points on the various elements. As the title says, I learned a new trick today, the forward-to-backward lunge/3-turn. It's actually pretty easy. The trick is to keep your skating foot firmly on an outside edge by keeping your weight on the outside of the skating foot. Without that there's no control at all. I managed to do some passable ones -- it needs more practice. I need to get down a bit more on the lunge, but it will be there. I also got to practice the final "wipeout", which should be fun. We spent probably 20 minutes on this but the result was I feel pretty good about it.
• bunnyhops -- since we had practiced the bunnyhops in the holiday show program, we went on and looked at them. Anna wants me pushing off with the toepick, which is problematic for me. I'm so conditioned not to push with the toepick, and of course since I never skated before I had lessons I'd just never done that! Anyway, we practiced them singly and then in pairs and they improved greatly.
• forward crossovers -- emphasis on these was to keep over the circle, and of course eyes up. I managed on the last (or second to last) set to get what felt like a lot more lean and push. It was scary but felt really cool. I mentioned it to Anna and she got this look on her face and said, "I'm not going to comment on that right now." I'm not sure what that means, but I suspect it means I did something good but she wants me to play with it and doesn't want to push me on it or freak me out. I'm sure if it were bad/wrong she would have said so (in a heartbeat!). So I'll have to keep working on that.
• back crossovers -- main point on these was to try to even out the two strokes, to make them symmetrical, and to feel my weight on the back/inside skate more. Some small progress, and again something that needs more work.

All in all a good lesson. Unfortunately I will not get any practice time before my next lesson. Grr!