Perimeter XOs

My lesson with JJ on the 7:30 a.m. FS at Gilbert.

We spent our lesson working on the perimeter crossovers from Bronze Moves.  On the forward ones I've developed a real block on doing the CW FXO...ugh.  Could not get my body turned into the circle.  We made some good progess, though.  Then we worked on the BXO side and although these are better in some respects, my BXOs are pretty scratchy.  Yuck.

Moves

My lesson with JJ on the 8:15 FS at Gilbert.  This was a make-up lesson from last week. I had not skated since last Wednesday so the first few minutes were interesting, ugh.

Today's lesson:

• power-3s -- we actually made a little progress on these.  JJ actually got me to do a whole pattern :-).  On the L side I finally got into the swing of actually moving my R arm forward before the turn so I could actually do it.  The R side was a lot rougher as I'm still having difficulty on the step forward out of the BXO.
• BXOs to BO edge -- these are kinda okay, by which I mostly mean that I can more-or-less do them.
• 5-step mohawk -- mmph.  Actually the R side was kind of okay (better than it has been).  The L side is still pretty weak and I'm way up on my toe on the BO edge.  Oh well.

Spins

My spins lesson with Lynne on the 7:30 a.m. FS.

Today's lesson:

• standing start -- ugh.  These were pretty cruddy to start with but improved to about where they were last week.  I was doing a little better job of relaxing into them.
• windup -- again these had regressed (I am just not getting any ice time right now, and won't for a while) but we did manage to get a couple of pretty decent ones.  My entrance and hook have improved a lot, the biggest issue is still getting into and holding position once I hook the spin.  Ugh.

Spins

My spin lesson with Lynne on the 7:30 a.m. FS at Gilbert.  Good ice and just 4 or so of us present.

Today's lesson:

• standing start -- these started out with me losing a lot of ground from last week, but then making it up again.  The weak point here is maintaining the spin after it's initiated.  I've made good progress on the entrance and the hook but it looks like I am too slow to bring the free leg in and pull up.  Urgh.
• two-foot spin -> one foot -- Lynne wanted to try these to see if that would help me feel the one foot spin.  Ugh.  I had not done them in some time so they were pretty rough; and I tend to be pushing onto the L foot instead of just picking up the R foot.  So not much help here.
• windup-- we finished off looking at the windup into the spin.  We made some great progress!  I did a much better job of holding the edge around and getting it to curve while holding the free leg back, then bringing it around.  Still having issues finding and holding the position though, and my entrance was still inconsistent -- I'd say 1/2 or 2/3 were good, no more than that.  Still it's pretty exciting progress.

5-Step Mohawk

My lesson with JJ on the 7:30 a.m. FS at Gilbert.

Today's lesson was all about mohawks.  As many of my readers know my mohawks are really really bad... We started by working on the 5-step mohawk pattern from the Bronze moves.  Of course part of the issue was to get me to keep going even though they are horrible.  I really need to get over that.

We spent some time working on the pattern and trying to get me to really turn my upper body.  Then we worked just on the mohawks themselves.  JJ had me try keeping the free leg closer and trying to square up the hips before and after -- I think the main point of that was to try to get the free hip to stay up and not drop.  Anyway we spent a lot of time on it but I'm not sure that we really made any progress.  Urph.