2017 Sherwood Invitational Waltz-8, FI8
My figures competition at the 2017 Sherwood Invitational today.
After practice ice, I had about an hour so I took my skates off and tried to relax (ha!). At 8:45 I got my skates on and we gathered at the ice door at 9 for some last minute instructions; then we got to our warmup patches and warmed up for a bit (5 or 10 minutes, I'm not sure). The event was double-paneled so they took us two at a time, "low" events and "high" events (mine were "low", of course). Waltz-8 was the first low event, and I was 2nd to skate that figure, so I had a little extra warmup time. Warmup was not great (I actually fell once!) but okay.
Finally they called me out for my figure. Kelli gave me some advice on choosing a starting spot. I found a good spot, marked my center and pushed off! It's kind of a blur from there. The R side was generally okay although I was skidding a lot on the BO edge. Sherwood's ice is really hard and fast and I didn't feel I had a good grip on it. The L side turns were mostly really nice but my return to center was not too great, at least one time I came in 1-2 feet to the right of center. Ugh. In the end I managed to do the figure without falling, so that was a relief.
After I finished I returned to the warmup area and began warming up my FI8. There were 3 of us competing that figure and once again I drew the last slot (yay!). So I ran through it 3 - 4 times and it was pretty good. The girl before me had just finished so I skated down the side of the rink and waited for them to call me. Kelli and I discussed good spots to start from, again. Finally they called me out and told me they wanted me to move down the rink to a new patch (#14 to be exact). This was nice as I could line up a few feet off a red hockey dot in a spot that wasn't too bright (they had the lights turned down so we could see our tracings better). Again, marked my spot, took a deep breath, reminded myself to hold that darn R shoulder back (!) and pushed off! R side was a little shaky the first time but I managed to hold a good edge and keep the shoulder back until I returned to center. The LFI is always really nice for me so once I got to the first one I felt more confident and it was fine thereafter. I think my R circle was still a bit smaller than the L side, but my tracing was pretty good on the L side for sure and also I think on the R side. I was really pretty happy with it.
After I was done I skated down the side of the rink and got off the ice, put my guards on, got a drink of water and went to watch the last figure - Heath doing the RFI/LBI counter. Eeep. Maybe someday I can do that?
After we were all done we gathered for a group picture on-ice. Kelli and I went to wait for results; the waltz-8 was up and I got 2nd (of 2) as I expected. I met my fellow-competitor Jessica and we went and got our medals etc. Waited around a bit more in the hallway for my results and when they came out, I got first (of 3) with all 1st place ordinals!
WHEEEEEEE!!!
I think the last time I felt that happy about something was when I passed my APB MITF test on the 3rd try (2008).
After practice ice, I had about an hour so I took my skates off and tried to relax (ha!). At 8:45 I got my skates on and we gathered at the ice door at 9 for some last minute instructions; then we got to our warmup patches and warmed up for a bit (5 or 10 minutes, I'm not sure). The event was double-paneled so they took us two at a time, "low" events and "high" events (mine were "low", of course). Waltz-8 was the first low event, and I was 2nd to skate that figure, so I had a little extra warmup time. Warmup was not great (I actually fell once!) but okay.
Finally they called me out for my figure. Kelli gave me some advice on choosing a starting spot. I found a good spot, marked my center and pushed off! It's kind of a blur from there. The R side was generally okay although I was skidding a lot on the BO edge. Sherwood's ice is really hard and fast and I didn't feel I had a good grip on it. The L side turns were mostly really nice but my return to center was not too great, at least one time I came in 1-2 feet to the right of center. Ugh. In the end I managed to do the figure without falling, so that was a relief.
After I finished I returned to the warmup area and began warming up my FI8. There were 3 of us competing that figure and once again I drew the last slot (yay!). So I ran through it 3 - 4 times and it was pretty good. The girl before me had just finished so I skated down the side of the rink and waited for them to call me. Kelli and I discussed good spots to start from, again. Finally they called me out and told me they wanted me to move down the rink to a new patch (#14 to be exact). This was nice as I could line up a few feet off a red hockey dot in a spot that wasn't too bright (they had the lights turned down so we could see our tracings better). Again, marked my spot, took a deep breath, reminded myself to hold that darn R shoulder back (!) and pushed off! R side was a little shaky the first time but I managed to hold a good edge and keep the shoulder back until I returned to center. The LFI is always really nice for me so once I got to the first one I felt more confident and it was fine thereafter. I think my R circle was still a bit smaller than the L side, but my tracing was pretty good on the L side for sure and also I think on the R side. I was really pretty happy with it.
After I was done I skated down the side of the rink and got off the ice, put my guards on, got a drink of water and went to watch the last figure - Heath doing the RFI/LBI counter. Eeep. Maybe someday I can do that?
After we were all done we gathered for a group picture on-ice. Kelli and I went to wait for results; the waltz-8 was up and I got 2nd (of 2) as I expected. I met my fellow-competitor Jessica and we went and got our medals etc. Waited around a bit more in the hallway for my results and when they came out, I got first (of 3) with all 1st place ordinals!
WHEEEEEEE!!!
I think the last time I felt that happy about something was when I passed my APB MITF test on the 3rd try (2008).
Labels: Competitions, Kelli
posted by Gordon @ 6:02 PM
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