Final Choreo

My choreo session with Tammy on the 7:30 a.m FS at Chandler.  Okay ice, just me and Jillian (and Maria briefly).  This was our final chance to work on the dramatic program before Autumn Antics this Sunday.  I warmed up with stroking and then ran some chunks of the program.

For today's lesson, we ran the program once -- mostly okay.  Then we ran through some parts of it, ran it again, worked some more, and ran it one last time.

In general it's looking good.  I'm a little slow right now so I'm not having as much time at the end for stuff (I'm having to shorten a bit).  Hopefully on Sunday I'll skate faster.  The only other real issue is the salchow, which is being difficult (just like Tuesday).  Hopefully I can get my head in the right place and make it happen when needed!

Competition Prep

My lesson with Holly on the 7:30 a.m. FS at Gilbert.  Okay ice, just me, Q and Addy.

I warmed up with stroking and slaloms, did a spin, a waltz jump and a salchow.  Meh.

For today, we focused on final prep for Autumn Antics (this Sunday!).  We ran through the light program - I had an issue where I did a kind of bad bunnyhop and my prop fell out of my pocket and a piece fell off.  So I had to stop and grab it and put it back together.  Clearly I need to tape it or something so that even if I drop it in competition it won't do that.  Anyway, we restarted and it went really well!  I did all my elements (including the dreaded bunnyhop) and finished on time, so yay me!  There's of course some room for improvement in execution etc., but for today I was happy to just get through it all.

After some review etc. we ran the dramatic program.  This too went really well -- to be honest I was just glad to have remembered all the elements, lol.  But it went fine and I did manage to do an okay-ish salchow, so yay. 

All in all a good lesson and really glad to have things coming together.

Competition Prep

My choreo session with Tammy on the 7:30 a.m FS at Chandler.  I had time to warmup jumps and spins and spent a little time on the harder elements for me.  Before we started I also showed Tammy the two shirts I'd considered and we agreed on the royal blue one, so costume is set.

Today we ran the dramatic program twice and worked a bunch of the pieces, and made some small refinements..

• be sure to use both hands when carrying prop
• Moved the spin more to the audience side of the rink so there's better ice coverage and just more space
• Removed the RFI3 (or at least made it 'optional' lol) as it was just a bit too much.

All in all things went reasonably well, except that I'm still struggling with the salchow -- it was okay when I warmed up but in the program I had the same difficulties I had on Tuesday, I just rush the whole thing and my timing is all off and it just doesn't happen. Ugh.

Just over a week to go!

Backwards

My figures lesson with Danette on the 7:30 a.m. FS at Chandler.  I warmed up with forward edges and scribed circles.

Today's lesson:

• BO/BI edges -- some work on posture; I tend to break at the waist when pushing off.  These were okay.
• BO8 -- we worked to have a more aggressive initial push and to look into the circle (sound familiar?).  I'm pretty good about this on the RBO but no on the LBO.  Ugh.  Still having issues with posture and getting around.  Ugh.
• BI8 -- these are pretty weak. I'm still widestepping the push, and I need to stand up straight.

I really miss that nice clean adult skate ice!

Competition Prep

My lesson with Holly on the 7:30 a.m. FS at Gilbert.  I skated a double session this morning, something I almost never do -- 7:30 - 9 a.m. (in to work late).  I warmed up with stroking, slaloms and spins, then walked through my dramatic program a bit.

I had asked Holly for extra time, so we had about a 50 minute lesson.   Whew!

We spent most of our time working through the dramatic program.  It's pretty rough, a combination of not enough practice and sometimes slightly vague memories of choreography.  Thank goodness I wrote it down in this blog!  We had enough time to work through some of my weak points -- especially, the cross and hold after the LFO/FI change of edge.  I wouldn't say it's comfortable, but I was in fact able to do it so that's something.  By the last run through I at least attempted everything, though I was not having a good salchow day.  Ugh.

We finished off by running the light program again (I did not do the bunnyhop, ugh) and then working on salchow some more.

Back At It

My figures lesson with Danette on the 7:30 a.m. FS at Chandler.  Ice was rather crusty.  Ugh.

I warmed up with edges and scribed circles.

Today's lesson:

• edges -- we ran through all of these.  Not too bad.  A little extra work on the BI push.  I swear these were better before, but oh well.
• FO8 - I'm not getting around. Ugh.
• FI8 - I AM getting around.  Not too bad.
• BO8 -- I'm not getting around and my push and position - not great. Bleah.
• BI8 -- yuck.  Not getting around, and small circles.  I need to push a lot harder.  Bleah.

Anyway, considering I've not worked on this stuff in like a month I guess I shouldn't complain.  Bleah.

Light Program Runthroughs

My lesson with Holly on the 7:30 a.m. FS at Gilbert.  Okay ice, just me and Addie and Q and our coaches.  I warmed up with stroking (hadn't skated in a week, ugh) and then some spins and crossovers.

For today's lesson we warmed up my salchow and spins, then ran the light program once.  Mostly okay, but alas Holly felt obliged to point out I was leaving out the dreaded bunnyhop.  So we warmed it up a bit and ran the program again.  I managed to do okay - bunnyhop was okay, I did a great spin, but the salchow was just a disaster again.  Ugh. I have some mental thing going on here I need to get over.

 Less than 3 weeks 'til Autumn Antics!  Eeep.

Jumps, Spins & Program Runthrough

My lesson with Holly on the 8:15 FS at Gilbert  I warmed up with stroking (it had been a couple weeks since I skated, ugh!), some waltz jumps, spins and circle-8.

Today's lesson:

• toe loop -- on the blue line.  The first couple were pretty bad but they did improve.  Still a bit cheated but better.
• salchow -- again the first couple were pretty ukky but they did improve.
• waltz-toe -- Holly gave me my choice of sal-toe or waltz-toe, so I chose the latter.  Just did a couple. Relatively okay, actually.
• spins -- I had one really good one (3 revs) and a couple not so good.
• program runthrough -- we ran my light program.  Not bad, actually, except for my spin (not so great) and my salchow (also not so great).  Choreo was mostly good.

Registration for Autumn antics is due next week and I've not gotten it done yet.  Eeep.