I learned the Dutch Waltz today! It's the first of the Pre-Preliminary ice dances, and consists entirely of forward skating: Edges, progressives*, and outside swing rolls. In many ways it's like a more interesting Moves pattern.
I think C taught it to me mostly because my swing rolls are atrocious, and this will inspire me to work on them. Right now I seem able to do either a reasonably sized outside edge (a la the outside edges on a line Moves pattern) or a semblance of a swingy free leg, but not both.
Alas, I need to be able to do a decent swing roll for my Moves test, because the transition between forward and backward crossovers is a swing roll change of edge into a mohawk, which is just impossible right now. We worked a lot on changing from an outside to an inside edge today, and I don't think I'm any better at it, but at least I have a step sequence to practice it with.
On a good note, I am totally great at the timing for this dance, because I actually know what a waltz beat sounds like. Yaaaaay, ballroom dance!
Next week I get to do it to music. Hopefully the music is slow enough that I can keep up.
ETA: It occurs to me that I have finally achieved what prompted me to join the Kenyon Ballroom Dance ClubJesus was it really almost twelve years ago. I was a huge fan of ice dancing at the time, and desperately wanted to do it myself, but I knew between finances and location, ballroom dancing was the closest I would get at the time. Of course, it turned out to be a lot of fun in its own right, so I'm not at all disappointed I went that direction at the time. /ETA
I'm also now to the point where I need to start doing my waltz jump out of...well, we didn't quite make it to back crossovers, but that's next on the list. Today was just about skating backwards and turning into it. All the nice timing C taught me last week that made it feel like a real jump instead of an awkward step went to hell when I tried to do it with the extra turn, but I think if I do it off the ice enough times I'll get there.
* Progressives are scarier forward crossovers where you plop your free foot to the side of your skating foot, kind of towards the front, and then slide it in front and to the other side while picking up the original skating foot. All while moving forward, with the distinct possibility of running one foot into the other and going down. It requires more coordination than I possess right now.
I think C taught it to me mostly because my swing rolls are atrocious, and this will inspire me to work on them. Right now I seem able to do either a reasonably sized outside edge (a la the outside edges on a line Moves pattern) or a semblance of a swingy free leg, but not both.
Alas, I need to be able to do a decent swing roll for my Moves test, because the transition between forward and backward crossovers is a swing roll change of edge into a mohawk, which is just impossible right now. We worked a lot on changing from an outside to an inside edge today, and I don't think I'm any better at it, but at least I have a step sequence to practice it with.
On a good note, I am totally great at the timing for this dance, because I actually know what a waltz beat sounds like. Yaaaaay, ballroom dance!
Next week I get to do it to music. Hopefully the music is slow enough that I can keep up.
ETA: It occurs to me that I have finally achieved what prompted me to join the Kenyon Ballroom Dance Club
I'm also now to the point where I need to start doing my waltz jump out of...well, we didn't quite make it to back crossovers, but that's next on the list. Today was just about skating backwards and turning into it. All the nice timing C taught me last week that made it feel like a real jump instead of an awkward step went to hell when I tried to do it with the extra turn, but I think if I do it off the ice enough times I'll get there.
* Progressives are scarier forward crossovers where you plop your free foot to the side of your skating foot, kind of towards the front, and then slide it in front and to the other side while picking up the original skating foot. All while moving forward, with the distinct possibility of running one foot into the other and going down. It requires more coordination than I possess right now.
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