Today I did battle with the Evil Salchow, and emerged victorious.
P played with the positioning of my arms and legs on the entry edge and I finally manged to make it an entry with a hook instead of just an arc that keeps going and going and never actually turns into a jump. (Let me remind you, this is the jump "you just have to feeeeeeel" when it's right to actually move off the edge into the air.) Unfortunately, the entry wasn't into a jump so much as a stumble and a forward landing.
So in the last half hour, I decided I was going to get this to look like a jump. I'm pretty sure I did it 50+ times. It was like I was starring in one of those cheesy motivational commercials that has twenty fast cuts of some athlete or other doing the same thing over and over again untilexhaustion perfection.
And I will say this for those cheesy motivational commercials: The strategy is sound. By the fortieth or fiftieth mohawk-into-entry edge-into-stumble, I was able to get the hook--albeit scratchily, and too far onto my toe pick--and step through so that I landed mostly backwards. Depending on exactly where you pop off the toe pick, a Salchow is actually more of a 2/3- or 3/4-revolution jump than a full revolution (a fact which surprised me, given what you see on TV--it looks like they take off backwards, but in reality you take off...kind of halfway between forward and sideways). I probably have half a revolution now.
Also, the exhaustion. The exhaustion was real. I don't usually get that out of breath skating unless I'm doing Moves I know well at a pretty good clip, or those few occasions where I do 5+ waltz jumps one after the other or something. I usually do something, then take a moment to contemplate why it went wrong and how it can go better before trying again. Not this time. I was ready to fall over after all that.
It made me thankful that toe loops exist and are so much easier, especially since mine actually became a jump while I wasn't looking this week. Well, if I remember to bend my knee after the three turn; then I get into the air and I can feel my free leg swinging out and around as I land because I have real momentum, which is a very cool feeling. Toe loop-toe loop combinations are also less scary now that I can land the things more securely (yaaaaay new blade placement!).
*
( Agent Carter 1.05: Iron Curtain )
*
I went to an "Asian bistro" on the university side of campus for lunch yesterday (where I had a bowl of completely flavorless pho, ugh), and on the way saw a hawk of some stripe. It floated out of the sky onto a tree and then sat there for a while, tucking first one foot and then the other into its feathers (perhaps because it was 42 degrees at the time). I don't think it was a red-tailed hawk--although it might've been a lighter morph--but maybe a broad-winged or Cooper's?
P played with the positioning of my arms and legs on the entry edge and I finally manged to make it an entry with a hook instead of just an arc that keeps going and going and never actually turns into a jump. (Let me remind you, this is the jump "you just have to feeeeeeel" when it's right to actually move off the edge into the air.) Unfortunately, the entry wasn't into a jump so much as a stumble and a forward landing.
So in the last half hour, I decided I was going to get this to look like a jump. I'm pretty sure I did it 50+ times. It was like I was starring in one of those cheesy motivational commercials that has twenty fast cuts of some athlete or other doing the same thing over and over again until
And I will say this for those cheesy motivational commercials: The strategy is sound. By the fortieth or fiftieth mohawk-into-entry edge-into-stumble, I was able to get the hook--albeit scratchily, and too far onto my toe pick--and step through so that I landed mostly backwards. Depending on exactly where you pop off the toe pick, a Salchow is actually more of a 2/3- or 3/4-revolution jump than a full revolution (a fact which surprised me, given what you see on TV--it looks like they take off backwards, but in reality you take off...kind of halfway between forward and sideways). I probably have half a revolution now.
Also, the exhaustion. The exhaustion was real. I don't usually get that out of breath skating unless I'm doing Moves I know well at a pretty good clip, or those few occasions where I do 5+ waltz jumps one after the other or something. I usually do something, then take a moment to contemplate why it went wrong and how it can go better before trying again. Not this time. I was ready to fall over after all that.
It made me thankful that toe loops exist and are so much easier, especially since mine actually became a jump while I wasn't looking this week. Well, if I remember to bend my knee after the three turn; then I get into the air and I can feel my free leg swinging out and around as I land because I have real momentum, which is a very cool feeling. Toe loop-toe loop combinations are also less scary now that I can land the things more securely (yaaaaay new blade placement!).
*
( Agent Carter 1.05: Iron Curtain )
*
I went to an "Asian bistro" on the university side of campus for lunch yesterday (where I had a bowl of completely flavorless pho, ugh), and on the way saw a hawk of some stripe. It floated out of the sky onto a tree and then sat there for a while, tucking first one foot and then the other into its feathers (perhaps because it was 42 degrees at the time). I don't think it was a red-tailed hawk--although it might've been a lighter morph--but maybe a broad-winged or Cooper's?
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