More adventures in the Alpha class
Jul. 27th, 2013 02:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
icepixieD'oh! Fell on my butt doing a two-foot turn on a hockey circle this morning. On the other hand, I learned the correct shoulder placement for said turns, so there's something to be said for that, I guess.
The whole lesson was kind of an exercise in two steps forward, one step back. My crossovers improved, and I got faster at them...and then the instructor happened to mention that more-advanced crossovers actually include a second push from the trailing foot. Crap. I can get a tapping motion going, but a push is way beyond me. I think I really need to bend my knees more (again, sigh). Oh well, at least the ones we're doing now will pass me through Alpha if I can get a consistent rhythm going. As an unexpected bonus, my hip exercises for PT are strengthening exactly the muscles used in skating and crossovers in particular, so I'm having an easier time holding up the trailing foot long enough to not catch my toepick on the ice. Always good!
My forward stroking feels prettier now that I'm really concentrating on pointing my foot (and now that my Achilles tendons don't hurt from being poked at by the physical therapist). My backwards stroking is still sad, but right at the end of the practice session I think I made a breakthrough: You have to push on the inside edge on that little kick after the half-swizzle. And I just read on my favorite skating forum that someone does theirs while doing Latin hip motion, and YES, YES, THAT MAKES TOTAL SENSE TO ME AND I SEE HOW IT WOULD WORK. So I'll try that this week.
In other news, I broke 40,000 words on the not!drawerfic. Sweet. Onward to at least 41,000 this weekend. I think I'm not quite halfway to the end. Goal is to finish a rough draft by the end of 2013.
The whole lesson was kind of an exercise in two steps forward, one step back. My crossovers improved, and I got faster at them...and then the instructor happened to mention that more-advanced crossovers actually include a second push from the trailing foot. Crap. I can get a tapping motion going, but a push is way beyond me. I think I really need to bend my knees more (again, sigh). Oh well, at least the ones we're doing now will pass me through Alpha if I can get a consistent rhythm going. As an unexpected bonus, my hip exercises for PT are strengthening exactly the muscles used in skating and crossovers in particular, so I'm having an easier time holding up the trailing foot long enough to not catch my toepick on the ice. Always good!
My forward stroking feels prettier now that I'm really concentrating on pointing my foot (and now that my Achilles tendons don't hurt from being poked at by the physical therapist). My backwards stroking is still sad, but right at the end of the practice session I think I made a breakthrough: You have to push on the inside edge on that little kick after the half-swizzle. And I just read on my favorite skating forum that someone does theirs while doing Latin hip motion, and YES, YES, THAT MAKES TOTAL SENSE TO ME AND I SEE HOW IT WOULD WORK. So I'll try that this week.
In other news, I broke 40,000 words on the not!drawerfic. Sweet. Onward to at least 41,000 this weekend. I think I'm not quite halfway to the end. Goal is to finish a rough draft by the end of 2013.
