2021 Updates

February

February 1st

Had a snow day and didn't have any sweethearts dance practice. Originally asked my parents to go to the noon public skating but then my dad suggested doing a "trial run" of the Junior Club, got to see what the Junior Club was like. Instead of having the LTS usual of over 40 skaters on the ice at a time, in the Junior Club there were only 8 (including 2 coaches and also including me) total skaters on the ice. In the LTS, we had to stay in one section of the rink during the instructional time but in the Junior Club, we were able to use the entire rink and only had to make sure we didn't run into anyone and make sure we don't get in anyone's way. We did more advanced versions of forward edges and more advanced forward half swizzle pumps then we practiced lunges, basic/traditional spirals, three turns, spins, and I started learning the waltz jump. I found that I really liked it, even more than the LTS because my coach/instructor is able to push me a little more. After talking to my dad, the decision was made to finish out the current set of lessons and then switch over to the Junior Club (First official Junior Club practice will be on February 15th, 2021)

February 6th

So I went to my 2nd to last Saturday morning LTS Basics 1 to 6 lesson. My LTS instructor, who will be the Junior Club coach, said that she's excited/happy for when I start the Junior Club! Can't wait!

Today I worked on backward edges, backward crossovers, forward outside three turns, lunges (I kind of did it the one time but this still needs a ton of work), and hockey stops (which my LTS instructor said that I'll never use in figure skating). I'm able to do the forward outside three turns on both feet though I'll need to work on holding the backward inside edge longer than what I've been doing which is usually a second or less.

My checking (basically a fancy way of saying "gracefully stopping the rotation of a jump or a spin") out of my two foot spins have been even better than I've done them before. I'm able to hold the checking position a lot longer than I used to be able to and I'm actually stopping my rotation compared to back when I first started learning the checking a spin about a month and a half ago.

February 7th

So I took my one friend "skating" yesterday but the most she did was stand at the doors on the ice holding the wall and then decided she was done (And there was like a full 1 hour and 20 minutes left of the public skating that she didn't even try to go further. She asked my crush for help on skating on the Facebook group chat because he wasn't going but she literally took none of his advice, which was really good advice, and listened only to her fear), well that was a waste of my dad's $8 that could've been used by someone who would've actually either tried skating (taking one of my other braver friends) or would've been skating the whole time (my one other friend who's gone skating with me multiple times or my crush could've also used the spot).

If you don't know about my crush, yes I have one on a figure skater that I met at the ice arena (We've known that we existed since February 2020 but we didn't actually talk/meet and get to know each other until middle of August 2020). He started skating around the same age as me (which was about 4 years ago) and he also does motorbike racing. I find that I REALLY like him (for who he is now) and I find that he's one of the most mature guys that I've ever had a crush on (plus I've never heard/seen him say/type out cuss words and/or swear). I'm waiting for God's approval on my crush and I dating in several months (Basically letting God tell my crush when it's time to ask me out if my crush and I are meant to be together). His personality type is an INFJ while mine is an ESFJ (16personalities). I have an INFJ female friend that I'm best friends with and she thinks that he's got a crush on me (I'd cross fingers but that seems to always bring me bad luck lol).

February 8th

Only 1 more week until my very first official Junior Club practice!

February 13th

I officially passed the Basic 5! There is a snow storm coming on Monday that supposed to be all day but we won't 100% for sure know if the storm will actually hit us or if it'll miss us or not be as bad as the weather people say. If there's no storm, then today was my last Saturday Learn To Skate basic lesson. Onto a new chapter (hopefully this coming Monday) of my skating life/hobby/timeline!

February 15th

The weather was good enough at the beginning to go to the Junior Club (I drove and my dad came along). We did more complex versions of the basic skills and edges, lunges, spirals, bunny hops (you can look up what the bunny hops look like in figure skating terms), and worked on the skills for the pre-free skate. I started working on mohawks (no, not the hairstyle mohawks, the figure skating terms mohawk. You can look it up and see what it looks like) which I'll need to do some flexibility work but I'm super close to having it down. My forward crossovers going counter clockwise are really improving because the 2nd push, the push under, is starting to actually happen and my clockwise forward crossovers will still need tons of work. My lunges (literally just skating forwards on the ice and doing a forward lunge which is much easier said than done because the one skate literally is dragging behind you as you are still gliding forwards) are really starting to improve, especially on the one side.

February 19th

I had a "Remote Learning" day for school so I went to a public skating session at was from 12:pm to 1:30pm. Nice thing is that there were only about 12 others compared to the 40+ others at the previous public skating sessions that I've been to that were in the evening. I need more room as I'm learning things that take up more than just a simple circle or area so thankfully it wasn't too crazy crowded. It was very productive and I made a good amount of progress. I'm finally getting comfortable enough with my forward crossovers on the one direction to be able to do them without needing to hold my arms out for extra balance, I'm able to do a more advanced version of the backward crossover pretty well on the one side (video to show backward crossovers both the one I first learned and the more advanced version), the spirals on my bad side have gotten a lot better (still not as good as my other side but way better than it used to be before today), my lunge on my one side is way better than before, got some really nice advanced edge work going (getting a hang of most of the more advanced edge drills), my "fancy footwork" sequence has so much improved (called chasses), bunny hops have really improved (video showing what both the side toe hop and the bunny hop should look like ), got some really nice one foot spins in (managed 3 revolutions/spins today compared to my previous 1 or 2), and I've got one of the Pre-free skate skills down pretty well (two backward crossovers into landing position).

February 22nd

Had another successful Junior Club practice! Got to learn Mazurka, attempt backward spirals, continued to add more advanced movements/positions to some of the basic skills (forward crossovers where I hold the crossing position and "push" with my back leg, having arms over head during two foot spins to increase speed). I also continued working on one foot spins, the waltz jump, lunges, and forward spirals all of which are coming along really nicely.

I'm still amazed at how far I've made it in only my 13/14 months of experience in skating!

March

March 5th

I tried rollerblading tonight just for fun as there was no public skating at the ice arena. Some of my basic skating forward ice skating skills helped me skate forward in the rollerblades. The stopping is different between ice skating and rollerblading and my body's instinct was to stop the way that I do in ice skating but I had to keep on reminding myself that I wasn't ice skating. I fell a few times but none were that bad compared to some of my falls in ice skating (my worst ice skating falls were where I was doing a waltz jump and wasn't able to stick the landing and fell on my behind and I had some black spots for a little bit and needed to skate around before I finally recovered and the other fall was a few months ago when I was doing a backward one foot glide and fell backwards and nearly rolled up onto my head). In terms of the environment and music playing, I definitely preferred the ice arena to the roller skating rink (think of a place where you'd find people who cuss and smoke. That's what the place's environment felt like). The staff at the roller skating rink were kind of gruff (Not friendly whatsoever and cussed a bunch). So I definitely have to say that if I were to go rollerblading again, I'd find a different place to go. But as figure skating is my main skating sport and I'm taking figure skating lessons, I put that in front of any other kind of skating so I'm not sure when I'd next get the chance to go rollerblading again.