My arms folded gently over my torso and my back arched as I spun, mesmerized by the light show on the ceiling. The lights on the ceiling! I was spinning and staring, transfixed, at the rafters of the Martinsville Community Arena. I was the one doing a layback. Surprised, I lurched upright and quickly edged out of the spin. For a few seconds, I stood in the center of the rink, disbelieving.
“Nice layback,” the other skater repeated.
“Thanks, Vijay,” I replied, still confused by the epiphany.
“When did Willa teach you that?”
“She didn’t. It just happened. Just now,” I babbled.
Vijay smiled broadly. “We all should be so lucky.”
I shyly looked away, afraid that my face had reddened with pride and embarrassment. Vijay did not have to hope for luck on the ice. An athletic man, he became interested in the sport when his wife decided to enroll their young daughter in a group lesson. Vijay decided to make a father-daughter night of the lesson and accompanied his child every week. The girl hated falling and coming home with a chilled wet backside, but her father could not get enough ice skating. After the group class concluded, Vijay continued with private lessons from Randall. He channeled athleticism previously devoted to jogging and tennis into figure skating. Since the Martinsville Arena opened in September only a few months before, Vijay had learned all of the basic singles. Easily the most naturally gifted skater I had ever met, Vijay was the lucky one; but he respected my determination and responded enthusiastically to the unexpected layback.
“Well, Kate,” he ventured. “Aren’t you going to try it again?”
“What?”
“The layback. Do another layback,” he demanded anxiously.
Already stepping into the spin, I muttered: “I probably won’t be able to repeat that miracle.”
“Nonsense!”
He was right. It was nonsense. I hit another layback, spinning smoothly in a draped position.
“Willa!” Vijay called as I continued to twirl. “Look at Kate’s layback!”
Willa had just finished a lesson with a teenage girl who did not skate particularly well. “My goodness,” she agreed in astonishment.
My instructor insisted that I perform another layback. She watched with both hands on her hips and one toe pick secured in the ice, like a master coach evaluating a competitive pupil. When I finished, she mimicked my pose, and it was not flattering. She leaned over with limp arms resembling a frail old woman, a depiction of my accidental layback. “Your arms are dangling and your free leg has drooped. Start the spin again.” Willa did not waste time dwelling on the improbability of me stumbling upon anything that remotely resembled the advanced and difficult layback. She merely set about cleaning up my technique as though I had been working on the spin for months. On my first day out, I had attained and surpassed the ‘better than nothing’ stage.
I stepped into a layback and draped my arms over my chest, as before.
“Upward, Kate! Reach upward. Extend your arms. Stretch!”
From the corner of my eye, I could see Willa reaching for the ceiling in demonstration. I lifted my arms and raised them skyward. “Higher!” I heard her demand. My arms stretched until they extended straight upward. The stereotypical image of a female skater performing a layback features a curved arm position where the limbs form a circle above an arched torso. Willa wanted me to stretch which provided the desirable side effect of keeping my free leg high and extended. If a skater is unable to achieve the curved free leg pose of a textbook layback, she wanted the leg straight and almost parallel to the ice with the toe pointed outward. The backbend naturally directs the free leg slightly behind the body. Just as she despised squat spins, angular laybacks incorporating a bent free leg with the knee and toe pointed toward the ice, repulsed Willa. Far too many of these atrocities find their way into the highest levels of competition. I may not have been ready for a curved free leg or ballerina arms, but Willa declared my layback ‘pretty’, none the less.
“Congratulations, Kate. That is a pretty layback,” she announced, satisfied with the modifications.
Although I had completed several laybacks, the experience left me dumbfounded. While taking group lessons at the Arctic Circle almost two years before, I watched a young lady about eighteen years old performing a perfect layback with beautiful arm and leg positions. I coveted the spin but concluded that a layback was beyond my capabilities, possibly forever. Yet, I admired the spin wishing to learn it someday, the same someday reserved for the equally improbably axel. Here I stood in the presence of friends after performing a layback that my coach labeled as pretty. A dream had come true that evening. I achieved a fantastic goal on the ice. I owned the layback spin and the possibilities for improvement seemed limitless. I wanted to cry and jump for joy at the same time.
I attribute my unforeseen success with the layback to Willa’s instruction. Her lessons with the hooked camel and L-spin led naturally to the layback, so naturally that the spin happened on its own as soon as my body was primed for the challenge. My coach set high standards for me. Even though she became frustrated with my jumping problems, she focused on edgework to improve my foundation skills. While I did not immediately reap rewards in the jumping category, these exercises improved my overall capacity on the ice, making more difficult elements possible. She accepted poor sit spins no more readily from an adult than from a young competitor. She banished ugly leg and arm arrangements from my layback immediately, fashioning a spin that bolstered my confidence. Given my apparent limitations, Willa expected good skating from me. Her coaching knowledge combined with my persistence ultimately produced good skating, better than I ever expected.
Over the years, I would develop my layback from its larval stage into a senior caliber spin. I never fell into the unsightly free leg trap but always extended the leg straight or curved it, creating two distinct variations. I experimented with a variety of arm positions eventually achieving the rounded ballet pose. On that fateful day, I discovered what would become my best move; a layback that could rival those performed by champions. Even though Willa said it was pretty, I had years of work to invest in its evolution. Although the layback occurred by accident, it was not easy for me to learn to perform any trick on ice skates. My most natural talent involved spinning, but transforming that talent into expertise required years of practice and countless hours of instruction. But being a good spinner and commanding the attention of everyone in virtually any rink with my layback has been well worth the effort. I may never land a triple jump, but few triple-jumping prodigies can match my ability to spin while hanging upside down.
Stephanie and I sat side by side in the warm lobby of the Martinsville Community Center unlacing our skates.
Stephanie could not do a layback. After months of effort, her version looked like a strained, painful backbend that survived one or two rotations before grinding to a stop on the toe pick. Like many skaters, the combination of balancing on the blade’s rocker while leaning backward eluded Stephanie.
“Did I see you doing layback tonight, Kate?” my friend asked.
Looking up from toweling my blades, I replied as humbly as possible:
“Yes. Yes, you did.”
Layback? I mused. Who’s doing a layback?
Chapter 27 posted 3/15/01
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