January 2004
Week of January 4, 2004
Sticker Shock
I did not skate over the holidays because my husband and I went on yet another cruise. This time we sampled five Caribbean islands. It was a lovely vacation, and I was able to enjoy more exercise than usual. The ship offered a wide assortment of excellent aerobics classes. I averaged two classes per day and supplemented this routine with walking and swimming. Unfortunately, upon returning home, my regular aerobics class was cancelled this week due to installation of a new gym floor. Next week, I will dive back into aerobics and possibly try an ice skating public session or two. A new public session has been added to the schedule for Friday afternoon that I could comfortably attend after work. Hopefully it will not be a zoo.
I got back to the rink after a three-week holiday absence. The ice felt unusually smooth and fast, the quality I prefer but rarely experience. After becoming accustomed to the pleasant sensation, I skated through a few moves patterns and dance skills before playing with spins and jumps. I spent more time on jumps than usual, experimenting with faster skating into lutzes and half-lutzes. My new and more effective lutz formula involves movements similar to a backward swing roll. Upon shooting into the lefty lutz corner, my free leg reaches forward then swings smoothly into picking position in one continuous motion. Without hesitation, my skating knee bends and the free toe picks the ice launching a lutz jump. This approach maintains speed and flow. It also minimizes flutzing by essentially eliminating the time spent in limbo poised to pick but waiting for some internal signal to instigate the process.
After the session, I spoke the skating director about lessons. She told me she charges eighty-nine dollars per hour! I nearly succumbed to sticker shock. While a skating mom told me this woman is among the best coaches in the state and has taken children to regionals, I am not convinced she is worth that kind of money, at least not for my needs. Cynthia, my most recent coach held gold medals (passed USFSA senior tests) in freestyle, dance and figures. With over thirty years of experience, she has taken many children to regionals. Now semi-retired, she enjoys keeping her blades on the ice by training adults. Cynthia charged about twenty-five dollars per hour less than this skating director. Geoff, a former world class and Olympic competitor, also charged approximately the same fee as Cynthia. I find it difficult to believe this other woman has more to offer than Cynthia or Geoff, especially since she does not teach dance.
Regardless, I told her I would call during the week. I mulled the price over while driving home and decided I cannot afford her fee. Since I am only skating one freestyle per week and maybe a public, I cannot justify the expense. I simply lack sufficient practice time to make such exclusive lessons a sensible investment. However, I will call her and ask if she can recommend an alternative, maybe someone who teaches dance. I might sample a few coaches before choosing one. Apparently this woman is the best available at this rink, but maybe a secondary option will suit both my needs and my budget.
Week of January 11, 2004
Used Skates
At the roller rink, I complained to a coach that I still do not have proper equipment and am skating on my rockered inlines. I discussed the pros and cons of these skates with a few people who have seen them worn in specialized events at roller skating competitions. One elderly coach with an impressive resume claimed he knows kids who can spin on them, but none are able to spin well. “They may be designed to simulate ice skates,” he stated, “but they aren’t ice skates.” I could not agree more. I am an excellent ice spinner, but to save my life, can barely squeak out one sloppy rotation on my inlines.
Upon hearing my desperate cries for quad dance plates and wheels, and my tales of woe about merchants who will not return my phone calls or email messages, a coach produced a pair of boots with plates and wheels attached that she wanted to sell. The plates (the chassis that allows the wheels to turn as well as attaches them to the sole of the boot) are my size and will make a lovely addition to my most recently retired pair of custom boots. Unfortunately, the session will not be held next weekend, but the following week, I will get my skates assembled and begin my odyssey as a roller dancer.
I enjoyed the session on my inlines and made several important mental notes. Many ice skaters pooh-pooh roller sports as a poor relation to ice skating, a meager substitute, the clumsy pounding of too many wheels on a room temperature surface. I maintain these people are sadly mistaken. The beauty of roller dance aside, roller skating offers a very valuable benefit to the adult skater. Pushing and generating speed on wheels is much more rigorous than on ice. To accelerate and glide effectively, a deep knee bend applying pressure to the floor is absolutely necessary. Quadriceps and glutes start to ache from the effort. However, the skater who persists will overcome and develop power and stamina. By the end of the session, I flew around the rink in smooth fluid, dance steps; skating as fast as my young, roller-trained contemporaries. I moved to the corny roller dance music, keeping time to the beat with chassé drills.
Next time I step on the ice, it will seem effortless by comparison. The stroking force used to propel myself across the wooden floor on wheels will essentially launch me into orbit around the ice arena. I strongly recommend roller skating to any ice skater who wants to improve speed, strength and stamina. The results are amazing.
Week of January 11, 2004; Part Two
Snow Day
The magic phone call came at five o’clock this morning. I work in public education, and the school where I am employed closed because of a snow storm. I planned to take the four-wheel drive to the rink if at all possible to make the most of this unexpected freedom. By midmorning, the snow subsided and the sun came out revealing a beautiful blue sky. My husband shoveled the driveway and brushed the accumulation off our cars. He decided to take me to the rink so we could go out for sushi afterward.
I enjoyed an hour of unimpeded skating ecstasy. The place was almost empty. I circled the hard fast ice in swing rolls of various flavors and completed a few moves patterns. I also enjoyed spinning and did several jumps. The loop remains my favorite along with the stag half-lutz. Due to greatly reduced practice time, these are the only two jumps whose quality I have been able to maintain. While I can still complete the others, their prior magnitude exists only in my memory and tales of former glory. However, if I ever have the opportunity to add a couple more worthwhile hours to my regular practice schedule, I could regain command of these skills.
Halfway through the session, people began to arrive. They had apparently also removed snow from their vehicles in order to treat their children to an ice skating session. This happened suddenly as though a group consciousness triggered a skating epidemic. Soon little kids darted around the previously empty rink, spoiling the open space I filled with flying camels and scratch spins. It was time to go, time to change my clothes and head for the sushi restaurant.
I used to skate three or four sessions each week and logged up to eleven hours of ice time. My ability reached a peak of excellence, and I worked on difficult jumps, almost mastering them. Now I am lucky to skate twice weekly, with an additional session on wheels. Very often, I only skate once. Today was a luxury, an unexpected gift from the deity that watches over deprived skating fanatics. I treasured it in a way that was not imaginable when I took ice time for granted.
My husband noted improvement in my basic skating skills. He said I am skating faster with better flow. I spent many hours on dance last season. This season, all of my roller time is focused on dance elements since I cannot spin or jump worth a hill of beans on my inlines. Sadly, he also acknowledged a significant decrease in the speed of my camels. In the past, my camels (including the flying variety) rivaled those we witnessed at senior regional competitions. While my position remains attractive, they are not as fast. While I appreciate his honesty and am conscious of this deterioration, hearing it voiced confirmed the very real possibility that I may never skate regularly again. Yet, I can only feel slightly depressed. I had a good day and am still a better skater than most hobbyists can hope to become. I have sacrificed in the freestyle area but improved as a dancer. Presently, my goal is to cover the ice with speed, grace, and confidence; and to get my spins back to an impressive caliber.
Week of January 18, 2004
Skating Toward a Crossroads
I am approaching a crossroads in my skating saga. I have been skating as an adult in a fairly serious manner for almost twelve years. During that time, I have taken some breaks and had a few lulls for various reasons. I am presently in the midst of such a lull. Since I have returned to fulltime employment, skating sessions are hard to find. The new rink near my home offers one hour of freestyle per week on Saturday mornings. I attend that session regularly and have hit a couple of publics after work. These are generally very crowded.
This morning, I went to the rink for a public session since I had the day off, as do many adults and children for Martin Luther King Day. The place was a madhouse. A new sign has been installed near the entrance to the ice surface stating the following: “No freestyle will be allowed during public sessions. The center is reserved for lessons or people with special permission. No backward or fast skating.” That really stinks. Of course, a couple of kids were taking beginner lessons in the middle, so I could not commandeer it for myself. The rink was a zoo of stumbling clods clinging to rusty steel walkers. In my opinion, these are more dangerous than beneficial. They give the user a false sense of security, permitting a person who cannot stand up on skates to forge across the rink in random patterns, ultimately collapsing between the metal supports and occasionally hitting himself in the head. I skated for about forty minutes and left in a funk.
With only an hour of decent ice time available each week, I wonder about the future of my skating. Undoubtedly my skills will erode regardless of keeping in shape with aerobic exercise and a weekly roller session. Ice simply is not available to me right now. However, roller skating club sessions are. If I disciplined myself, I could enjoy up to nine hours of floor time each week. Of course, this would require waking up very early on weekends and going out one evening per week, a evening that naturally conflicts with one of the two aerobics classes I can attend. If I were really determined, I could roller skate early Saturday morning and drive straight to the ice rink to catch the freestyle session. That is probably more running around than I can handle.
Once I get involved in roller dance lessons, I may have to make the decision I have often contemplated. Would I continue to ice skate if good sessions are not available? Right now I am not sure.
Sunday January 25, 2004
On Frozen Pond
The weather has been cold lately and very bitter when the wind blows. However, this cold snap is ideal for producing outdoor ice whether on a pond or in a backyard rink. I live in an area with many ponds, some man-made, others natural. However, my town offers no legal skating on public land. I often drive past a community with a small private lake. Next to what the residents enthusiastically call a beach in the summertime, a space has been meticulously cleared for skating. I have seen children and adults on it almost every afternoon. Many people who own “lakefront” property on this small water feature have cleared rinks just beyond the shoreline. Someday I would like to live in a lake community or have a big and flat enough backyard to build my own personal rink. It would not have to be huge, just a decent spin space where I can play with basic elements. I would not expect to complete dance or moves patterns, but spinning can be done in a limited area, as evidenced by center ice practice during a crowded public session.
My husband heard about an outdoor rink in another town from a coworker. Today we went for a drive. There it stood: black ice, alone in an expanse of blown snow. No one was skating. There was no one in the park but a man walking a dog. We walked carefully over the ice toward the sacred area. I rubbed the sole of my shoe over the dark slippery surface. I walked on it, exploring its texture and deformities. My husband looked at me quizzically. He probably expected me to turn up my freestyle nose at this miserable excuse for a rink. However, I returned to the car and carried my beautiful custom skates to the edge of the prepared zone. I sat atop a windshield reflector in the snow lacing my boots. I took baby steps through the border of snowdrifts and placed a tentative blade on the unfamiliar ice as though I had never skated before. It felt different, imperfect, magical.
Swizzling cautiously, I avoided fractures where the ice had heaved and cracked. I memorized the position of a stalagmite formed from packed snow. Eventually, after a few beginnerish turns and strokes, I began to skate. I centered a scratch spin that should have only been possible on Zambonied ice. Confident, I proceeded to a layback, a camel, a backward camel, and a deep sit spin. Passersby honked car horns at me. I apparently was an unusual sight twirling like a pro on this tiny park rink.
I skated longer than originally expected, enjoying the sensation of real ice, the type of ice that first inspired some centuries-dead genius to invent skating. I appreciated the difficulties faced by early skaters who performed all of their stunts on outdoor ice, limited by its inherent characteristics and the moodiness of climate. My blades did not cut in effectively, but often skittered across the surface, losing purchase and making a loop jump a foolish proposition. However, I landed several waltz jumps, enjoying the fabled spring of natural ice. I left behind a palette of remarkable spin tracings as evidence of my presence.
Week of January 25, 2003 Snow Day, Take Two
Only two weeks have passed since my last snow day. Again, I used this found time to make up for lost skating. When the snow subsided, I drove to the rink. Not a soul was in the building but a man at the counter. And it basically stayed that way for most of the two hour session. Some workers came through fiddling with this or that and a couple of hockey players invaded the rink across the lobby, but nobody disturbed me. Only during the last fifteen minutes of the session did I have to share the ice with a woman and her two young children. None of them could skate, so they stayed close to the boards, providing no inconvenience or obstacle.
This was paradise, absolute heaven on ice! I have not had such marvelous skating since I called in sick to work. Now that quality skating is a rarity, I must admit, I appreciate it far more than ever before. I had the most wonderful time in that rink, all alone skating without interruption. Lively music from the seventies played on the loudspeakers, although I tried to count proper beats for dance practice. For the first time since last spring, I made an honest attempt at the Hickory Hoedown, a dance I never really mastered. I did not bother with the last two dances I learned last June, The Willow Waltz and Ten Fox. I barely memorized the steps and did not want to squander precious time stumbling through movements I have little hope of improving in the near future.
My best dance of the day was the Cha-Cha, probably because I practice it at the roller rink on my inlines. All of that roller skating has translated into faster ice skating. Even my Hickory Hoedown consumed too much ice, and I had to slow down to concentrate on placement. Most adult skaters worry about filling the rink. Thanks to roller skating, I consciously avoid slamming into the walls.
Although I rarely jump on inlines except for a tiny waltz jump or pitiful half-flip, roller skating has improved other ice jumps. I have started to attack the split jump, gaining more air distance and hopefully a better split pose. While I have always enjoyed the stag half-lutz, it has new vigor. I fly into the lutz corner, with my free leg sweeping seamlessly into position, picking and launching without hesitation.
Recently my husband commented on the inevitable deterioration of my spins, the forward camel in particular. My blades need to be sharpened. My camel entrance edge skids a little, indicating the blade has lost precision. However, I hit several good camels, punctuating the better ones with a combination or two forward illusions. My back camel is unusually stable and secure, and I centered many truly good ones from various approaches. I concluded an exciting series of stars with a flying camel that centered so beautifully, it readily inverted for five confident upside down revolutions.
If I had two days per week to skate on a regular basis, I could maintain my skills and build upon them. Hopefully, another acceptable practice session will materialize this spring once the hockey season ends and people lose interest in the ice in favor of warm weather outdoor activities.
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