A solid start

Welcome to my new skating blog!

As you can probably tell by the title, I am, indeed, a figure skating newbie and this is to trace my progress in learning this rather deceptively difficult sport. I first started lessons at the end of July this year in order to achieve two goals: the first to improve my appallingly bad sense of balance & co-ordination whilst getting much need physical exercise. The second was to give myself something completely non-music-nerd-related in contrast to my community band/music performance-saturated life. I think I'm improving in both cases. I have been learning now for 10 weeks and I can tell you, amazingly, that I AM improving. What I mean by improving is that I can now stand upright. :)

I have learned three things so far, in addition to the basics of ice skating technique.

a) Hire skates are rubbish. I have weird shaped feet, one considerably larger than the other, that sit uncomfortably in between the two hire skate sizes. I have tried the better white ones rather than the 'one foot shape for all' blue monstrosities but still no luck and I have two large welts that are turning into callouses just above my ankles to prove it. My ultimate aim is to buy a pair but I can't afford a good quality pair at present and I'm not prepared to buy cheapies just for the sake of it. So I have to settle for wearing plastic boxes on my feet for at least another few months.

b) Competitive figure skating, evidently, is pretty nasty and bitchy. Comments like 'my daughter lost FIVE kilos this month! How much did yours lose?' and 'Your tights are the wrong shade of beige' are apparently common place in this sport. I've been at the rink at least once a week for the past term and there are some skaters that see us there every week and yet not even a smile from them, even though I always smile at them. There is a pod of selfishness at this place that I notice each week i.e. more elite skaters getting on to the small rink straight after it has been swept (usually straight before the beginner class) and tearing the shit out of the ice by jumping, spinning and hockey-stopping on the surface before the newbies, who can't even stand upright, get on there. They have their own rink allocated to them for that session but they do it all the time anyway. Hmph!

c) Public sessions for practice are a nightmare - I don't want to go back again! You can't practice there at all without being told off, even in the centre of the large ice. And the surface is so bad, it's an accident waiting to happen. Private practice sessions are usually at a terrible time (before business hours are over) so they are difficult to get to and since I am not yet freestyle level, we can only use the crowded small ice. Wednesday nights sessions are particularly bad due to the learn to skate classes on at the same time.

With all that said, I really enjoy the lessons and I like and respect our coach. He's very nice, supportive and relaxed and I have learned lots in the last term so far from him. So far, we have learned the following:

a) Forward and backward swizzles - both I am getting better at, the more I practice.
b) Two foot and one foot glides - although the latter, I still can only do for a few secs on my right foot. It also doesn't help that the rink surface is sometimes like skating on corrugated iron.
c) Forward slaloms - I find these easy since that was the way that I could naturally move forward before I started learning. I could imagine that you could hurt your knees a lot doing this all the time though.
d) Backward wiggles - not too good at this. I can't shake my butt very well! I think I need to practice that Zumba more often! :)
d) Forward stroking - not so bad at this. This seems the most straight forward of all the things we've learned.
e) Forward crossovers - this is something I truly suck at, partly due to the fact that the too-large skate I have on wobbles around when I move. I am generally okay in a counter-clockwise direction (except for a tendency to forget to shift weight properly and/or bend my knees) but after a fall on the clockwise direction which resulted in two very sore black knees, I have lost confidence moving this direction and I'm struggling.
f) Backward stroking-like move. 'D' shape with one foot. I think this was in preparation to start us on backward crossovers, but I can't even do a backward swizzle faster than a snail yet so not sure how I'm gonna go with this.

I'm sick this week so I'm having a week off but I'm hoping that in the near future, I will be able to fit in at least a couple of practices a week so that I can master this damn skill! Somehow I don't think I'm the next Michelle Kwan but at least I'm not spending half my time bathing my ass in ice each week anymore! :)