Adult Gold moves in the field: Passed

Tags

moves in the field, testing

I took my Gold moves test this weekend, and I was the most uncertain I’ve ever felt going into a test. A few complicators popped up at the last minute, but the main one was my fault for thinking that the test date was the last weekend of the month, and then finding out on Thursday that it was actually in three days!

Apparently the club tests on the fourth Sunday of the month, not the last Sunday; the last time I tested happened to be both the fourth and the last Sunday of the month. The club tests every month so they don’t announce the test dates in advance; they just assume you know the rules, and send out the test date schedule a few days before the day. So all this time I thought I had more time, and then suddenly test day was upon me. On top of that, I’ve been moving places so I hadn’t been skating much lately; I figured I would focus on moving homes first, and then really buckle down and practice the last week leading into the test. HA. HA. Ha… Joke’s on me!

I’ve been working on Gold moves for a while so I wasn’t completely unready. But I hadn’t yet got to that place where I could skate the test clean in one full run-through with no mistakes, even though I was capable of doing each element without mistakes. So my confidence was not there, plus I had that extra bit of panic for not having as much practice time as I thought I would. I seriously thought about scratching the test, supposing that I had about a fifty-fifty chance of passing. But then I figured, well, if I skipped the test altogether, that’s throwing away a chance to pass.

Working on Gold moves in the field

Tags

moves in the field, testing

After I passed my Pre-Bronze tests and was therefore able to work on programs and compete, I haven’t been in much of a hurry to take my tests. I usually defer to my coaches as to when I’m ready, and even when they think I am, I want to wait longer because testing is enough of a hassle (time, expense, emotional anxiety) that I don’t want to risk failing, in which case I have to repeat the whole process all over again.

I talked to my coach about the possibility of moving up to Silver for freeskate next year, but she was fairly hesitant about that idea. She feels that Silver is competitive and crowded, and felt I might be better off competing at Bronze again. I was a little disappointed since I wanted to move up to Silver, and I know that I still could push for it, but it’s not only that I want to skate in the Silver category; I want to be good enough that my coach thinks I am ready for Silver, and as of right now she doesn’t.

So I decided to focus more on the Gold moves in the field, and in contrast to freeskate, my coach does think I’m going to be able to test this year. I’d started working on this test before my surgery, but it took a while to work my way back up to the Silver/Gold moves after I returned. My moves coach has been encouraging me to test this summer, and thinks I’m at passing level on most of the moves and getting close on the weaker ones. Mostly, that’s the backward circle 8, and I feel like once I can consistently get all of the circles around, I will be ready to test. Currently, I’m sometimes able to get all the way around, but many times I’ll fall just a bit short on one or two of the circles. So I’m working on more power on the pushes, and a smoother glide.

Forward and backward double threes are pretty good. I’m at the stage where I can do them consistently, and the struggle comes in doing them with power and smoothness, so that there’s no jerky motion that comes from forcing the turn. My coach wants smooth ice dancey turns, with no lurching or breaking of position. I’ve been working on increasing the speed, too, because I know there’s a big emphasis on power and speed at the Gold level.

Brackets are coming along. As with the double threes, I’m working to make them look effortless and smooth, with no toe scraping or balance checks. More speed would be nice, too.

I think power circles are at passing level, although my coach would like for me to push that top speed, and to look less tentative. Forward crossovers at top speed still scare me, but I’m working on at least not letting it show!

The benefits of comparison

Tags

competition, IJS scoring, programs

I was on Youtube recently (…in that I am on Youtube every day, procrastinating) and saw a few skating videos pop up in my recommended videos list, and realized that an account had uploaded a whole slew of programs from Adult Internationals in Vancouver from last summer. I fell down the rabbit hole of watching video after video, and then realized that Adult Internationals had posted the protocols of every single program from the event. Score! (Literally! Har har.)

Which meant that I could pull up all of the score sheets alongside the Youtube videos and follow along element by element. It was illuminating and incredibly motivating, because the event used IJS scoring, so not only could you see the placements, you could see exactly how well the judges deemed every element performed, and how strong their skating skills and other program component scores added up. (Here’s the Youtube channel; you can get the protocols here.)

I’ve done something similar in past years by looking up Adult Nationals videos on Ice Network (example: this link starts out with the 2016 Adult Nationals videos) and comparing them to the results, but since the event is scored on the 6.0 system for lower levels, all we get are ordinals. Still very helpful, but it was exciting to see the Vancouver protocols and see what my event category looked like — what jumps are being landed? What kind of GOE is standard? What’s the PCS range for bronze ladies in my age group? For instance, a salchow with zero GOE shows me what a standard, acceptable salchow looks like, compared to one with negative GOE that may have had a two-foot landing, or scratchy exit, or a stumble.

That also made me realize that while I feel like I could technically test for silver freeskate within the year (in that I could probably perform the elements at a minimum level), I don’t need to be in a rush to move up to silver because I’m not all that competitive in bronze yet. For instance, I saw that almost every layback spin attempt wasn’t given credit as a layback, and instead got called an UprightSpB — and some didn’t even net upright spin points and got the dreaded dash of doom. Same with sit spints — many ladies had them in their programs, but many weren’t credited at all because they weren’t low enough. Or they had asterisks next to them indicating that some portion of a combo didn’t meet the requirements (I’m guessing it didn’t hit the minimum revolutions). And in the bronze ladies, the PCS scores ranged from about 1.25 to 2.75, with the majority in the upper 1’s. Skaters who scored 2’s were, to my eyes, pretty darn good with flow and speed.

So I’m revising my goal to competing at bronze again, and getting some amount of points for every element attempted. I’d love to add +GOEs and PCS in the 2’s as additional goals, but I think that’s still a way off from where I am, so I’ll stick to that initial goal for the moment. I haven’t decided whether or not that’ll entail new programs, but I have a few months to put things together and get working!

Final thoughts about Sectionals

Tags

Adult Sectionals, competition, programs

Some additional thoughts post-Sectionals regarding my performances, competing in general, and whatever else (plus video):

Before taking the ice, when dealing with nerves it has never helped me to remember “Bend your knees” (even though it should — I just always forget it promptly) but it did help tremendously to remind myself at every step, “Take your time. Slow down. Don’t rush.”

Sadly, you can never practice for the nerves. Amazing how once second you can be fine, and the next second the nerves can hit and render you almost immobile.

On the upside, competing does get better the more I do it. Each time I’ve stepped onto the ice, I feel a little less sick to my stomach and terrified, which is promising. Not that I’ll ever NOT feel nerves, but it’s comforting to know it gets better.

Also, competing is so much more about dealing with when things don’t go according to plan than it is about doing things perfectly as planned. In practices, I’m focused on doing things exactly as they were meant to be done, but once you’re on the ice the smallest detail can throw you! In my warm-up for the dramatic program I was marking through all the elements and their placements, and I totally mixed up the ends of the rink and got confused, which I never do. I make it a point to do my programs in both directions at my home rink so that it doesn’t throw me off when I’m elsewhere, but all it takes is a split-second and you’re lost. Quick recovery is the name of the game.

Adult Sectionals: Day 2 (Bronze free skate)

Tags

Adult Sectionals, competition, programs

On to Day 2!

After my dramatic program on Friday, I stuck around to watch the other events for most of the mid-morning (bronze and silver dramatic programs), then headed home and crashed super-early that evening. I was wiped out from the sheer effort of getting up so early, plus the nerves of competing, and then the aftermath of the adrenaline crash. On the upside, it helped me get a decent night of sleep, which I hadn’t gotten the night before.

I was grateful not to have to wake up as early on Saturday, so I had a bit more time to get ready, then headed to a rink nearby the competition for a freestyle session. That rink was an utter zoo, with the regulars out in full force and the many Sectionals adult skaters on top of that. It was the kind of freestyle where it takes a lot of circling and waiting to find an opening to jump, where you’re constantly thinking someone might run into you, and where you feel like trying too hard will get you injured. So I just stayed long enough to get warmed up and feel the ice, then cut things short.

I got to the Sectionals rink with plenty of time to change into my dress and stretch, jog around, and visualize my program. To be honest I was dreading my free skate a little, because there were multiple elements giving me trouble (my flip combo, my lutz, my camel spin) and more opportunities to mess up. Plus, I had already seen from the day before that the bronze level ladies were very good skaters, some quite a bit better than me. I wasn’t putting pressure on myself to win, and I think most adults will agree that it’s more about doing the best you can do, but even so, it’ll never NOT feel intimidating to know you’re competing with really good skaters. Seeing the field keeps things in perspective, both for better and for worse.

This time, I was set to skate later in my group so my coach had me waiting in the locker room, and I missed seeing a lot of the programs. That was disappointing since I like to watch events, but while I didn’t actually feel like it psyched me out to watch the others, maybe there’s an unconscious effect and it’s better to stay in your own bubble? Who knows.

My warm-up went pretty well. There was a rough patch when I wasn’t getting my flip combo despite repeat attempts and it was starting to get to that place where you just dig yourself in deeper into a hole by trying too hard and missing it even more. My coach saw I was overdoing it and called me over to ease off, and also said I was rushing. She reminded me to take my time and wait longer between the jumps, and that turned out to be really important advice, because I think it saved me during the actual program when I went into the flip-loop-toe loop. This combo been my big bugaboo in recent days, and the element I was most worried about, but this time I managed to pull it off and went directly into my sit spin, which is when I recall thinking, “This is going well.” I did mess up my lutz (didn’t get all the way around and two-footed the landing) but I stayed in control through my footwork sequence and pulled off a decent flip. Last was the camel-sit-backspin, and although I had to fight to keep the sit spin going, I held on and had a nice ending.

There were definite bobbles and small mistakes, but even with the lutz error, I skated off feeling really great about the performance, and my coach was super happy with it too. I had no idea where I would place and I wasn’t really concerned with the scores… but when I saw the sheet I literally blurted “Oh my god” in shock to find myself in 2nd out of 7. The first place skater had unanimous 1’s all across so she was clearly better than the rest, but I had received almost unanimous scores with 2, 3, 2, 2, and 2.

Because I missed most of my group I couldn’t tell how well everyone else skated, but I’d seen half of them skate the day before and hadn’t expected to place well. So I was happy to get my medal — although really, the most exhilarating thing was to do my program well and be satisfied with my performance!

Okay, the medal’s not bad either.