There's a first for everything....

Competition season is upon us here at the U of I, and I did my first competition of the season last Saturday at Homewood-Flossmoor.  The competition got off to a super late start due to the sound system malfunctioning, but was able to catch up and be on time again.  As a whole, my events (ISI Bronze solo, compulsories, and FS 3 interpretive) went well, and it was a good competition overall.  I met two other adult skaters there, and I got the chance to cheer on one of them as they competed right before me.  The other adult skaters were Gold and Silver level.  The gold level skater and I happened to meet earlier that day, and she told me that she had remembered me from last year, and I inspired HER to compete again this year.  I was very honored and humbled by this, and that alone was enough to make my day in skating. It just reminded that I may never know who's watching me, and may be inspired to skate for the first time, or return to skating/competing.

 Results wise, I got a first place finish "against the book" both my solo and interpretive skate.  For my interpretive skate, I was given "Fireball" by Pitbull, which I'm thankfully familiar with.  Interpretive was actually pretty fun! I honestly didn't really know what to in the first half of the song (about 30 seconds or so), but there was a big downbeat a bit later, and suddenly, you couldn't help but basically dance to it.  I basically focused on footwork type of stuff, and I hope that I get better with interpretive skating, I can just really go things and really play things up to the audience.  However as a whole, I came off the ice feeling that I had done well, and was told by several other people (mostly from my rink) that I did well.


Also, at this competition, I faced a first for me....falling in competition.  I'm sure it was bound to happen to me at some point, and that some point was during my compulsory portion.  For my compulsories, I was required to perform my change foot spin, dance step sequence for FS 3, and a salchow.  I fell on my salchow, which was my last element of the routine.  I'm not quite sure what I did wrong, but my feeling is that I was too tilted when I took off, throwing off my balance when I went to land, and I couldn't hold onto it.  Too be honest, I was disappointed about that jump, and I knew that fall was going to cost me.  I know that I was skating against the book, and I have been struggling with that jump a little bit lately, but for the most part, it's been pretty consistent for me. I was suppose to get my falls out of the way up to the competition, not the other way around.  So, for me to have that fall when I've been working so hard to do well, was disappointing.  The rest of the routine had also gone pretty well too!  I pretty much nailed my change foot, although I was on my toe just a little bit at the end of the backspin (could've swore I heard my coach yell "nice!"), and my dance step was alright...could've stayed more steady on my outside mohawk so that it looked more like a mohawk than a bracket (and a bad bracket at that), but was other wise good.  I was especially happy with the change foot as those have FINALLY kicked in.

However, looking back at that fall, what I told myself a bit later on in the day was that fall was ONLY a fall...nothing else. I did not disappoint my coach, the audience as a whole, or even the judges.  They marked me down because of a technicality with my skating, that's it. As a matter of fact, my coach was super proud of me going out there and competing, and doing well as a whole.  It takes A LOT of courage to go out there and compete, especially as an adult, and doubly so when you're in a competition with mostly kids/teenagers.  So knowing that, I am glad I competed, and have hopes to do another competition later this spring if finances will allow.

As for back at the home rink, my rink has changed hands from ISI to USFS.  This change has been a change in the making since I started skating, and has finally come through.  I'm not entirely sure why we changed hands, but I hope that this will draw really good coaches to our rink, so that we can continue to increase the quality of good skaters at competitions.

Speaking of coaches, I'm in the process of changing of changing coaches.  My current coach, Jeremy, is graduating this spring, and will not be staying here for graduate school.  I respect his decision to go someplace else, and want the absolute best for him, but am very sad that he is moving on.  His leaving is one of the sad things that I don't like about our rink...coaches coming and going every few years due to them being college students.  However, what I am liking is that Jeremy is taking the initiative in finding a new coach for me.  Unfortunately, I'm not able to skate much this next week or so, due lack of finances, but I have a lesson scheduled with a potential coach, Michelle, in about two weeks.  I don't know too much about her, but she has come from one of the top skating training centers in country (even did boarding school there), and sounds like she has quite a bit of competing and coaching experience under her belt.  She would also be able to put me onto the ice for both ISI and USFS, which is a bonus.

My other personal choice is Max Liu, who use to teach Gracie Gold.  I know first hand that he's an excellent coach, and has flat out said that he enjoys working with adult skaters (major plus in my book).  I have seen him coach other students at our rink, so I know he can be tough.  However, I also know that he's also very good because of his emphasis on technique, which I sometimes feel like a lot of our coaches lack with their teaching, in order to "push" students through levels.  Then, when it comes to competition, the student doesn't generally do as well because of it.

My plan with both of these potential coaches is to take a few lessons with each, and Jeremy wants to be involved by observng/"co-teaching" the lessons.  That way, he can have some additional imput about who he thinks would be a better fit for me.  Ultimately, it'll be my decision on who I want to be my coach, but this way, we can discuss the positives and negatives together.