Testing, Ebersole Rink, White Plains, NY.

Group-type photos, after the test. Whew!

This is Nina and Jirka, my skating coaches, with me in the middle. Yup, there I am, short and roundish, surrounded by beautiful skater people. Why are all skaters so good looking? Is it something in the ice?

Skating test with Jirí Procházka

I recently whipped through two skating tests, passing them both in no small part due to my excellent skating coach, Jirka. He's such a great coach, but (sadly for me, happily for him) has moved back to his home country.

Claire's First Skating Trip!

This was my daughter's first time on ice. We were at the outdoor rink at Bear Mountain, which has beautiful views of the mountains, the bridge, and a lake, but of course my eyes were all for my daughter, slip sliding away. I kept saying, "March! March! March!" and when she did this, she actually skated! Otherwise, it was pretty much my husband and myself holding her up by the arms, while her legs went in different directions. Awesome!

RM with Naomi and Peter

This was the last day of Skate Camp, so I imposed on them for a group shot. Nice, nice!

Vakhtang Murvanidze

RM with Vakhtang Murvanidze. Murve is the former national champion of Georgia, in men's singles. He made an impression on the international scene as a real showman with a fabulous and original skating style.

Skate Camp

RM with Peter Tchernyshev.

Skate Camp

RM with Naomi Lang. She's the former US Ice Dance national champion, with her partner, Peter Tchernyshev.

Skate Camp - Sunday

Sunday 8am. I am SO TIRED. Off to skate!

Sunday 9:45am. Just got out of Naomi and Peter’s class. We began by doing edge work. Forward and backward lunges, focusing on edges and flow. Then on to crossrolls. The forward ones went okay, but backwards? Thank goodness for Naomi, because she helped me figure them out. Well, sort of, anyways.

Sunday 10:45am. We’ve begun to think about choreography, and how to approach our skating with a sense of musicality. Of course, in order to do that, Peter had us disco dancing on the ice. I am not skilled. But then again, none of us really were. We started to get it better when Naomi and Peter had us doing simple crossovers and chasses, but with us interpreting tempo and timing from the music that was playing. That was great.

Sunday a bit later. I just got out of stretching class. Christine is an amazing teacher. She really knows how to make these stretches real, explaining exactly how each one is relevant to my skating. Although I’m pretty bendy for someone of my size and age, there were a couple of stretches she gave us, for hip flexors, that I was usless at. I obviously have a lot to do in that area!

Sunday 11:45am. Back on ice for compulsory dance class, which we had to abandon when we realised that we were sharing the ice with the pairs. The pairs are awesome to watch, really powerful skaters, but sharing the ice with them meant that we couldn’t complete our patterns. It ended up being fine, because we instead played with choreography. Peter and Naomi were trying to get us to interpret emotion through movement. For example, he gave us the emotion “anger”, and we, as a group, had to try to get that across in our skating. We were doing fine until, in the middle of our dance, two of us crashed into each other and both went flying! Once we got over the shock, everyone burst out laughing. So much for “anger”.

Sunday 12:45pm. The staff sat as a panel, and we were able to ask them questions. I’m not shy, so I piped right up. I asked what they found to be the differences between teaching adults and teaching young skaters. Edward said that adults are very intense. They work hard. He did say that one of the things he sees with some adults is a fear of falling, which an adult must overcome if they are to progress as a skater. Zuzanna said that adults WANT to be there, where sometimes with young kids, they don’t, and that can be hard to deal with as a coach.

Sunday 2:00pm. Naomi split the class into two - the more advanced dancers went with Peter to work on their CDs, and we stayed with Naomi to work on the lower level dances. This was wonderful, because we really got to focus on some of those tricky moves in the Rhythm Blues, Swing and Fiesta. Naomi has a way of explaining things where I totally get it, and am able to fix things that I’ve been struggling with.

Last we had our practice session. This was an open skate, held on two rinks, where we got to ask any coach anything we liked. I did end up meeting Vakhtang, and I'm glad. I commented on his performance at the Ice Theater of NY a few years ago, when he'd done this amazingly hot and funky tango. He looked chuffed that I remembered, and even did a bit of a riff off the number for me. I skipped back and forth between the two rinks - I think I was afraid that I’d miss something. I practiced some of the moves that I’d learned, got the email addresses of some of my fellow skaters, and grabbed some quick snapshots of myself with Vakhtang (!), and Peter and Naomi (!!)

The weekend is over, and all I can say is wow, and wow, and wow. I’d been nervous about attending, but I’m so glad that I went. In fact, I’m already trying to figure out ways to get there again next year!

Skate Camp - Saturday

11:15am. I just got out of Naomi and Peter’s “Compulsory Dance Moves” class, where they did a review of some of the elements that are required in the CDs. Of course, for me, some of those moves were quite new! I think the hardest were the series of linking three turns that we did. My left forward outside three is fairly strong, but my right forward outside three? Next to non-existent. Still, I managed to make it through.

The best part of this class was doing the chasses. I love chasses, although I find them a challenge to do well. Peter was extremely helpful and patient, taking me by the hand (huge grins on my part) and helping me learn a new style of doing them. I normally do them quite upright, but Peter taught me how to do them with more knee bend. That really helped. And I learned a new one – what I’d call a back cross chasse, where you put your foot down behind your skating foot. That was difficult at first, but I caught on quickly.

My favorite part of the class, though, was when Naomi had to teach Peter how to do an open Mohawk. Apparently, for Peter, it had been a while. Then we all got to do a variety of types of Mohawk. Fun? Well, sort of. Fun and challenging.

12:20pm. We just did an hour’s worth of two elements I’d never done – Chocktaws and Twizzles. The Chocktaws were great, once Naomi showed me what the heck one was. I was shaky, but she showed me the basics, so I could practice this new move.

But the twizzles…those were AWESOME. I love them. I’ve seen people do them, but never tried myself. I’m not very good at them, I’m sure, but they are so fun. I felt so free. They ROCK.

Yesterday was really the first day of camp for me. I’d been at work earlier in the day, but I was useless. All I could think about was the Skate Camp. I’d do five minutes of work, then spend the next ten thinking of Peter Tchernyshev. I was hopeless. I was so excited, I was literally bouncing in my chair. When I got to the rink, I introduced myself to every adult around me with a “So, are you here for the Adult Camp?” I met people from NY and NJ, from Boston, from Ohio, even from as far afield as Los Angeles and Canada.

It’s been great skating with so many adults. At my normal rink, I’m the only adult, so this has been a pleasure. And people at this camp are at all levels, from relative beginners, to high level skaters new to dance, to advanced dancers, to people like me, who are just okay.

Skate Camp - PPT

Today was the first day of the Adult skating camp in NJ. Well, the first real day is actually tomorrow, but today was our opportunity to take private lessons with the coaches if we wanted them.

This is my first year attending, and I was so excited that I was pretty much useless at work today. As the time got closer, I was literally bouncing in my chair. Boing...

And sure enough, when I got to the rink, there was Peter Tchernyshev giving lessons to someone. I sat and watched for a few minutes until my own lesson with another coach came up. I just love PT's style of skating. He really has great flow and power. It's something to watch.

But I had a hard time focusing on my lesson at first. After all, PT kept skating by me. It was very distracting. :grins: That's actually the reason why I didn't choose PT for my private lesson - I knew I'd get nothing done. I'd be way too star-struck. And anyway, I get him all day tomorrow. ALL DAY! And I did see him hanging about outside afterwards. I was too shy and stupid to go up to him and...what the hell would I say? Hi, you're PT? Duh...

On my ice time was also Aaron Parchem and Marcy Hinzman. They were working with a pair team, and they seemed to be having a blast. I did not see Vahktang Murvanitze, although I'd been hoping to. I like his skating.

Of course, I was too shy to introduce myself to PT, but I did introduce myself to several other of the adult skaters. Most are like me - new to the program, so we were all a bit nervous. I'd also been afraid that I'd be the worst skater there, but there really are people at ALL levels at this camp. (Shh...In other words, there are others there who skate WAY worse than I do. Thank God.)

Of course, my coach basically told me, without TELLING me, that my skating sucks. And it does. Well, what he actually said is that I have "adult crossovers", which I do, but that's BAD BAD BAD. My goal in skating is to skate like I belong out there, not like I'm freekin' Frankenstein.

Realised while I was there that I need much chic-er clothing. Off to shop now, hoping to find workout wear that 1) is chic and 2) doesn't make me look fatter. Good luck to me!

Skate Camp - Pre Camp Jitters

"Skate Camp" starts in...two and a half hours! I can't wait. You have NO IDEA how excited I am to attend this thing. I've wanted to go for the past couple of years, but couldn't fit it into my schedule. Now I get to go! Not only that, but I was just asked to blog this thing officially by the reporter covering the event for United States Figure Skating. So I'll be posting on the official USFS website and whatever else they want. I'll know more about that tomorrow, and will post a link. I can't possibly work. I'm too distracted. I do two minutes of work, then spend the next ten thinking about Peter Tchernyshev. I am such a skate geek. And I have to leave work in a half hour in order to get to Hackensack, NJ on time for my first lesson, so I'm completely useless at this point. I am positively bouncing in my chair.