Muse back!
February 01, 2009 / Sunday
Almost Time To Skate Skate Skate
Tomorrow, I start day one of a three day power skating clinic. I did this once before, 4 1/2 years ago, when I was working on getting good enough to make it into Maroon.
The next Red game after that clinic, I blew past everyone and racked up a hat trick before the game was even half over. The clinic pretty much paid for itself right then and there.
Amusingly, it taught me to go too fast for my cornering/stopping abilities, and I ended up crashing into the boards at the end of the rink a lot. Fortunately, my cornering/stopping skills have since caught up.
What am I looking for this time around?
- More efficiency. I want speed with less energy expenditure.
- Better cornering. Sharper, faster, cleaner.
- More stable right crossovers. I feel like I'm catching a skate blade on the ice for some reason.
- Backward skating. I still suck at it.
After each session at the last clinic, I took notes on my then-Palm phone. Those notes were synced into Outlook, and have been synced from laptop to laptop and onto my Blackberry. I carry them with me to this day. Here they are, for posterity, and for comparison three days from now.
Power Skating Notes
forward:
- arms straight
- front to back not side to side
- don't cross arms over center
- palms up / stick backhand
- diagonal movement
- push out not back
- don't kick legs up
- BEND LEGS
backward:
- arms straight
- don't track w/ hand in front
- crossovers don't lift leg
- crossovers wide stance
- BEND LEGS
stopping:
- remember puck placement
- dig for crossover
- BEND LEGS
crossovers:
- shoulders turned in
- inner shoulder up
- BEND LEGS
power turns:
- legs wide
- legs staggered
- braking w/ back leg OK
- BEND LEGS
"BEND LEGS" in every category makes me laugh. I still don't do it.
I finally started doing the bullet points under "power turns" in Vegas last week. (That was the big epiphany I had before the Arizona game.) Maybe I just needed a few years for it to sink in.
I hope to get as much as I can out of this week's clinic, because I think it'll be the last power skating class I take. After this, I think my time (and money) will be better spent learning better stick handling, shooting, positioning (body and overall play), and team skills.
Sounds like I have hockey camp in my future. :)