Brody's Lesson - November 5, 2018
Brody's hockey skills have been improving dramatically over the past several weeks. In particular, his hockey (stick & puck handling/shooting) skills have shown tremendous growth.
However, I do not want to become so focused on hockey that working on Brody's skating skills goes by the wayside. My goal for this lesson is to re-emphasize the importance of skills such as edge correctness.
Goals
•Improve stability and control on inside edges
•Work toward balancing skills in both directions (Crossovers specifically)
Warmup
On most days, Brody warms up by excitedly skating around the rink like only a seven year old boy can.
This warmup is fine, especially at his age. If I am in a particularly mean mood, I will consider doing one of the following: •Bother him about doing crossover at each turn
•Make him skate in a serpentine pattern
Skills
EDGE CORRECTNESS
EXERCISE 1: LEG LIFTS
Description: Begin with a fast one foot glide. While maintaining the glide, move the free leg:
•Up in front of the body
•Back behind (lean forward to compensate for balance shift)
•To the outside
To describe the positions, refer to this photo from Laura Stamm's Power Skating:
EXERCISE 2: EDGE SNAKES
Background: This is based on a fundamental figure skating exercise that tests skaters' edge control. This variation only focuses on the inside edges, since outside edges are a much more difficult skill to master, and it is less strict on the size, shape, speed, and other nitpicks of the circles.
Description: The skater (OK, just Brody) starts on a line. After a single T-Push, he does a one foot glide on a single foot, making a semicircle returning back to the same line ("axis line").
When he gets back to the axis line, he swaps feet with a push and practices the inside edge on the other foot.
Side Note: I am obviously writing this before Brody gets on the ice, but I have a prediction: Brody will claim that this will be easy before beginning, but will quickly realize that it is more difficult than it sounds.
EXERCISE 3: CURLY CROSSOVERS
Description: Brody loves showing off his crossovers, and they have gotten quite good... as long as he's going counterclockwise, which most skaters prefer. Even if he always prefers counterclockwise crossovers, he needs to be competent in both directions.
Instead of my usual figure 8 pattern, I will be trying this whole-ice curly pattern to try to sneak both directions in without emphasizing the clockwise crossovers.
Drills
DRILL 1: FORWARD POWER CIRCLE
Description: This is a figure skating test from the USFS Moves In The Field Juvenile test. I need a pattern to put here, but the concept is that the skater starts in the middle of the ice and does crosssovers in a single direction. The skater increases the power of the crossovers to increase the radius of the circle, forming my nickname for them, "Shell Crossovers."
DRILL 2: SHOOTING FROM TURNS - NARROW AND WIDE
Description: This drill gives a chance to make two shots in one run. One of the shots is from a narrow turn, while the other is wider and made with more speed.
The best part is that it forces Brody to use clockwise crossovers! Hopefully he doesn't read this description before the lesson; when he gets older I'm going to have to stop putting my secrets right on the page.
