Build on Love and Skill at the Beginning of the Season

Today, I’d like to share a post my mom, Deb Chitwood, published at Raising Figure Skaters. It tells about the work skaters can do at the beginning of the season and the benefits for skaters attending summer skating school. It also has a motivational word-art freebie.

Here are the first two paragraphs:

Each sport has its pre-season time to build. And I think we can look at almost anything as pre-season whenever we’re starting a new project or new time of our lives.

This is the beginning of the season for many in competitive figure skating. I always enjoyed watching how skaters go through the process of finding the right music, choreographing programs, and designing costumes. At the same time, extra emphasis is placed on developing and refining skating skills at the beginning of the new season.

Read the entire article.

Have Fun with Your Hair This Spring

Fishtail Braid Photo by Elaine Whitney at Flickr Creative Commons.Spring is a great time to experiment with new hairstyles and start getting ready for summer. This doesn’t have to mean changing your hair color or cutting your hair. You can do so much with fun braids and more!

A great site that I like to get e-mail tips from is Daily Makeover. Recently, Daily Makeover had some videos on “5 Easy Spring Hairstyle Tutorials.” I wanted to share them with you, as they are very straightforward but can freshen up your look!

My favorite is the fishtail braid, and Lauren Conrad shows an easy way to do it yourself. A hairstyle like the fishtail braid is great for skating practice. Fancier hairstyles are typically better for competition, but it depends on your program. Check with your coach about your competition hairstyle.

Read the entire article.

How Ice Resurfacers Work

I Wanna Drive a Zamboni Photo by Eric KilbyI’m often asked questions about the ice resurfacer at the rink and how it works.  Ice resurfacers are typically called Zambonis after the creator, Frank Zamboni, but there are other brands, such as Olympia. Every official rink has an ice resurfacer. Here are two good articles on how they work:

How Ice Rinks Work: Maintaining the Rink

Ice Resurfacer from Wikipedia

Photo Credit: Photo by Eric Kilby at Flickr Creative Commons.

Competition Makeup Tips

When you compete in an event that is judged, appearance is typically taken into consideration. Even if there isn’t a mark for appearance, your appearance in how you present yourself can affect how the judges perceive your ability.

As much as it would be nice to believe that only ability is judged, the human eye tends to be drawn toward those who are well presented. If you’re in a sport such as figure skating and you’re female, makeup should be an important part of your competition regimen.

Here are competition makeup tips for figure skaters or anyone in a similar sport or art.

Read the entire article.

Crash Pads Help Skaters Learning New Jumps

This week I want to talk about crash pads for skaters. Pads can be very beneficial for skaters learning new jumps that require many repetitions and falls to master. I usually have my skaters get pads when they are learning their axel. If they’re falling a lot on another single jump, I might recommend crash pads earlier.

Since the axel jump is 1½ rotations in the air, it takes more time and practice to master than the previous jumps. Also, the longer the rotation, the more height and rotation speed required. This causes falls on jumps like the axel and above to have more force with the skater possibly getting a bruise or another injury.

Even if the falls aren’t that hard, just falling many times in a row can cause muscle soreness or bruising. Another advantage of pads is that they usually give the skater an extra boost of confidence that makes the jump easier because the skater isn’t as afraid of falling.

There are various crash pads for skaters, including pants you can buy with pads sewn in already. My favorite individual pads are made by Waxel Pad. They’re a foam material that’s available in ½-inch, ¾-inch or 1-inch thickness. Waxel Pads have small, medium, and large sizes available, but the medium size in a ½-inch or ¾-inch thickness works best for most skaters. You can buy the hip or butt pads separately, although I recommend just getting the set of three with both hip pads and the butt pad.

Happy skating! 🙂

New Year, New Goals

To be a good athlete, you need strong motivation. However, levels of motivation can vary throughout the year. So it’s important to find ways that spark your motivation. One of the best and proven ways to keep on track with your athletic plans and increase motivation is through goal setting.

What better time to set goals than the New Year?! As an NASM-certified personal trainer, I was taught to set S.M.A.R.T. goals.

Smart goals can stand for:

Specific

Measurable

Appropriate

Realistic

Time-Bound

How to set a S.M.A.R.T. goal:

Read the entire article

Photo Credit: Photo by Niharb at Flickr Creative Commons (License).