This blog is a collection of my thoughts and experiences from ten years as a skate dad. For those of you sitting with your jackets in the bleachers, first I salute you, but second I want to give you an honest sense of what you are in for and what to expect. Ice skating is both a trying and a glorious sport, but it doesn't happen without the special group of folks who cheer, support, and console the participants. This is dedicated to you.


Monday, November 16, 2015

- last note

My first choreo post was logically enough about an early part of your program, your first jump. Now though I leap all the way to the very end of your program: the last note, actually, at the very very end. I don't know if folks deliberately plan this out, as it seems to be more an artifact of the music you selected for your routine. One might easily though recalibrate the music to address this issue that leaves the last impression.

In an earlier post I chatted about how to allow yourself enough slack time to ensure you finish your final movements in time to the music. It seems the more I watch particular skaters though the less coincidental their endings appear. Some skaters can simply always nail the timing while others cannot.

If you are one of those lucky souls who has the rhythm in her bones then you can make a dynamite impression by choosing a musical piece with an abrupt and spectacular ending. Nail it and everyone goes Whoa.

But if you're like most skaters who can at best time it to within a couple of seconds, it would seem to me you should cut your music to end on a holding chord. That way if you're a tiny bit early you can melt into your final pose. If you made it just in time then you'll look like you planned it that way.

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