How hard can you try?

At last night's practice, we were reminded that we have only seven official practices left before the Milpitas meet. Seems our coach is trying to induce some panic reaction into the team. So instead of back to back races in which we do two races in a row, we are doing five races in a row, without any rest. She even tried once to start before people were in ready position:-) I was exhausted, but it seems not as exhausted as the others:-) and I managed quite well, lead four out of five races in the one lap races and two out of four races (as we had one senior joining us) of the two lap races.

Ruri maitained her position for all five races, not dashing for one and resting for one, which I think was good. The competition among the elementary boy/girls are getting more intense. They are now finishing in alternating lead, which is good for them to improve as a whole. As a small group, they are moving towards the back of the pace line gradually.

It seems however hard you tried, you can always try harder. This should be a good lesson for Ruri, and even me.

Taking stock

Ruri and I had a private lesson last week, we got to see close-ups of our skating techniques via frame-by-frame video footage. For Ruri, it is mostly knee-bend (or lack of it) and left foot setting. After a few runs, Ruri managed to get the left foot setting much better. For me, it was my hip and shoulder, I'm just not turning out enough, which impede my left foot push (shorter). However, I was not as lucky as Ruri (or smart:-) I was not able to correct them during the lesson, but I got a few excercises that I can try later. Seeing myself skating in details made me understand that I'm a long way away from howI would like to skate:-)

But not all bad this week though. I tried to run during non-skating days, and I felt my endurance was going up. Yesterday I made a 35.6' for 300m race. Under 12' per lap for three lap race. Hopefully I can extend that to 500m. The final race of this season is less then a month away.

Small step

April is "go as fast as you can" month, but it is easy said than done:-) However, the practice are more gear towards two key aspects: entering corner with high speed while maintaining correct body posture, and fast foot accelerating out of the corner. Ruri is doing very well at fast foot going out of the corner, but she is tentative entering the corner, especially after a fast start and she will lose to the second starter half way in the corner already.

Some good news too. During the one lap burn today, Ruri clocked 12.7" (0.9 second improvement) and I clocked 11.9" (0.7 second improvement), first time that I'm officially under 12". We are getting faster, and Ruri is catching up...

The next regional meet will be on May 6-7th at Cal Skate Milpitas, the home rink of our team. It is also the trophy meet where the club with most points will get the trophy. Our club seems to secured this one. It's going to be a fun meet and we are looking forward to it. One month to go.