Coach's critiques

I saw recently a post in a skating group on facebook of somebody that felt that the Coach critiquing every little thing with no encouragement made her feel like a failure as a skater and everything that she was doing was ugly and bad and she almost wanted to quit. There were answers ranging from saying to fire the coach, to advising that some time personalities of the coaches and students don't match, to pointing out that that's what we pay the coaches for: to critique us...

I started learning skating in group lessons of 4 to 8 people. There wasn't time for much individual critique. There wasn't much time for much instruction either. When I started private lessons I was craving and got instruction, lots of it! And then came the corrections, lots of them... Let's see how many corrections I can come up for the Forward Stroking. 1.Posture, 2.Shoulders back 3. Chin up, 4.Look over the glass boards, 5. Press into ice 6.Bend the knees 7. Bend more... 8.Free leg goes laterally after stroking 8. Extend the free leg higher 9.Hold the extension 10. Free leg straight, don't bend the knee 11. Free foot pointed 12. Free foot turned out 13.Free leg is to lateral now, a little back 14.Don't lean the upper body forward when you stroke 15.Re bend with the weight on the skating hip 16.Feet in V before a new stroke 17.Keep knees separated before the new stroke 18. NOOO, don't collapse on the knew skating leg before the push 19.Soft arms 20.Look up (I know I said it before but I hear this a lot). My coach could add to these, I'm sure. Now, I don't think I heard all of them at once, but 15 of them wouldn't be unusual. And that's just for a 2 min exercise. There are 28 more minutes in the lesson.... After the lesson I write down all the corrections I remember, and I don't remember all of them. I'm panicking... Then next day I'm on ice I try to incorporate the corrections I remember, then I go and read the notes and work on more corrections. Damn! there are too many.

I honestly had moments when I felt exactly as the facebook skater. I was brave for maybe a month after I started with my private coach and then I told him that I cannot handle so much instruction and corrections. He said, "Oh, no! I don't expect you, or anybody, to work on (or to remember) all the corrections at a time. The reason I give so many corrections is because different people pick up different things to correct and get stuck on different things. Just choose few of them, 3 maybe, and correct those, then I'll give you the rest of them again, and... add to them. Aha!

A few weeks ago, I did mention it at the time, my coach said that I hit some milestones to my forward chasses in alternating lobes. Not easy, beginner stuff, but more towards intermediate, like lean and correct change of lobes direction. And immediately he said in a devilish, satisfied that he can pick on something, voice "but your free knee is bent". Thoughts were running trough my mind: "No my knee is straight, I corrected that a year ago".  I had to work hard not to burst into crying. Actually it wasn't like that at all, but that's what it felt like :) In reality, he was very excited about my progress and said in a neutral voice that my knee is bent... He didn't even say straighten your knee, it was obvious that I can and I will. Me wanting to cry, that's real. After few minutes of gathering myself, I thought to ask why I don't do the things I CAN do? He said that when I concentrate in doing a specific correction I let go on the things that are not yet body memory. It seems that it takes an even longer time than I thought for some skill to become body memory...

Some random things different coaches said, related with critiquing...
- well, sometimes you have to take it with a sense of humor (the temporary failure in doing something, and the repeated corrections/ nitpicking)
- the hardest part in a coach's job is to trick the student into doing something she doesn't want to do

To draw some kind of a conclusion, nobody likes to be criticized, it's important to think at these coach's critiques as corrections or constructive criticism. Also, the coach cannot know how you feel if you don't say. So the student should say if she/ he is overwhelmed, or needs encouragement. I've got into the habit of asking my coach if I improved a certain skill. I ask specifically about something. For example, it seems that I grossly misjudge my speed and flow (power) improvement. As I test at standard level I need to show power. I'm always on the hunt of that, especially because it's against my personality. It seems that I improve steadily, and I don't realize because I'm comfortable and in control skating with this increased speed.

I also do agree that not all personalities work together. I believe that sometimes, despite everybody's best intentions and effort a relationship doesn't work. On the other side of too much criticism, I would mention that I had a coach that was so nice that I didn't feel she was drawing out of me all I could give.