I haven't posted an update from the beginning of March. The plan was to take a balanced approach to skating in both scheduling, goals/ expectations and even the actual skating effort. Also, I've still haven't finalized the blade adjustment, in the sense that it felt better, but I have hoped it could get even better, so the blades mount had only on temporarily screws so I would able to move the blade/add shims myself. The first week of March I couldn't skate at all (work related), and the I've slowly deflated and skated on and off, mostly off.
The month of April... no skating! (including this first week of May). The first 2 weeks of April I had crazy work projects, then, as I was very tired, I've got a little cold. Plus one of my cats went through teeth surgery. What I find interesting is that, while I would have been able to skate at least once a week, I've chosen not to... Yes, I was tired and a little sick, but I also reasoned that skating just once a week my muscles are going to hurt. And looking back, I was also unmotivated because I didn't have a clear skating plan and the fact that I'm still not comfortable with the blade alignment.
The plan for the month of May?
The priority is to finish with the blade alignment. If you remember I had a bootfitter on the ice with me for an hour and he basically agreed with everything I was feeling. Then he moved the left blade forward, over the edge of the tip of the boot's sole, as I wasn't feeling stable on the rocker. Now I just have to figure out the balance between inside/outside edge, as I did on the right boot. I pronate (on both right and left sides), so it's not gonna be perfect. My "technique" is to move the blade towards inside, this helping to get on the outside edge, until the inside edge starts to suffer. Of course both the front of the blade and the heel have to be figured out, and they also have to "feel"straight. Then, if I still cannot go hold the outside edge, I add shims. It is annoying because on ice, instead of skating, I have to run specific exercises that show the balance, then go out of the ice, take the boot off and adjust... then back on ice...
The alignment on the right boot feels as good as it's gonna get. On the left I was feeling that my heel needs to be a little more "in", I was collapsing towards inside. It wasn't terrible, so I thought let's mostly skate, build muscles and have the alignment in the back of my mind. But it seems that it is holding me back mentally as I perceive it that I "cannot" skate, I'm just building muscles/ exercising.
The plan is to hopefully progress with the blade alignment, and to skate as I used to skate, for progress, at least 3 times per week, to start with, though, realistically I cannot expect much progress even skating 3 times per week. But I don't think the "balanced" approach to skating worked for me. I am motivated if I have goals and work towards certain skating skills or tests.
My last goals (3 years ago, before covid and the boots troubles) were Adult Gold Moves and Standard Tenfox. I think I should start working on this and maybe have a lesson to map out the Gold Moves.
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