Life in the patch lane
A combination of nagging from the better skaters and their mums at my rink; my growing obsession with obscenely long run ups to my paltry, single jumps and starting work on the Lutz jump with its absurd entry all came together to push me into moving my lesson and regular training schedule into a patch session instead of public sessions.
Some people find the prospect of transitioning to patch a bit daunting as it's where the serious folk go to learn to skate, but when I talk about "the serious folk" then what I really mean is mostly girls aged 8-13. Most adults are afraid of the judgement that might come from this group, however one of the first things I discovered when training on patch is that it's a bit like going to the gym: all the regulars care about is their own work out and they're happy that you're making the effort to be there yourself, whatever your ability.
So I got started by trialling myself on the busier after school session, just to see how I held up. The thing that girls aged 5-13 generally don't do is work up a huge amount of speed, so it's actually a relatively manageable experience as long as you keep to the side when you're not doing anything and keep checking around you when you are so you don't run into anyone coming the other way.
This experience started to come apart when I joined the midday patch sessions. My rink features one of Team GB's future Olympic hopefuls, a passionate girl that's at the rink almost every day, grinding out practise for around the same number of hours most kids normally spend at school. She's often working on her triples during those quieter sessions, as the ice rarely has more than 5-6 people on it. I soon learned that the trick was to wait until she started her run up and then just do whatever I was planning in the space behind her as she whizzed across the rink into her next attempt. Simple. Manageable.
But the skating gods saw fit to test my ability to navigate patch at even greater heights when one of the UK's few senior, male free skaters moved to the rink as well. He's working on his quad toe, which is a much louder experience up close than I expected.
So now there're two advanced free skaters zipping round the ice at a terrifying pace. Before it was a case of just hiding behind one of them, but now there's two of them throwing gale forces winds behind them as they streak past, which has the following effect on me as I press myself flat against the barrier:
Some people find the prospect of transitioning to patch a bit daunting as it's where the serious folk go to learn to skate, but when I talk about "the serious folk" then what I really mean is mostly girls aged 8-13. Most adults are afraid of the judgement that might come from this group, however one of the first things I discovered when training on patch is that it's a bit like going to the gym: all the regulars care about is their own work out and they're happy that you're making the effort to be there yourself, whatever your ability.
So I got started by trialling myself on the busier after school session, just to see how I held up. The thing that girls aged 5-13 generally don't do is work up a huge amount of speed, so it's actually a relatively manageable experience as long as you keep to the side when you're not doing anything and keep checking around you when you are so you don't run into anyone coming the other way.
This experience started to come apart when I joined the midday patch sessions. My rink features one of Team GB's future Olympic hopefuls, a passionate girl that's at the rink almost every day, grinding out practise for around the same number of hours most kids normally spend at school. She's often working on her triples during those quieter sessions, as the ice rarely has more than 5-6 people on it. I soon learned that the trick was to wait until she started her run up and then just do whatever I was planning in the space behind her as she whizzed across the rink into her next attempt. Simple. Manageable.
But the skating gods saw fit to test my ability to navigate patch at even greater heights when one of the UK's few senior, male free skaters moved to the rink as well. He's working on his quad toe, which is a much louder experience up close than I expected.
So now there're two advanced free skaters zipping round the ice at a terrifying pace. Before it was a case of just hiding behind one of them, but now there's two of them throwing gale forces winds behind them as they streak past, which has the following effect on me as I press myself flat against the barrier:
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| And the really tragic part about this is that I'm still the oldest skater on the rink if you discount the coaches! |
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