Free Audrey Weisiger seminars for Fort Dupont volunteers

[Query]

I've mentioned the Fort Dupont Ice Arena (Washington, DC) volunteer-taught program before here.

Audrey Weisiger, a two-time Olympic team coach who volunteers some of her time to help run the volunteer program, has started giving free lectures to the Fort Dupont volunteers who play skating instructor.

Of course, she knows that most of us aren't really coaches, so the lectures are probably at a lower level than the ones her http://grassrootstochampions.com company charges people good money for.

But she talked about things that she thought would help us, such as focusing on basic skills and posture early, that will allow potentially allow the best skaters to progress to elite level. She also talked about motivating skaters. For example, she says good posture is useful in life outside skating. She showed us the benefits of using videos to help skaters analyze their own movement and posture, as well as the motions of great skaters. She used Dartfish software, and is associated with that company.

As an example, she tells skaters to balance further backwards when skating forwards than back - opposite from what other coaches have told me. The way she sees it, they are skimming the surface like a speed boat. (Perhaps the difference is because my coaches have mostly been ice dance coaches, where maintaining a line from head to spine to hips to ankle to foot is more emphasized.) She also advocates flexing (not pointing) the ankle of the foot around which you rotate in the air, so that leg creates a stronger, better controlled axis. She showed, in some jumps, how the toe should initially point on take-off, flex in mid air, then point again on landing.

So - those of you that have considered volunteering your Saturdays, now you have another reason. You can be trained a little by someone truly extraordinary.