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Beginner: Neck stretch up and down exercise
Purpose: Neck mobility is often overlooked but it is important for skaters posture, alignment, stress relief, and expression in choreography
Focus: Neck flexion, neck extension
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Foundation: Off-ice wide second position plie pulses
Purpose: These plie pulses in second position help skaters build their inner thigh, or adductor muscles, which are needed for external rotation and turnout
Focus: External rotation, adductors
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Foundation: Off-ice spiral to sit position on the floor drill
Purpose: This challenging skill helps skaters test their balance and their strength; even if they can do a camel to sit position on the ice, they will be surprised to find it is much more challenging to do it off the ice!
Focus: Strength building, lower body strength, balance, alignment
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Foundation-Advanced: Off-ice post-training or post-workout flexibilty cool-down
Purpose: This video takes skaters through a mini cool-down flexibility and mobility sequence with an emphasis on the front splits.
Focus: Flexibility, mobility, lower body flexibility, hamstring flexibility, hip flexor flexibility, forward splits, cool-down.
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Foundation: Off-ice floor backward sit spin entry to snap position walk-through
Purpose: Skaters can improve their sit spin off-ice without a spinner by working on the balance, weight in their foot, and strength needed to move from the entry phase to the snap phase.
Focus: Basic technique, weight placement, stability, edge consistency, strength -
Advanced: Spider mountain climber with kickout
This variation of a mountain climber targets your glutes as well as your core, including the obliques with the kick out. It's also a good cardio exercise when added into a high intensity interval.
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Advanced: Off-ice side plank hip lifts with bent knees exercise
Purpose: This side plank helps build hip strength and stability, but is slightly easier with the knees bent rather than straight
Focus: hip strength, hip stability, hip flexors, obliques
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Foundation-Advanced: Off-ice seated butterfly cool-down stretch
Purpose: The butterfly stretch is a great stretch to open up your hips and increase your external rotation. It's a good recovery stretch after a workout or training session. Leaning forward in the stretch increases the benefits of low back relief and flexibility.
Focus: External rotation, adduct...
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Foundation: On-ice loop jump entry edge increase drill
Level: Foundation
Base exercise: Loop entry hold
Variation: From a forward inside three turn, entry outside edge gets progressively tighter
Purpose: This drill helps skaters work their body alignment and control during the increase of outside edge pressure in a loop entry into a loop take-off. By... -
Foundation: Counterchecked forward, lateral, and stroking leg extension drill
Purpose: This drill challenges skaters to maintain good balance and engagement through their standing leg and to keep their core strong and free hip lifted as they move from a forward leg extension, to a lateral leg extension to stroking position, while maintaining a countercheck with their arms....
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Beginner-Foundation: Off-ice beginner balance skill class
Purpose: This follow-along video is a great class to do to work on improving your balance. Balance is such an important skill for figure skaters to work on because so much of figure skating is done on one foot. This class starts with some basic balance positions and then ends with some skating sp...
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Advanced: Ballet squat pulses & weighted lateral arm extension demonstration
Level: Advanced
Base exercise: Ballet squat
Variation: Pulses, lateral arm extension
Purpose: Work on building strength in your turnout position with this ballet squat. Pulses help tone the muscle by causing them to do short contract and relax cycles. Holding hand weights out to the side adds an... -
Advanced: Side lunge step out with bicep curl exercise
Purpose: This drill combines a side lunge with a bicep curl to make it a good upper and lower body compound exercise
Focus: Quads, abductors, glutes, hamstrings, biceps
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Foundation: Off-ice stationary change foot 1/4 turn with arms up drill
Purpose: Doing change foot jumps from stationary is helpful for skaters to improve their consistency and their power because they need to generate vertical height and the rotation without the additional help of momentum from the entry. Skaters should consistently practice change foot stationary p...
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Advanced-Elite: Alternating sprinter sit-ups exercise
Purpose: This sit-up variation is a great way to increase the difficulty as well as have skaters work on coordination and powerful arm and knee drive.
Focus: Core strength, timing, coordination, speed, power
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Foundation-Advanced: Lying down Y stretch with stretch strap
Purpose: Using a band can be particularly helpful when skaters are working towards certain poses, such as a Y-stand. This stretch helps skaters improve their Y-stand for spirals and spin variations
Focus: External hip rotation, hip flexibilty, hamstring flexibilty,
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Foundation: Off-ice alternating backward landing hops drill
Purpose: This exercise helps students work on absorbing impact from jump landings and maintaining good control on the stretched landing position.
This exercise can be done with cones to help skaters work on maintaining even spacing on each jump, but the drill can also be done without cones
Focu... -
Beginner-Foundation: Wrist flexion stretch
Purpose: This wrist flexion stretch is helpful for creating more mobility through the wrists, which can help with more fluid artistry. Stretching the wrists is also helpful for skills like handstands, which can be tough on the wrists if they are not properly warmed up. More mobile wrists are als...
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Foundation: Off-ice across the floor forward inside spiral pattern
Purpose: This pattern helps skaters practice their forward inside spirals in a pattern that moves across the floor or the ice
Focus: Across the floor, flow, glide, ice coverage, skating quality
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All levels: What is navicular bone pain, and why does it happen? Q&A
Purpose: This video addresses the question: what is navicular bone pain and why does it occur?
Focus: Navicular bone, foot pain, flat feet, boot fit, inflammed tendon, foot pads, orthotics, tendonitis
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Foundation: Off-ice backward outside three turn demonstration
Purpose: When working on backward outside three turns on the floor, skaters should focus rotating outside the circle with their upper body and looking over their shoulder before turning forward. When they turn forward, they should have their arms counterchecked, free side lifted, and weight align...
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Advanced: Off-ice 5 compound plyometric workout sequence C
Purpose: This sequence of plyometric exercises can be used as a workout with 2-3 sets. Skaters can either do a timed workout, with 40-60second intervals and a 20 second rest, or they can do 10-15 reps of each exercise.
Focus: Workout, explosive power, rotation, quick twitch, plyometrics
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Foundation: Off-ice forward camel on spinner demonstration
Level: Foundation
Base exercise: Forward camel spin
Variation: None
Purpose: Skaters can practice their balance, axis, and weight in their skate by doing their spins on spinners that are designed to mimic a skate.
Focus: Basic technique, consistency, spin axis
Direction: Counterclockwise
Equipme... -
Foundation-Advanced: Upper body and core 15 minute workout
Purpose: Follow-along with Sarah in this 15 minute upper body and core strength workout. You will need a raised surface and hand weights for this workout.
There are two circuits in this workout, with ten reps of each exercise. You will do three sets of both circuits.Focus: Full body core, bic...