OTHER IMPORTANT FIGURES.
While the school figures, both elementary and advanced, have been
described or illustrated, there are other important figures which the
skater should learn. These will be useful for introduction into any free
skating programme and some of them are exceedingly interesting. In my
theatrical skating I make up a programme which contains very few of the
school figures. Spectacular jumps and spins, pirouettes and acrobatic
development of skating strokes are the most taking features of any
skating programme offered to the general public. For this reason, the
skater who is ambitious to become an exhibition skater must perfect
himself or herself in these movements which are somewhat outside of the
strict school figures but which nevertheless are most important
additions to general figure skating.
In this list are comprised cross-cuts or anvils, the very names of which
tell the method of their execution or appearance, also spins, pirouettes
and jumps, introduced between changes of direction or edge, or for their
own sake as independent movements; grapevines, beaks, spectacles,
spirals and spread-eagles. From these figures, together with the school
figures, all skating exhibitions and competitions are made up.
It would be difficult indeed for even the most painstaking student of
skating to learn some of these movements from a printed description or
diagram of them. Such description is almost worthless. They can be
learned best from a teacher and in almost every locality where there is
figure skating there will be found at least a few skaters capable of
executing some if not all of these free skating figures. The student is
urged to watch carefully the strokes of those who can do them and then
work the figures out for himself on the ice. Do not be ashamed to ask
questions of those who skate better than you do. Make pencil sketches of
figures that interest you and write down the correct carriage of balance
foot and arms until you have learned them.
Spins and whirls, on one foot or two feet, on the flat blade of the
skate or on an edge, are best started from a long, strong spiral on one
foot which ends in a three, the balance foot and the arms being swung
widely to give rotating impetus. Pirouettes are done on the toes of the
skates and imply extremely difficult balances. Jumps on to the toe of
the skate are not so difficult, although they appear very difficult, are
very effective for exhibition purposes and often form very pretty
interludes to introduce into a skating programme.
Cross-cuts and anvils are explained in the diagrams. They are not pretty
figures but are sometimes useful in embellishing a skating programme
through their oddity. Spectacles are often extremely beautiful numbers
to skate to music, the balance foot beating time in the air. Spirals are
splendid figures for pair skating or for the demonstration of graceful
carriage. The various grapevines have never been very popular in Europe
yet they have much value in stimulating ingenuity and in increasing the
flexibility of the ankles. Some surprising figures can be built up by
executing one movement with one foot while the other foot executes a
different movement.
The spread-eagle is a figure which many skaters find themselves
physically incapable of. It requires a flexibility of the hip-joints
which can not always be cultivated. It can be made very spectacular by
the introduction of jumps while it is being performed. Some of the
cross-cuts and even some of the dance steps, require that the skater be
able to execute the spread-eagle. It should be learned unless physical
inability prevents.
The various dance steps are merely variations of the school figures or
the addition to them of some of these movements. Few of them are at all
difficult, the combinations being all that the skater has to learn. The
waltz, for instance, is simply the three turn, on both edges, forward
and backward, with a partner, who is oftener a help than a hindrance to
the beginner.