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- 1. Keep your head forward: In most movements, keep your head looking forward, because your body will usually follow the direction of your head.
- 2. Keeping your eyes and head in the direction of your movement: The direction which you want to travel will be determined where you look and where your head is facing. As stated before, your head will always lead where your body will go. But more specifically, both your eyes and head must work in conjunction with each other. During a jump, if your head is facing the horizon but your are looking down, than the natural direction of your jump is to follow a downward or tilted path.
- 3. Keeping your shoulders and hips "in-check": Your hips and shoulders should always act as either one unit or two parts working in opposite of each other (such as twisting your body sideways). For instance, if you're doing the Apolo's Turn, than your hips and shoulders should be together, not rotated. If doing a switch turn (a move where your rotate your body forward and backward), your hips should be opposite of your shoulders. This is done by using your abdominal muscles to rotate your hips all while using your back muscles to rotate your shoulders. It's very important that you use proper muscle groups when controlling precise movement. And the only way to learn this is through constant practice and self-awareness throughout practice.
- 4. Lower back is arched inward: For almost every movement in Xtreme Ice Skating, your lower back must be arched inwards. This keeps your posture more erect and your spine straight. A slouched posture - - such as having your lower back arched outward, will direct your off-balance. This is not to say that every movement must be erect like figure skating. However most movements require your lower back to be arched inward. This provides balance over your waist.
- 5. Chest is pushed out on certain movements: Your chest is pushed outward during most stops and jumps. However for footwork, this technique is not applied as strictly because footwork is so fast. With your chest pushed outward, this realigns your center of balance and makes certain movements for stable.
- 6. Posture is facing upward rather than bent over: Upward posture will decrease any kind of awkward balance or "falling-over" feeling. A good center of balance will cause most jumps to stay straight in the air. An upward posture will keep your balance over your hips and create an even axis.
- 7. Spotting: Spotting is where you reference a specific focal point to maintain course or direction. You find a point(s) in space, and keep looking at those points until you're forced to move to the next point or until the movement has ended. Spotting is used most often in jumps and spins.
- 8. For jumps, your knees must come up to hip level: This guideline is solely for the purpose of aesthetics (how good something looks). Do you really want to look like a figure skater? No of course not. All respect to figure skaters of course.
- 9. Legs and feet must conform together on certain movements: The Tuck Stop and the One Footed Stop for instance, require that your legs and feet touch each other. This guideline is the space between your legs or feet will misguide your balance, and secondly, this technique allows you to learn greater control of your skating. Even in aggressive skating, you don't want to be doing a "TopSide" grind or a "Royale" grind with your feet too far apart. This is simply because the technique is too hard to control - - at least for some tricks.
- 10. Rotation and spin is always derived from the hips, legs, and shoulders -- never swinging arms: This guideline is used most frequently in jumps. Power and rotation start at your feet, the move to your hips, and finally through your shoulders from energy of your arms. Notice that the rotation didn't start at your arms. Your arms were the last point of rotation. However, some jumps require you to pivot your hips after the last point of rotation because this allows you to snap into a spin.