Dan Replies:
E. L. of St. Albert writes:
"I have taught power skating in the past, but I had questions about the leaning in/out of the circle as Dan describes. A series of E-Mails and a face-to-face meeting with Dan has helped explain what he was saying. Actually, we were both saying the same thing, but speaking different languages. I’ve been asked to try to explain it – maybe the language that I speak will make it easier to understand!
"If you swing a ball around on a short string, you will feel it pull out on your hand. Swing the same ball at the same speed on a long string, it will pull out much harder (try it if you don’t believe me). If you spin the ball on the short string very fast, the force pushing out on your hand gets even bigger. You can make it as much as with the long string. Of course, spinning the ball on the long string very fast makes it even worse! This is why we need to bend our knees in tight turns (crossover or tight cuts). We want to keep the string as short as possible, to keep the force pushing us away from the circle we’re skating, as small as possible. I think most people understand this.
"If we bend our knees, our upper body can end up at an angle, which makes it hard to see or stickhandle (both come in handy when you’re playing hockey).
"For this reason we’re taught to bend our knees deep, and hold our upper body upright (90’ to the ice surface). We’re taught to lead into the turn with our shoulders to help steer us through the turn.
"The faster you go, the more you have to lean to keep from getting flung outwards, using your derriere and the boards as a landing assembly. Unfortunately, when we lean, we expose less and less of our in-turn edge to the ice.
"So how do we overcome this? You have to learn to keep your hips and shoulders parallel to the ice in your turn. This will not feel natural at first, but that’s part of learning. What this will force your body to do is to bend a bit sideways through the knee. You end up with a low body position to keep the string shorter, an upright upper body to be able to see and stickhandle, hip lean (i.e./ center of gravity) to help us push against the outward pull, and more edge on the ice. It sounds difficult, and it is – but it isn’t impossible. It just takes 3 things to get good at it “Practice, Practice, Practice!!!” Once you get the basic form down, you can work at improving your speed through turns.
"Hope this helps! If Dan can learn it, so can you! :o)"
K.M. from Chicago writes:
"Doing the turn correctly does feel like "leaning away". I describe the turn as "keeping the shoulders level", and others describe it as "leaning in with the hip".
"It is simply maintaining proper basic skating form: knees bent, shoulders back, head up and back (nearly) straight. To turn, the knees are bent even lower (like starting from a standstill) and the shoulders must be kept level. One leans into the turn with the hip as much as the shoulder.
"If done right, a line drawn from the inside heel though the middle of the butt and chest would point almost straight up. This keeps the center of gravity low and over one's feet (for stability) and allows the muscles to work freely (for stronger, quicker crossovers and strides)."
Dan and I thank these contributors. Anyone else want to weigh in?
