A Test Worth Passing

I went for my silver moves on Saturday. I've been planning to test them this month since December. This was my first test to go through without my original coach. I've been doing lessons with two different coaches for the past six weeks or so. One of them was supposed to take me through the test. He announced last week that he couldn't make it, but a coach he team teaches with was going to take all of his students through. I've met her, but I haven't worked with her before.

My warm-up went fine. I didn't feel nervous. But even when I don't think I feel nervous, my legs still manage to shake. I think perhaps I wasn't really thinking much about the test at all. Maybe that was my problem. Nothing felt too strong. Everything was just okay. On the RFO-LBI 3s, the transition between lobes felt completely weak. I was really close to the wall on the last one and turned way early. Because I'd been so close to the wall on my last set of FO-BI 3s, I decided to only do three lobes of FI-BOs. I really wanted to knock the spirals out of the park. When my spirals are good, they get a lot of good reactions. But I never got into the groove and actually touched down between the last two inside spirals. *sigh*.

In the end, I got one pass and two retries. I was supposed to call Coach as soon as I had the results. "Who passed you?" he asked. I deciphered the signature and read him the name on the test form. "What?!? She passed you? She doesn't pass anyone! You must have been really close!" I told a few other folks when they asked who passed me and got similar reactions. One friend said, "Oh, I've heard of that judge! I heard if you walk in and she's on your panel, just start moaning about your knee, withdraw, and don't even bother trying!" Both coaches I'm working with and the one who took me through the test think I should try again on the next test session in a month. I'm disappointed in the result, of course, because I'd had a crummy week and also because I was hoping to keep up a streak of passing on my first try. But at the end of the day, a test isn't worth passing if nobody fails it.

Here are my more detailed results:

Eight-step mohawk sequence:
2.7 - rushy, but cadence almost there
2.7 - 2nd circle a little scratchy, nice flow & edges shallow - nice speed
2.6 - scrape-y transitions - nice cadence/timing CCW

Fwd & Bkwd free skating cross strokes:
2.8
2.6 - nice flow F, B - need more knee bend, a little scratchy b/c F on blade
2.7 - lifted posture, good acceleration over ice, watch toepick!

FO-BI three-turns in the field:
2.7 - R okay, L control ok
2.6 - RFO/LBI - nice 3s F&B, clearly not stepping on BI edge. LFO/RBI - F 3s shallow, B OK
2.6 - R/L LB turns too early w/ balance control issue. L/R Nice control/flow

FI-BO three-turns in the field:
2.7 - edges mostly good
2.6 - RFI/LBO - only 1 set of clean 3s. LFI/RBO - 3s edges not true
2.6 - difficulty maintaining inside edge following back turns

Consecutive outside & inside spirals:
2.6 - 0 1 (stepdown between last two)
2.6 - very nice extensions. FO. FI - bobble-two-foot, watch toe pushing, nice extension & edges
2.5 - nice high free leg,but inside edges lack rotational control. foot down.

Forward & backward power change of edge pulls:
2.8 - nice upper body
2.7 - F - well done. B - OK.
2.7 - strong rhythmic knee action. good progress across ice.

Totals:
16.3
15.9
15.7

Need 16.2 to pass.