I wrote a post about a week ago but I forgot to post it. You have no idea how often this happens. I write posts at work and forget to email them to myself, and by the time I remember to send them to myself they are no longer relevant and I have more stuff to write about. Anyway, the post was about weight loss, fitness goals, and healthy eating. That is to say, I’m going to be losing at least a little weight, improving my fitness levels, and start eating good food again. No more fried crap at the bar after practice.
Improving my fitness levels and losing weight is going to be a little harder than just skipping out on greasy food at the bar though. Today I officially started the Insanity Workout. Not just me, but BoneSaw is doing it too so we’ll have a lot of support and reminders and all that good stuff. The first day is just a fit test and it kicked my ass. I know for a fact that the fit test is the easiest thing in the workout, so I’m a bit worried about how bad I’m going to be hurting during the next two months. I have the (pretty crummy) results of my fit test here on my new tumblog that is all about fitness, weight loss, derby stuff, and stupid inspirational quotes.
Yesterday I got a tiny workout as well. We didn’t have practice because the rink wasn’t available, so Bone & I decided to try out the Roller Derby Workout DVD. I have to admit that I’m super disappointed with it. I think out of all of the exercises in the video there were only 2 that I had never done before. Everything else in there is typical of a regular derby practice, except we do a lot more of everything at practice. For instance, the dvd only had you do 20 bicycle crunches. At practice we do 50. If the team does Mason Twists (which I can’t do because of my tailbone injury**), I end up doing another 50 bicycles.
I was thinking this dvd was for roller derby players, but it isn’t. If you play roller derby you can already do everything in the dvd without breaking a sweat. This is for people either just getting into derby or outsiders. The thing that really bothered me was that there were no arm exercises at all. Ladies, you had weights in your hands, use them!! There should have been a whole other section just on arm exercises. If I do the dvd again I am going to add in the arm exercises we do at practice.
**Yes, my tailbone is still in pain every single day even though I injured it over 3 months ago.
Showing posts with label exercise. Show all posts
Showing posts with label exercise. Show all posts
Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Saturday, October 22, 2011
Weight Loss Photos
Last time I posted weight loss photos I said I would do it in another 2 months just to see how fresh meat changed my body, and it did! I'm officially done losing weight though and I'm trying to gain back at least 3 or 4 pounds so the new jeans I bought last month fit rather than get more baggy. I'm currently at 181lbs.
May 26 - front
August 1 - front
October 22 - front
May 26 - side
August 1 - side
October 22 - side
May 26 - back
August 1 - back
October 22 - back
My favorite part of the difference between August 1 and today is that my thighs are actually bigger (yay muscle!). Also, here's a gif that shows May 26 to October 22.
August 1 - front
October 22 - front
May 26 - side
August 1 - side
October 22 - side
May 26 - back
August 1 - back
October 22 - back
My favorite part of the difference between August 1 and today is that my thighs are actually bigger (yay muscle!). Also, here's a gif that shows May 26 to October 22.
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
Long posts are my specialty!
“What week are we on?” a fellow fresh meat girl asked me as we were gearing up.
I didn’t know and I told her exactly that. A few weeks ago I had looked at a calendar and determined that the last week of fresh meat should be around the last full week in October, but it may be the week after that, depending how the weeks are counted (back in the beginning, we didn’t have practice for a full week so I don’t know how that factors in). So basically, there are about 3 weeks, or 9 practices until we do our minimum skills test (ack!).
A few weeks ago I was full of love for all of the girls in fresh meat, but now it has formed into some kind of strange anger. I’m angry at the girls that have quit. I know I shouldn’t be, but the fact that there are usually only 2 fresh meat girls (myself included) at any given practice is frustrating. There are essentially 3 of us left.
So this sort of goes against my personal rules regarding talking specifics about people that may read this in the future, but our fresh meat was like this:
--- deleted all of this, I think it was much too intrusive to people that may not want to be blogged about ---
I think a lot of the anger comes from the fact that people came out to try for derby and aren’t really trying. It isn’t something you can just do casually and it bothers me that some obviously tried to approach it that way. I am 100% committed to doing derby and even when I’m not feeling well or my life is crap I am going to go to derby practice and not spend the whole time whining about my various aches and pains (although I admit that last night I had to skate off the track during my 25-in-5 to puke and I didn’t finish my laps and get a time *sadface*).
Wow, this post is already long and I’ve got more to talk about. So, let’s start with Saturday.
Saturday was like fun & games. We did some drills for footwork and did the dodgeball exercise again. We also did the “last man standing” thing again and even though everyone was told not to hit me too hard (since I’m fresh meat and apparently have bones of glass), one of the guys that was skating with us didn’t hear that and got me good. Not the worst hit I’ve taken, but it was pretty brutal.
After practice I rushed home to shower, do homework, and watch Doctor Who before going back to the rink for some more skating. Yeah, even though I had skated for 3 hours I was going back to skate some more because I was meeting with a girl that I had skated with once before derby started. The coolest part was that I was able to convince my sister Laci to join me!! I was worried that the girl wouldn’t show, be late, or not want to skate very much (in the end, the girl was late and didn’t skate very much) and I didn’t want to be all alone.
I have been trying to convince my sister to skate with me for months! We got to the rink and it felt so weird. I had just left there two hours ago and it seemed like a different place completely. The colored lights were on, there were people of all ages, music was playing, and I was wearing jeans. Laci got some rentals and I had her wear my kneepads. It’s a good thing she was wearing them because she fell…a lot. The best part was that she kept getting up. She was sweating and it was a real work out for her (Laci used to be a lot heavier but over the last year and a half she’s lost about 100 lbs). She really enjoyed skating, too. I don’t think it’ll be too hard to get her to go with me again.
While we were there I saw the team’s former coach (he was up in the dj booth putting on some good music and said hi to me when I skated by), my fresh meat coach (he has a very young son that loves to skate), and one of the girls on the team that couldn’t make it to practice. It was refreshing just to skate without having to worry about doing a skill or being evaluated. I definitely want to go to next Saturday’s evening session (no practice that day).
So, on to last night’s practice (finally!). We started out with our normal routine of jogging, doing crunches, pushups, and other icky things and then geared up. Fresh meat was going to do the 25-in-5! I was hoping to get a lower time than my last one of 4:58 but that didn’t happen. After 4 laps I started to feel sick and skated off the track to throw up in the bathroom. When I get stressed and worried I get physically sick and worrying about real life crap made me ill. I shook it off and skated around the track while the other fresh meat girl did her 25 laps.
We split off with a vet and once again, we had to show her our falls just to make sure we were doing them right. Left-footed T-stops were discussed, and it has become very clear that everyone has a preference and most girls are crap with stopping on their non-dominant foot. Most say that they did it okay enough to pass their test, but haven’t really bothered with it since. We practiced plow stopping for a bit before another vet, S, that has led our fresh meat practice once before came over to us. We did some general stuff with stance, grapevines, and some sticky skating.
At one point I said that I thought I could kind of do a tomahawk but that I was still not good at all. S asked me to show her my tomahawk and she could help me out with it. I did one just fine and told her that it was a fluke. Then I did another one without any problems and said that was a second fluke. She told me that if I did it five times in a row that it means that I can do a tomahawk and that it’s not a fluke. So…yeah, I did 10 tomahawks in a row and only slightly stumbled on my very last one.
Sometime later in the practice I asked if we could go over pushes and whips, so we did that for a while. S said that, “If you fall, it means you’re doing it wrong.” I am glad that I am not doing it wrong, but it is kind of a bummer that I’m the heaviest girl and I think the other fresh meat girl was kinda pissed that I would be whipping from her.
While the other fresh meat girl was tending to her skates, S asked me if I wanted to learn something cool. Of course I do! It’s called a suicide fall and while there are a lot of other falls that can be done, this is basically just a crowd pleaser that looks cool. You go down on one knee and then tuck and roll back onto your skates. It’s really cool looking and I think with some more practice and speed on it, that I can do it. I don’t need to do it, but yay fun!
Practice was great for stress relief, and I’m hoping tomorrow’s practice is good like that too (although our fresh meat coach better come to practice!).
I didn’t know and I told her exactly that. A few weeks ago I had looked at a calendar and determined that the last week of fresh meat should be around the last full week in October, but it may be the week after that, depending how the weeks are counted (back in the beginning, we didn’t have practice for a full week so I don’t know how that factors in). So basically, there are about 3 weeks, or 9 practices until we do our minimum skills test (ack!).
A few weeks ago I was full of love for all of the girls in fresh meat, but now it has formed into some kind of strange anger. I’m angry at the girls that have quit. I know I shouldn’t be, but the fact that there are usually only 2 fresh meat girls (myself included) at any given practice is frustrating. There are essentially 3 of us left.
So this sort of goes against my personal rules regarding talking specifics about people that may read this in the future, but our fresh meat was like this:
--- deleted all of this, I think it was much too intrusive to people that may not want to be blogged about ---
I think a lot of the anger comes from the fact that people came out to try for derby and aren’t really trying. It isn’t something you can just do casually and it bothers me that some obviously tried to approach it that way. I am 100% committed to doing derby and even when I’m not feeling well or my life is crap I am going to go to derby practice and not spend the whole time whining about my various aches and pains (although I admit that last night I had to skate off the track during my 25-in-5 to puke and I didn’t finish my laps and get a time *sadface*).
Wow, this post is already long and I’ve got more to talk about. So, let’s start with Saturday.
Saturday was like fun & games. We did some drills for footwork and did the dodgeball exercise again. We also did the “last man standing” thing again and even though everyone was told not to hit me too hard (since I’m fresh meat and apparently have bones of glass), one of the guys that was skating with us didn’t hear that and got me good. Not the worst hit I’ve taken, but it was pretty brutal.
After practice I rushed home to shower, do homework, and watch Doctor Who before going back to the rink for some more skating. Yeah, even though I had skated for 3 hours I was going back to skate some more because I was meeting with a girl that I had skated with once before derby started. The coolest part was that I was able to convince my sister Laci to join me!! I was worried that the girl wouldn’t show, be late, or not want to skate very much (in the end, the girl was late and didn’t skate very much) and I didn’t want to be all alone.
I have been trying to convince my sister to skate with me for months! We got to the rink and it felt so weird. I had just left there two hours ago and it seemed like a different place completely. The colored lights were on, there were people of all ages, music was playing, and I was wearing jeans. Laci got some rentals and I had her wear my kneepads. It’s a good thing she was wearing them because she fell…a lot. The best part was that she kept getting up. She was sweating and it was a real work out for her (Laci used to be a lot heavier but over the last year and a half she’s lost about 100 lbs). She really enjoyed skating, too. I don’t think it’ll be too hard to get her to go with me again.
While we were there I saw the team’s former coach (he was up in the dj booth putting on some good music and said hi to me when I skated by), my fresh meat coach (he has a very young son that loves to skate), and one of the girls on the team that couldn’t make it to practice. It was refreshing just to skate without having to worry about doing a skill or being evaluated. I definitely want to go to next Saturday’s evening session (no practice that day).
So, on to last night’s practice (finally!). We started out with our normal routine of jogging, doing crunches, pushups, and other icky things and then geared up. Fresh meat was going to do the 25-in-5! I was hoping to get a lower time than my last one of 4:58 but that didn’t happen. After 4 laps I started to feel sick and skated off the track to throw up in the bathroom. When I get stressed and worried I get physically sick and worrying about real life crap made me ill. I shook it off and skated around the track while the other fresh meat girl did her 25 laps.
We split off with a vet and once again, we had to show her our falls just to make sure we were doing them right. Left-footed T-stops were discussed, and it has become very clear that everyone has a preference and most girls are crap with stopping on their non-dominant foot. Most say that they did it okay enough to pass their test, but haven’t really bothered with it since. We practiced plow stopping for a bit before another vet, S, that has led our fresh meat practice once before came over to us. We did some general stuff with stance, grapevines, and some sticky skating.
At one point I said that I thought I could kind of do a tomahawk but that I was still not good at all. S asked me to show her my tomahawk and she could help me out with it. I did one just fine and told her that it was a fluke. Then I did another one without any problems and said that was a second fluke. She told me that if I did it five times in a row that it means that I can do a tomahawk and that it’s not a fluke. So…yeah, I did 10 tomahawks in a row and only slightly stumbled on my very last one.
Sometime later in the practice I asked if we could go over pushes and whips, so we did that for a while. S said that, “If you fall, it means you’re doing it wrong.” I am glad that I am not doing it wrong, but it is kind of a bummer that I’m the heaviest girl and I think the other fresh meat girl was kinda pissed that I would be whipping from her.
While the other fresh meat girl was tending to her skates, S asked me if I wanted to learn something cool. Of course I do! It’s called a suicide fall and while there are a lot of other falls that can be done, this is basically just a crowd pleaser that looks cool. You go down on one knee and then tuck and roll back onto your skates. It’s really cool looking and I think with some more practice and speed on it, that I can do it. I don’t need to do it, but yay fun!
Practice was great for stress relief, and I’m hoping tomorrow’s practice is good like that too (although our fresh meat coach better come to practice!).
Saturday, September 17, 2011
Three practices (long post is long)
In my last post I was worried about my ankle. It swelled to an outrageous size all through Tuesday and I was planning on telling the fresh meat coach that I wasn't going to be able to skate. I checked my email before leaving work for practice and saw a reminder that we were meeting at Greenway rather than the rink since they had an event. I decided I would give skating a try and if I had trouble skating to where the trails started then I wouldn't skate.
Practice started with an hour long league meeting before we donned our skates. I laced up my skates and skated with the team. I was able to keep up much better than I had on Friday. In the end we only skated 3 miles before it got too dark to do anything else, so we packed it in. When I took off my skates I noticed that the swelling had gone down about 90%. So yes, healing powers of skating!
Thursday practice was great! One of the girls that has been in fresh meat with us was testing out. She's a former vet of the team and per the team's bylaws, she's eligible to test out of fresh meat after her 4th week (this was the 6th). So while we did our jog, stretching, and a few drills she was doing her minimum skills (she passed!). I'm excited for her, but kinda sad that she'll be leaving our small group (although we're halfway through, so the group won't last all that long).
We freshmeat were lucky enough to be able to do some drills with the vets. I'm kind of an idiot, because now I've sort of forgotten what they were because I waited so long to post about them, but I'll remember to the best of my ability.
The first one we did after our initial warm up laps was a paceline drill. As we skated in the paceline the very front person would skate ahead and pass the line on the outside and then skate around again to join them in the back. After that we worked with a partner on staying in the blocker's blind spot by weaving from side to side as well as some positional blocking and a bit of pushing.
After that we did a sort of "pass the panty" type of thing. Everyone was skating as a big giant pack and one person would be wearing the jammer panty, they would skate around the track, find holes through the pack (with no blocking - except on some we were told to make it hard for them) and on their second pass through the pack they would hand the jammer panty off to someone else and they would do the same. I ended up being the last one to get the jammer panty (IT FELT SO WEIRD TO TRY AND PUT IT ON WHILE I WAS SKATING!!) and as I was making my final pass through the pack someone yelled something like, "Shae wants to be a jammer, make it hard for her!" and EVERYONE THREW THEIR ARMS OUT TO BLOCK ME! I crouched low and went through on the inside. Just as an fyi - no, I do not want to be a jammer, she just wanted to make it hard for me, lol.
All of that was in about an hour and a half of our practice, and then freshies broke off to go do our normal thing. We did the normal falls with the addition of 180 knee slides and some plow stopping. We focused a lot on stopping for our part of the practice. We're all pretty good stopping with our right leg, but the left is a mess. I really need to figure out a way outside of practice that I can work on stopping with my left. About 10 minutes before practice ended we joined the rest of the team to do backwards laps. I fell 3 times, one of them forward! When I fell forward I got a large round of applause, lol. I am not awesome at backwards skating.
Today was a very different type of practice. First of all, our fresh meat coach wasn't there. After the meeting we had on Tuesday, I don't know if he just wasn't there or if he's not going to come back because of all of the main team coaching changes that are happening right now. I guess we'll see how Tuesday practice is.
As I said, it was very different than normal because our fresh meat coach wasn't there and there were only 2 freshies, 6 vets, our captain (who was leading the practice), and the team's head ref. Also, a couple of the ladies had gone to part of the matinee skate that happens before practice to drum up some interest in the league and the sport. Several people, including a bunch of kids, were allowed to hang back and watch us practice for a bit. Rather than doing our normal run and stretch we immediately geared up. We started with some warm up laps before forming a line for some paceline drills.
In the line we did: regular weaving, backwards weaving, butt swipes (you get in real close and swipe your butt across their lap/vag area), and hip whips (my first time trying them!). After that the vets did a little mock 3 on 3 scrimmage. Right as they were finishing up a jam the spectators left, so they ditched doing that since they never start practices with scrimmaging.
We got back into a line and did an exercise where we had to cut across from one side of the track to the other when a whistle was blown. Never having done this, I fell (of course) and it made the girl behind me fall. The tight paceline separated and practiced the actual movement involved. Once I got exactly how the lunge to the inside/outside worked, it became a lot easier. I really liked that one and want to try it some more!
The next one was getting from one side of the track to the other with *ominous music* lateral hops! Now, we've done lateral hops in fresh meat, but that was during off-skates training. Big surprise though - I didn't fall! Not even once! I think I did several good ones, a lot of mediocre ones, and one or two bad ones.
After that we worked with a partner and I did not do well, in my opinion. I didn't fully understand the drill and was a little lost. We combined the cutting movement and the butt swipe for blocking someone, but I think we were supposed to be passing them, and I wasn't passing my partner. I don't know. I felt like a bit of an idiot during this part (especially because my partner is an amazing skater with a lifetime of skating experience).
Rather than keep practicing that one on each other, our ref changed from skates to sneakers and got out a large hitting pad so we could practicing hitting it. We did some of the same butt swipe hits; none of my attempts were right. After that he held the pad to the side and we had to cut from one side of the track to the other to deliver a hit with our whole body. I think out of all of the ones I did, I landed 1 or 2 correctly. Kind of discouraging, but this was the first time the fresh meat practiced any type of hitting at all.
The next drill the vets were going to do was skate around the track and when a move was called they would do it (tomahawks, falls, stops, etc). We were pulled aside and worked with the skater I had partnered with before. She wanted to know what we had been taught to do and correct a few of our falls. Our knee falls were good, but we were falling a bit too hard (and me leaning a bit too far back) in our double knee falls. Our pornstars/superman falls were good, but our baseball slides were wrong. She showed us another way to do them, so we did one of two of those. The one we learned before was a bit harder than the new one. I don't mind either though.
We did some t-stop practice after that, and I came the closest I ever have to actually stopping with my left foot!! So yays, hopefully I'll keep improving! We did some plow stopping after that, not too much since we both had the basic concept down, it's just a matter of perfecting it. Then we did...TOMAHAWKS!
The other fresh meat girl has already been able to turn around (and around and around and around) since we started, so she got those really easy. As long as I think about the steps involved in turning around, I can kinda do them. So I was able to do 2 good, but very slow, tomahawk stops. I definitely want to practice the hell out of those! Then we did hockey stops. The same turn around as a tomahawk, but with one leg out in back. I did one good one of those, and definitely want to work on it (I need more work with the turn around rather than the stopping motion in both the hockey and the tomahawk). The captain announced that it was time to start picking up the track, but the skater that was with us wanted us to try some regular hopping. We hopped in place once, and then started rolling, doing 3 hops down one part of the rink, and then 3 hops down the next part. I am happy to say that I only fell once, and I knew exactly why I fell (put too much weight on the front of my skates rather than the middle). I was kinda bummed when that was the end of practice, because I was very excited at the new skills we were able to tackle today.
I've also decided to stop going to Monday night skate because I need more time for homework type stuff and this week I have two tests (also, I don't like spending money). On Monday I'm going to study and prepare for both tests and on Wednesday night I'll go ahead and take both of them. Right now I'm skating at practice Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday and then I will be doing trail skating on Friday and Sunday (except tomorrow since I'm going to Orlando in the early morning). After this coming week, I think I want to start doing zumba or another kind of cardio on Monday & Wednesday when I'm not skating.
Friday, August 12, 2011
Stop looking at me, swan!
When I got home from practice last night I was pretty sweaty, gross, and already feeling the soreness (advil was wearing off). I made a quesadilla and my brother made me a banana orange smoothie. After eating, a nice hot bath was the only thing I wanted, so I rummaged through a closet and found an old thing of Epsom Salt. Of course, the swan thing reminded me of that scene in Billy Madison. I took a nice bubble bath and relaxed and then completely crashed out.
I had an awesome dream. In my dream I was able to do perfect derby stance and my squats were awesome. I woke up and instantly felt bummed because I know for a fact that my derby stance sucks and I can't hold a squat for very long. *sadface forever*
The last thirty minutes of practice last night, we joined the team while they did some off-skates training. We did some push-ups, planks (dear god, they are awful), and two other exercises that I don't know the name for. The worst part, in my opinion, was the low walks that went from one end of the rink to the other. I think I was one of the last to finish that one (although I will note that the two freshies that are less fit than me sat out for the 30 minutes with the team, usually they're the ones that lag behind in our drills). On the way back down to the other side of the rink we did frog hops (which I loathe). I was tired and sore, but one of the girls was nice enough to stick around with me and another freshmeat girl and make us finish. She told us we could do it and would count to three and we all jumped. It was really awesome of her!!
I was going to use my new outdoor wheels this morning, but I've already had a bit of a late start and I have other things I have to be doing. Also, Florida is stupidly hot. I just checked weather.com for my area and it says, "Dangerous heat index. Outdoor exposure should be limited."
Also, the team is playing in Ormond Beach on Sunday, and I agreed to NSO. My original plan this weekend was to go to Orlando Saturday evening for a bout in Deland and then skate with Heather and Itzel on Sunday morning. Since practice is from 3-6 on Saturdays, I won't make it to the bout on time, so I think I'll trail skate with them on Sunday morning, shower in the afternoon, drive to Ormond Beach to NSO, and then drive back home from there.
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
My First Day (Off Skates Training)
aka - the day before the most horrible soreness of my life (I know this because the soreness is already creeping in)
Fresh meat here starts out with a few weeks of off-skate training, also known as hell. IT WAS AWESOME.
We all started out with a 5 minute jog and stretching (everyone does this, it wasn't just us), and did one of the things I fear most: the introduction thing. Basically it's the thing that takes place in every class and makes me freak out hardcore. You're in a circle and you say your name and something about yourself. Uuuugh, agonizing.
Anyway, before I get distracted, let me tell you what we got to do during our training tonight (not in the right order, because it all blurred together) -
There are probably a lot of other things that I'm forgetting, but maybe it's for the best. I loved every minute of it though (okay, I didn't like the minutes that I was doing burpees. That exercise can go die in a fire. Other than that, I caught myself smiling several times. I'm definitely not in the best shape of all of the girls (I will be forever jealous of the Firefighter girl because she is AMAZING), but I think I did crazy awesome and I can't wait to do it again.
As I said during the training, "I lost 30 pounds of fat, I just need to gain 30 pounds of muscle and I'll be set."
Fresh meat here starts out with a few weeks of off-skate training, also known as hell. IT WAS AWESOME.
We all started out with a 5 minute jog and stretching (everyone does this, it wasn't just us), and did one of the things I fear most: the introduction thing. Basically it's the thing that takes place in every class and makes me freak out hardcore. You're in a circle and you say your name and something about yourself. Uuuugh, agonizing.
Anyway, before I get distracted, let me tell you what we got to do during our training tonight (not in the right order, because it all blurred together) -
- Suicides (4, I think?)
- Grapevines (4 across the rink's width)
- Lunges (60 total, 30 each leg)
- Frog Hops (lots)
- Low Walks (4 across the rink's width)
- Run Backwards (6 across the rink's width)
- Chair/Jump (more than I ever wanted to do)
- Three Hop One Squat
- 5 point Hops (?) (hop back, middle, front, middle, left, middle, right, middle, back middle - 10 or so of these)
- One Leg Jumps (maybe 15-20 each leg)
- Side to Side Jumps (so many of these! They were my favorite)
- Heel Taps (from derby stance)
- Toe Taps to Jumping Jacks
- Push-ups (10 of these just for me, because I knocked over one of the cones!)
- Crab Walk (2 across the rink's width)
- Some weird exercise that I was bad at and don't know the name for
- Burpees (30)
- Crunches (30)
There are probably a lot of other things that I'm forgetting, but maybe it's for the best. I loved every minute of it though (okay, I didn't like the minutes that I was doing burpees. That exercise can go die in a fire. Other than that, I caught myself smiling several times. I'm definitely not in the best shape of all of the girls (I will be forever jealous of the Firefighter girl because she is AMAZING), but I think I did crazy awesome and I can't wait to do it again.
As I said during the training, "I lost 30 pounds of fat, I just need to gain 30 pounds of muscle and I'll be set."
Monday, July 4, 2011
New Skills and an Achievement
This weekend was great! I got to spend all of Saturday and Sunday in Orlando and picked up a few skills as well as gained an achievement. As I said in my last post I wanted to get 5 days straight on my Zumba game. I got that on Saturday so now I'm hopefully going to have ten days in a row by next Thursday.
Now to the important skating bits! The Saturday morning class at Universal Skating Center was led by someone else this time, and it was pretty great. She did a lot of the basic stuff we've already been doing, but with a little extra instruction. She explained how we should be feeling the push when we T-Start and when we're just regular skating. Just feeling that push helped a lot. Anything that makes me more aware of how to move is a good thing, and I think it will help me with my speed. Even though I'm not even close to recruitment, I have a horrible fear that I will fail the 25 laps in 5 minutes because I've seen the same thing happen on various other derby blogs.
So the Saturday morning class was pretty good, but I think the best thing was the adult skate at Semoran Skateway. I will proudly admit that I spent almost the entire time in the beginner's area (there were several large groups of shuffle/jam skaters and they were SCARY). It was awesome though, because Laura, who skates (or skated, I think she's taking time off but I'm not sure) with Thunder City, was able to give us a few pointers and an amazing lesson in how to do T-stops!!
Yes, T-stops, one thing that I've seen as impossible and difficult! After lots and lots of practice I'm feeling semi-confident in my ability to do a T-stop. It's definitely not perfect or pretty, but I'm going to get to a point where I can stop faster. For now, it takes a little bit more time than I'd like, but I know if I keep working at it my stops will be better. In the Saturday morning skate class, they teach us to do a Toe Stop (which is a big Derby no-no). Hopefully I can go to class next week and still be able to do a good T-stop and not have to worry about my horribly performed Toe Stops.
Another thing I worked on was skating backwards! I'm still kind crummy at it (unless no one is watching, then I can backward skate like a mofo), but at least I'm moving and going backwards at the same time! I thought it would be an impossible skill, but in working in the Beginner's Rink I was able to take time to keep trying again and again.
So this weekend was a roaring success as far as I'm concerned. I'm kind of getting worried though. Last Thursday two of my friends went to recruitment with the league they're going to join and now I'm worried that once they start regular practices I'll be the person left behind. I know my chance at recruitment will come and I know for a fact that I'm still not physically fit enough to go through recruitment, but a huge part of me wishes that I lived closer and that driving there twice a week was possible. Oh well, time to stop being a whiner and start celebrating the fact that I can do t-stops!!
Now to the important skating bits! The Saturday morning class at Universal Skating Center was led by someone else this time, and it was pretty great. She did a lot of the basic stuff we've already been doing, but with a little extra instruction. She explained how we should be feeling the push when we T-Start and when we're just regular skating. Just feeling that push helped a lot. Anything that makes me more aware of how to move is a good thing, and I think it will help me with my speed. Even though I'm not even close to recruitment, I have a horrible fear that I will fail the 25 laps in 5 minutes because I've seen the same thing happen on various other derby blogs.
So the Saturday morning class was pretty good, but I think the best thing was the adult skate at Semoran Skateway. I will proudly admit that I spent almost the entire time in the beginner's area (there were several large groups of shuffle/jam skaters and they were SCARY). It was awesome though, because Laura, who skates (or skated, I think she's taking time off but I'm not sure) with Thunder City, was able to give us a few pointers and an amazing lesson in how to do T-stops!!
Yes, T-stops, one thing that I've seen as impossible and difficult! After lots and lots of practice I'm feeling semi-confident in my ability to do a T-stop. It's definitely not perfect or pretty, but I'm going to get to a point where I can stop faster. For now, it takes a little bit more time than I'd like, but I know if I keep working at it my stops will be better. In the Saturday morning skate class, they teach us to do a Toe Stop (which is a big Derby no-no). Hopefully I can go to class next week and still be able to do a good T-stop and not have to worry about my horribly performed Toe Stops.
Another thing I worked on was skating backwards! I'm still kind crummy at it (unless no one is watching, then I can backward skate like a mofo), but at least I'm moving and going backwards at the same time! I thought it would be an impossible skill, but in working in the Beginner's Rink I was able to take time to keep trying again and again.
So this weekend was a roaring success as far as I'm concerned. I'm kind of getting worried though. Last Thursday two of my friends went to recruitment with the league they're going to join and now I'm worried that once they start regular practices I'll be the person left behind. I know my chance at recruitment will come and I know for a fact that I'm still not physically fit enough to go through recruitment, but a huge part of me wishes that I lived closer and that driving there twice a week was possible. Oh well, time to stop being a whiner and start celebrating the fact that I can do t-stops!!
Monday, June 20, 2011
Standard Introduction + Weight Loss Stuff
I'm very afraid of new and different, but I seem to be trying new things all the time. Roller derby is going to be one of those new and different things. I've always had an interest in the sport, but the real interest to actually do roller derby started in January of this year. I saw my first live bout (I'd seen others on tv and in movies) with my friend Heather and we both were blown away by how awesome it was. We immediately said we wanted to do derby, but then sort of let it go for a few months. Heather was busy with RenFaire and I put the idea down on a list of things I could never do because of my size.
Fast forward a few months to May, and I was feeling fed up with the fact that I couldn't do much at all because of my weight. I was sad that I would never be one of those smaller, sportier girls, but then I asked myself, "Why not? Why can't you be one of those girls?" So I decided to start dieting and exercising with the intention of becoming a derby girl.
On May 18th I bought a scale and weighed in at 223. It's been a month and two days since I started my diet and this morning my weight was 204. One pound away from losing 20 pounds and 5 away from being under 200.
My original plan was to buy skates once I lost 30 pounds, but I went skating once and couldn't help myself. In my next post I'll talk about the skating classes and sessions I'm going to as well as what I'd really like to be able to do as far as skating goes.
Also, my friend Heather is keeping a Fresh Meat blog as well. We live an hour away from each other, so she's going to be skating in a different league. You can read her blog here.
Fast forward a few months to May, and I was feeling fed up with the fact that I couldn't do much at all because of my weight. I was sad that I would never be one of those smaller, sportier girls, but then I asked myself, "Why not? Why can't you be one of those girls?" So I decided to start dieting and exercising with the intention of becoming a derby girl.
On May 18th I bought a scale and weighed in at 223. It's been a month and two days since I started my diet and this morning my weight was 204. One pound away from losing 20 pounds and 5 away from being under 200.
My original plan was to buy skates once I lost 30 pounds, but I went skating once and couldn't help myself. In my next post I'll talk about the skating classes and sessions I'm going to as well as what I'd really like to be able to do as far as skating goes.
Also, my friend Heather is keeping a Fresh Meat blog as well. We live an hour away from each other, so she's going to be skating in a different league. You can read her blog here.
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