Easy gratification?

Or long-term deferral of pleasure?

It should be an easy choice, but it’s not.

On the one hand, I am getting quite frustrated with the way that I feel like I need to revamp my entire way of skating, like, every time I get on the ice.

The way I used to skate (balanced over my skates rather than really on an edge) was horribly, horribly wrong. I have gotten to the point that it actually feels wrong, which I suppose is a kind of progress.

Making things right, however, also is exhausting. I am working on several kinds of alignment corrections these days. One is making sure my weight into the circle, which means that my blade is striking down to the outside of where I perceive my midline to be.

Two is making sure that I am activating my glutes and hamstrings whenever I initiate a new edge. I wish I could figure out a way to make this happen automatically, but it doesn’t seem to work that way for me, especially on the left side.  I wrote about this in a post several years ago when I was describing “skating from the butt“; what I’m finding now is that knowing about it and actually doing it more than 20% of the time are two different things.

Three is feeling steady pressure through the blade down into the ice during the entire edge. I have this tendency to release the pressure in favor of hanging out on top of my skates.

These things are definitely outside of my comfort zone. Plus they are so basic that I can’t avoid working on them.

Perhaps I have come to a standstill? Or reached the point of no return?

Or perhaps it is a turning point?

I used to think the operative words were about not getting satisfaction. But maybe it’s also important to hear

’cause I try/ and I try/ and I try

Will I be around as long as these guys have been? We’ll see.