Steps and Turns
Step sequences are a required element in all four Olympic disciplines. The pattern can be straight line, circular, or serpentine. The step sequence consists of a combination of turns, steps, hops and edge changes. Additionally, steps and turns can be used as transitions between elements.
The various turns, which skaters can incorporate into step sequences, include:
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Three turns, so called because the blade turns into the curve of the edge or lobe to leave a tracing resembling the numeral "3".
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Bracket turns, in which the blade is turned counter to the curve of the lobe, making a tracing resembling a bracket ("}").
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Mohawks, the two-foot equivalents of three turns and brackets.
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Rockers, one-foot turns that involve a change of lobe as well as of direction.
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Counters, one-foot turns that involve a change of lobe as well as of direction.
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Twizzles, traveling multi-rotation turns on one foot
Choctaws are the two-foot equivalents of rockers and counters. Other movements that may be incorporated into step sequences or used as connecting elements include lunges and spread eagles. An Ina Bauer is similar to a spread eagle performed with one knee bent and typically an arched back. Hydroblading refers to a deep edge performed with the body as low as possible to the ice in a near-horizontal position.
Read more about this topic: Figure Skating
Famous quotes containing the words steps and, steps and/or turns:
“There must be a solemn and terrible aloneness that comes over the child as he takes those first independent steps. All this is lost to memory and we can only reconstruct it through analogies in later life....To the child who takes his first steps and finds himself walking alone, this moment must bring the first sharp sense of the uniqueness and separateness of his body and his person, the discovery of the solitary self.”
—Selma H. Fraiberg (20th century)
“Now Morn her rosy steps in th’ eastern clime
Advancing, sowed the earth with orient pearl.”
—John Milton (1608–1674)
“So turns she every man the wrong side out,
And never gives to truth and virtue that
Which simpleness and merit purchaseth.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)