The moment of truth. It’s 31st December 2017. A few hours till the New Year. Where am I at with the spin after 4 weeks of training? I’ll be honest, even though I’ve been practising several times a week, I’m still on three revolutions. I did manage four a few times. I’ve even started doing it on one leg if that’s any consolation. Trust me, it’s REALLY HARD to do five turns and I frankly didn’t realise how big of a challenge I’ve set myself here.

I’m still learning how to get the right speed into my pirouette (and not get super dizzy). One thing is knowing the very basics of how to do it and the correct technique, and the other is just getting ‘the feel’ for the movement. My coach, Rosie, tells me it takes years to master the seemingly simply moves (that’s why kids start when they are 3 or 4 years old..), but it’s the same story with anything you want to be good at. It takes hours and hours of practise. Plus a bit of natural talent (not that my talent for skating is massive, but I’m certainly not the worst at the tender age of 33)

So…it looks like I need another few extra weeks on this one. I’m definitely NOT giving up, but on this occasion, I have to extend the deadline by a tiny bit. End of January it is. Am I disappointed? Well, I did hope to complete this challenge end of December, but let’s not forget that four weeks ago I couldn’t even do one revolution. All in all, that’s a massive improvement.

Apart from training all month at the Alexandra Palace, I did manage to visit five of the most beautiful Xmas rinks in London, which I’m pretty happy about (read about them in this separate blogpost). And I’ll keep you updated on the spin in the New Year!