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You are here: Experts > Recreation/Outdoors > Figure Skating > Figure Skating > Rotation vs height
Expert: gary beacom - 10/15/2009
Question
Hi Gary
My daughter is 9 and manages her axel and double jumps well.However because her rotation is so fast she does not jump very high. Is it better to slow down her rotation and go for more height or keep the fast rotation for future triple jumps. Her jumps are very fast and has caused some confusion with the judges. I have no idea if this is a good or a bad thing. Please shed some light onthis for me. Many thanks
Answer
height is itself a virtue, ashley. a jump that soars is grander than a spinny one and ought to be rewarded by the judges. a certain amount of height is necessary for triples. my method is to achieve sufficient height on doubles without being too tight, so that the only difference between double and triple is how tight the air position is. spinny jumps are often cheated on both take-off and landing, even if only slightly. there has been an unfortunate trend in this direction recently, but it appears the trend is reversing. any toppling on the take-off of a jump will present more of a problem on higher jumps because of the air time, so bare minimum height is safer in this sense, but the extra time to check out for the landing that comes with more height is also a plus. that fast rotation will come in handy for triples, but it will be to no avail if sufficient height is not achieved. it is difficult to get used to exchanging rotational speed for height. still, i would encourage your daughter to devote attention to this if she wishes to advance as far as possible in the sport. i hope i have shed meaningful light on this issue. thanks for asking such a fundamental question and one that i have a strong opinion on.
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