“Just Stay In!” – Another Perspective on Opening Jumps Early (Trevor Laak)

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Trevor Laak offers a short computer video analysis. Historically these analysis videos have become known as Dartfish analysis, but with the prevalence of inexpensive apps for mobile phones and tablets, expensive PC software like Dartfish is no longer required. This video was created using the app Ubersense.

The point of this video is to offer an alternative explanation to this common problem of “opening early” and landing forward. Many coaches will see this jump and simply tell the skater to stay tight with the feet crossed longer. This solution obviously works as shown by the tens of thousands of skaters that have overcome this problem based on this coaching advice.

But Trevor shows in the video that the skater can land this jump without pulling in any tighter or longer or keeping the feet crossed at the ankles. He argues that the basic advice offered to skaters in these situations is not strictly correct but it does solve the problem in most cases. However, many skaters can solve the problem faster with a more thorough understanding of the problem and drills focused on this “new” understanding. Below the video, please see a set of references for exercises on iCoachSkating.com that address this issue.

Here’s some reference videos on this topic.

1. To get skaters to internally rotate the hips, take a look at the end of Audrey Weisiger’s recent backspin video.

2. The jump development exercises discussed by Chris Conte have as one of their primary focus points the idea of internally rotating the landing hip.  See the earlier exercises in Chris’s series.  The snap drill is classic for addressing this problem.

3. Nick Perna offers a great exercise for this in his loop jump development video where he did a standstill jump across the river (at about 2:00 min in the video).

4. In his Adult Leg Syndrome videos, Nick Perna offers a pivoting drill that forces a skater to develop the internal rotation of the landing leg.

5. Note how Page Lipe takes advantage of this “problem” to create proper alignment using a cheat exercise.

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8 responses to ““Just Stay In!” – Another Perspective on Opening Jumps Early (Trevor Laak)”

  1. Nancy

    Thank you so much Trevor! This is a great way to explain where the shoulders should be on landing and will help a couple of my skaters who have the habit of opening the shoulders before landing! Awesome!

    Reply
  2. RinaAmir

    Trevor, thanks a lot for this video. Gave me a better understanding.mthendifference is so small. Could you do similar analysis on double jumps toe, dbl flip, lutz and loop? I see so many kids stuck on these jumps even though they have solid Axel and dbl sal and good height.

    Reply
  3. Trevor

    Yes, RinaAmir I’ll start putting similar videos together for the other jumps! Great suggestion.

    Reply
  4. April

    Hi Trevor, Can you tell me what you might say to a skater to help them understand this? For example, “let the shoulder come around,” or “don’t let the shoulder open up until you grab the ice?” Just want to clarify that I’m understand the video fully. Thanks!

    Reply
  5. Trevor

    April, I don’t really talk about the shoulders with the skater in these situations, except to show them with video that the upper body is already done with the necessary rotation. The shoulders will automatically continue to rotate after initial landing impact and will “turn backwards” on their own without the skater thinking or worrying about it. But as I say in the video, the shoulders are not the problem. The problem is opening the landing hip. For these cases, I often do drills like placing the landing toe pick in the ice and internally rotating the landing leg (heel out) so the skater understands what has to happen on the way down to the ice.

    Reply
  6. Debi

    Trevor, thanks for this video! I understand about the hip but I didn’t think about the leg connected to it!

    Reply
  7. Debi

    Thank you Trevor! My skater is doing this exact same thing and it will help enormously!

    Reply
  8. spinningandjumping

    Awesome video!! I have this exact landing error on almost all of my jumps and it’s been such a difficult habit to break, even when I visualize a jump I often find myself imagining this type of landing since it feels so more more natural. Do you have any tips for breaking that habit and re-programming how your brain prepares for landing a jump?

    Reply

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