Crossing over to my right.

[Chadley]

First i'll give you some info about myself. I started playing at the age of four. I was a forward until the age of 9. I was a goalie throughout minor hockey. Played half a season of jr.b. My knees couldn't take it anymore, and I stopped about 3 years ago. Since then I've been playing out.

For the life of me I can't crossover to my right. My skating is actually pretty good. I'm not the fastest by any means, but my technique is good.

I feel very comfortable going to my left. I feel very strong on that side. I have no problem pushing off with my left foot. I just can't make a freaking crossover to my right. Everytime I try, it slows me down..and it just feels flat out awkward.

Any ideas? It feels like everytime I try to crossover to my right. My right leg "gives out"...it's not like when I crossover to my left..where I feel very strong on my left leg. Which is weird considering my right leg is the stronger leg.

Is this a technique issue? Strength? Just not used to using my outside edge on my right skate?

 

[Thesensation19*]

1) make sure you skates are properly fitted.

2) could be your leg and back strength and well as flexibility. I am not saying you need to go overhaul on training if you dont wanna but simple gym sessions and proper stretching training could go a long way in your health and skating. You could be essentially tight in your glutes and that could affect your skating. I dont think it is, but could be a factor

3) Practice. I didnt know how to stop on my left at all back in the day. I went to one summer camp where we were on the ice for 2 hour practice every day for 6 days and every night for 2 hours in a scrimmage. and 7th day a game for fun. I came back and i didnt even realize I could stop on my left. It was amazing. one try out i was like woah.

Simply from patience and most of all repetition. Just keep skating. and dont be afraid to fail or attempt

 

[wondeROY]

Walk the blue line sideways, stepping over and over again. Don't practice it while skating, just go the width of the ice rink on the blue line, do this for at least 20 minutes each time you skate. I was the same way, my left foot felt {Mod Edit}, this technique helped a ton!

 

[SpokedBee]

I was in the same boat and I practiced around the house in bare feet, when noone was around of course because i'm sure i looked ridiculous. I would cross over to the left and then the right to see what the difference was and i noticed a few things that I fixed and now I can cross over either way. One thing I noticed was that I was bringing my leg to far over so I couldn't start my next stride as quick as I would crossing over the other direction. It wasn't much but made a difference because now I can get the power I have going the other way.

 

[theMajor]

same here man. crossovers going left come easy as ever, when i try to go right i feel incredibly uncomfortable

 

[TickleMeYandle]

I have the same thing and while it's taking me a while, just plugging away at it and doing some L over R practice each time I get on the ice is starting to make a difference. I went from not being able to do it at all to being able to get one or two in each time we do the circle drill.

I find it's not so much the crossOVER that gets me, but the crossUNDER. I can step over with no problem, but since the goal is to get the push from the foot going under, it does me no real good to just cross over.

Everyone will have one side that is better than the other. For most people, it tends to be going R over L - I believe this has a lot to do with the fact that most rinks have people going counterclockwise, so you just get more used to turning left. In all of the rinks I've skated public session on, only one changes to the other direction.

Myself, I'm used to going in one direction as I did speedskating for 3 years. The only things you really practice are starting, turning left, and going straight. So I've got many, many hours of turning left under my belt.

 

[SpokedBee]

Can we start calling this the Zoolander syndrome?

 

[mikitas donut]

Can we start calling this the Zoolander syndrome?

Ha! It seems so.

I have the same problem, and likely it's because of learning to skate and public skate in one direction like a few posters above said. I have a practice tonight so hopefully I can get some pointers from the better skaters.

 

[SacredPetra]

I'm in a novice league and one exercise our coaches had us do was to delay the actual crossover and work just on turning on the outside edge. What we did is slalom down the length of the rink and on each turn you picked up your outside foot, made the turn using the outside edge of your inside skate, and waited to cross over with the outside skate until the turn was nearly competed. I found the drill pretty tricky at first, but it did really highlight the mechanics of what the crossing under leg is supposed to do.

 

[Phil Connors*]

Please refer to this as a left crossover, and not crossing over to your right.