Word: lutze
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...Hughes trains, her coach Robin Wagner took one look at me and shook her head. "I've got a coat and some gloves in my office; you'll need those." She was right. I spent hours watching Wagner and Hughes break down the bane of Hughes's existence, the Lutz jump. Judges had penalized Hughes repeatedly for taking off on the wrong edge, and as painstakingly frustrating as it was, Hughes practiced the jump over and over--and over and over. It was my first hint at the type of competitor Hughes is. Even then I could sense the same...
...LUTZ...
...WHAT JUDGES LOOK FOR The most important aspect of a good Lutz is a clean outside edge on the takeoff. The U.S. women, including Kwan, above, tend to "flutz," or fudge it by shifting from the outside to the inside edge just before launching into the air. Sarah Hughes has been particularly penalized for this flaw, and to correct the problem, she does not enter the jump with as deep an outside edge...
Even so, getting to the podium won't be a slap shot for Hughes. Cohen, a gifted performer, is as much a master of the mental game as she is of the triple Lutz. At last month's nationals she clipped Kwan twice during the warm-up before their final programs, rattling Kwan enough that she cut short the prep for her jumps. Cohen denied the hockey tactics were intentional, but gamesmanship may be part of her package. "I'm always trying to be on top of the podium," she says. Hampered by a back injury last year, Cohen...
...business. Training with pairs, who generate more speed than singles skaters, pushes Hughes to mimic that power. After soliciting feedback from judges last season, Wagner and Hughes devoted the summer to addressing two criticisms of Hughes' skating--her still nascent expressiveness and her faulty technique on the triple Lutz jump, one of the most challenging leaps a female skater makes (only the triple Axel is more difficult). Hughes was slipping badly onto the wrong blade edge before taking off. Most women skaters make the error, as they lack the upper-body strength to hold the edge and counter the rotation...