Back in the frame#

Fri, 13 Apr 2007 17:22:54 +0000

My right ankle collapses a bit when it's tired, and I have difficulty getting a good heel carve on that side. After thinking about it for a while, yesterday I moved the frame on my right boot inwards about 2mm. This shifts it away from the line of my Achilles, but towards the centre of the mounting block, and first impressions (from a few laps at Tatem) are that I should have done it ages ago. I haven't skated far enough on it to see if it fixes the collapsing, but the heel carve feels a whole lot easier. I did manage to round off the bolt in the process, which was not so impressive.

Although I don't know if it's because of that change, or if it's just because I spent 30 minutes practising on the empty track, but suddenly I can crossover on the bends at Tatem (the banking is weird). My self-timed 500m there yesterday was down to around 55 seconds (and could have been faster, I forgot just how far down the straight the finish line is), which is a big improvement on last year's typical 60s+ times.

Racing there Sunday. Will be interesting, but I'm not expecting to win anything.