International coach and jump specialist Nick Perna continues working with a class of beginner skaters on the lutz jump. In the first part of this class, Nick focused on helping the skaters understand and see what a proper lutz is. In this video, Nick shares important fundamental concepts to begin learning to execute a proper lutz. He begins with backward power pulls to teach awareness of the necessary strong or “active” outside edge needed for the lutz take-off. He mentions the desired “crunch” sound of the active edge or “cut.”
Next, Nick has the class attempt to get to a strong outside edge pull from gliding on a flat straight backward. The point is this exercise is essentially impossible (but that’s lost on skaters at this level). To create an active outside edge from a flat, a skater needs to first perform what Nick refers to as a “blurb.” He describes it here as simply moving the heel of the foot (briefly creating a passive inside edge) to change the direction of the skate, which unbalances the skater from being directly over the top of the skate. From this unbalanced position the skater can cut strongly. Nick says, “That foot as to kick out to cut.” He continues, “You can’t go on a straight line and just curve your foot (without a blurb).”
Another very important fundamental concept for the lutz is how close the feet must be as they pass during the take-off for the skating foot to remain on an outside edge. Nick demonstrates this to the class in a clever and memorable way, by simply having the skaters stand in place on two feet with the feet touching and trying to drop to inside edges (can’t be done). He also has them stand like this and let the ankles press outward to easily stand on outside edges. So a major key to proper lutz technique is making sure the feet are close together. Nick says, “What am I saying here? I’m saying we don’t want our feet wide when we do a lutz. We want our feet super close.”
Finally, he has the class try back outside pivots to build awareness and control of the outside edge. For CCW jumpers, the process is a left forward inside three turn to the left back outside pivot. Nick then demonstrates the more difficult version where the skater starts on a shallow back outside edge and simply stretches back directly into the pivot (deepening edge).
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