Forward power three turns

Also called Power threes

A forward outside three, a back crossover and a step forward, round a circle, to build speed from the turns.

On a circle

Not checked yet. The drill details on this page are a first draft by a non-expert, and no coach has seen them yet. Read them as a starting point and check them with a coach. Corrections are very welcome.

The run LFO three LBI · back crossover to RBO · step forward to LFO · repeat

The pattern on the ice, one line for the blade on the ice, coloured by edge.

Not drawn in the body frame yet: the change of foot onto a new lobe, which the body frame is gaining next.

Round one circle: a forward outside three, a back crossover underneath, a step forward onto the forward outside edge, and the three again. Each lap of the pattern should come out faster than the one before it.

The point is that a turn can make speed rather than lose it. The knee bends into the three, rises through it and bends again as the crossover pushes, and the step forward comes off that push rather than off a pause. Where the skater stops pushing and starts drifting is easy to see on the ice.

The same circle is the setting for spin entries and for the three turns that lead into jumps, so the drill feeds both.

Coaches differ after the three: some take a full back crossover, others shift onto the inside edge of the other foot with a short push underneath.

This drill trains

Left forward outside three turnLFO to LBI: half a turn into the circle, changing edge and staying on the same lobe.
Right backward outside crossoverRBO to LBI: the free foot crosses in front of the skating foot onto the same lobe, still travelling backwards.

Built from

Left forward outside edgeLFO: the left foot travelling forwards on an outside edge, tracing an anticlockwise lobe.
Left backward inside edgeLBI: the left foot travelling backwards on an inside edge, tracing an anticlockwise lobe.
Right backward outside edgeRBO: the right foot travelling backwards on an outside edge, tracing an anticlockwise lobe.

Found in 5 independent sources: coaches' public teaching and published skating-skills tests, taken as base guidance and written for the guide.