Fig. 409.
The Straddle-Bug.
By Dan Beard
The Spread Eagle is one of the first steps in the advance from plain to fancy skating. Even when well done it lacks the elements of grace, but it is most excellent practice to render the limbs supple and make other more graceful tricks possible. and it is a favorite performance of boy skaters.
How to Perform the Feat.
You must skate straight away until you have gained sufficient headway, then at the end of the last stroke turn the toes out so that the runners of your skates make a straight line heel to heel, one skate following the other. In this position you will glide over the ice until momentum first gained is exhausted. At first the beginner will be only partially successful, but gradually he will be able to describe a wide circle forward, and in a little while gain sufficient control of his feet to slide across the skating pond in a straight line (Fig. 409)
The Spread Eagle Backwards
will be found more difficult, for it necessitates turning the toes out until they point backward. In performing this last feat it is no easy matter to keep your balance, but perfection comes with practice, and soon the boy who devotes time to practice will excite the admiration of his comrades by the ease with which he turns either forward or backward. During his practice the beginner will undoubtedly bend his knees, as shown in (Fig. 409), but after he has reached that point of excellence where his whole mind need not be centered on his feet, he may learn gradually to straighten his legs until at last he can do the spread eagle forward and backward without looking like a straddle bug (Fig. 410).
