The layback
spin is the most
beautiful and
elegant of all spins if done properly. The
skater spins on her left leg with the right leg bent and lifted behind the body.
The skater pushes her
hips forward and leans back while raising her arms over her body in an elegant
fasion. The arm position is open to
interpretation. The most standard way of arranging them is by forming a loop over the body.
Some skaters can lean back far enough that their back is
parallel to the ground and they are looking straight up at the ceiling. A poor spin is one in which the free leg is in a poor position, the back is slumped, the spin is slow, or the spin travels.
The layback spin is done almost
exclusively by
women because the
majority of men are not flexible enough to assume the layback position. It has also just been known as a woman's spin.
There are, however, a few men who do laybacks (most notably
Victor Petrenko and
Rudy Galindo).
In almost all cases the man fakes it by leaning to the side instead of straight back. A lot of women do it this way too, but
technically it's not a true layback.
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