COMPETITIVE FIGURE SKATING
INSPIRED BY THE OLYMPICS
When people find out that my brothers and I were competitive figure skaters for four years, the first thing they ask is how we got started. The answer is that when I was 5 years old, I was watching the Ladies’ figure skating competition with my mom during the Olympics. Immediately, I was struck by their glittery costumes and dramatic moves.
Mom started telling me about her favorite women figure skaters over the years, like Debbie Thomas, Surya Bonaly, Oksana Baiul, Mirai Nigasu, and Michelle Kwon. She Googled some of their programs and showed them to me.
I was mesmerized.
I immediately asked Mom if I could take lessons, and she promised to look into it.
I ran to tell my brothers I was going to take ice-skating lessons. They got excited and immediately wanted to take lessons, too.
OUR VERY FIRST LESSON
After we talked, Mom went on Facebook to see if she could find an account for a figure skating coach she had met only briefly, two years earlier. She found him and sent him a note through Facebook Messenger, reminding him where they had met and asking to book a lesson with him for all three of us.
The very next Saturday, we headed out for our scheduled 30-minute lesson. Knowing the rink would be very cold and would probably fall on the ice, Mom dressed us in sweatpants, heavy jackets, and bike helmets. She made the 1-hour and 15-minute drive to the rink in Simsbury, Connecticut.
To our disappointment, the time went by quickly. It was over before we knew it, and we begged Mom to set up another lesson.
Before long, we were going to the rink every Saturday morning for regularly scheduled lessons with the same coach. We had fun learning basic moves with just the three of us, and also participating afterwards in group lessons in off-ice conditioning with some of the coach's other students.
All of the other girls and boys in the group classes were already competing, and the off-ice focused on building their stamina, endurance, and core strength necessary to skate well in the approaching season. One of the girls, Summer, was the same age as my twin brother Dayton and me.
Another girl and a boy, Megan and James, were about the same age as my 8-year-old older brother, Jackson. There were two older girls, Abby and Marren, who were both about 14 years old. I immediately looked up to them because they were older, already had advanced, exciting skating moves, and patiently helped me with lacing up my skates and with conditioning exercises.
That same year, we also started competing, which meant training for 10-12 hours each week. The more we advanced in our skating skills and levels, the more hours we skated. Off-ice became more rigorous. Eventually, we received special permission for Early Dismissal from school so we could get to lessons sooner and have more ice time.
PHYSICAL TRAINING, OFF-ICE CONDITIONING, AND MOVES IN THE FIELD
After a year of skating, I started competing, which meant I needed to take the sport more seriously. I was inspired by seeing the friends I trained with winning medals at the Nutmeg State Games in Connecticut. Deciding to skate as a competitor required me to spend more time not only at the rinks, but also in the gym.
One of the most invisible parts of competitive figure skating and training is the intense off-ice conditioning all skaters have to commit to building and maintaining their physical fitness and strengthening their core. Regular fitness training is required for skaters to advance towards learning the more complex elements and impressive tricks on the ice, such as spirals and sit spins..
Skaters need intense core conditioning, thousands of push-ups, sit-ups, and vertical jumps to increase hang-time, giving the skater more time to complete rotations in the air before landing. Exercises using spinners help skaters learn to stay balanced and oriented during spins.
I spent just as many hours in the gym working on strength training and core conditioning as I did on the ice. These experiences taught me discipline and perseverance at a young age.
MOVES IN THE FIELD
“Moves in the Field” are standardized test patterns required by the U.S. Figure Skating Assocation and that all skaters are required to pass in front judges to compete at specific levels. It’s yet another challenge that is invisible to most people outside the skating world. Practicing for Moves In the Feel requires hours of deep concentration and hours spent memorizing and executing specific patterns of increasingly difficult skating elements.
To pass the tests and move on to the next performance level, skaters have to skate the specific patterns and complete all required elements while being graded by a panel of judges. Each judge independently decides how well the skater performed the moves and assigns points. Each judge's total score determines whether the skater passes or fails.
As you move through the levels the patterns become more complicated and harder to memorize and execute.
MUSIC CUTS AND COSTUMES
Music is one of the most important components of any skating program. The music determines the choreography, the tone of the performance, and can even impact the amount of artistry points a skater can earn for their program. Picking songs for performances is not as simple of a process as many would think. Coaches typically have their own opinions for songs, because the musicality behind the selection and how well-matched it is to the skater heavily impacts scoring by the judges.
My first ever competition song was “ABC” by the Jackson 5, which I first performed when I was just five years old. My coaches had asked us to propose five songs and then they would choose. As we grew older, they began to suggest songs they felt best suited my personality and skating style. In later programs and ice shows, I skated to "Little Pretty One," Light 'Em Up," "Jump In the Line," and "Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now).
At each level of skating the cuts have time limits. Skaters have to time their performance to make sure they don't end too soon or run over time, because this will result point deductions.
We had to have "cuts" made for us that fit the regulation time for the skating level. The cut excerpts certain parts of a song and blends them together so the energy rises and falls at the appropriate places to create an exciting program. allow for an exciting program temailing the finished cut to my mom, who always carried a portable disk drive and blank CDs with her just for competition emergencies like this.
Now every time we hear any of our competition songs from over the years it takes our family back to all those experiences the three of us kids shared on the ice together. That will always be special to our family and makes us smile.
THE HIGH COSTS INVOLVED IN SKATING
The combined costs of skating, on and off-ice training, new skates as your feet grow, off-ice equipment, and ice time at the rink are expensive and, unfortunately, make the sport inaccessible to many people. I was incredibly lucky to be able to have the opportunity to skate at a young age. I skated with world-class coaches and shared ice with Olympians. My siblings and I also had the chance to learn from a famous former USSR Coach who had also been an Olympian competing on behalf of the Soviet Union.
Some of our best and favorite times involved driving up to Lake Placid to train and participate in "Freaky Friday" individual and group programs. We choreographed them ourselves and performed at the 1932 rink. I'll never forget when our group program my brother participated in tied for First Place with his individual program. My parents took the whole group of us into town for a celebration dinner.
With unique and memorable opportunities like these, I never took for granted the fact that I had access to such an interesting and uncommon sport for four years.
MUSIC CHOICES AND CUTS
Choreography is an art form within itself and usually requires an additional coach fully dedicated to the task beyond just the normal coaches. I was lucky enough to have choreographers when I was just beginning to compete who already understood my personality and never forced me to skate to overused Disney songs.
I was able to skate to songs that I actually loved and enjoyed, like C & C Music Factory's “Everybody Dance Now” and Harry Belafonte's “Jump in the Line.” The choreographers have the tough job of needing to blend personality, music, dance, and required skating elements to form a cohesive and interesting program.
The main job of the person making the "cuts" is to shorten the music to the regulation length while cutting and seamlessly intermingling specific parts of the song to make sure the energy rises and falls in the right places for the program level and the elements. Back when we were competing, we needed to upload our music when registering online, and also provide the rink with CDs marked with our names and skating levels. My mom used to always carry a portable disk drive and blank CDs, so we would be prepared in case of emergencies to make extra disks for us or any skater who didn't have their music. That came in handy a couple of times for other skaters in emergencies.
THE END OF AN ERA
After we moved to California, Dayton and I continued to train at the Torrance and Lakewood rinks. But while Dayton took Moves In the Field tests and competed here, with all the new changes caused by the move, I decided I just wanted to improve my skating, but I didn't want to compete. I preferred to focus on making new friends at school and playing soccer.
My California coaches, Derrick Delmore and Peter Kongkasem, were patient and encouraging. I often wished I had been coached by them earlier as a skater because of the way they boosted my self-confidence while fine-tuning my skills.
There is an art to dealing with kids on the ice to keep them focused and make them better skaters, while also making them feel good about themselves. I will always appreciate my coaches who did that for me.
I keep this goal in mind when I'm coaching, making sure none of my students feels discouraged or embarrassed about making mistakes while learning.
Our First Lesson
My Skating Photo Gallery
My Video Gallery
U.S. Figure Skating Greats
 "Quad King" Nathan Chen and Karen Chen |  Mom was as excited as we were to meet Adam Rippon |  Olympians Madison Hubbell, Zachary Donohue, and Mirai Nagasu |
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 Sarah Hughes 2002 Olympic Gold Medalist |  Starr Andrews' coach kindly took a photo for us at a competition in Philadelphia. He later coached us. Starr is now a decorated American and International Medalist and the first Black American woman to medal in Grand Prix. |