synchro team...

[sweetskater31]

im really confused about synchro right now... i really love it... i want to do it in college... thats how much i love it... but lately... it seems like the coaches are sucking all of the fun out of it... they are treating us like complete babies... i mean we cant even hand out papers to the team without it going through ALL the parents first!! i mean COME ON!! we are a teen team... i thought the purpose of spliting the teams was to give the older girls some more say in what we are doing!!! (we recently split our senior youth team of 20 some skaters into a teen team and a senior youth team) im really really sick of this... im even thinking about going to a different rink and seeing what they are doing and maybe trying out for their team for the next season... dont get me wrong.. i love the sunfire and all the girls... but i feel like there is SOMETHING more out there... and im not getting the full benifit of it by being on a teen team whos program is like a senior youths teams program! its hard... for some people... but up north (im from illinois... but we moved to florida in 2003 i think...) this program would be BLOWN out competely! we are competing for the first time in june (june 20 i think) and we dont even know our whole program yet! sometimes i think it would be sooo much easier if we only had 1 coach because i believe the other one is holding us back by MAKING us stop in places we dont need to stop at! its not fair to me and its not fair to the rest of the girls that are really trying hard to make this team work! i know im not the only one who feels like this... i have had thousands of conversations like this with other people... but nothing seems to be happeneing.. we havent learned any thing new in 4 weeks!!!
im sorry to be dropping this on all of you... if i am out of line posting this here let me know... im new here
another thing... does anyone have any sugestions on how to motivate my team?? everyone is really stressed and annoyed with how things are going...
thanks!

[Schmeck]

First of all, what is a senior youth team? I've never heard that term used in the US.

If you have questions about policy in your club, then you should really have it clarified by your line manager, team manager, or coach. If your team has girls under the age of 18 (as in, 18 makes you a legal adult) realize that there is a liability issue connected to every action that is not cleared through all parents/guardians.

Most likely, the handouts need to be cleared so that the manager knows about everything going on with the dynamics of the team. The manager is responsible for so much, especially for competitions, and the eligibilty/conduct stuff is getting pretty strict.

Coaching problems - that's a tough one. Tread lightly here. I can't suggest any way of approaching this situation that seems proper. That's one of the biggest problems in skating - coaches rule. Parents might have to get involved, bring it to the line manager's attention, etc. The parents should not directly question the coach though!

Hope some of my rambling helps. Synchro has been such a great addition to the skating world. It does have its problems still, though.

[sweetskater31]

we are ISI teams... we will soon be joining the wonderful world of USFS but are just ISI for now
the main problems with the papers is I AM the team manager/ co-captian! and up until this season there was no problem with us handing out papers to the girls... i understand that certain theings need to be done through the parents.. but things concerning MAINLY the girls should go RIGHT to them!
i am really fed-up with how things are going... we get MORE things done in practice when the coaches ARENT there... they spend a good deal of our time arguing about things they should have gone over off the ice...
sorry for my rambling... i just dont know what to do anymore.. :(

[CanAmSk8ter]

How old are the girls on your team? I can see where having everything go through the parents might seem like babying you guys, but in synchro it's so important that EVERYBODY be on the same page, know where to be and what time, etc. If there have been even one or two girls who have been unreliable in the past, it probably is better to do things through the parents, just so you can count on everybody.

As far as the coaching, I would just take a deep breath and deal with it for the rest of this season, and if you really feel this team isn't right for you, think about trying out elsewhere for next season. As the line manager, I don't think it would be totally out of line for you to approach your coaches before practice and say nicely, "Do you think during practice today we could aim to do two runthroughs of as much of the program as we know without stopping for anything?"