blue111moon
01-06-2010, 08:56 AM
Last fall the management company that runs my home rink started running 40-minute freestyle sessions a couple times a week and asked the skating club to support them. Up until now the only people on the weekday sessions have been club skaters and their coaches. It's been running fine for the most part with everyone pretty much on the same level (Pre-Pre to Juvenile range) and adapting. The one squabble we've had is over the sound system but that's a different issue. :)
This week Management decided that the sessions were "under-utilized" and moved a "freestyle" group class onto the ice with us. It was frankly a disaster.
While the group coach did a good job controlling the class, they just weren't freestyle level skaters; they were working forward and backward wiggles and just starting forward pumping on the circle! Then management allowed one coach (non-club) to bring private students onto the session who were barely able to stand up. The coach then monopolized the center line to teach marching and sliding on two feet. Another coach who had been told she could not give semi-private lessons to more than two skaters at a time saw the group lesson going on and got upset.
I got frustrated myself because I spent the entire 40 minutes pretty much restricted to 1/3 of the ice. The MIF skaters were unable to complete a pattern because of having to dodge either the group lesson people or the kids in helmets marching on the center line. Program run-throughs were impossible.
The director now wants to know if the club skaters will be contracting for the next eight weeks. From those I've talked to, the answer is "no" because it's no longer "freestyle" ice. But if the club skaters walk away, management may turn around and refuse to offer any freestyle ice at all, claiming that club skaters don't support it.
Another problem is that it's January, the start of the heavy club competition season here. Coaches have already filled all their slots on available ice at the local rinks and finding other sessions instead is going to be either impossible or require some major travel.
So we're wondering what to do.
I know this whole post is basically just a rant. Rink management will do whatever they want when they want. I guess I just want sympathy and maybe to hear that other rinks have played the bait-and-switch game with figure skaters coming out on the short end. And I'd like to know what exactly defines "freestyle" ice, since this management doesn't seem to have a clue.
This week Management decided that the sessions were "under-utilized" and moved a "freestyle" group class onto the ice with us. It was frankly a disaster.
While the group coach did a good job controlling the class, they just weren't freestyle level skaters; they were working forward and backward wiggles and just starting forward pumping on the circle! Then management allowed one coach (non-club) to bring private students onto the session who were barely able to stand up. The coach then monopolized the center line to teach marching and sliding on two feet. Another coach who had been told she could not give semi-private lessons to more than two skaters at a time saw the group lesson going on and got upset.
I got frustrated myself because I spent the entire 40 minutes pretty much restricted to 1/3 of the ice. The MIF skaters were unable to complete a pattern because of having to dodge either the group lesson people or the kids in helmets marching on the center line. Program run-throughs were impossible.
The director now wants to know if the club skaters will be contracting for the next eight weeks. From those I've talked to, the answer is "no" because it's no longer "freestyle" ice. But if the club skaters walk away, management may turn around and refuse to offer any freestyle ice at all, claiming that club skaters don't support it.
Another problem is that it's January, the start of the heavy club competition season here. Coaches have already filled all their slots on available ice at the local rinks and finding other sessions instead is going to be either impossible or require some major travel.
So we're wondering what to do.
I know this whole post is basically just a rant. Rink management will do whatever they want when they want. I guess I just want sympathy and maybe to hear that other rinks have played the bait-and-switch game with figure skaters coming out on the short end. And I'd like to know what exactly defines "freestyle" ice, since this management doesn't seem to have a clue.