Synchro at your clubs

[Synchronized]

Hi!
Would you like to promote synchro at your clubs, but there is resistance from everyone? Don't know what to say. Here's some suggestions:

BENEFITS OF A CLUB
SYNCHRONIZED SKATING PROGRAM

- PROVIDES RECREATIONAL AND COMPETITIVE OPPORTUNITIES TO SKATERS OF ALL LEVELS

- IS A TEAM SPORT, WHICH ATTRACTS PARTICIPANTS WHO PERHAPS ENJOY AND BETTER RESPOND WITHIN A TEAM ATMOSPHERE

- ENHANCES SINGLE SKATERS' DEVELOPMENT BY PROVIDING ADDITIONAL SKATING AND CHOREOGRAPHY

- ENABLES MALES AND FEMALES TO PARTICIPATE ON THE SAME TEAM

- PROMOTES CLUB LOYALTY AS THE SKATERS REPRESENT A TEAM WITHIN A CLUB

- INCREASES THE COMMUNITY AWARENESS OF THE SKATING CLUB

- REDUCES THE COST PER INDIVIDUAL

- KEEPS SKATERS IN SKATING

[StarshineXavier]

Originally posted by Synchronized
- KEEPS SKATERS IN SKATING

I know many skaters, who, if not for synchro would have quit many years before they originally did. In singles, they were mediocre at best, and did not have what it took to compete in Sectional events. With synchro, they were able to compete at National levels, because they had the skill needed to skate synchro. So many people look down upon synchro, yet it is something that keeps skaters interested, especially in Canada, since we have no formal adult stream for singles/dance/pairs, yet there are Adult synchro teams which compete at National levels. When I'm at the right age to skate for Adult Synchro teams, I will be one skater that kept skating, because of synchro.

[*Starryskye*]

Originally posted by StarshineXavier
I know many skaters, who, if not for synchro would have quit many years before they originally did. In singles, they were mediocre at best, and did not have what it took to compete in Sectional events. With synchro, they were able to compete at National levels, because they had the skill needed to skate synchro. So many people look down upon synchro, yet it is something that keeps skaters interested, especially in Canada, since we have no formal adult stream for singles/dance/pairs, yet there are Adult synchro teams which compete at National levels. When I'm at the right age to skate for Adult Synchro teams, I will be one skater that kept skating, because of synchro.


That is just how it is for me!! I know when I am an adult i will continue synchro, and synchro has allowed me to skate at a national level! with singles i never would have been able to even get to sectionals!! It's just awesome...it's great to see too that i'm not the only one who's going to keep going and feels this way about it!!:)

[Synchronized]

I know at my club, most of the skaters aren't familiar with synchro. They usually don't understand what I do. So I would love to get the message across about it. It's a great sport and I wish more of the girls would have an open mind to try it, and have fun.

[NoviceSweetie14]

Exact same with me! I don't think I could ever give up synchro! There's ice in my blood!!! hehe! And with singles, eventually everyone must give it up sometime because of injuries/knees/age ect. I will always do singles as long as I can, and synchro forever! And I have competed in Nationals in Synchronized Skating before, and the only way I would get to nationals for singles, is if I bought a ticket and was a spectator.:lol: All you competitive singles skaters who can get to nationals, wow! You guys are amazing!!!! Honestly, I am so astounded that you are my age and so good, but you should watch synchro competitions! Man, they are amazing too! In so many different ways:D

[Figureskates]

Since my rink is home of the haydenettes, Ice mates, Ice Cubes, and both Espirit de Corp teams, I guess we can't get more synchro than that.

[Mrs Redboots]

Synchro isn't for me, but I do love to watch it. We don't have a team at our rink, at the moment, but there are a couple of local-ish adult teams I could join, always supposing I was prepared to practice at 1.00 am, which, since I have to get up at 5.30 am, I'm not!

[synchro4evr]

I was a competitive singles skater for a long time. There is a local synchro club in my area and I had seen them at various carnivals etc. I had reached a point where skating wasn't fun anymore even though i love to skate. It was my coach who suggested I try synchro. I went to try-outs, scared out of my wits. I was picked for the team and have never looked back. I've been to Nationals twice and to Europe three times to represent Canada. What an amazing feeling to watch the Canadian flag go up and "Oh Canada" played. I would have never experienced that as a singles skater.
I have made long lasting friendships with some terrific girls, worked really hard and had so much fun. This will be my third year in synchro and I'm having a blast.:lol: :lol: :lol:

[garyc254]

Several rinks in the St. Louis area have multiple synchro teams covering all age groups.

I know most of these skaters would have given up the ice long ago if they were only skating as singles. Synchro has kept them on the ice.

They compete around the Midwest and have loads of fun.

[skaternum]

It's really hard to get synchro started from nothing. I know, because we tried! It was a lot of fun, but there are some major obstacles. Problems are:
(1) Cost! Where I skate, the ice is incredibly expensive. This prohibits a group of "interested parties" from simply renting it and starting up a team. The cost per person would be outrageous. The local clubs can barely afford to subsidize the reasonably well-attended freestyle and dance sessions, much less a sparsely-attended synchro session.

(2) Inability to get ice! We have to beg & plead & whine just to get any sort of club or rink-based freestyle. Hockey or public take up all the best hours. Most of the folks interested in skating synchro are NOT interested in 6 am Saturday morning.

(3) Time commitment! Most of the skaters who are interested want to do this in addition to, not in lieu of, their singles or pairs or dancing. It's a big time commitment, which scares off a lot of people. (Also it's one more coach's bill to pay.)

Plus, there's an assortment of other little issues: In order to get things started, you have to be willing to accept almost anyone who shows up, whether they have the required skills or not. This can be very frustrating to the higher level skaters and can waste a lot of time.

We tried to get a Master's team together. After almost a solid year of trying (and we tried lots of creative solutions to the above problems), we finally bagged it. We only needed 8 people. Over the course of the year, we probably had 12-15 people float in to try it out, but we never developed more than a core of 6 who were willing to commit. I estimate I spent about $800 for ... um ... nothing but the chance to say I tried synchro. :( I really enjoyed it. I wish we could've made it work.

[*Starryskye*]

That is so great to hear about other clubs trying synchro!! Atleast you tried, and maybe again in the future you will be able to and things will work out. It's an amazing experience, and yes...all the problems you said are very true..and tough to deal with! Good luck in the future trying at a team, and maybe if you really wanted to skate synchro you could check out some of the clubs around you to see if they have teams!! Have fun:)

[flo]

For adults in the Baltimore area, there is a team starting at Ice World in Abingdon.

[luna_skater]

Originally posted by skaternum

(1) Cost! Where I skate, the ice is incredibly expensive. This prohibits a group of "interested parties" from simply renting it and starting up a team. The cost per person would be outrageous. The local clubs can barely afford to subsidize the reasonably well-attended freestyle and dance sessions, much less a sparsely-attended synchro session.



The other things you listed are definitely common obstacles...but this shocks me!! Maybe I'm misunderstanding...But are you saying that no matter how many people are on the ice, they still pay as if they were the only one out there? How do they take care of ice fees when it comes to hockey teams? Couldn't the same rules be implemented for synchro?

We recently tried to get a fourth synchro team started at our club, and unfortunately, didn't get enough skaters out. But one of the things the coach did was to go to singles coaches and talk to them about encouraging their test skaters to try synchro. There are lots of skaters out there who are strong skaters, but who simply aren't going to make it big alone. These skaters would do great on a synchro team, and would have a much better shot at making it to National and International competition. It is not easy if the coaches are adamantly against synchro. But one of the differences between some successful clubs and the struggling ones, is that there are some synchro coaches of "big name" teams who are also singles coaches. I think if we start to see more of that (and I mean coaches who are extremely dedicated to synchro, not just taking it on because they are forced, and throwing a program together), we will start to see more team development. I don't think the key is to get singles coaches to start coaching synchro....but to get people who are interested in coaching synchro to establish them as singles coaches at their club, as well.

[garyc254]

Originally posted by skaternum
(1) Cost!

A lot of times, several teams will pitch in together to buy a block of ice time. They share the ice and after one team runs a practice drill, the next team gets their turn.

(2) Inability to get ice!

This is always a problem. Some rinks will work with you. Others won't. I've found that kids prefer 11:30 Friday night rather than 6:00 Saturday morning.

(3) Time commitment!

Once they get started skating with a team and learn how fun it is, they'll give it the necessary time.


In order to get things started, you have to be willing to accept almost anyone who shows up, whether they have the required skills or not. This can be very frustrating to the higher level skaters and can waste a lot of time.

This is when you hold tryouts. If you can establish a few teams with different skill levels, skaters can be sorted into the appropriate group. They can advance each season depending on improved skills. If you can afford to have a very young team, recruiting from an advanced learn-to-skate class can work.

I know synchro skaters that started on a team during their learn-to-skate days and were still skating synchro 10 years later for the same club.

[sk8er1964]

One problem that I have with synchro is the cost. I would be interested in being on the masters team at my club (Gems On Ice - they finished 2nd at Nats last season) but I cannot afford to do both synchro and individual. I was told the synchro would be around $3,000 for the season, with travel costs. Ouch!

So I made the choice to continue skating as an individual, leaving the option open to myself to someday try it out if I either win the lottery or decide I want to stop skating as a single competitor. I know a few kids whose families made the same choice.

[synchro4evr]

If one were to sit down and really figure it out.....synchro skating is not anymore expensive than singles skating. While skating single, I had a base coach, dance & skills coach and a coach for spins and jumps. Take into account, cost of spring, summer, fall and winter school, skates, costumes, travel, etc. In synchro, our membership fees include coaching, ice, dresses (2), team wear, competitions entry fee, transportation and accommodation. We do alot of fundraising to subsidize our membership fees and for international competitions. It costs about $50,000. for the team to travel to Europe which included transportation, accommodation, tours, food. We only needed to bring spending money for stuff we wanted for ourselves.
I agree that getting ice is a problem. We have been fortunate to be able to have enough ice for four teams. We travel between two rinks. I do know that if we ever give back any ice we will never get it again. We negotiate every year for the amount of ice that we want. Luckily the city does support us somewhat because we are a national team. It is alot of work to keep things going and you need a base of hardworking committed people to make sure it all stays together.

[luna_skater]

Synchro is DEFINITELY cheaper than competitive singles. My synchro expenses this year were about $2300, including all travel expenses, one of which was Nationals. Where, as a matter of fact, we medalled. I don't know of too many singles skaters who can go to Nationals and medal on $2300!!

There are often a lot more fundraising opportunities that come with synchro as opposed to singles, as well. When you're fundraising for a team, you can ask for sponsorhip, hold events that you sell tickets to, organize raffles, etc. It's tough for singles skaters to go door to door and ask for money for "me." There is a club I know of that attended about 7 competitions this year, including a trip to the States and two down East, and they pay something like $500-$1000 and fundraise the rest. This is obviously an easier task with more well established clubs. But if you can get a club behind you, that is the first step to getting anywhere.

[Synchroprincess]

Yeah Im so glad I decided to skate synchro I LOVE IT! Come on when ur little, every girls dream was to be a national, olympic, or world champion or at least make it and medal at nationals, and I realized I could never be that good so I decided to try synchro and Ive been to nationals 2 times and we medaled this year! Its an unbelieveable feeling to be there with the team and get ur medals and know that you were in the top 4 in the country! Synchro gives more people oppritunities to go to a national competiton and to medal. YAY for synchro!

[sk8er1964]

Originally posted by luna_skater
Synchro is DEFINITELY cheaper than competitive singles. My synchro expenses this year were about $2300, including all travel expenses, one of which was Nationals. Where, as a matter of fact, we medalled. I don't know of too many singles skaters who can go to Nationals and medal on $2300!!

You are right there, especially for elite kids. Not necessarily for adults, though. The cost, however, is too much to be able to realistically do both for most kids. I was talking to a young lady today who has done synchro for the last few years, and plans on trying out for her college team. She pointed out the time factor, too - that it's hard to do freestyle, synchro and MIF's at the same time. I guess it's like choosing dance instead of freestyle - once you've made your choice it's best to stick with it.

As an aside, when I was a kid we did "Precision Team". It was the start of synchro, I guess, but we were more like toy soldiers out there. Our hardest move was a pinwheel. Of course, back then, women were just starting to do triples. Ahhh, how things change :D .


Edited to remove the email notification. :oops:

[skaternum]

Originally posted by luna_skater
The other things you listed are definitely common obstacles...but this shocks me!! Maybe I'm misunderstanding...But are you saying that no matter how many people are on the ice, they still pay as if they were the only one out there? How do they take care of ice fees when it comes to hockey teams? Couldn't the same rules be implemented for synchro?


No, I'm saying that it costs $250 total to rent an hour of ice at a crappy time. So if 10 people get together to rent private ice, it costs $25 per person per hour, all season long. (This is the most likely scenario, because in order to get our pathetic little group of 6, we took adults from both local clubs. So neither club is the "home club" for the team.) It's hard to convince people to pay that much every week + coaching fees. And if one of the clubs did decide to subsidize synchro, then each skater pays about $8.00 to the club, and the club loses $170 per session, all season long.

[skaternum]

Originally posted by garyc254
A lot of times, several teams will pitch in together to buy a block of ice time. They share the ice and after one team runs a practice drill, the next team gets their turn.

There's only one other team within about a 2 state radius. They practice at a rink WAY out and at the dreaded 6 am Saturday session.

Some rinks will work with you. Others won't. I've found that kids prefer 11:30 Friday night rather than 6:00 Saturday morning.

Yes, this is a very limiting factor. Most 40 year old working adults just WON'T come to a session at that time. It's really frustrating.



Once they get started skating with a team and learn how fun it is, they'll give it the necessary time.

Yes, it's a shame we couldn't get over the startup phase. It really was a lot of fun. But we just couldn't get over all the problems at the same time. It became a self-defeating cycle. "Tracy, would you like to join a synchro team? We don't have any ice time yet, but we'll need you to give us $35 per session, get up at 4:30 am on Saturday morning, practice these steps on the 3 remaining hours of ice time you have per week, and do all that every week." Very few people will jump at that chance! :) It was just impossible. I hate we couldn't make it easier -- even after almost a year of trying. We had an excellent coach too, a former Haydenette.


This is when you hold tryouts. If you can establish a few teams with different skill levels, skaters can be sorted into the appropriate group. They can advance each season depending on improved skills. If you can afford to have a very young team, recruiting from an advanced learn-to-skate class can work.

This really isn't a solution for a small group of people trying to get synchro started in a rink. We couldn't even get a team of 6 together, so we didn't really feel like we could exclude anyone who was interested. And we certainly couldn't create multiple teams!

Synchro is a lot of fun. Maybe later we can give it a try, but it was just too difficult to do at that time. Those of us who worked so hard for a year, trying to hold it all together and keep it going, are just exhausted. Maybe in a few years we can try again...

[quarkiki2]

Our team is only about 1 year old.

Getting busy adults together is tough. In fact, I couldn't join the team until they moved practice to 7AM on Saturday.

My skills are the weakest of the team because I am certainly the most novice skater. However, with my dance training I have good posture, extension, and rhythm. I did OK at the last session -- I lost my grip on one of the moving circles, but was able to stay in formation and regain it. I think it helps that I'm in the taller half of the skaters so I'm closer to the middle for pinwheels and lines.

[Synchronized]

(1) Cost! Where I skate, the ice is incredibly expensive. This prohibits a group of "interested parties" from simply renting it and starting up a team. The cost per person would be outrageous. The local clubs can barely afford to subsidize the reasonably well-attended freestyle and dance sessions, much less a sparsely-attended synchro session.

Fundraising like mad. This year for example, our team was sponsored so we could take a plane to nationals. I've heard of people paying 600 dollars for the entire year off three thousand from fundraising. Plus, the more skaters your have the cheaper it gets.


(2) Inability to get ice! We have to beg & plead & whine just to get any sort of club or rink-based freestyle. Hockey or public take up all the best hours. Most of the folks interested in skating synchro are NOT interested in 6 am Saturday morning.

Yes, ice availability can be a problem. My team skates two mornings a week Monday and Thursday. But, these are ideal. You may grumble at waking up early, but it isn't all that bad. Mornings are great:
#1 Carpools so that your parents don't always have to drive.
#2 Our rink is rigth next to the bus station, alot of us just bussed to school after no problem
#3 I had someone tell me to suck it up. And it's true. Get over it, it's early. You love to skate and you're doing just that.
#4 PRODUCTIVITY! Do you have any idea how much gets done in the mornings? Everyone shuts up and does as they are told. It's amazing what you can accomplish in two hours.



(3) Time commitment! Most of the skaters who are interested want to do this in addition to, not in lieu of, their singles or pairs or dancing. It's a big time commitment, which scares off a lot of people. (Also it's one more coach's bill to pay.)


Okay, it's a huge commitment. My skating last year basically in total including car rides was about 24 hours. But, guess what? I went to nationals for the fourth time. It depends on what you're willing to sacrfice. I was willing to give up two hours of sleep two mornings of the week to have a great year with some of my best friends and compete and have a blast.

[StarshineXavier]

Originally posted by Synchronized
I've heard of people paying 600 dollars for the entire year off three thousand from fundraising. Plus, the more skaters your have the cheaper it gets.

The one year I skated synchro, the season was a bit over $5000/person, and my parents paid for only $250 from their pocket. Myself and my parents fundraised the rest. It took us the whole season to do so, but it was very rewarding in the end.