I have a student that is moving to the general LA area in June and I told her that I would look into rinks and coaches. Can someone help me out with the better rinks in the area as well as coaches. PM me if you have any info that could help. Thanks a bunch!

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- Ashley

If your student is moving to the West LA/Santa Monica/Westwood area of LA, I think the only rink in that area is the Culver City Ice Arena. The rink is easily accessible from the 405 freeway, and is a couple of miles from the 10/405 interchange. This is one of the home rinks of All Year FSC.

Thanks for your help Joan!

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- Ashley

If your student is moving to the eastside, near downtown, or to the valley, Pickwick in Burbank is an option. However, there is a very nice rink farther north in Valencia and another in Simi Valley. If your student is heading more south, Anaheim may be an option (I haven't been there, but I'm hoping to skate there on Friday- I hear it's a great rink), I think there are other rinks in southern LA, but I'm not familiar with them.

There are also smaller rinks in Van Nuys and Pasadena, but Pickwick will probably be just as close and provide more options. Most people I know skate at Pickwick or Culver City depending on which is closer.

I was just down in LA for spring break. I don't know anything about their coaches, but we skated a couple of public sessions at Toyota Sports Center in El Segundo. It's a fairly new facility with a separate hockey and Olympic rink (plus a 3rd rink for roller hockey). Again, I don't know who is coaching out of there but the facility itself was very nice with great ice.

That's where Frank Carroll and Ken Congemi coach their group of elite skaters, which include Evan Lysacek and Bebe Liang. I'm sure there are plenty of other coaches there, too. The rink, which was named after Healthsouth then, was the practice rink for 2002 Nats. I think it was built around 1999 or 2000, and I remember (as a spectator at '02 Nats) that it was a nice facility, but cold. It's near the L.A. airport.

AshBugg, from what I know about L.A, you're talking about a very large area. It would probably be best to find out exactly where your student is moving to - as in what suburb - to get the most relevant information from posters here.

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I know, they just don't know what area they are moving to yet. Just trying to get an idea about what rinks exist and then I'll get more detailed when they figure it out.

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- Ashley

So it looks like they may be moving to Burbank and therefore skating at Pickwick. Any info on that rink I should know about? Feel free to PM me with coach info.

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- Ashley

The Pickwick rink is a nice skating community and I think your skater will like it. The rink manager there is one of the nicest guys ever! Their club affiliation is LAFSC, Michelle Kwan's club. The coaches there include Mingzhu Li (Caroline Zhang's coach and formerly Chen Lu's coach) and Trifun Zivanovic, 1999 U.S. men's silver medalist and current competitive skater for Serbia. Freestyles are a little expensive, though. If I recall correctly, it's $10 for 45 minutes.

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