Anyone here skating in this competition? I let my coach talk me into it. I'm doing the adult bronze free event, skating up. There must be quite a few skaters since I'm in flight B. Although they also thought i was a man so maybe there's a separate group of men. The sheet that came in the mail gives no hint of warmup time or group size. Is there anyone who's skated there before who can offer some insight?

Pat

I did this competition last year and I'll be there this year in Silver. Last year I think there were around 8 or so Bronze ladies. Since they have two flights I'd assume there are over 10. The warm ups were standard 5 minute last year. One thing though that was crazy...they were running almost an hour early last year and didn't stop to catch up. I arrived and all my competitors had their skates on! This year we go on in the morning so I doubt something like that would happen. Practice ice is at 6am though, ick.

See you there!

Lara

Hi Pat,

I competed in this last year as a Bronze, but I am no longer in the area (and I've moved up to silver). As Lara mentioned, get there very early. I almost missed my event last year--I showed up an hour before my event, only to find that I had to get my skates on RIGHT THEN and get on the ice. They did wait for me, and it's a good thing, too--my coach JUST got there in time for the competition, but missed the 5-minute warmup since they were running so early. There were 8 in bronze last year, and I believe they combined age groups into one competition group (I definitely remember competing against two other women who would be Bronze II, and I was Bronze I). However, there were two warm up groups.

If they are still holding the event at Baker Rink on the Princeton campus, one thing to note is that it's arena seating--there are spectators on three sides of the ice, including behind where the judges sit. I was used to skating at a rink where there were only bleachers on one side (the side opposite of the judges), and so I actually got lost coming out of a spin in my program and went the wrong direction. Oh well. No one noticed except me...oh, and my coach.

Good luck and have fun!

Thanks for the tips, both of you! I see the schedule is now posted on line, too. There's 10 minutes allotted for each of the Bronze groups. If they have us warm up separately, that's only 5 minutes of competition, if they do give us 5 minutes of warmup. Well, we'll just have to wait and see. I'll be sure to tell my coach about the tendency to run early, though! He tends to arrive just at the last minute for things, and it could be a problem there! He also has some kids competing in this event, I think probably in the afternoon.

Lara -- Are you going to skate that 6 am session? I haven't made up my mind yet. I don't know if I could manage it without killing myself, LOL!

thanks again.
Pat