I'm sorry but I really need to vent and my non-skater friends just won't understand. Today I went to skate at a rink on their late public session...BIG mistake. I thought it would be less empty, but that wasn't the biggest problem. Despite there being 2 lessons on the ice with their coach and 3-4 rink guard staff on ice, there was no control going on for the middle figure skating circle! people were skating in and out, a cute little boy was slipping and falling over his toe picks, and it wasn't like he fell in one place he would slide right across the ice, I was terrified for him that s/o would just skate over him as he can easily get in someone's path. and to top it all off, they started playing some rap music which went s/t like "now move to the right..move to the left..etc." and a bunch of tweens got in the middle and started following the steps!! as if they were at a disco...and no it was not teen night at the rink! it may have been cute to watch but it made it impossible to skate. it also semed these girls decided to just hang out in the center. i attempted a couple of lousy spins (in the tiny space i may have found in the center) and left greatly disappointed spending not even 45 minutes skating. all I know is..never to skate at that rink on a public session over the weekend!

Did the guards do nothing? If so, I can hazzard a guess or two about which rink it was.

I was giving private lessons today in a coned off area at the back of a public rink. People kept skating into our area, and I kept politely telling them that it was for lessons only. One adult kept coming back in, really getting in the way, and argued with me about it. I pointed him out to the guards, and he obligingly came into the coned area right in front of them. They told him the rules, but ten minutes later he was back. One of the guards that I know well went over to him, came back and told me the guy wouldn't do it again. My guard friend had told him he was going to be kicked out if he persisted

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If the coaches were rink coaches, couldn't they have said something? No they shouldn't have to, but if the guards aren't looking out, they should at least make sure they have space for their skaters.

I try to be tolerant of such things if there are no lessons going on. If it's a public skate, especially a weekend-night, well there must be twenty or more people out there being (mostly) excluded from the center for the benefit of sometimes only one or two figureskaters. As one hockey skater said to me when I got in his way while doing edges, "we can't go in there, but you can go anywhere you want".

What *does* get to me is when a rink won't let anyone but lessons in the center even though there are no lessons or coaches on the ice. I think they were holding the area open for a party, but the funny thing is that the girls they kicked out of the center (and they were doing jumps and spins, not fooling around), *were* the party, and as such they got let in later in the night. Anyway, this was at Wollman, which is huge, so center or no center there's usually enough room for everyone.

I guess when ii hear the words "public" ice, I find it very odd to have the centre closed off for figure skating. The word public means for everyone. What if hockey players were allowed a part of the ice to have a shinny game, or if speed skaters got a section. I know the way ice is allocated in the US is different in Canada, but I wouldnt dream of trying anything on public ice, except maybe an odd spin or some edges .

froggy - I can completely understand where you're coming from Once I was good enough to go on patch ice I never went on public ice again, it was just too much of a pain. If you're lucky the steward take their job seriously and sort out the problems, if you're not then they spend most of their time chatting up the opposite sex! I remember being at one rink and asked for a steward to be put on because it was packed and becoming dangerous. They sent this guy out who couldn't even stand on his skates, he had to hold onto the side

Some rinks (I'm in the UK) don't have provisions for lower level skaters on patch ice so the ONLY time that some people can have lessons is during a public sessions. Certainly over here the centre circle is usually supposed to be for people having lessons or for figure skating. I'm sure that most figure skaters would prefer not to have to skate on a public session! They'll sometimes section the ice off for parties or a group lesson but I've never seen it done for privates

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The best whisper is a click

I think it depends on the rink, over here. At ours, I think public sessions are a free-for-all, although sometimes part of the ice is coned off for group lessons, or celebrities practising for Dancing on Ice or some other show. But people having lessons on public ice have them as and where they can!

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Mrs Redboots
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I love my computer because my friends live in it!
Ice dancers have lovely big curves!

Many of our rinks are privately owned, yet the municipal rinks are the strictest. I guess it has to do with insurance liability. Almost every rink I've skated in has a coned-off area for lessons/figure skaters/parties during the public sessions. Some rinks even hold their group lessons DURING the public sessions in a coned-off area. (Parties are usually a LTS lesson and/or a game-playing session on the ice.) The roller rink I went to also had a middle section coned off for backwards skating, spins, and turns.

South Mountain Arena in NJ used to (20 years ago) be the strictest - NO spins or jumps on public sessions. Get out of line and the "Commandant" would come out and tell you off. (She scared me. I behaved.)

sunjoy - I remember reading about the Wollman rink using some sort of inflatable barriers/walls to section off part of the ice. Do they still use those? (All I could imagine was what we call a "jersey barrier" - waist-high concrete highway dividers.)

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They use a foam or perhaps inflatable barrier about 1 foot high and 1 foot wide. Easy to step over, light enough to not trip someone too badly, but they create more of a psychological barrier than cones: it *feels* like the end of the rink.

Group lessons and some privates go on in there, while other privates happen in the public skate space, which still has a coned-off center.

I had a similar experience in December and I was like "Never again!". I am lucky in that at my rink both lessons I have use coned off ice which allows for practice after (or before sometimes with my private one) on that ice. Public ice scares me!

I would love to skate more, but until I am at a level where I can use patch, I'm going to stick to time off when I can use a near empty daytime session as addition to my evening lessons!

Same here. I went to a weekend public session yesterday....... One day ater Dancing On Ice and a third of the rink barriered off for hockey training, was not a good move. Weekdays public sessions are lovely and quiet during the day.

It's not so much the volume of people that bothers me, it's those chavs on hockey boots that come flying at everyone then do those horrid hockey stops on purpose that I think should be banned.

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If you want the best seat in the house, you'll have to move the cat!

We have those too! It is a real pet hate of mine, and one of their recent tricks is to scuff up the ice by the exits so people trip getting off. I love it when they fall over when showing off in front of their mates

ohmigosh, the hockey skaters...
in the early stages of my skating, I absolutely DETESTED them, and anyone who went fast and in front of me.
I tolerate them now, as they seem to be in control, and they do get out of your way. But it's very hard to practice with them around - I usually skate off to another patch on the rink away from them.
Our rink has Family Sessions which forbid hockey skates... they should ban them on an after school session too. They are VERY annoying.

hockey skaters...

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Translation, please? What's a "chav"?

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Few things. First these "hockey skaters" may or may not be hockey players, so let's not give hockey players a bad name based on the action of some overly macho teens who skate aggressively and wear hockey skates. I can't see hockey players resorting to pranks like scuffing up the ice on purpose -- that's awfull. In fact I've had aggressive skaters point out a rut in the ice to me and told me to be careful not to practice my stops oven it. I mean I don't know them that well, but they have a great and incredibly tiring opportunity to productively use their aggression when they play or practice right?

Lets call them aggressive skaters. Aggro in the sense of skateboarding/X-games, not their attitutude which may or may not be aggressive. I've come to more than tolerate them. As peanutskates said, most of them are very much in control and can literally stop on a dime. They do what they do, but kids are kids: meaning that you shouldn't judge all of them based on the same cover. A couple have been very polite to me, appologizing to me when they've seen me practicing and they have gotten too close -- not even really getting in my way.

Again some of them are very good skaters, either having that effortless, efficient, fluid stroking that hockey players have, or some of them very good at jam-skating, dancing and doing tricks. These are the serious guys of course, not the hangers-on who don't do much more than play tag. Try asking them to teach you one of their tricks, like a Barrel Roll.

I think if you can get *in* with them that way, and start some grudging mutual respect, it can help control the real out-of-control skaters or toublemakers. You'll no longer be the old fart mouthing off, but will have the backing of some of the very kids that the wannabees look up to.

All this depends heavilly on the culture at your rinks. At mine, I really feel the kind of "grudging mutual respect" if not outright kinship with the few aggressive skaters who are out there to work hard and practice their moves.

Sorry, forgot that it's unfortunately a trend that has sprung up among teenagers in the UK, basically acting like thugs in gangs round street corners in designer clothes.

Wikipedia offers a better explanation than me!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chav

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If you want the best seat in the house, you'll have to move the cat!

I have to agree about the difference between proper hockey players and teens (and sometimes 'adults' who should know better) in hockey skates! I know a lot of hockey players (ex git was on the British team at one point years ago) and some of them are fabulous skaters, ok in a different way to figure skaters but they DO respect the ice for the very same reasons that figure skaters do.

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The best whisper is a click

This is what I do. I skate during the week, stealing time from work specifically so I can attend public sessions that almost no one goes to. I went to a weekend public session this weekend for the first time in years and years and I hated it. But I figure they call it a "public" session for a reason, and all those skaters do help support the rink. I guess if I want uncrowded ice, I need to go when no one else does...or win the lottery so I can afford private ice time!

Yup, I am well used to having my lesson in the middle of Thursday night public chaos I am lucky to have a coach whose "shoo-ing" skills are right up there with his skating skills!

Clare

Also, very few serious hockey players skate on public sessions. Much the saem way few figure skaters skate on public ice once they reach a certain level, the same is often true for hockey players. Odds are, if they're serious about it and on a team, they skate more than enough during practice, or they'll go to open hockey sessions.

Now the teens who think they're soooo cool, they drive me nuts. They're the reason I avoid public skates on the weekend.