Skating Fridays

Initiation

There is a saying that one is not a “real” figure skating until one experiences the following:

• Stepping on the ice with hard guards on
• Face planting during a spiral (and therefore knocking all the wind out of yourself)
• Experiencing the “click of death” during crossovers and taking a hard fall

In my years of skating, I’ve done two of the three. I’ve fallen on a spiral during my younger years and knocked all the wind out of me. I experience the “click of death” several times a year so it’s a fairly regular occurrence. But never in my skating career have I ever gotten on the ice with hard guards on. The main reason is because I rarely wear hard guards while at my home rink.

One afternoon, I put hard guards on because I needed to run to the restroom. When I went to get on the ice, I had forgotten that I had the guards on. I took my phone and notebook with me onto the ice. As I stepped on, I realized something was wrong. My blade didn’t move, and I did a slow, dramatic fall to the ice. I landed on my right knee and elbow pretty hard.

My fall was pretty epic because all the coaches asked me if I was OK. I was fine, minus the pain, but it was really embarrassing. I couldn’t bend my knee the rest of the day but it slowly got better as the days went by.

Now that I’ve completed the trifecta of skating errors, I can now fully call myself a real figure skater.

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