A Summary of the French Cup

Feelings before the short

“Everyone has butterflies, champions are those who are able to make them fly in formation”. 

While sitting in the locker room waiting to take the ice for our first official practice (the short program) our Co-team leader Justin Dillon entered the room filled with excitement and spoke those words. We then took the ice and had a very solid official practice, really feeling the ice and skating as a team.

We began our week on Tuesday the 29th with an evening flight out of Boston that landed in the city of Paris around 8a.m. on Wednesday morning. The weather was cloud filled but the temperature was comfortable. We then began our two hour bus trip into Rouen. After preparing for our first unofficial skate we arrived at the arena and were greeted by the sun through the large windows that opened up to the city alongside of the rink. The feeling of skating a program you have been training extremely hard for while looking into a completely foreign land is magical, a dream come true.

Thursday morning began with a very early practice, (as we took the ice at 7:45 am) but due to jet lag,  none of us were too bothered as our internal clocks were already a bit off. From there we were able to get a look at the city. Rouen is extremely gorgeous, scattered with historical cathedrals and old French charm. In the evening we participated  in the competition parade. It was amazing to hear all of the different cheers in multiple languages while winding through the city filled with locals who seemed to be just as excited as we were!

Tonight is the short competition for the Junior and Senior teams from the United States and we could not be more excited and proud to represent our country. Best of luck to all of the teams!

After all was said and done

France was unlike any competition I have been to. From the beauty surrounding the city of Rouen, to the energy in the stands it was really something to behold. It was an absolutely amazing week for synchronized skating. So many teams from around the world illustrating just how far this sport has come. It gives me butterflies to think about where synchronized skating is headed.  After skating a free skate that I am sure the Haydenettes and I will never forget, we had the opportunity to get a look at our competition. As team after team came to the ice I was filled with emotion; what I saw was inspiring. There was so much talent and each and every step was finished with grace and power.  After the competition was over it was a mutual feeling between my teammates that we cannot wait to get back to work!

               

Before heading back to the United States there was one more place on our list of things to see: the Eiffel Tower!  We were filled with emotion as we stepped off the bus, taking picture after picture in hopes of never losing the memories we had made on this trip. We all took the ride up into the first level of the tower, and many of us continued all the way to the top. It was absolutely exhilarating to see all of Paris and its gorgeous landmarks from the Arc de Triomphe to Notre Dame.  There is no other feeling like that of representing one’s country and we could not feel more honored to be members of the United States Figure skating team.

Goodbye for now:]

Lindsay Grajek

               

Skyliners French Cup Wrap Up

Time flies when you’re having fun! Au revoir France!

Our trip to France blew by and I can’t believe we’re already home. After the first three days of sightseeing and practice it was finally competition time on Friday and Saturday. Friday was the short program. We arrived at the rink early and were able to get pumped to skate by playing our animal game and dancing around. When it was time to compete we entered the arena in our shimmering lavender dresses and I could see all the American flags waving in the stands. Although this is my fifth international event, it always seems surreal to see the USA section cheering as we take the ice. Our short program felt good. We had a minor fall, but otherwise a clean skate that we were happy with. The 46.66 we received was not as high as we had hoped and showed room for improvement in both our technical and program components scores. Only 4 points separated our current 7th place position with 3rd place. With such a small gap, we knew the competition was not over yet and were ready to make a come back in the long program. To end the day we headed to “Pizza Pai” for some delicious sundaes, continuing our team tradition of having ice cream the night before the free skate. We all headed to bed excited to bring it for the next day!

At Pizza Pai

 Saturday night we put on our game faces. Knowing we had nothing to lose, we focused on taking each element one at a time, putting our best performance out there and enjoying the skate. We had a blast and a few of my teammates joked that they made facial expressions they had never made before in our program! I would definitely say we brought it that night and had a lot of fun performing! Our score was high enough to pull us up three spots to fourth place overall, which made us incredibly proud.

Performing our free skate

After the junior competition we stuck around the rink to watch senior. We signed some autographs and traded pins with other teams. It was exciting to have a little slice of fame. I ended up handing out all of my American flag toothpicks to a local Novice team from France. We also met a lot of girls from Great Britain. Saying that the senior free skate event was amazing would be an understatement. The programs were stunning and when I thought no team could be better than the last, I would see even better skating. We enjoyed cheering on Team USA, the Haydenettes and Ice’Kateers, who both skated great! The arena was packed. Even the stairs were filled! During intermissions the entire crowd danced and I could see all the different countries’ flags waving. It was like watching the entire world come together, an unforgettable and unique experience. Anyone who bought tickets for senior World Synchronized Skating Championships in Boston is definitely in for a treat!

The crowd for the Senior free skate

Skyliners with Team Great Britain

Team France

Now that we’re back in the States, we are ready to work extremely hard in these last few weeks leading up to U.S. Synchro Championships and World Junior Championships! You’ll know where to find us: At the rink!

Good luck to Skyliners Senior, Chicago Jazz, and Lexettes at Spring Cup this week!

Au revoir!

Dana

Bonjour de Rouen! (Hello from Rouen!)

We arrived here safely Tuesday afternoon and have been having tons of fun regardless of the rainy weather. After all of our traveling on Tuesday  we finally got to settle down at the hotel and go out to lunch at a creperie called “St. Romain’s” where we kicked off our week in France by enjoying some of their delicious crepes, my favorite French meal! After lunch we freshened up at the hotel and took a walk to the rink for practice. It was a comfortable 10 degrees C (that’s 50 degrees F) a pleasurable contrast to last year’s French Cup where it was below freezing. Despite our exhaustion from the plane and bus rides, we had a great practice. We had the honor of sharing our practice ice with Team Synchro Energie from France. It was exciting to watch their programs and warm up alongside them. We did a few run throughs and sections of our short and long programs to start getting our heads back in the game. It felt good to stretch out our legs and move around after being cooped up in our plane seats for so long. Feeling satisfied after practice, we grabbed some dinner at “Holy Cow!” a new burger restaurant that we discovered and headed to bed for some much needed rest.

Sightseeing in Rouen

Skyliners with Coach Josh Babb

Wednesday morning was filled with sightseeing and shopping. The pouring rain and gusting wind didn’t stop us from walking all over town. I think we were definitely a sight to see in our clear ponchos (we were a little short of umbrellas!) We visited the Cathedral, a 13th Century cemetery, a park with a playground and swans, as well as the Rouen Art Museum. The museum had many impressive paintings and sculptures that we enjoyed snapping pictures of. The city of Rouen is beautiful and the French Cup is such a big deal here. Advertisements for the event are found all over town and many shopkeepers I spoke to knew about the competition. We saw a big sign for the French Cup at the park we visited. It sounds like the arena will be crowded this weekend. I’m looking forward to it! That night we had a great two hour practice and revisited “Holy Cow!” for dinner.

Skyliners with Team Leaders Dann Krueger and Justin Dillon

At the Parade of Teams

This morning we had our last unofficial practice ice. Practice went smoothly. We have adjusted to the Olympic sized rink and are feeling confident and ready to compete tomorrow and Saturday  This evening was the parade. We got some team pictures with our team leaders, Dann and Justin and with our head coach, Josh. It was amazing to see all the different countries’ waving flags as we walked through the streets of Rouen. People watched the parade from their windows and took pictures. What a thrilling experience! Can’t wait for the competition to officially to begin tomorrow! Good luck to all teams!

 Go USA!!

Dana

Farewell, Sweden!

The last two days of our journey have definitely had its ups and downs.  Saturday started with a great official practice; great energy, great presentation, and great execution.  We were feeling confident and felt ready to show the judges what we had in store for them.  After our official practice, we had lunch and rest time.  Following our well-deserved rest time, we began our “primping”.  Still feeling pumped, we jammed to some fun-filled music to get us in the spirit of our sassy, flirty short program.  When our primping finished, we had some off ice to solidify our confidence in our ability to execute a solid program.  Feeling confident in our team and ourselves was certainly the emotion rushing through our bodies as we loaded the bus ready to skate.  As we arrived to the rink, we headed to our warm-up area and began entering into full competition mode.  Before we knew it, warm-up was over and we were in our gorgeous dresses visualizing our perfect program.  Time definitely seemed to fly by because once we opened our eyes, it was as if we were in our beginning position.  Unfortunately, our program was not as strong as we had hoped it would be, but we were still proud of how we pushed through the program and finished strong.  We received our scores and immediately put it behind us.  We were ready to transform into vampires; we were ready to attack. 

           

Sunday came faster than expected.  As our six o’ clock alarms went off, we knew we had a long day ahead of us, but we were ready for the challenge.  The routine was similar to Saturday’s.  After breakfast, we loaded the bus and headed to our official practice.  Like Saturday, we had a strong official. We were extremely proud of ourselves and were ready to show our fierce and ferocious program.  During the pre-competition hours, we came together as one and fed off each other’s positive energy.  It truly showed how much we trusted each other and how we were going to work together to skate well.  As the bus pulled up to the rink, we took on the persona of vampires and warmed up.  Just like Saturday, before we entered the ice, we called our other coach, Shannon, who was unable to be with us this week.  She assured us that she was confident in our skating and ability to perform our best skate yet.  Sooner than we knew, it was time to take the ice.  We went out there and gave it our all. Unfortunately, we had some mishaps, however, we did not let those accidents bring us down in the least.  We pulled through and ended strong.  After the competition, we returned to the locker room and had a team pep talk.  We knew we had a lot of work to do, but we weren’t going to give up.   Colette came in and said she was incredibly proud of us and impressed by our strength of not giving up when times got tough.  We supported Team USA at the awards ceremony and expressed our congratulations. 

We returned to the hotel, changed our clothes, and then went to a pizza parlor.  There, we got the chance to see our parents, let loose, and have fun on our last night in Sweden.  It was nice to finally be able to relax and just enjoy everyone’s company. Even though we may not have ended up where we wanted to be, we have learned a lot from our time here in Sweden. We have big plans to help us prepare and come back stronger than ever at nationals.   A final congrats to the Synchroettes junior team and Miami University’s senior team on their bronze medal finishes!

GO USA!!!!!

Sharon & Katilyn :)

Short Program in Sweden!

Hej alla (Hi Everyone)! Returning to Göteborg, Sweden with Miami Senior after being here in 2010 for the Junior World Challenge Cup is a DREAM come true. The atmosphere is amazing, the people are enthusiastic, and the skating is even better.

Miami Senior Varsity Synchronized Skating Team

After being here for a few days and getting a couple of great practices under our belts, everyone seemed all settled in and ready to compete. This morning we skated our short program official practice after just a short debacle with the bus not picking us from the hotel to take us to the rink. However, once we all finally trickled over and arrived at the rink, it was time to get to work. We skated a solid official practice and felt that we were more than ready to compete that night.

Dream skaters Ashleigh Ostin and Ashley Mulhern getting ready for official practice.

Before we knew it, we were heading back over to the rink and taking a few minutes to warm up. I personally had an amazing time warming up next to Team Boomerang from Sweden and getting to see some of my good friends who skate for them. I make no exaggeration when I say that those girls have a ton of spirit and really know how to make some noise!

Miami skaters Colleen, Katelyn, Alli, and Ingrid are excited to skate.

Stepping on the ice, I think I can speak for my whole team when I say that we got chills when they announced us as “Miami University representing the United Skates of America”, but we quickly snapped right back to reality and took on our fierce character as we skated to our warm-up block. Taking a deep breath, hitting our pose, waiting a few beats, and then finally making our first movement as one, I knew that this was going to be a great skate. Right now we are sitting in 2^nd place behind the reigning World Champions, Team Surprise of Sweden, and could not be happier or more ready to compete our long program tomorrow!

Miami Senior Team after a fierce short program competition in Sweden!

Congratulations to all of Team USA on amazing performances today! I am so excited to continue to show the world what USA can do tomorrow!

Det var allt för nu (That’s all for now),

Ashley Mulhern

Update from Göteborg

Hello everyone! I'm Ashley Tomich, a new DREAMer, and a member of the Synchroettes Junior team.  After a flight departing from Newark, NJ on Wednesday night and a quick layover in Copenhagen, Denmark we safely arrived in Göteborg, Sweden thursday morning. We stopped at our beautiful hotel, the Novotel, to drop all of our luggage change so we could head over to the rink to have our first practice. Although our feet felt a bit swollen from flying, we did lots of skills and a few parts of the program to get used to the ice and get our knees bending.  After practice, we went back to the hotel and had an early dinner and were all very happy to get to bed early as we all felt a little bit of the jet lag.

On our way to our first international competition! Fun fact: My teammate Flora and I also sat together on the flight to our first National Championships 7 years ago in Colorado Springs.

Friday, we woke up and got to enjoy a beautiful breakfast at the hotel and were then off again to the rink.  We watched a bit of Miami's practice in the official competition rink and put on our skates in one of the locker rooms there to then walk across the parking lot to the back rink for our practice. This rink was tiny and cold but it didn't stop us from smiling our way through a strong two hour practice, especially while wearing our Team USA jackets.  As this is the international debut for the Synchroettes, it is a very special experience for all of us and we are extremely proud and honored to be competing here while representing our country!

Synchroettes Junior at their unofficial practice with US team leader Colette and team doctor Tina.

Since our hotel is located along the water, we got a chance to take the ferry into the city of Göteborg.  It was nice to walk around and do some shopping.  We took the ferry back to the hotel in time for dinner, off-ice to watch some video, and then the draw.  The draw was for the junior and senior teams competing and was held in one of the conference rooms here at the hotel. They had tins of swedish candy with a number written on the bottom for the captains of each team to pick to decide the skating order for Saturday. We will be skating third in the short program event. Now we're off to bed as we have an early wake up call tomorrow morning for the official practice, but I know I, and the rest of my team, are excited for the competition to begin and to cheer on our fellow US teams, Miami and Crystallettes!

Three of the five DREAM skaters in Sweden: Ashleigh O., Ashley T., and Ashley M.

Stay tuned for more updates to come from other DREAM skaters here in Sweden. Go USA!

Ashley

Hallå från Sverige!

Hello from Sweden! 

The Crystallettes have finally made it to Gothenburg, Sweden! After nine hours of traveling, we were thrilled to claim our luggage and fully focus on what we came to do. However, when we were getting our bags from the baggage claim, we noticed that one of our skaters was missing her suitcase with her skates inside of them. The missing skates were left in Detroit and caused quite a panic because of the upcoming practices scheduled for the next few days. Thankfully, one of the skaters on the Synchroettes was generous enough to lend our skater her skates. Before we took the ice, we had the opportunity to meet our team leader, Colette. She came with us to our first practice and gave us some great feedback about both of our programs. It was nice to finally get our legs moving and our feet back on the ice. Although we only missed one of our usual practices, it felt like we hadn’t been on the ice for a week.  After a great practice, we enjoyed a nice team dinner with our coaches and manager. Shortly after, bedtime arrived and we got our clothes ready for tomorrow’s practice and hit the sack.

With alarms ringing at eight in the morning, we knew today was even more important than yesterday. As exhausted as we were, we knew that we had to stay focused and keep our heads in the game. In today’s two-hour practice, it was imperative that we showed two solid run-throughs. With Colette by our coaches’ sides, they continued to support us and provided beneficial information to help us achieve our goal. We were happy to know that we had another solid practice under our belt. Following our practice, we took a team walk to the Hard Rock Cafe. Eating a full meal after a long day of hard work hit the spot.  Once we finished dinner, it was time to shop! We visited many clothing stores, tourist venues, and chocolate shops. It was a very fun-filled day.

To finish the day off right, we had a very productive off ice session. While we were having off ice, two of our team members went over to participate in the draw. USA was the first country to pick their place in the lineup and we had the honor of picking first. Funny as it may seem, we drew number one!  

Best wishes to all of the teams competing at the Leon Lurje Trophy & thank you again to the Synchroettes for the skates and the personalized gifts. We love them! :) 

Katilyn & Sharon