A New Chapter

Hey Everyone,

This blog is long overdue, but I hope that it finds everyone well at the start of our 2011-2012 seasons. I just recently started a new chapter of my life as I moved out to Oxford, Ohio to start my freshman year at Miami University. One of the hardest things about this transition, other than moving 13 hours away from my mom, dad, and younger sister, was moving away from the other huge piece of my life, my 20 “sisters” and “family”, my team, the Skyliners. After skating with the Skyliners organization for the past 9 years, there were definitely a few tears shed as I had to say goodbye, but that being said, I was excited for the new opportunity that stood ahead of me. My Skyliners coaches, including Josh Babb, Jenny Gibson, and Sarah LeBlanc Blosat, could not have prepared me better as both a skater and person for the challenges that I face in college.

The first few weeks of college were surreal as I could not believe that after 10 years of attending Miami Summer Skating Camps and always dreaming of being a Redhawk, I was finally there. The week of tryouts took me by storm, with so many amazing skaters working for just 53 spots on the varsity teams. I was beyond thrilled when I was placed on the senior team, and it was clear that one of my life long dreams was really coming true.

So far, my experience on the team has been absolutely incredible. Being a varsity athlete at a division 1 university is something so special. Although each week is busier than the next, with classes, on-ice practices, off-ice practices, and much more, you always know that you have 52 other teammates standing behind you ready to support you and help you out whenever you may need it. The veterans on the senior team were so extremely welcoming and have really helped me get through these first 3 months of completely new experiences.

Although Miami Skating gets a much later start than many other teams throughout the country, we really hit the ground running right away. In just the second week of post tryout practices, choreographer Sarah Kawahara came in to piece together the senior free skate. This was a whirlwind experience for the rookies, but ended with a very fun, creative program and 20 extremely exhausted girls. Less than 4 weeks later, choreographer Scott Brown came in to to “Jazz up” our very enthusiastic short program. At the conclusion of fall break weekend, we had 2 programs that we were completely thrilled with and had gotten a great critique from 3 U.S. Figure Skating officials. In addition to all of our busy practice schedules, the Miami teams participated in the Susan G Komen Race for the Cure, supported other Miami varsity teams in their sporting events, held spirit days at practice for homecoming week, walked in the Miami University Homecoming Parade, and had a very successful skating Parents Weekend.

This past weekend was filled with skater-parent reunions, family skates, and crowd filled performances. I was so excited to see my parents after 3 months of not seeing them. I’m so grateful that they were able to make the trip out to see all 3 teams perform their 2011-2012 competitive season programs and be here for such a nice weekend. This coming weekend both the collegiate and senior teams are looking forward to our first opportunity to skate between the periods of the hockey games making the sport better known across the campus.

Best of luck to all teams in their last weeks of practice prior to the competition season. That’s all for now! Can’t wait to see everyone at Porter!

Love & Honor,
Ashley

From Miami: A Post-Nationals, Pre-Worlds Update

Hello Followers!

An apology on the delay, as life’s marathon has been rather challenging to keep up with.

First, let’s have a quick recap on the U.S. Synchronized Skating Championships from our perspective.

The event was amazing! There was so much energy the whole week that we couldn’t help but to feed off of it when we competed. After placing second in the short program we were completely ecstatic at the chance to come back again the next night and claim our spot on the world team!

Leading up to the free skate we were all so fired up to skate. We couldn’t wait to get out there and show everyone our passion for this sport. We will never forget that moment in the locker room when we found out we were in second place - we don’t think we’ve ever cried such tears of joy in our lives!

For Taylor, it was a really awesome experience to have received this honor in her home state. She loved being supported by both current Miami teammates and old ICE‘Kateer teammates throughout the week.

At awards it was a great privilege to be given our medals by former Miami skater, and DREAM program founder, Becky Search! Afterwards we went to the World Team meeting where we were given our sweet new USA jackets! We heard from a few officials what they had to say about the competition and a few words on Worlds. We finished up the night with a celebration dinner with our parents and headed off with high spirits into Spring Break.

As second semester of school is speeding up, with four weeks left in the semester, so has our training on and off the ice. We’ve made great progress since U.S. Championships and are moving forward in the right direction everyday. Monday, Dan Krueger came to our practice to give us constructive feedback to focus on with our few practices left before the World Championships. For fifteen of the twenty skaters, it will be our first time as World Competitors. We are humbled and overjoyed to be apart of such a special honor and look forward to representing the United States in Helsinki next week. We’re excited to see the atmosphere of the World scene, as we’ve heard it will be like nothing we have seen before. We ordered some new apparel, just for the event and of course can’t wait to put on our World Team jackets.

Best of luck to our Team USA counterparts, the Haydenettes, as they prepare their final week before Worlds as well! We look forward to being in Finland with them and will be sure to report to everyone how the week is going.

Love and honor,

Taylor and Sarah

Road to Helsinki!

Hey Everyone,

Just thought I'd give you readers an update on how the Haydenettes are preparing for the World Synchronized Skating Championships in Finland in a week!

After the U.S. Synchronized Skating Championships in California we came home with much work ahead of us before going to Finland. For the past few weeks we've been training hard as usual, fixing details and video reviewing our programs. We've also had several spirit practices including St. Patricks Day, Hope for Japan day, Neon Day. (see pictures throughout). We are also very excited for this weekend's spirit practices as well :-)

Another exciting event on the Haydenettes March calendar included a visit from one our local news stations, Channel 7. They did a segment on our team and our training for the World Synchronized Skating Championships in April. It was a very cool experience having a news crew at our practice and on the ice with us. Here is the link to the news story: http://www1.whdh.com/news/articles/sports/12003861830136/meet-the-haydenettes-of-lexinton/

The Haydenettes also paid a visit to the State House in Boson on March 30th. We had a great time meeting our local representatives and were also honored with several certificate citations from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts' House members. One our teammates works at the State House and we were lucky to see her office and meet her boss. The Speaker of the House also announced our accomplishments this season to the current House members, as she spoke of how our hard work had paid off this season we received a standing ovation! It was a very exciting day for all of us.

We have only a few practices left before the World Synchronized Skating Championships, and we are all excited to compete in our coach's home country of Finland!

We will keep you updated while were in Finland! Keep your fingers crossed and GO USA!!!

Jenna and Noelle

photo credit: Erika Hoffman

December Madness

Typically, December is a month filled with shopping, preparing for the holidays and hanging out with friends and family. Well, this month definitely was a busy one, but filled with so many exciting synchro events, that there was minimal time for shopping. Still, with all of these events came several reunions and countless hours spent with teammates.

The month started with a trip to Michigan for the Dr. Richard Porter Classic. The Skyliners junior team was excited because it was the first time we would get the chance to compete against the midwestern junior teams and a few teams from Canada. Before competing the short program, we headed to the rink to cheer on our intermediate team. As they took the ice, we (the novice team, too) cheered as loud as we could to support our fellow teammates. They wowed us once again with their fast and fun "Glee" themed program and won gold in their group.

Finally it was our turn to compete and we were so excited to show the crowd our energetic and bright program to “Don’t Rain on My Parade.” We skated well with just one small fall and were BEYOND ecstatic with our second place finish.

As we waited to perform our long program the next day, we spotted three former teammates, who now compete on two different collegiate teams, coming to cheer us on. We were very happy with the way we skated while still knowing there was room to improve. Hearing our score of 101, we were thrilled and could not believe that we had won the long program and came in second overall to one of the top Canadian teams, Gold Ice. We were extremely proud of our performance that weekend and had a wonderful experience at the Porter competition. Throughout the weekend, we were happy to reconnect with several friends we hadn’t seen in a while, as well as catch up and take a few quick pictures with our Dreammates.

The second weekend of December was upon us and we were off to Cape Cod for the second competition weekend in a row. We once again competed against the East Coast junior teams including the Lexettes, Team Image and the Synchroettes. We were really happy after competing the short program. The next day we had some time before we competed, where we were able to help the younger teams prepare for their competitions including sewing in the juvenile skaters hair pieces for their “Hairspray” program.

As the last division that night, we competed our “Phantom of the Opera” long program placing first. Cape Cod is always a fun competition that brings back so many memories of competing there year after year in the younger divisions.

Weekend number three put us into our favorite city, New York. That Friday, directly after school, we all raced to the train stations in our towns, just in time to board extremely crowded trains and meet each other at Grand Central Terminal. From there, we traveled together to the Chelsea Piers rink, home of the Skating Club of New York, for the annual "Holiday on the Hudson" skating show. We had a great time spending the night together as a team and performing under the spotlights in front of a crowd that doesn’t often get to see synchronized skating.

Finally, this last week of December has been spent busily preparing for the Junior World Team Selection Competition to be held next week in Fond du Lac, Wis. We have spent this week at the rink, once again, for our “Christmas Bootcamp,” as we like to call it. It has been hard, but a lot of fun and we have loved getting to spend so much time together. We are extremely excited to compete again next weekend and cannot wait reunite with friends from all over the country.

See you all at Fondy,

Ashley and Audrey