Skate for the Love of It

Sunday morning saw us heading to Brockton, Massachusetts for another skating competition. Maura competed in the Skate for the Love of It ISI Competition hosted by FMC Icesports at the Asiaf Ice Arena. It was Maura’s first competition at the Alpha level. She’s been working on her new program now since the beginning of the year and she was ready to do it for real.

We got up early to get to Brockton by 8:30, an hour before Maura’s scheduled ice time. Early is relative. Brockton was only about half an hour from our house in Weymouth, a much shorter trip than it was to Marlboro in December and not much further than it is to her home rink in Rockland. Leaving the house 7:45 was sufficient to allow us to get lost on the way and still arrive with time to get Maura registered and dressed before she had to take the ice. Since we managed to get lost driving through Brockton it was good that we’d given ourselves the extra time.

Maura skated well. During her program she had her usual look of intense concentration but when she was done she was all smiles. She was happy with her performance and so was her coach. I’m not a qualified judge (at least not yet) but I thought she’d done fairly well. She came in third in a field of four, not a stunning result, but it is the first time she’s gotten a medal that wasn’t by default. Maura was happy to come in third and posed to get her picture taken on the podium with a big smile on her face. If she ever decides she isn’t satisfied with third place she’ll start working harder when she’s off the ice and she might do even better. Until then I’m satisfied with her performance if she is. The most important thing is that she enjoys what she’s doing and keeps at it. She certainly does enjoy it and I’ll do my best to get her to lessons every week as long as she wants to keep taking them.

After Maura was done we headed home for most of the day. I was happy to get out of the rink. I need to get a warmer coat to wear when I’m watching Maura skate. I’m always shivering in most of the rinks we visit, at least in the winter. They are quite pleasant in the summer.

We spent the early afternoon playing games together as a family and then headed back to the rink to watch our friend Rheannon Swire skate with her synchronized skating team. Rhe is one of Maura’s role models and we wanted to go out to cheer her on. Cheering on your friends is almost as important a part of the competition experience for Maura as skating. She’s always happy to see her friends skate well, even when she’s skating against them.