Skating In Vegas

I was in Las Vegas Wednesday through Friday for work, and of course I brought my skates with me!

Wednesday night I decided to check out the ice at Caesar's Palace. There is a small (I'd guess 60 x 60 or s) outdoor rink there in front of the casino that is open from late November to mid-January. It's a bit pricey ($10 for a 2-hr session), and the ice has got to be some of the hardest and most brittle I've ever seen (and did I mention how small it was?). Still, it was definitely a treat since I'd never skated outdoors before. It was not bad, but the smallness of the rink was definitely limiting. I did manage to work on some 3-turns and spins; there was not enough room for moves of any kind really. There was a teenage girl there who was fairly good -- did a very nice Axel to impress her boyfriend (and the rest of us). I don't know what impressed me more, her doing it on that ice or doing it in such a small space. Very fun!

Thursday afternoon I went up to the Fiesta Ice Arena, an ice rink inside a casino (after all, it is Las Vegas). The Fiesta only has one ice sheet, but it was pretty nice ice. I skated the 3:30 public session. For the first half hour or so it was just a few figure skaters, several taking lessons. After that there were more recreational skaters and it crowded up a bit. Still, I got some good practice in on a lot of different stuff, including taking some time to work on my right-foot lunge. I've been really bad about practicing bad-side lunges and spirals so it was definitely good to get some time in. All in all it was a nice session and I liked the ice a lot.

Thursday night I was going to go out and do Vegas-style stuff but the Nationals were on on ESPN2 (dance and pairs) so I stayed in my room and watched. It's a treat since I don't have cable at home, but of course I guess it really proves I'm a skating geek when I stay in my room in Vegas to watch skating instead of being out partying. They have a new "skycam" they were using in the broadcast for the first time and it was quite cool -- they used it to follow the ice dancers down the ice so you could really get a good view of their moves. Neat!