Foreign Ice

I'm in Medford. I drove up today and found the RRRink after a bit of confusion (there's been some freeway work that Google Maps didn't account for :-().

I got to the RRRink around 3:45. The competition was not quite over so I watched the last four skaters or so, then found Donna and introduced myself. Pam (the club's test chair) also introduced herself. There was a ceremony after the competition -- Tai Babilonia was at the rink to present an award (she lives in nearby Ashland!). I finally got on the ice around 4:40 or so and Donna and I had a half-hour lesson starting around 4:55. We went through the whole test, paying special attention to the W-8 and 3-turn pattern. Not surprisingly neither has improved much since yesterday :-); they are about the same. The ice at the RRRink is quite hard -- Sherwood's is fairly hard but the RRRink's is harder still. Since I had my blades sharpened just last week I felt fairly secure, though -- but I'm really glad I had some additional time to skate on this ice and get used to it.

Practice ice tomorrow morning at 9 for 45 minutes; then the testing starts at 10. There are only 10 skaters testing. I am warming up with2 other skaters (pre-juv and preliminary MIF) at 10:41 (I am last of the group to skate :-().