I met Ola Kamieniecki when she was a little girl.  I've seen her turn into a beautiful skater and young woman.  Like many figure skaters, Ola has Olympic dreams.  Her dreams may come true.  She is the 2012 Polish Figure Skating Champion. ...read more

• Ola Kamieniecki Profile

_{Ola Kamieniecki - Photo Courtesy Skating Designs}

I finished reading Flying Camels and Tiger Mothers last night. It is quite an entertaining figure skating story, but I do hope there are no mothers like Norma Gardner or Ming Chen in real life.  Skating moms who do things like pushing people into swimming pools, destroying blades, running an innocent dog over with a car, or trying to kill other skaters are just not exhibiting rational behavior.

Can competitive figure skating "take over" one's life to the point that irrational behavior can seem normal? ...read more

• Review of Flying Camels and Tiger Mothers - An Entertaining Figure Skating Novel
• What Skating Mothers Do
• Figure Skating Parents Can Be Similar To "Dance Moms"
• How to Be a Figure Skating Parent

_{Flying Camels and Tiger Mothers - Shopping Image}

I'm an experienced driver, but I admit I'm not a car mechanic.  Like many women, I let my husband worry about what my car needs.  I know that is not the best idea; I should know more about what I'm driving...

Similarly,  it seems that most experienced figure skaters and coaches know a lot about figure skating, but they don't know much about the blades they skate on.  In fact, most figure skating coaches recommend blades for their students that they used when they skated.  The problem with this is that no one knows why they picked a certain blade in the first place! ...read more

• Some Frequently Asked Questions About Figure Skating Blades
• Understanding Figure Skating Blade Curves
• Before You Buy Figure Skates
• Review of Paramount Figure Skating Blades

_{A Figure Skate Blade - Shopping Image}

I took my first ice dancing lessons when I was a little girl. It was common, in those days, for figure skating families to take skating vacations to Squaw Valley, California, the site of the 1960 Winter Olympics.

During the summer of 1967, an accomplished ice dance coach and national ice dance champion, Darlene Streich Gilbert, happened to be teaching in "Squaw" for part of the summer.   My parents watched Darlene coach other skaters.   They were impressed, so we  decided I should give ice dancing a try.   I was  lucky.  Darlene "knew her stuff."

In those days, choosing an ice dance coach was a fairly easy task.  Figure skaters looked for someone who had competed through the senior level in ice dancing and had passed the Gold Dance test.  Today, choosing the right ice dance coach is a much more difficult task. ...read more

• Before You Choose an Ice Dance Coach
• How to Become an Ice Dancer
• What Is Social Ice Dancing?
• "Learn to Ice Dance" - An Instructional DVD Review

_{Ice Dancers - Photo Copyright © JO ANN Schneider Farris}