Junior Grand Prix of Figure Skating Ice Dance Costumes Were Lost in Belarus - Now Found!

The ISU Junior Grand Prix of Figure Skating is an elite ice skating competition series where top junior level skaters from more than thirty countries compete. A series of eight qualifying competitions take place. The competitions take place in different countries all over the world. This week's Junior Grand Prix event is taking place in Belarus.

This morning, I received an email from Tiffany Hyden-Dombeck, the coach of American ice dancers Rachel Tibbetts and Collin Brubaker, who are competing in the Belarus event. She has quite a story to tell!

Her dance team's skating costumes had been gate checked in Chicago, but that piece of luggage was missing when the skaters arrived in Belarus. Two days passed. The costumes were still missing.

Numerous calls were made by both U.S. Figure Skating and Dombeck. The compulsory dance event was scheduled for today; the ice dancers had to have their costumes in order to compete. An important part of ice dancing is the costumes since the outfits are designed to go to the music and to a certain theme. Substitute outfits would not work.

Fortunatelly, for Tibbetts and Brubaker, "Coach Tiffany" speaks Russian.

Using her ability to speak the language that is spoken in Belarus, Dombeck took some initiative. All alone, at night, in a foreign country, she took a 45 minute taxi drive to the airport. She told the cab driver what she was trying to do. He accompanied her to the area where missing luggage is kept.

At first, the airline officials would not help her find the costumes, but after insisting "she would sleep on the airport's floor unless the costumes were found," an airline official finally told Dombeck that the costumes were at the airport. In fact, the missing bag had been there for two days! The now happy figure skating coach returned to the hotel with the costumes and Tibbetts and Brubaker will be able to compete today!

Sometimes when we see figure skaters compete, we don't always realize what measures have been taken to be there. Traveling to foreign countries to compete in figure skating can be complicated. Things don't always go smoothly.

I hope that Tibbetts and Brubaker skate well today. They, and their coach, have been through quite an ordeal.

_{Tiffany Hyden-Dombeck, Rachel Tibbetts, and Collin Brubaker - Photo by JO ANN Schneider Farris}