Loud Cheering, Clapping, and Figure Skating

A certain figure skating coach does everything "team style." It's common to see her skating students cheering and banging the boards when someone lands a difficult jump or completes a difficult spin. When her skaters do complete run-throughs of their short or long programs, the arena gets really loud. Sometimes there is very loud clapping. When her group goes to competition, there is a cheering section that includes that coach's skaters and families. It's fun for everyone who is in her group.

Other coaches have copied that coach. As Sectionals is getting close, there really is a lot of clapping and cheering and banging of the boards going on.

I think that is GREAT! Cheering seems to make kids skate better!

Unfortunately, not everyone is part of the groups that are doing the cheering. Some kids are not getting equal attention. I've even heard that someone complained to a rink's management that certain kids are getting too much attention.

In my opinion, hearing cheering at the rink while practicing is a good idea, since most likely, at a competition, there will be some cheering going on from the stands. Skaters need to learn how to be able to deal with cheering and clapping before the "real performance" since a lot of noise may be distracting.

What are your thoughts? How should we go about cheering for figure skaters?

_{Ryan Bradley Is a Figure Skater Who Loves to Skate to Claps and Cheers - Photo by Matthew Stockman/Getty Images}