At the 2008 U.S. Adult Figure Skating Championships in Lake Placid, New York, there were many volunteers from the community who made certain that the competition was a success. Dedicated personnel in the Accounting Room, runners (who ran back and forth from the rinks to report on results), ice monitors, announcers, ice sweepers, and many others, were pivotal in making the skaters feel comfortable and welcome at the Olympic Center.
I spoke to a few of the volunteers and they were as enthusiastic about the event as the skaters! One of my interviewees was Jim Rogers, a Lake Placid resident, who has been volunteering as an announcer for U.S. Figure Skating since 1962! With a career in radio broadcasting spanning 50 years, Jim told me that one of his fondest memories was about ten years ago when he was announcing a competition where Dorothy Hamill was a participant. After her skate, as she was leaving the ice, he said over the speakers, "She's just as beautiful inside as she is outside." Dorothy came back on the ice and blew him a kiss! For more of my conversations with the volunteers at Adult Nationals, please check out the above video.
(Below photo: volunteers in the Accounting Room include, from left to right, Anita Conrad, Christie Sausa, Candee Gonzalez and Cecelia Erisman)
Why is it that I keep seeing celebrities in honest-to-goodness figure skating dresses/outfits? Previously I did a doubletake because in addition to the cute dress, I really thought Sarah Jessica Parker also had on skates. (I was wrong.) The next skater I see is the gorgeous R&B singer/songwriter Ashanti at the 2008 BET Awards which were held on Tuesday, in Los Angeles, California. I was waiting for her to do a layback spin. My friend Aaron at Axels, Loops and Spins thought Bebe Liang wore the same dress for her short program a few years back.
I got this photo from the folks at gofugyourself, who covered other fashion hits and misses at the BET Awards so please check out their site. I'm just waiting for the red carpet moment when someone shows up complete with a fleece warmup jacket and pants (you know, the breakaway ones that zip at the sides and you can wear your dress under it), then takes off her jacket, unzips her pants, and voilà! The dress.
How many times have I been frustrated at a session because I couldn't get my spin centered? Last week, of the 50 spins I tried, I centered less than half. Wouldn't it be great to have the best spin in the world and what would that feel like? Why wonder about this? Let's ask the Queen of Spin and the greatest spinner in the world (ever), Lucinda Ruh.
Lucinda, age 28, is a two-time Swiss national champion and two-time World Professional bronze medalist. She also holds the Guinness Book of World Records for the longest and fastest spin on ice --115 revolutions. Below is one of my favorite program of hers from 1999 -- Lucinda's short program at the 1999 World Figure Skating Championships where she skates to Lawrence of Arabia. Dick Button's effusiveness is contagious!
Lucinda had to stop skating as an amateur in 1999 due to a fractured back. Afterwards, she traveled the world while touring professionally (with a fractured back). Growing up, Lucinda spoke English, Japanese, Chinese, German, and French, so I'm certain she felt at home whereever she was touring. Lucinda has also branched out to other endeavors close to her heart, such as being the force behind Lucinda Design, a design firm that helps cities, corporations, and families create beautiful and functional skating arenas. I'm used to skaters going into fashion, acting, coaching and modeling (all of which Lucinda also does, by the way), so when I had the opportunity to catch up with her recently, the design company was the first question I had for her.
1. Was Lucinda Design always somewhere in the back of your mind as a company that you wanted to create? Or did it come about by accident?
I have always loved architecture and it has always been my passion. As a child traveling and living all around the world due to my father's work, and of course traveling for competitions, I had always dreamed of making the ice rinks a better place to train and compete in, the airports more inviting, hotels more of an experience, and hence, I am designing an ice rink right now! Plus my architectural sense is infused with culture from around the world, so it truly will be a unique ice rink in a unique setting, which will allow everyone to enjoy the end product. I am truly excited to have an ice rink named after me and be designed by me. It is opening at the end of next year. It is wonderful to be so monumental to giving people the joy of being on the ice, whether it be for the future skating champion or a couple on a date. I hope to design more in the future expanding into other areas of architectural design as well!
2. Of your worldly travels, what are your favorite cities?
My favorite cities in the world are New York City, Dubai, Hong Kong, Tokyo and Zurich.
3. How involved are you with skating now? Do you still teach clinics and/or classes?
I will always be involved in skating directly or indirectly as it is a part of who I am and I very much enjoy giving seminars on my spinning secrets. At this moment, however, I am channeling my creative ideas into acting, design, writing and a few more projects underway in terms of books and producing.
4. When you start and are in one of your signature spins, what is going through your mind?
Spinning was an extraordinary experience and moment of trance for me and my mind. I did it like meditation. I just let it happen and let my mind watch over my body. I never had thought much about how I did it until I started teaching...I was like, "Wow, I do have a very special way of doing it that no one was teaching... Now I have to put it into words!" It was very interesting for me to analyze it and yet at the same time, it scared me that now I wouldn't be able to spin anymore because the mind got in the way :) But luckily, I still could spin. :)
5. Where and when will we get to see you perform again?
You won't be seeing me strapping my skates on and performing like you used to quite yet. I have had a very tough five years behind me so I am excited for my future. So you will hopefully be seeing me soon in your movie theater and on your TV screen. Currently, I am acting as one of the main roles on a new dramedy -- a one hour TV show. We are in production now and I am hoping that it will air nationwide and worldwide this year, so please check my website for further information and show times, which will be coming soon. It's so exciting and I am loving it. I have some movie scripts that I am reading as well. I love to act and have always been acting since I was a child, yet skating took over my life and I didn't have the chance to further it. I had always said that I was an artist first, then an athlete, and I think my skating definitely showed that by me telling a story each time I skated. I am also looking into the world of fashion since I designed every one of my skating costumes from the age of four and truly have a passion for it.
6. Since you are pursuing acting will full energy, which actor do you admire?
8. You have collaborated with many artists, such as Gloria Gaynor, Aretha Franklin, and Seal, to present skating in different and interesting ways. Was there a celebrity that you were truly star-struck by?
You know, I am so thankful to have skated LIVE with the most incredible artists and to have met them personally and continue to do so. Yet, I am as star-struck by a special fan, or a person telling me their personal story, or the Chinese policeman who fed all the children who survived from the devastating earthquake, as I am of meeting a superstar in their own right. I feel everyone on this planet is here to bring something special to this world and I am star-struck by all of them in their own special way. Everyone is a superstar and at this time in the world, we need everyone to tap into their inner stardom to bring light, peace and goodness in this world.
9. If you could have three people over for dinner (fictional or not, dead or alive), who would they be?
I would have five people. :) I would invite for dinner Jackie Chan, Charlie Chaplin (because he can make you laugh and cry at the same time), Albert Einstein, Picasso and Sonia Henie, and end with a Wii game to top it off!!
10. What is your favorite meal?
My favorite food is something that my mom and I make together. It's the best home-made dressing drizzled over a ginormous fantabulous salad with the freshest and most interesting ingredients in it. It has an ethnic bite of every country I have been to mixed inside of it...mmm...I think I will go make one right now. :) Anyone want to join?? :) Oh and red seedless watermelon with salt...mmm...my favorite! :)
"This is why the terrorists hate us. It’s not the glitter and pomp and circumstance. We got black and white, we got Hispanic and Asian, we got gay, straight and Guttenberg all working - all working together for one common goal: to get the mirror ball. And the mirror ball doesn’t care what color you are. It doesn’t care how rich your parents are. And it doesn’t care what God you pray to. It’s an even wooden floor and may the best man or woman win. And I say God bless Dancing With The Stars and God bless the USA."
When boots didn't come in tan, you had to do what!?! [Ice Charades]
Hockey broadcaster Don Cherry makes fashion statements. [SportsIllustrated]
1996 U.S. champion Rudy Galindo (see right) is a Gay Games Ambassador. [gaywired]
This past weekend, comedian George Carlin (see right), 71, passed away from heart failure. No topic was off-limits for the legendary Carlin, including sports. From soccer to lacrosse to golf to hockey -- you name it, Carlin dissected why pretty much any "sport" was not really a "sport." His take on hockey:
People think hockey is a sport. Hockey is not sport. Hockey is three activities going on at the same time: ice skating, playing with a puck, and beating the sh** out of somebody. If these guys were intelligent at all, they would do these things one at a time. First you go ice-skating, then you play with a puck, then you go to the bar and beat the sh** out of somebody. The day would last a lot longer, and these guys would have a whole lot more fun.
Tell you another reason hockey is not a sport -- it's not played with a ball. Anything that isn't played with a ball can't be a sport. These are my rules, I make them up. Hockey is played with a puck. What is a puck? I never even heard of a puck outside of hockey. The only other place you'll find a puck is in the urinal to control the smell in the bathroom. And as far as I'm concerned, any game where the main object is something that came out of a urinal is definitely not a sport.
To hear Carlin deliver the above as only Carlin can, check out the below performance from minute 3:00 to 3:50. Advisory: Contains foul language.
At the 2008 U.S. Adult Figure Skating Championships in Lake Placid, New York, there were many volunteers from the community who made certain that the competition was a success. Dedicated personnel in the Accounting Room, runners (who ran back and forth from the rinks to report on results), ice monitors, announcers, ice sweepers, and many others, were pivotal in making the skaters feel comfortable and welcome at the Olympic Center.
