Article by Tacy Brown
My first figure skating competition at four years old; here I am standing on the podium with my medal.
Imagine your first memories being in cold air, sharp blades, and the echo of skates carving the ice. These are the majority of my first memories. My mother was a figure skater and a coach. Growing up figure skating was always on our television. When I was two years old, I was gifted my first pair of figure skates. I was already excited to finally get on the ice. By Christmas, I participated in the 2008 Winter Showcase and was assisted by an older skater around the ice. The next few years are a blur but I do remember my first competition at four years of age. I was so nervous to go out by myself, I made my mom come out on the rink with me in her sneakers.
Side by side photos; right shows me hugging my mom before I compete at 2016 South Atlantic Regionals; left shows my mom hugging me as a baby after a clean skate at 2008 Adult Nationals in Lake Placid.
When I was seven I had a goal to land my axel before I turned eight years old. An axel is the first hard element you learn in figure skating and I had been practicing non stop for a whole year and still had no luck landing it cleanly. Two days before my eighth birthday, my mom scheduled a lesson with 2006 World Champion Kimmie Miesner. In that very lesson, I landed my first clean axel. After that, my doubles came pretty easily. By nine I could land all my doubles up to a double lutz.
“By nine I could land all my doubles up to a double lutz.”
During my most intense period of training I was homeschooled and training everyday at the University of Delaware. I throurly enjoyed the constant training, but it did get lonely after a while and thats when I went back to school at the end of fifth grade. Being around my friends who weren’t involed in sports made me wish I didn’t have skating practice to go to. I envied how they could do whatever they wanted when they got home instead of training. Looking back, I realize how lucky I was to have the opputunity to participate in such an expensive sport, but at the time it made me feel like an outcast.
Figure skating being a niche sport did not help with that feeling. No one seemed to take it seriosuly like they took volleyball, baseball, or football serious. Which at my hormonal stage did not make me feel so great. I was also only in middle school during this time. When I was eleven, I started taking lessons from Johnny Weir ‘s coach. She was great and a core memory of mine was her calling up my mom to tell her she had the same good feeling about my skating that she had with Johny Weir, an Olympian.
Ready to take the ice before a Spring Showcase.
Around this time in my life I watched almost all the skaters I grew up with slowly quit to focus on new sports or school. When I was younger I couldn’t fathom leaving skating for a new sport, or to hangout with friends, but that feeling of leaving the sport came to me too. Eighth grade was when I really felt like quitting for good. All I wanted to do was hangout with my friends and brain rot. I wasn’t built different, I realized i really just wanted a normal high school experience like all the girls I watched before me.
I completly gave up on my skating during covid; at least mentally, which was the end of eighth grade through my sophmore year. I was actually happy there was an excuse to stop skating for a while. This is when I started to become your average lazy teenager. I lost all my athletic skills and when I came back I had a new body and was completly done mentally with the sport.
“I lost all my athletic skills and when I came back I had a new body and was completely done mentally with the sport.”
My mom kept pushing me to continue and at least pass up to my Novice MITF and FS tests so if I was interested in coaching later on, I could. I took my last skating test at seventeen and it felt so freeing to finally be done. About a year or so ago, I started ice skating with my girlfriend. Teaching her basic skills, and being on the ice again on my own terms felt great. I am now thankful I kept going to pass my tests because I am now interested in coaching LTS.
My 19th birthday celebrated on the rink with my close friends and girlfriend.
Watching the Olympics this year has really motivated me to go back on the ice and find time for it. It’s the first year that the majority of ladies competing are my age and it really puts things in perspective. Everything happens for a reason and I don’t regret any of the choices made to put a pause on my skating career, but I would tell young athletes to never stop chasing a dream because of the world around you.