LAVAL, Que. Keegan Messing is chalking up the good times. They keep rolling in, like a wave. Last Saturday, he got engaged on a windy mountain ridge. He forgot the matches to light up the stove for soup. Everything went wrong. But Lane Hodson said yes. “If she says yes when everything goes wrong, you […]
Nam Nguyen
Nam Nguyen: In The Driver’s Seat
Amble into the Scotiabank Pond arena complex for a mid-August Skate Ontario summer competition, and a voice from a corner rings out greetings. It’s Nam Nguyen, and he’s helping to set up the displays for the Figure Skating Boutique booth. Really? Yes, really. The 20-year-old former Canadian champion (2015) has got a job, working […]
Boys to Men
One thing leads to another. Keegan Messing finished fifth at the Canadian championships last season. That landed him on the national team. That meant he got some financial help for training. And it means that this season, he is actually a full-time skater. Skate Canada photo All of these upticks in his personal situation rolled […]
Nam and the wonderful shirt
Nam Nguyen, 17 and ready for another breakthrough, has never been so well dressed. He showed up at Thornhill Summer Skate in August with new costumes barely out of the box. The shirt for his new free program to the very serious Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor by Johann Sebastian Bach shimmered […]
Patrick Chan finds his rhythm
Patrick Chan has been through the valley of doubt and has come through the other side. The proof? He took part at Skate Canada’s national team training camp on Wednesday in Mississauga, Ont., along with the best figure skaters in the country. Yes, he had his doubts after a year off, trying to get his […]
The Margaret Garrison show: 2015
In the early morning light – say 7 a.m – a battalion of choreographers showed up at the Powerade Centre in Brampton, Ont. Their job? To create moving, arresting, complicated routines for the sixth Margaret Garrison Ice Show. In one day. In all, 29 choreographers lent their talents to this show. This show held extra […]
Tracy Wilson: the wind beneath wings
This is a story I wrote that appeared on the Skate Canada website: By Beverley Smith Tracy Wilson figures she learns as much as she teaches. Yes, we all know she’s a crack skating analyst for various television networks, having won Gemini Awards for her work. But the former Olympic ice dancing medalist has […]
To quad or not to quad: that is the question
His Four Continents experiment – putting the quad in the short program – was a learning experience that cost Canadian champion Nam Nguyen nothing but a few lumps. He took his lumps (11th overall at Four Continents) and will compete at his second world championship with an eye to the future. In other words, although […]
Day Three, Four Continents, men's final
Denis Ten knew he wasn’t in his best condition when he contested the Four Continents championship in Seoul on Valentine’s Day, exactly one year after his Sochi Olympic medal-winning effort. What’s he going to do when he is in top shape? The 21-year-old from Kazakhstan gave a drubbing to all competitors when he won the […]
Day One, Four Continents
In faraway Seoul, where the Mokdong Arena lies bereft of spectators a great deal of the time, the Four Continents Championships are offering up lots of unexpected dramas. On Day One, forgiveness wasn’t the name of the game, clearly. Grand Prix Final champs Kaitlyn Weaver and Andrew Poje lost a couple of levels in their […]