Septenber 20, 2007

As is typical of me, it has been awhile, so I will try to pick up where I left off since my last journal entry:

U.S. Nationals was over, and I think that all of the medalists were asked to compete at Four Continents Championships this year since it was in the U.S. I was tired out after nationals and wanted to rest before Worlds and go back to my training feeling fresh, but that didn’t happen. I went to Colorado Springs instead. My coach brought her youngest son along; his goal was to be on television! He did accomplish that goal, on European TV anyway; we had him sit in a certain spot in the stands during my Don Quixote exhibition program, where I would go over to the audience and flirt a little and then throw snow from my blades towards someone over there. He, unknowingly, was in that very seat. We found the tape of it on a Euro sport station that someone had put onto YouTube….he looked quite surprised! The only other thing that I might mention about this trip was the travel time to get to Colorado. It was in the U.S., but it took us 24 hours to get there, another one of my “great” travel ordeals that I won’t waste time describing here. Maybe instead of travel miles, I should be getting travel hours from the airlines!

Japan was next on my travel and competition agenda. I had been there a few times already for competition, but this was the first time my coach, Julie, would be going there. My mom and I assured her that she would like Tokyo, despite the long flight there. The people of Japan are very friendly and polite, and the city seems to have very little crime and is very clean, despite its large population. They are also great figure skating fans. Although I did not put out my best performances there, one of my goals last season was to make it to Worlds, and I did just that. I tried to watch as many of the other skating disciplines practice and compete, and tried to learn as much as I could for my first trip to Worlds.

Returning from that competition, I still had to perform at Marshall’s in Reading, PA, the sight of this year’s Skate America. I believe it was about a week after coming back from Japan. The world and junior world team would all perform two exhibition programs, and most of us that went to Worlds only had one program choreographed by this time. I wouldn’t be taking any time off after returning from Japan when I had another program to get ready. That week I was also asked to skate in a benefit show in Canton, Michigan, along with Tanith and Ben, Brooke and Ben, and Meryl and Charlie. A young girl, Natalie Salazar, who was a skater at the Artic Edge Ice Arena, had been diagnosed earlier last year with cancer, and the club and community wanted to help her family by raising money to help with her medical expenses. Tired as I may have been, I gladly agreed to skate. Natalie’s life and the testimony of her bravery with her cancer reminded me often last year of what is really important in this life, and how much I have to be thankful for. Sadly, as I write this, I just received a phone call that she lost her battle with cancer last night. She will be missed by the Detroit area skating community, but she will be remembered, I’m sure, by many for her always positive attitude and courage.

I had the great privilege to do the entire Champions Tour this year, visit many cities while doing so, and meet many wonderful people. The only weekend I missed was when the show was in my training town, Detroit, since I was previously asked to do the Bowling Green, Ohio, show that same weekend with my sister. Partway through the tour, Tom Collins asked me to change from doing a new show program to do my long program (although a shortened version of it). I was sick a lot of the time on tour, thanks to springtime allergies and a couple of flu bugs, but I was probably better off in ice arenas than outdoors. We did get to have a few days off in a few cities, where I got to spend time at the LA beach with skating friends, and even go sailing with Shae Lynn in Seattle (I even got to steer the sailboat for awhile!). In San Francisco, some of us went sight seeing and took in a tour of Alcatraz. I tried my hand at the guitar, taking a few lessons from Gwendal on the tour bus or at the airport, even learning a song or maybe two?

School and Champions on Ice Tour ended the first week of June; I was planning to take a week off from skating; however, I was asked to do the shows at my home club, Detroit Skating Club, the following week, so I did not get that much needed vacation. I did four of the five shows and took Sunday off before heading to Canada for two weeks. The first week in Toronto David Wilson choreographed my new long program to West Side Story. I also worked with Jackson Skate Company during that time trying out their newest version of the hinge boots and tried out three different kinds of blades (I decided that the blades I had were the best ones for me). My second week in Toronto, Lori Nichol and I worked together to find short program music (we decided on The Swan), and then she choreographed it. Then, to stretch my mind even more choreographically in such a short time, Kurt Browning worked on my new exhibition program, that week also. He chose the piece, but I thought it might be fun to do, so I agreed to “step out of the box”. So my mornings were spent being the graceful swan, and my afternoons I spent moving to a piece by BodyRockers. I tried not to do much jumping those two weeks, as I knew they might be my only weeks before I had to start training programs again. Getting three programs choreographed in 8½ days isn’t something I would recommend, but my spring and summer schedule this year was making it almost impossible to do them at any other time. I feel very fortunate and thankful to have had the opportunity to work with David, Lori, and Kurt. I have gained something special from each of them that I hope I will be able to give back to other skaters and skating fans in the future.

I had to rush back to Detroit to fly out to Champs Camp being held in Colorado Springs that weekend. Most of the U.S. team skaters were there since it was a mandatory meeting. It was nice to visit with some of my friends that I hadn’t seen for a while.

Back at DSC the following Monday, I had a week to train my new short and exhibition programs for the Sun Valley show that I was doing in a week. When you have no down time from one season to the next, training can be difficult, even if the programs are new and exciting; at least, I would be in Sun Valley for the entire week training before the show, and that was somewhat of a vacation for me to look forward to as I had never been there before. Training in the altitude was a little challenging at first, since I hadn’t been doing these programs longer than a week—of course, not as challenging as was biking in the mountains with my mom! I’m used to flat trails, not mountains! The scenery was beautiful there, and it was unusually hot the entire week, sunny and in the 90’s (just the way I like it!). Being able to perform on their outdoor ice rink under the stars was a special experience for me. I spent the Sunday after the show in Sun Valley, since my mom and I couldn’t get a flight back to Detroit until Monday. We went horseback riding—my first time ever! I wanted to climb one of the mountains in Sun Valley that week, but I decided to let my horse do it for me. What a fantastic view from the top! Unfortunately, I have no photos of that day because I lost them when I transferred them from my camera to my computer

My only nonskating week this year was during the week of Skate Detroit in July. I spent that week in New York City and participated in an acting and modeling competition. I went there with an acting and modeling group from an agency in Detroit with whom I train. We were there for 7 long days, but aside from the competition, I did get to see Ground Zero and the Empire State Building, take a harbor tour, and do some shopping.

Again, back on the ice the following Monday only to train four more days before flying again, this time to Dallas with my coach to assist with a spin clinic. I finally realized I had enough NW Airline miles to become a silver-elite member, which means that I could upgrade my seating to business class if there was space available on my flights. Yeah, more leg room (sometimes)! I wish I could do that for my Grand Prix trips to China and Japan, but those seats are never available for trips like that. The spin clinic was held at the Galleria mall ice rink—it was really neat to skate inside a mall.

I was home to skate the following Monday, again, for only four days before my family and I drove to Wisconsin for a family wedding. It was my cousin’s wedding, and the ceremony was in a country church built in the 1800’s. She had an outdoor Wisconsin prairie reception, and the weather was hot and sunny. We had spent the day before the wedding at my grandparents’ home and even had enough time for that yearly water balloon fight in their backyard! The drive back to Detroit from the Madison area was a long, hot one though.

I was planning to do the DuPage competition for my required monitoring event, but I chose not to travel back through the Chicago area the weekend following my trip to Wisconsin. I stayed home to train, and the farthest that I went that week was to Bowling Green, Ohio, to buy my books for the fall semester. School started August 20th and I was taking a full load again. By January I will almost be a senior, only five credits short.

A week into the school semester I had all four wisdom teeth removed, and fortunately I only missed one day of training. Three weeks later though, I discovered that I got an infection, and now I’m on antibiotics, trying to get over that.

Labor Day weekend and a few days following that, I was in San Francisco training. When I returned to Detroit I had to be monitored at the Wyandotte competition. I did not want to put my programs out that early, as my first Grand Prix isn’t until November, but U. S. Figure Skating requires us to be monitored. My short was obviously more ready to perform than my long program.

That just about brings me to the present; I hope now that I will be able to stay home to concentrate on my training without too many distractions—other than homework, of course.

Thanks for visiting my website, and sorry for the lack of journal entries so far this year. I am on the computer so much for classes that I needed a vacation from school and computers this past summer. Enjoy autumn and a new skating season!

Alissa