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Ben's Favorites
Spin Flying camel
Jump Axel
Pairs Element Lifts
Female Skater Kristi Yamaguchi
Male Skater Alexei Yagudin
Pairs Skaters Elena Berezhnaya & Anton Sikharulidze
Ice Dancers Marie-France Dubreuil & Patrice Lauzon
Actor Edward norton
Movie The Departed
Shows Lost
Book 1984 by George Orwell
Magazine I like bits and pieces from most magazines
Bands That’s way too hard to choose! Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, Jeff Buckley, Jimi Hendrix, Radiohead, Wilco, Oysterhead, Martin Sexton, Marvin Gaye, Talking Heads and so on
Color Black
Flowers Orchid
Animals Dogs
Food Tacos
Drink Powerade
Quote "What is insanity? Insanity is doing the same thing over
and over again and expecting
a different result."
Benjamin Okolski began skating at 8-years-old when his mother put him in lessons.
"I used to play all kinds of sports," he said. "I played baseball, football, and soccer. When my parents moved from California to Michigan, they put me in winter sports and I started skating." Ben skated singles for four years. But at the encouragement of his sister Colleen, he switched his focus to pairs by the age of 12. "It was her idea," Ben said. "Her coach had done pairs and wanted Colleen to do it. It took a lot of convincing for me to do pairs. But there are so many more elements, so many combinations of everything, with the elements so intertwined in pairs that you can do whatever you want. There are not as many possibilities doing singles. It would be like a painter doing only one subject." After finishing fifth in novice pairs at the U.S. Championships in Los Angeles, Colleen and Ben ended their partnership. He soon began skating with longtime friend Brooke Castile. "My coaches asked her to do pairs so she said she'd give it a try," Ben said about the partnership. The pair has collected ten medals including gold at the 2007 U.S. Championships. But his favorite part about skating is "skating in front of a very large crowd." Off the ice, Ben has several interests including reading and playing different sports. He was the first baseman on his high school baseball team for one season. "Music is my passion," Ben said. "I listen to a lot of rock music including classic like The Doors, Pink Floyd, and Led Zeppelin. I love blues, like Eric Clapton and B.B. King. I'm learning to play the guitar. I used to play the piano and the viola. I'm looking to get back to playing the piano." Ben also studied engineering at Washtenaw Community College. One of his goals is to "go back to school and get a degree" while the others are to "get more organized on a permanent basis" and "do more reading." - Contains information and quotations courtesy of J. Barry Mittan of SkateToday |
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Brooke Castile and Benjamin Okolski Online is written and produced by Brooke Castile and
Benjamin Okolski in cooperation with Figure Skaters Online and the webmaster.
All photos are courtesy of Leah Adams unless otherwise noted.