They’ve been a part of the fabric of Parksville for years, and last weekend the Sandy Shores Skating Club put Parksville on the figure skating map with a fantastic showing as hosts of the first stop on the inaugural Pond To Podium figure skating competition.
Round two of the Super Series is May long weekend in White Rock. This is the only Island stop scheduled for the series this year.
Newly initiated scholarships in place means skaters can also earn themselves some cash at the end of the Super Series’ fifth and final event (slated for Kelowna in November) for completing various jumps and other difficult elements. The scholarships were put in place to encourage the skaters to push themselves and try more difficult moves.
The Super Series also has stops in Kamloops, Burnaby and Surrey.
According to SSSC president Launie Elves, there were 564 skaters aged 5-19 from all over B.C., Alberta, the Yukon and the Northwest Territories at Oceanside Place last weekend. SSSC had 29 skaters in the mix, the youngest five, the oldest 17.
The highlight for SSSC was the podium sweep in the Preliminary Ladies 11 & Over that saw Sheye Speers garner gold, Indianna Berg earn silver and Emily Bau bronze.
“To get top three was great for the club for sure,” said Elves, adding, “there was lots of great skates, we had a lot of fourth place finishes, we had some terrible skates, but the main thing is the kids learned a lot from this event.
“I hope we get to host it again for sure,” she said, then echoed what many others were saying at the rink, that, “Save-On-Foods were amazing. Without them it wouldn’t have been the success that it was. We owe them big-time, they definitely went above and beyond for us.”
Ted Barton, executive director of sections for Skate Canada BC out of Burnaby, shed some light on the event.
“It’s mote like the pros, like national and international competitions,” he explained.
The BC Summer Skate in August, for instance, he said attracted 57,000 views.
“It’s a big event,” he said, adding, “Parksville has been awesome. They’ve done an amazing job putting this on, and we will definitely be looking at bringing more events here.”