HOW DID YOU START ICE-DANCING?

[FSWer]

Say, to anyone here who is an Ice-Dancer...I would love to hear how you started Ice-Dancing?

 

[Clarice]

I started skating when I was 37 and was a freestyle skater. I wanted to jump and spin. I noticed that my programs did not look very smooth, though, because my basic skating skills were not very good. I decided to learn ice dance because I thought it would help me improve my edges and turns. It turned out that I really liked ice dance, so I stopped doing freestyle so I could spend more time on dance.

 

[FSWer]

Interesting.

 

[overedge]

When I took group lessons as an adult, most of the coaches taught us basic ice dance skills - edges, progressives, swing rolls - as well as freeskating elements. They taught us those ice dance skills because as @Clarice says, those are skills that will help you become better at any kind of skating. One coach taught us the first preliminary compulsory dance (pattern dance), the Dutch Waltz, and it was fun to learn the pattern and try to skate it in time to the music.

Also at that time in my region there were no clubs or rinks with freeskating sessions for adults, other than public skates. The only sessions that adults could enroll in were ice dance sessions. So once I had learned all I could learn in group lessons, the only way to continue skating was to enroll in ice dance.