Re-opening rinks with social distancing

[GarrAargHrumph]

The website said "no bags", so I'm thinking I'll need to carry them in with their hard guards on. Another local rink lets you bring in a small bag, but no Zucas or hockey bags, but this rink, my main rink, doesn't allow bags at all right now.

 

[Debbie S]

My club's secondary rink (our primary rink is closed until Sept for never-ending reno) is opening Wed. Club bought ice Mon-Thurs and Sat and Sun. Our limit is 11 skaters and 5 coaches, with the same group of skaters/coaches on the same schedule - 2 sessions (in a row), twice a week. Masks required for coaches, board still hasn't decided what will be required for skaters.

 

[concorde]

Wondering what skaters' feelings are regarding to rinks that were used as morgues.

The Laurel rink still has the morgue contract in place for another couple of weeks. That rink is nice - three full sized rinks + a curling facility. Its where both the May Day competition and the Chesapeake Open are held. It would be a shame if it does not reopen.

 

[Debbie S]

The Laurel rink still has the morgue contract in place for another couple of weeks. That rink is nice - three full sized rinks + a curling facility. Its where both the May Day competition and the Chesapeake Open are held. It would be a shame if it does not reopen.

There is no indication that the rink isn't going to reopen. It is not currently open b/c the county where it is located only just started phase 2 on Monday and per their social media, they are currently doing some major work on the ice and facility. I don't believe it is still being used as a morgue.

 

[concorde]

There is no indication that the rink isn't going to reopen. It is not currently open b/c the county where it is located only just started phase 2 on Monday and per their social media, they are currently doing some major work on the ice and facility. I don't believe it is still being used as a morgue.
[/QUOTE

But will the skaters be ok with skating there?
When my daughter first heard about its temporary use, she questioned if she was willing to skate there again. Now she is 15 and drama is queen at that age.

 

[Theoreticalgirl]

@Debbie S @concorde I identify as an atheist, but unless management did some kind of service/gathering to honor the dead who were housed there, and/or to acknowledge the rink's service, I would feel extremely uncomfortable skating at that location. I don't think you need to be a teenager to know that it's unsettling to think about and requires some kind of closure before moving forward.

 

[Sylvia]

Montgomery County (Maryland) opened some sports facilities yesterday:

Montgomery Parks reopened ice rinks, indoor tennis courts, sports pavilion on Monday

Montgomery County residents can now lace up some ice skates or dust off those tennis rackets. On Monday, Montgomery Parks reopened its ice rinks, indoor tennis centers, the Wheaton Sports Pavilion and two event centers. The reopenings have several restrictions, which include limited capacities...

bethesdamagazine.com

The reopenings have several restrictions, which include limited capacities, physical distancing and a face covering requirement.

No public skating sessions are allowed at the Cabin John Ice Rink and Wheaton Ice Arena. They are only open for individual athletic training.

 

[Debbie S]

The Gardens is in Prince George's County (next to Montgomery, highest number of cases of any county in the state) which I believe has allowed rinks to open, but it appears The Gardens is still doing maintenance. I don't know if they're planning any acknowledgment of the deceased.

None of the rinks in MD that have opened, that I know of, are offering public sessions or LTS. Ice World in the Bel Air area is planning to offer a weeklong figure skating camp (similar to its normal summer skate camps) in August.

 

[syzygy]

My rinks have all opened (Massachusetts) but my mother won't let me go until the cases are consistently under 100 new cases because my dad and my grandma are high risk. I can't wait to go, but I probably can't for a while.

 

[Yazmeen]

My rinks have all opened (Massachusetts) but my mother won't let me go until the cases are consistently under 100 new cases because my dad and my grandma are high risk. I can't wait to go, but I probably can't for a while.

Sending you a virtual hug - I'm in my 60s, with asthma and hypertension, so I don't see myself going back for at least another month or more. Health and loved ones first - skating can wait.

 

[GarrAargHrumph]

My rinks have all opened (Massachusetts) but my mother won't let me go until the cases are consistently under 100 new cases because my dad and my grandma are high risk. I can't wait to go, but I probably can't for a while.

Sending you a virtual hug - I'm in my 60s, with asthma and hypertension, so I don't see myself going back for at least another month or more. Health and loved ones first - skating can wait.

Exactly - skating can wait. Until you can go back, you can continue to work on your off ice fitness, so that when you do go back, you're ready!

 

[Sylvia]

Opening of a 180,000-square-foot non-profit indoor athletics facility in the Rochester, New York suburb of Brighton:

Hockey glides back onto the ice of Bill Gray's Iceplex

(WHAM) -- After almost four months closed the Bill Gray's Regional Iceplex reopened its doors on Monday to welcome certain programs back to the ice. A variety of ice hockey training and open free style figure skating has returned, but you need to call ahead to book ice time. Public skating...

13wham.com

 

[bladesofgorey]

Reporting on my experience skating for the first time since early march- I checked all of the open rinks within driving distance to see what their protocols were and decided on driving to a rink the furthest away from me that I've skated at before since I felt good about their extensive rules and protocols. Regardless, I did feel a lot of apprehension about skating there once I signed up for a session (sign ups are online and then approved or not within the system). Things that look good on paper aren't always carried through or enforced in practice.

So here's how it went:
As required by the rink I got there early and put on all of my gear (leggings, padding, jacket etc) outdoors in the parking lot in the pouring rain. Although the site says figure skaters should arrive fully dressed with their skates on I watched fully dressed skaters enter the rink with sneakers on carrying skate bags so I decided to do the same. The lobby check-in was easy, masks required and distancing in the short line to sign in and have a temperature check. There are two areas of ice surfaces in the rink with the lobby separating them. Depending on which area of the complex you are in you are required to only use the bathrooms in that rink so as not to travel through the lobby at any time, and after your session ends you exit directly through the doors at the back of each rink so once again you are not passing through the much smaller lobby space.

Coaches are required to wear masks at all time, skaters are allowed to remove their masks just before entering the ice surface. The sessions I was on only had 7-8 or so skaters on them, and at least 5-6 wore a mask the entire session. I wasn't upset at all about the two maskless skaters because they were both young adults who were at least being very conscientious about not setting up a jump or spin anywhere near anyone else, and kept their distance from everyone else along the barrier and when passing by the surface. I may have felt different about the safety of this if I didn't have some (likely waning) antibodies though, to be perfectly honest.

The ice and traffic flow was closely monitored by rink personal the entire time, and coaches could report any potentially problematic behavior pretty easily (I overheard one coach report another for their mask not completely covering their nose for example, and the issue was quickly and gently corrected). In general I felt pretty good about the risk mitigation in place, and will be back again to skate here- my sense when signing up to skate was that I'd try to skate once, find out I couldn't comfortably do so in good conscience, and then take at least a few more months (or possibly longer) off completely.

The only issue I saw was that at the end of the session too many skate bags had been placed too closely together on the (limited) bench space which meant family members crowding around young skaters as they removed their skates, creating a potentially dangerous situation, although almost everyone had a mask on. This may just be part of working the kinks out and the rink may need to enforce arriving and exiting in skates if it continues to be a problem.

 

[MacMadame]

This may just be part of working the kinks out and the rink may need to enforce arriving and exiting in skates if it continues to be a problem.

From my own experiences with skating, I think putting skates on in the rink but requiring them to be taken off in the car would work and be okay.

One issue is, for adult skaters, you can't drive with skates on. And trying to put skates on properly IN the car will be hard. In the parking lot would work better but, as you found, weather is a factor. But for taking off skates, you need no finesse, not like putting them on. So you can take them off in the car if you have to. Also, you can stagger people getting there and onto the ice more easily than people all leaving at once when the session is over.

 

[GarrAargHrumph]

My rink has a large tent outside over part of the parking lot. In the summer, they normally use it for off ice workouts for the hockey camps they hold, but now, it's where we put our skates on and you can leave your bag there if you want to (I left mine in my car because come on - this is New Jersey, I'm not leaving my bag outside.) We check in at a desk outside under the awning over the front door, where they check your temperature and that you've registered for the session (you register and pay online before you arrive.) You get a wristband, so they know they checked your temperature. Before your assigned session, the rink director comes out and gathers the folks who are skating that session, and brings them inside via a back door. We wear masks until we get to the ice, then skaters aren't required to wear them, but coaches keep them on. The benches and etc. are all marked off with signs and tape, indicating 6' spaces. There were only three skaters on the ice when I went.

Like you, @bladesofgorey, I figured I'd try this once and see how it went. I think it went well, all things considered, so I'm skating there again on Monday.

 

[spinZZ]

Opening of a 180,000-square-foot non-profit indoor athletics facility in the Rochester, New York suburb of Brighton:

Hockey glides back onto the ice of Bill Gray's Iceplex

(WHAM) -- After almost four months closed the Bill Gray's Regional Iceplex reopened its doors on Monday to welcome certain programs back to the ice. A variety of ice hockey training and open free style figure skating has returned, but you need to call ahead to book ice time. Public skating...

13wham.com

I've been interested in reviewing re-opening protocols. At the rink you cited, under "Additional On-Ice Protocols" is the following:

"Spitting on the ice, or in player areas is not permitted, as is the use of chewing tobacco, or other similar products."

I wonder if this implies that pre-crisis, the above was permitted?

 

[MacMadame]

I think hockey players spit. And maybe chew tobacco or gum when they are on the bench and not playing.

 

[overedge]

I've been interested in reviewing re-opening protocols. At the rink you cited, under "Additional On-Ice Protocols" is the following:

"Spitting on the ice, or in player areas is not permitted, as is the use of chewing tobacco, or other similar products."

I wonder if this implies that pre-crisis, the above was permitted?

Hockey players are going to spit, even if it's not permitted. A lot of them chew gum too, but I don't think I've ever seen any that were chewing tobacco.

 

[GarrAargHrumph]

Here, they don't chew tobacco. It's not really a thing. But the hockey players do spit, including spitting mouthfuls of water directly onto the ice, or spitting in the hockey box. While this was never formally allowed, it's what they did, and I think the rules are to make it so the rink can call attention to this now, and perhaps enforce a rule they never really enforced before.

 

[antmanb]

I never spit on the ice, but have lost count of the number of times that my nose has run while I've been spinning and had unavoidable, debris (for lack of a better word) fly out onto the ice that's probably more of a figure skating risk, but pretty much uncontrollable.

 

[Theoreticalgirl]

I never spit on the ice, but have lost count of the number of times that my nose has run while I've been spinning and had unavoidable, debris (for lack of a better word) fly out onto the ice that's probably more of a figure skating risk, but pretty much uncontrollable.

Not a doctor, but my understanding is that the runny nose thing can be attributed to exercise-induced rhinitis. This is one spot where skating with a mask could be a true asset and is hopefully embraced more post-YKW, since it has the capacity to keep the face warm and reduce nose goopage.

 

[syzygy]

Not a doctor, but my understanding is that the runny nose thing can be attributed to exercise-induced rhinitis. This is one spot where skating with a mask could be a true asset and is hopefully embraced more post-YKW, since it has the capacity to keep the face warm and reduce nose goopage.

The nature of figure skating being a cold sport probably has a lot to do with it.

 

[MacMadame]

and reduce nose goopage.

I read that as nose poopage.

 

[Theoreticalgirl]

I read that as nose poopage.

HAHAHAH, sounds equally accurate!

 

[Theoreticalgirl]

The nature of figure skating being a cold sport probably has a lot to do with it.

The cold contributes for sure, but EIR can happen across a variety of other sports.

 

[gkelly]

Have any of you tried skating with a mask on? What kind would work best?

 

[bladesofgorey]

Have any of you tried skating with a mask on? What kind would work best?

I skated this weekend and wore the disposable surgical-type mask and I was surprised to find it stayed on well for jumping and spinning. Had no problems with it at all. The sight lines are a little altered in it especially as compared to the fancier masks with dips around the under eye area I bet, but it didn't throw me off after the first 30 minutes or so of wearing it (not being on the ice since early march threw me off more).

The other skaters on the ice were a range of ages and abilities, with a few working on double axels/triples and there was a mix of face fitting cloth masks and surgical masks like I had there. Nobody's mask appeared to be a hindrance by coming loose during big jumps/fast spins/falls which was a something I'd worried about.

 

[concorde]

I don't think the issue is the mask coming off but breathing. My daughter who has asthma said that skating with it on felt like skating prior to being diagnosed with asthma. She is now on a steroid inhaler 2x a day and there is another one she takes 30 minutes before skating.

 

[gkelly]

I'm not ready to go back to the rink yet but maybe in a couple of weeks.

For me personally, I'm more concerned about whether the mask will come off. I have some with two strings that tie behind the head, that I'm confident will stay on. I also have some with earloops that I'm less confident about in that regard.

From using them walking around, I think the style won't affect the breathing, but the thickness of the fabric will. There are some that are too thick/warm for outdoor walks in the summer but might be better in a colder environment, e.g., ice rink in winter.

 

[bladesofgorey]

I'm not ready to go back to the rink yet but maybe in a couple of weeks.

For me personally, I'm more concerned about whether the mask will come off. I have some with two strings that tie behind the head, that I'm confident will stay on. I also have some with earloops that I'm less confident about in that regard.

From using them walking around, I think the style won't affect the breathing, but the thickness of the fabric will. There are some that are too thick/warm for outdoor walks in the summer but might be better in a colder environment, e.g., ice rink in winter.

One thing I did do that I don't when walking/jogging with the disposable mask is I criss-crossed the earloops once which I don't normally do which gave me a snugger fit. I didn't have any trouble breathing in it.