Synchro Nationals

I spent a good part of the weekend on a trip to Grand Rapids, Michigan to watch my wife in the US Synchronized Skating Championships (aka "Nationals"). My wife skates on adult Team Elan, winners at Nationals for the past two years.

They had a very good team this year, but struggled. They won their first competition of the year, but Dearborn, the other top team from the area, had elected to pull out the night before. Dearborn did show up to the next two competitions, and won both of them. Dearborn's program wasn't as difficult, but they skated cleanly and deserved to win. Meanwhile, Team Elan was just going through the motions. They had problems with injuries, which didn't help, and a lot of times they just looked to be in a funk (to put it politely). After their last competition a month ago, I thought they'd do well to get 3rd at Nationals.

What a difference a month makes! I'm still not entirely sure what happened, but between that competition a month ago and last weekend, they pulled it together. Sarah said that they started having good practices and let a lot of the internal conflicts drop. They had an outstanding skate on Saturday, by far their best performance of the year. Dearborn, and the other teams, looked a little flat, and that sealed the deal. Another national championship!

Here's the happy team after the competition.


There's also a nice write up about the adult competition on the USFSA website.