We tend to think of protocol as a diplomatic thing-- should Americans curtsey to the Queen, for instance, but these sorts of generally accepted rules also guide everyday situations. Do you call your doctor by her first name? How about your child's second grade teacher? Who gets the last seat in a crowded room, or on the train? We all know these things because of accepted protocols, and we're all offended when they are violated.
Figure skating sessions do have protocols as well, and in fact very specific ones for very specific situations, having less to do with diplomacy and more with safety. So here's a few.
Right of way
Right of way on free skate sessions is very specific, and universal. Lower level skaters have the right of way. Therefore, no stink eye allowed by the Novice level skater toward the pokey, tentative Freestyle 2 skater. Someone running a program with music and the pinney or belt on has the right of way. Someone in a lesson has the right of way. On Pairs and Dance sessions, a team executing a lift has the right of way.
Other rink behaviors
Don't stand in the lutz corner. Teach from the boards (i.e., coaches should not stand in the middle of the ice while teaching-- this is as bad as anyone standing in the middle of the ice. If you must be out on the ice while teaching, you should be moving.) Pay before you get on the ice, don't make the monitor chase you down. Wear a belt or pinny if you are running your music. Don't wear the belt or pinny until you are running your music. Nothing more confusing than three people wearing markers because "I was next!"
There are lots of do's and don'ts that I'm not sure reach the level of protocol but are more rules or accepted practices that may vary from rink to rink. Many rinks don't allow colored drinks, like coffee or soda, on the ice. While sitting on the boards is universally frowned on, some rinks tolerate it and some don't. There will be rink-specific protocols: which ice door to use to enter/exit, length (or indeed existence) of a warm-up period on each session, acceptable clothing. Not everyone will do these things the same way.
Lobby
Don't spread your crap all over the place, and throw away your trash. This does not apply only to skating.
Public skating
Since public sessions are full of people who can't be expected to know skating protocols, the guards enforce what amount less to protocol and more to actual rules. They will be posted and generally include no holding hands with more than 1 person, no carrying children on the ice, the center coned area is for lessons and figure skating practice, no hotdogging (too fast for conditions), everyone skate in the same direction, no sitting on the boards, etc.
Music
There are no universal protocols for program play. Every rink will have set up its own system. The main accepted protocol for music is that if your music is playing you have the right of way. But there are some generally accepted polite practices, for instance, even on a session where no one else is playing their music, for pity's sake don't play it 10 times in a row.
Parents
Hokay, here we go. Do not walk around to the coaches' area by the boards. I really can't think of anything that coaches hate more than mothers who do this. No standing in the ice door. Now, I'm going to stop here, because other typical annoying parental behavior does not actually violate what I would call "protocols" which have developed in skating around safety and flow issues. So things like "don't scream at the coach, the skating director, or your child in the lobby" is not so much a protocol as just evidence of bad behavior.
Protocols and rules are there to make skating safe, productive and fun. They can be summed up succinctly: don't be a jerk.
What are some protocols or rules that I've missed, or that are specific to your rink?
Posts
Some of the higher levels skaters at our rink, and their moms, would beg to differ with you on who has the right of way when it comes to skating level. My daughter, 8, is just getting ready to test pre-pre MIF and is very aware and considerate of others on the ice. She always gives way to someone running their program with music - often times standing flat against the boards when they come near her. I wish I could say the same courtesy is given to her by the older girls. She has been in a lesson, belt on and music playing and had one of the older skaters get in her way and not apologize. There are quite a few who love to give the stink eye when they don't land a jump or fall out of a spin - even when it's obvious no one got in their space. One in particular, I kid you not, actually seeks out the younger skaters and lands jumps right on top of them when there is plenty of empty ice in order to intimidate them. Their moms have made it perfectly loud and clear when they are talking among themselves (loud enough for all to hear) that their daughters have paid their dues and have earned the right of way on the ice. I just tell my daughter to continue with her good graces on the ice and not let the older girls intimidate her. (BTW...she has a beautiful Flip jump now.) ;)
ReplyDeleteYes, I have also observed all of these behaviors. This is the coaches and rink management not fulfilling their responsibilities. I have always held that along with test requirements, no one should be allowed on freestyle ice without training in accepted protocols. Check out Jimmy Santee's hilarious video on behavior on and off the ice, available at the PSA website.
Delete'Teach from the boards (i.e., coaches should not stand in the middle of the ice while teaching...' - at my rink, all the coaches teach on the ice, even those with higher level skaters. I've never seen one coach from the boards.
ReplyDeleteAre there issues with skaters having to navigate around them?
DeleteNone that I've seen. We actually have a very small coaching staff (only six coaches), only two high level dance couples and about three high level singles skaters. Everybody seems to be able to work around each other without any drama.
DeleteWhat!!?? A drama-free rink? Pics or it didn't happen ;)
DeleteIt's true, honest guv! My coach, however, does have great stories of his previous rink where people would shout and scream and occasionally swear at each other if you so much as looked at someone.
DeleteYes, the only coaches who coach from the boards her are those who no longer wear skates or are injured. I don't know why it works, but it does....
DeleteSeems we have an excellent rink then. When my son switch from working from early skating skills to more advance we switched from public to freestyle sessions. Before he set foot on the ice his instructor gave him a list of rules such as avoiding the Lutz corner. Skaters always seem to give way to each other rather then give way by level but the skaters who are skating to music do get the right of way. Our coaches teach from the boards.
ReplyDeleteHere is a question though. My son was doing some practicing during a public session and was freaked out because I told him to pracitce in a specific location. "That's the Luzt corner. I can't go there." Does the Lutz corner exist in a public session. I figured not.
No-- Lutz corner rules do not really apply on a crowded public session; however, if you're talking about an empty midday session, then yes, you can still apply the same sorts of restrictions. However, you should not just hog one spot on the ice-- even Basic Skills level skaters should move around, rather than just picking a spot and doing everything there. They idea is to keep the ice moving.
DeleteWe do, however, have a woman who I think is doomed to be in basic skills forever, as I've never seen her move from the lutz corner. I can't believe that her coach, who is the head coach, has never told her she shouldn't ally camp out rut here.
DeleteEmpty midday. Unfortunately then the Lutz corner is the best seat for video taping - sigh
ReplyDeleteSo who has right of way - person skating to the music or person in lesson?
ReplyDeleteAt my old rink, music took highest ROW over lesson. But if you were in lesson AND had music then you had ultimate ROW.
DeleteShauna is correct. Music has top right of way.
DeleteNot at my rink. Lesson trumps a skater just playing her music, unless said skater is also in a lesson. The rink should post their specific rules with their freestyle schedule.
DeleteThe protocols I noted are fairly universal, but as Q points out, there are variations. You should know the rules at whichever rink you are skating at. And yes, it would be extremely helpful and customer friendly for rinks to actually post these rules.
DeleteI kind of prefer that a lesson trumps. If I'm paying that much for a private lesson, I should have right of way over a skater just playing her music. But there's another rink I could skate at a bit further away, and I've checked their rules...music trumps a lesson, so yea...best to check the rules first. I wish every skater checked the rules.
DeleteGood point, about the cost of the lesson! As far as every skating knowing the rules-- your mouth to G*d's ear, babe.
DeleteThis just happened to us yesterday. A skater was playing her music, while not in a lesson, and got annoyed that my daughter, who was in a lesson, was at the end of the rink working on something with her coach. I think he specifically didn't make a big effort to get out of her way because lesson trumps non-lesson music-playing at our rink.
DeleteAhhh... no flying camels in the public session please (smile). Safety first.
ReplyDeleteThe rink we left this summer made the skaters sign a Code of Conduct agreement. One of the dress code rules stated that skaters were not allowed to wear earrings larger than a quarter. I suppose this was meant as a safety rule; however, the club president is VERY conservative (and VERY controlling), so I immediately surmised that it was meant to impose her personal tastes on the skaters. So, just to be contrary, I started wearing earrings larger than a quarter to the rink every time my daughter skated there. Then the board started talking about making the parents sign a Code of Conduct agreement as well. We did not renew our daughter's membership at that club, for other more serious reasons, but I still joke that we left because I would not be told how large my earrings should be.
ReplyDeleteWould love to see that Parent Code. If it's stuff like "don't scream at children in the lobby" awesome. But if it's a dress code, well, all I can say is wtf. We're really lucky in Chicago, because there are so many rinks that run their own ice the clubs have no power, so you really are insulated from a lot of the worst of the petty dictators.
DeleteI don't think the parent Code of Conduct statement ever made it past the discussion phase. Parents questioned how they could enforce such an agreement, if parents are not members of the club. Were they going to punish the skater for parent behavior? Some parents did suggest that the Board of Directors should sign a Code of Conduct statement, since they are club members and members of USFS. Currently the coaches and skaters are the only groups required to sign an agreement.
DeleteIn our area, a largish Midwest metropolitan area not so far from Chicago, many of the newer rinks offer non-club ice. At the established rinks, the norm is club ice only--hate that! Too much politics and coercion. At the club we left, they are finding that home club coaches are taking their students to other local rinks that offer contract or random ice sold by the rink, and thus they aren't selling as many contracts. Because the club is buying less ice from the rink, they are consequently getting less convenient ice times from the rink, which just perpetuates the problem. I'm just waiting for a rule to be passed that club members must purchase at least 1 session per contract from the club.
Recently, there has been a movement at the club for some coaches and skaters to become independent members of USFS rather than home club coaches and skaters. They can still test and compete but they buy their ice at several rinks that sell their own ice. Rink ice is often more convenient and less expensive. Do you find that this is common in Chicago with all the rinks that sell their own ice? There is certainly less politics involved.
You can never get away from the politics and the infighting, but yes, non-club ice is much less stressful. Until I started writing this blog, I had no idea the shenanigans that went on over club ice. Many rinks around Chicago are now forming their own internal non-USFS skating clubs, and yes one of the requirements of membership is purchase of a minimum amount of ice. However, since it's essentially rink ice that's set aside, there's no minimum number of skaters-- it doesn't actually cost the club anything, because it's just ice the rink has set aside for themselves, so to speak.
Delete"for pity's sake don't play it 10 times in a row"
ReplyDeleteI disagree with this. Freestyle sessions are the only time a skater can play their music. If a skater needs to skate the program 10 times, then they have the right and should do it.
What really annoys me is that some (older) skaters put some random music on during freestyle sessions, and then (1) my young skaters don't know if this music is really needed (may be they are working on getting ideas for this music, how do we know?) or it's there for no reason and can be interrupted at any time, and (2) some skaters turn the volume really loud and then it's harder for those in a lesson to hear their coaches. This is just disrespectful! Sadly, not all coaches turn the volume down, some just live with it, apparently not realizing that their student's learning is damaged.
Maria, mom of 2 skaters: FreeSkate 4 (age 5) and pre-pre (age 7)
Regarding the warm-up music, my friends and I (I'm a 16-year-old intermediate level skater) love making mix tapes to play at the beginning of freestyle sessions or on a particularly slow session. Our rules are the songs have to be clean, and as long as there is no skater with a vest/pinney on clearly skating to the music, then it can be turned off at any time. I'd say if it's pop music and there's nobody with your rink's "program identification" on, then it would be safe for your daughters to turn it off and play their programs.
DeleteThe problem is, there are no "program identifications" used at the rinks where my daughters skate. Somehow everybody is expected to know whose music is being played.
DeleteMaria
Yeah-- that drives me crazy. Or the rinks where there are 2 or 3 pinneys, and the kids wear them in "line up" so to speak, so you can't tell who is actually skating to the music.
DeleteJust a couple things...playing music 10 times in a one hour session is 6-8 times too many. The skater isn't doing themselves any favors making the same errors over and over. They should skate it with no music, fix what needs to be fixed and skate with music. If a coach is joining them for part of the freestyle, they may have them do it for them, make corrections and once more. At our rink, you put your name on a list once. After you skate to your music, you can put it up on the list again.
ReplyDeleteTeen skaters who play mixed tapes that have nothing to do with the session are intimidating to young skaters. They are learning to figure out the rules and trying to catch up to a 16 year old in the middle of her improve warm up is not easy and takes away from their skate.
We have no identification markers and yes, skating on a freestyle means learning to practice and see who skating to the music. It's a skill and younger skaters are encouraged to do freestyles with a coach until they learn the rules. ~Meg
But they are not necessarily making the same mistakes over and over again... or any mistakes at all! For example, our last small local in-house competition was exactly on my daughter's birthday, and she wanted to do an exhibition to the song "today is my birthday". It was a self-choreographed program. Her coach was fine with the idea of a 7-year old having a bit of fun and making up a program on her own. My daughter came to the rink with some ideas, but then she really needed to play the music a lot of times and try different things and see which ones worked better. Now, this was done on sessions with just a few other skaters, and usually none of them (sometimes may be just 1 or 2) wanted to play their own competition music. So she wasn't creating long waits for other people or anything like that...
DeleteMaria
It's not actually a rule to not play your music over and over everywhere (although there are rinks that do have limits, mostly to make sure everyone gets a turn). It's just bloody annoying. Just as someone upthread didn't like skating to someone else's mix tape, it is extremely annoying to skate an entire session where someone is playing a single cut of music over and over and over-- it gets hard to concentrate. And this goes for the little ones too. Just because no one else is playing music doesn't mean it's a good idea for you to play yours 10 times.
DeleteSometimes you cannot behave in a way that is optimal for you-- you have to consider the effect of your actions on those around you. Just because you *can* do a thing, or that there is no rule against it, doesn't mean that you *should* do it.
I'm an adult skater and find that many of the learn to skate kids that are on open freestyles at our (Xanboni and I) rink don't watch where they are going. They'll do back cross overs looking back the way they came! Since the Wednesday night freestyle is incredibly crowded, this is very dangerous behavior. I do my best to watch for them but it is also very important that coaches and parents stress the importance of paying attention to what is ahead of you. Especially, don't skate into that adult skater doing a camel spin. My blade is right at your kid's eye level. I have liability insurance but I hope that I never have the need for it and I'm sure the parents of all those kids would prefer we don't need it either.
ReplyDelete