Figure skaters and hockey players will be taking to the ice a little earlier this coming season.
After years of lobbying and working with the Sunshine Coast Regional District (SCRD) to try to find a way to coordinate with dry-floor programs, the two biggest ice user groups on the Coast will be able to skate at the Gibsons and Area Community Centre as of Aug. 5. That’s about three weeks earlier than the ice is usually laid at the rink.
Kate Turner, the registrar for both the Sunshine Coast Minor Hockey Association (SCMHA) and the Sunshine Coast Skating Club, said between them the two organizations will be booking about eight hours a day of ice time.
“We’ve got three extra weeks of ice for our advanced figure skaters, which means that we get to go to a competition in October or November, which we’ve never been able to do. That’s a huge positive for us,” she said. “For minor hockey it means that we’ll get to run some camps, which we’ve never been able to do, we get to run skill sessions, and we get to have our try-outs earlier, which means we’ll be much better planned going into September. Our teams will be made earlier, our practices will run smoother. It gives us a really big advantage preparing for our season.”
Turner also told Coast Reporter that, because they’ll still have to rent the ice, both organizations will need to do a little extra fundraising, although some of the programs will be run on a cost-recovery basis.
The drive for a longer season started as a lobby for spring ice, but Turner says right now the season is scheduled to wrap up at the usual time at the end of March.
“We don’t have any confirmation of an extended ice season into the spring, but we’re hopeful that after we are able to show the SCRD that our commitment is there for the August ice, we’ll have a little more prosperity on the other side of things as well.”
Turner said the Skating Club and the SCMHA will have more information about the extra programs for August on their websites.
The SCRD is still working on its schedule, but said there will be some drop-in programming during the extra three weeks of ice.
