Over 450 figure skaters are set to visit Airdrie's Genesis Place in order to compete this weekend.

Executive director Lisa Hardy says the skaters are coming from all over Alberta to Airdrie to compete.

"We have over 450 skaters coming from across our section, so primarily Alberta is where our skaters are coming from, to compete in our annual STARSkate & Adult Championships."

Hardy describes the competition.

"The figure skating clubs from across our section compete in competitions throughout the year and this is the wrap-up championship competition for them to come and test the programs and compete in a variety of different disciplines. We have younger skaters as young as four and five years old in the lower levels and we have some adult skaters that have continued skating in adult programs as well and then we have some Special Olympic athletes coming to compete as well."

This year, Airdrie was lucky enough to win the chance to host.

"We move our championships around the section annually and Airdrie Figure Skating Club is the successful host club that bid on hosting the championship. We're coming to Airdrie and we're looking forward to it."

Hardy says that the level of skating is not quite at the national level, but allows for athletes to compete.

"It's not the high performing athletes necessarily that you would see competing at the national level right now, this is another stream for those who want to compete and continue on in their skating careers but not necessarily at that high-performance level that you see at Canada Games and national level competing."

Hardy says this kind of competition offers skaters a chance to grow.

"It's a great opportunity to come and support skaters, for sure, by coming out to watch and see the different levels come through. There's a skater that's currently in Airdrie by the name of  Savannah (Martel) and she's one of our dance pair teams that just competed at Canadian Challenge and won a medal at the Canadian Winter Games, her and her partner Kobi Chant (from Olds). It's a competition that she competed in previously before going through that high-performance competitive stream. In those lower levels of STARSkate, that's where some of our shining stars start coming up through the ranks and get the buzz for competing and go on to start representing our section on a higher level."

Airdronians are more than welcome to come and support the skaters

"There's no fee, it's free and anyone can come and watch at any time."

"Our competition starts on Friday at 9 o'clock in the morning and it runs through all day and all evening, Friday, Saturday and on Sunday we wrap up around 3 o'clock."

 

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