Day Six at the 2003 World Figure Skating Championships Championships

March 26, 2003

Report and photographs by Marie L. Hughes

Wednesday was a slow day for SkateFAIR but an amazing day of skating.

SkateFAIRians continue to give out buttons and pins and talk up the issues. We are very close to running out of buttons but we also see the demand lessening so after going back and forth about it, we decided not to order more. For one thing, we now have to figure out how to get the brochures distributed since we couldn't do it today due to pouring down rain. Trying to deal with buttons too is probably too much for our small band of volunteers.

I think if we decide to stage another protest at Skate America this October, we need to get a booth. I'm just imagining both how many $25 pledges it would take to rent a both and the looks on the face of the Skate America LOC if we were to request one.

I've been so impressed with the dedication and willingness of all the SkateFAIR people to help out however they can and with how excited everyone is to be here and be part of making history.

One such volunteer is Ellen Rowe who is a 67-year-old retired Spanish teacher. Don't worry, she said I could say how old she is. Ellen is covered from head to toe in "No Secret Judging" attire that she had made up herself. The piece de la resistance is her No Secret Judging ear muffs which has earned her the nickname of "Muffy".

When Ellen's No Secret Judging paraphernalia showed up, she immediately went tooling around Florida in it. Everyone asked her what No Secret Judging was about and of course she told them. Her outfit ought to appear on TV because she's located in the first row right next to the judges. I can see her from my seat and I know people have noticed her because she's been giving out buttons right and left. Most of our conversations have consisted of "I need more buttons" and me running off to find some.

I asked Ellen how long she had been a fan and she said she could never remember not being a fan. One particular memory she has is in 1972 when the Olympics were in Japan and she was still teaching High School. They only showed figure skating for half an hour each day and the school only had black and white TVs. But that didn't stop Ellen.

Luckily that half-hour was during one of her prep periods so she borrowed a color TV and gave all the students who wanted one a hall pass so they could watch with her. Her only rule was: No talking during the skating! If you talked, you were outta there.

I've met many people in D.C. that before were only faces on the Internet. One such person is Trudi, the person who wrote our brochure copy, and who I first "knew" back in 1994 when we were all on the list that Skatefans grew out of. In all this time, I've never met her - until now!

I've met people who live near me but they might as well live in another state because our lives never intersect. This includes Mark and Nancy from Berkeley. Nancy is a Reverend and Mark had made up an enormous No Secret Judging "button" which is at least 6 inches in diameter that he wears slung around his neck. It's caused much comment and he is also a big hander out of buttons.

In particular, he gave one today to Tai Babalonia and Randy Gardner. I hope they wear it.

SkateFAIR members are somewhat abnormal protesters in that we have to fit all our activities around the skating events and practices because no one wants to miss a bit of skating. This is good because the skating has been wonderful. The Pairs event, which finished up tonight, featured several personal bests including one from (relative) locals Scott and Dulebohn and an amazing performance from winners Shen and Zhao. They literally brought the house down!

In fact, we gave them a standing ovation before they had even finished skating. They were wonderful. Their split triple twist was sky high and the throws were out of this world. They had so much expression too. After they finished, the whole arena was chanting Six, Six! When they got some, we went wild but it was disconcerting to realize that some of those sixes would be thrown out.

But what really incensed me was to find out later that they got two second place ordinals! That is just insane. I love the second place team and they did have a fine skate to a program that suits them well but there is just no rational explanation for putting them in first over Shen and Zhao. Not on this night anyway. Even people who normally don't like the Chinese team were saying they deserved to win.

And Cinquanta wonders why we don't like secret judging.