The Yahoo/Eurosport site now has Wintersports back on the menu. Compared with the old pre-Yahoo site, the coverage is lamentably poor, and as yet there appears to be no skating news.

Eurosport UK: http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com

The club outing to see Holiday on Ice in Brighton is on 20 January 2008. The point of contact is Carol Taverner (tel 883807).

The show is at 1.30pm in Brighton. The coach leaves Ryde Arena at 8.45am and the pick-up time at Fishbourne ferry terminal is 9.15am. Don’t be late!

For the first time in several years Planet Ice Ryde now has three resident skating coaches: head coach Terri Smith (nee Fleming), Matt Russell and now Tom Eklund, who qualified as a NISA level two coach in November. This is a remarkable change in circumstances given that at the beginning of 2007, Terri was our one and only coach.

Newcomers to the rink won’t know that Matt and Tom were the club’s strong competitive skaters only a few years back, although Matt put on a stunning impromptu performance on the last day of this year’s Christmas Ice Gala to music performed by Opera Anywhere, giving some idea of his skating talents.

With a new season of Dancing on Ice scheduled to hit the TV screens next year, tuition is bound to become more popular, and the rink now appears to have the coaching capacity to handle demand for group and private lessons.

The coaching team is best contacted through the reception desk at Planet Ice Ryde on 01983 615155.

The Christmas ice gala on 8 to 9 December has a novel twist this year, with British championship skaters performing to live music from Opera Anywhere.

British junior ladies solo ice dance champion Charlotte Aiken and her brother Henry, the novice men’s solo ice dance champion, are among skaters performing to the opera music. Charlotte and Henry both began skating on the IW and now train at Guildford.

IW skater Kirsten Ginger makes a welcome return to the annual show for the Arias on Ice segment, as does British championship skater Matt Kershaw.

Double national bronze medallists, the Wight Diamonds synchronized skating team, will also be performing at the show. The Diamonds picked up bronze medals at this year’s British and the Scottish championships, at intermediate and elementary levels respectively.

Show times on Saturday 8 and Sunday 9 December are 3pm and 6.30pm. Two special schools performances take place on Friday 7 December, one of which is already sold out. Opera takes place only on the Saturday and Sunday performances; the school shows will instead have extra artistic performances by IW club skaters. Tickets are £8.00 each for adults, £5.50 each for children, and £20.00 for a family of four. To book, call Planet Ice Ryde on 01983 615155.

Planet Ice has a strict no photography policy at the rink, except by previously approved photographers. Malcolm Mennie and Ian Marsh are approved video photographers for the show, and this year the show DVD will be produced by Malcolm, not Ian. Chris Wilmott and Mavis are the approved stills photographers for the show. Details of how to obtain the DVD or stills will be available later.

Show picture kindly provided by Mavis.

According to the timetable located in the Events section of the NISA website (published 28 November), the IJS synchro championships are now on 12 January, not 13 January. The change will, of course, affect travel and hotel arrangements.

The club newsletter for December 2007 is available to download now, and will be circulated in print form within the next few days.

The downloadable version is an Adobe Acrobat file, and you will need Acrobat Reader to open it. This version of the newsletter is in colour; the print version will be in black and white only.

Contributions for the newsletter can be sent to wightboots@iowfigureskaters.co.uk

The newsletter is available to download here: wightboots_dec07_web.pdf

The IW County Press’s report on Kent and Oxford opens appeared in the 23 November 2007 edition of the paper.

The report is available online at www.iwcp.co.uk.

The tuition page of the site has been updated to include details of our second Island coach, Matthew Russell. Matthew is currently accepting new skaters for private lessons, and can be contacted through Planet Ice Ryde.

Sharon Buckman has been co-opted to the committee to fill the vacancy left by Wendy Fishel. Sharon, who will focus on fund-raising efforts, was unanimously accepted onto the committee at the meeting on 9 November.

The meeting was the fourth consecutive meeting that Jeff Fishel has not attended. As a result he was asked whether he still wanted to be on the committee. He has decided to tender his resignation.

The committee is therefore still one member short. Anyone who wishes to be considered for the committee, and who has the time to give to such a commitment, should talk to the secretary or chairwoman.

The IW annual artistic competitions are covered by a full feature article on the IW County Press website.

Website: www.iwcp.co.uk