With the Winter Olympic Games in Milano Cortina still a fresh memory, the Santa Clarita Speed Skating Club hosted its Southern California Speed Skating Championship on Saturday at The Cube.
According to Ron Halcrow, president of the club, the competition was able to be scheduled last-minute due to the availability of the rink.
“Saturday’s event really popped out, almost out of nowhere, because of a major Southern California playoff series for hockey. The rink called us a week before and told us they had some extra ice, which is unusual for us in the winter. So we put together the competition in about a week,” Halcrow said. “And it turned out to be a real success, because speed skating is in trouble in California, so there are a lot of skaters from Northern California who try to see if they can qualify for the national competition.”
The national competition, which takes place once a year in March, is set to take place in Boston March 20-22. Athletes Xiaofan Feng and Meinuo Li, both from Arcadia, won their divisions and represented the Santa Clarita club.
In addition, 76-year-old pediatrician Robert Allison placed fourth in his division, competing against athletes between the ages of 15 to 30.
“I think he’s won something before (in) national championships, and now he’s going back to win another,” Halcrow said. “This is a smaller competition, but it’s actually more important. The skaters have been training all fall, very actively, in preparation for the national championships, and we have some very promising skaters. A lot of them are the age of 14 now, and so we’re expecting their glory days are going to be in four to five years — maybe the next Olympics.”
With the recent publicity for winter sports, including those on ice, Halcrow has seen a surge of people joining.
“We always see an increase right after the Olympics, where a number of people try the sport. We’ve had maybe 10 or 15 new skaters show up just in the last week or so,” Halcrow said. “What stood out to me this season was the progression of the skaters. There’s been a very, very strong progression in skating ability, and I attribute that to our two main coaches: Peiyu Jin and Mark Jeter. They’ve done a tremendous job in developing the kids.”
Seeing not only enrollment, but also improvement, from the next generation has given Halcrow a newfound sense of excitement for the future of speedskating.
“What’s different to me is the number of youths around the ages of 10 to 12 who are skating at the national level right now, which is unusual. I would say we have maybe 10 to 15 skaters who are national competitors in that age group. And that’s unusual. Usually, we only have one or two,” Halcrow said. “Speedskating seems to be growing, so I’m fairly optimistic about the sport right now. If you’dasked me a year ago, I would suggest the opposite.”
Since the team will often have the ice to themselves in the morning on Saturdays, Halcrow encourages any youth participant who is interested in joining to simply show up at The Cube at 7 a.m.
