Our Adults Skate Too Skater Spotlight Series is a bi-weekly blog where you get to know your fellow adult skaters from all over the world! For our next edition, you will get to meet Christin! She's a goal-driven gamer mom from Virginia who decided to take the leap and hit the ice after her daughter started skating. Read more about her experiences competing, how skating has changed her life for the better and her advice to other adult skaters!
What’s your name? Where are you from? What do you do for a living?
Christin aka @Lindeestarr_skates (lindeestarr is also my ps4 gamer tag, I’m a gamer mom too)
I was born in Ohio, but have been in Virginia since I was 12, guess that makes me local now!
I homeschool my youngest!
What’s your story? How did you get into figure skating?
I have always wanted to figure skate! But where I lived when I was little there was no rink. Fast forward to 2018 my daughter, Serenity, started skating... a lot! So by April 2019 I was too! I kinda figured since I was at the rink almost everyday; I might as well get some exercise and be there to help my daughter! I fell in love with it! And I competed in August!
What does your skating schedule look like?
Usually 3 to 4 times a week!
What has been the most rewarding or exciting moment in your skating career?
It’s always going to be those “AHA! “ moments and every mitten high five or ten from my coach Jill Stewart, that’s her and my daughter, Serenity in the picture from my first competition!
What was the most difficult moment of your skating career and how did you overcome it?
Surprisingly the hardest thing was after competition when I didn’t have any new goals, I felt totally lost and depressed. I mean I did smash my goals for my competition and it was wonderful but I didn’t expect to feel so lost after I achieved them! I just kept skating and talked to my friend and fellow skate mom, Jennifer about it and she shared that it can be normal to feel lost and sad after a competition and that helped a lot knowing I wasn’t the only weirdo! Ha! Plus when my coach came back from vacation we set new goals and some long term ones too!
What’s your favorite element to practice?
I love slaloms, and half swizzles and spins! I’m starting to like practicing backwards elements a lot more too!
What’s your favorite off-ice exercise to practice?
I have knee injuries from years of dance so I like to practice stretching & stability exercises and core exercises!
What motivates you?
Doing something for myself! I’m fortunate to stay at home with my kids and to teach them but it can be easy to do so much for others and not yourself, it’s very important to have your own thing you are passionate about!
How has skating impacted your life?
Skating brought me out of a dark place, I had been feeling down and bored and lost for a while. Skating helped me remember who I am and how to have fun and how to have a challenge! I’ve met so many wonderful people! I’ve been humbled by others telling me they are proud of me or even inspired by me! I have recently started assisting with coaching littles at our rink and it’s so rewarding watching them get it and know I helped or when they run up to me to tell me something new they did! It really makes my heart sing!
What’s the best advice your coach has given you?
Jill is such a wonderful coach and positive light! Anything she says is helpful I feel like! But right now it’s keep your head up, and trust your edges! I think it can apply to lots of things. Trust yourself and look where you’re headed!
What’s your advice for other adult skaters out there?
Just keep skating!! Follow accounts that inspire you and tell them! Make friends! Be careful of the comparison game! And remember why you started!