Am I too old to start Figure Skating?

Introduction

Undoubtely, one of the most recurring questions I get is: Am I too old to start figure skating? And although many people could tell that: yes it is too late, the real answer is: absolutely NO!

Above all, a sport is a sport and there should be no shame on wanting to learn figure skating the same manner you would start any other sport. If I wanted to go even deeper in this topic, I’d tell you that there is no age for anything basically.

Why constraining ourselves to a special age to discover, try or start something new? Evidently, the same rule applies for figure skating.

Why do we think that there is a specific age for figure skating?

After a certain age, many reasons make us think that we are too old to start figure skating:

This is explained by the fact that nowadays, athletes competing at the highest level are often very young and they most likely started figure skating in their youngest years! It can appear frightening for some adults passionate about figure skating to even think of putting a foot on the ice.

Taking that into consideration, we believe figure skating is not a sport for adults. It’s understandable. In the last decades, figure skating became more approachable for adults to start, and many clubs around the world offer adult lessons on a weekly basis.

What we usually see on tv, impacts a lot of our perception of figure skating. In fact, seeing athletes jumping triples and quadruples at a surprisingly young age can lead us to a certain timidness.

After reaching a certain age, many of us fear a fall that would lead us straight to the emergency room. This lets us think that an age limit to start figure skating exists.

Set up realistic goals

Obviously, if your dream is to become a national champion and participate in the biggest figure skating championships, there is almost no chance – to not say none – that you will manage to achieve it. Being realistic will be key for your figure skating journey.

It’s understandable that people get excited by thinking of jumping and spinning, but before being able to do this, and following quite some trainings before getting there will be the only way!

• Take it step by step (liturally…)
• Have an honest talk about your possible skating career with your trainer
• Set up goals that you can achieve quickly! It is usually more motivating to reach more small goals than wiating 20 years before reaching one goal.
• Don’t compare yourself to others. We are all different, we all have different bodies, different postures, different problems. Adapt your goals to your abilities and not to what other people expect from you.