The North Atlantic Figure Skating Club – based at the Family Ice Center in Falmouth – has an impressive lineup scheduled for their upcoming show, one that includes big names like Ross Miner, who took fifth at the 2016 National Championship, and local standouts like Morgan Sewall, silver medalist at this year’s New Englands, and Sophie Lawsure, co-captain of the Nor’Easters Open Juvenile team, who recently took bronze at Eastern Sectionals.
Sewall, 19, graduated from Scarborough High School in 2015 and is now a freshman at Merrimack College in North Andover, Mass., where she double-majors in marketing and graphic design.
“To be honest, I thought that last year’s ice show would be a farewell, but I’ve managed to stay close to home!” she says.
Lawsure, 17 and a senior at Scarborough, has been skating for 10 years, and got hooked on synchronized skating in particular in 2009.
“When my skating club, the North Atlantic Figure Skating Club, hosted the National Sychronized Skating Championships in Portland, I was hooked. I was at the Civic Center the whole time during the four-day event, cherishing every moment that I was able to watch these teams perform, smile and work together.
“A few of my skating friends and I had no question that this was what we wanted to do with our skating,” Lawsure says.
Caryn Bickerstaff, who’s chairing the upcoming event – actually a pair of shows – expects anywhere from 300-800 spectators to attend the weekend-long affair. The first show is scheduled for 7 p.m. on Saturday, April 9, and the second for 2 p.m. the following day.
Nearly 100 skaters, ranging in age from 3-70, will participate in the annual exhibition. Miner, 25, hails from the Boston area and is perhaps the most recognizable name on this year’s docket. As mentioned, he recently finished fifth at Nationals, but he’s also accrued a number of other accolades. He won silver at the same competition in 2013, competed at the International Skating Union’s World Figure Skating Championship in 2011 and 2013, and has collected a string of bronze medals on the Union’s Grand Prix Circuit.
“We always try to have a guest star that’s known on the national scene in some way,” says Bickerstaff. “It’s inspiring for the skaters to see what hard work and perseverance can bring.”
Also appearing this year is Heidi Munger, reigning New England champion and bronze medalist at Eastern Sectionals.
“This year is kind of unique and fun for us,” says Bickerstaff, “because we gained Heidi, due to us having Ross come up, and the friendship between Heidi and Morgan Sewall, who’ve competed against each other for years.”
Sewall is skating as the “club star” this year – not her first time in the role. Thankfully, her studies have not overwhelmed her, and she’s continued to skate, finding time to keep her skills sharp.
“I’ve been able to keep up with my practice at college,” she says.
Sewall’s been skating for 13 years now, and has earned her fair share of laurels. She’s passed the battery of tests any skater must pass to attain the highest levels, and competed all across the country – from California, to Colorado, to Utah, Virginia and North Carolina.
She’s placed every year she’s competed at New Englands, and been both the Novice and the Junior Ladies Regional Champion – performances which earned her trips to 2012 Eastern Sectionals and Nationals.
“At the senior level there,” Sewall says of her trip this season to Sectionals, “there were about 20 competitors total. Being (as this was) my first year in college and (I was) mostly just competing for fun, I was thrilled to just make it, and get to enjoy the experience. Although it wasn’t my best performance, I am grateful for being able to experience the competition yet again.”
“It’s hard to tell the future,” Sewall says, “but something tells me as long as I’m still skating I will always be involved with the North Atlantic Figure Skating Club, whether it’s as a skater or a coach. I’m just happy to be able to perform in my home club with the people I grew up with and love so much.”
One might think Sewall is attending college on a skating scholarship. Alas, that is not the case.
“Sadly, figure skating is not a part of the NCAA,” she says. Merrimack has a very small skating club, which I hope to, at some point, make a U.S. Figure Skating Association-affiliated competitive team.”
Even if she succeeds in that endeavor, though, her team will remain a club sport at the college.
As a synchronized skater, Lawsure works the ice not as one lone figure, nor as one half of a pair, but as one member of an entire team. This year, the Nor’Easters, as they are called, featured 12 regular competitors and an alternate, all from southern Maine.
Figure skating has taken Lawsure to a variety of destinations, including Boston and the surrounding area; Lake Placid, N.Y.; Hershey, Pa.; and Richmond, Va. That last location was the site of this season’s Eastern Sectionals, where the Nor’Easters performed exceptionally, finishing third.
“We skated really well,” she says, “and received a bronze medal out of 30 teams at the Open Juvenile level.”
Lawsure is one of the “founding” members of the team that’s given her so much.
“I’ve been part of the Nor’Easters for seven years, including being co-captain for two years. The teammates that have come and gone, the memories of each competition and the feeling of getting a medal that we worked hard for, I’ll never forget. Synchronized skating and the Nor’Easters have made me realize that overcoming struggles and completing a great performance is 10 times better with people by your side on the ice.”
Like Sewall, Lawsure has passed her “Senior Moves in the Field” test, a challenge that called for dedication.
“It required a lot of time and hard work,” she says. “I trained with coaches for several summers in Lake Placid, and practiced three or four days a week at local rinks.”
Lawsure credits the other Nor’Easters with also enhancing her skills.
Regarding the future, Lawsure hasn’t settled on a college yet, but she has been accepted to Simmons, in Boston, for Health Sciences.
“As for skating,” she says, “I might be taking a year or two off. But it will always be part of me, wherever I go, and I will keep in touch with my teammates, (other) skaters and my coach, Beth Houghton.
“Since I will always be part of U.S. Figure Skating,” she says, I may want to coach a synchronized skating team in the future. How fun would that be?”
Also on the docket for this weekend’s festivities are Julia Curran of Westbrook and her partner Franz-Peter Jerosch of Yarmouth, who combined for silver in Juvenile Pairs at this year’s Nationals – the best finish by any Maine skaters at Nationals since 2008.
The show is a fundraiser for nonprofit club. Proceeds allow the group to enhance and expand their offerings, from Learn-to-Skate to brand new programs, seminars and events. Likewise, the money fuels their promotional and community-outreach efforts.
Bickerstaff elaborates: “North Atlantic Figure Skating Club was incorporated in 1998. We operate Learn-to-Skate program classes based off the U.S. Figure Skating Basic Skills model from September to June each year and have seen growing numbers in the last two years – which is great!”
“We offer a summer camp in July and hold seminars throughout the year,” says Bickerstaff, “and offer year-round club ice for our members. As of Feb. 1, we had 147 club members, which include coaches, associate coaches, associate members, collegiate members, home club members, and introductory members.”
The North Atlantic Figure Skating Club, a member of U.S. Figure Skating, can be found online at www.northatlanticfigureskating.org. The organization is also searchable on Facebook.
Scarborough’s Morgan Sewall will appear once again at the North Atlantic Figure Skating Club’s annual exhibition this weekend in Falmouth.
Scarborough senior Sophie Lawsure kisses a stuffed lobster wearing a bronze medal at this year’s Eastern Sectionals.
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