On March 9, 1990, a convoy of vehicles left the Village of Arborg.

We were heading to the 1990 Interlake Regional Precision Competition at the Stonewall arena. The final competition of the season for our 16-member Arborg Junior team.

The Stonewall Figure Skating Club were hosting the competition that warm, spring-like day. It was the finale of a successful season for the Arborg Junior, Juvenile, and CanSkate teams. And the Arborg Junior team’s swan song. After searching high and low, merging skaters from three clubs, and pulling skaters out of retirement, our team would dissolve after this competition.

Interlake *Precision Regional Competitions were usually held in the evening. Rather than starting at 8:00 p.m., the competition started around 6 p.m. Unlike the previous year, my parents couldn’t drive my sister and I, and we carpooled with on of our team mates.

Inside the Stonewall arena, we wait for our teams – smelling the arena’s aroma. Most skaters agree arenas have an aroma. It’s fresh and minty. With a hint of ammonia, but that fades. The stench of changing rooms is another story.

We found the assigned room for the Arborg Junior team. Just the 16 of us. As we were settling inside, most of us missed the cork board across our room. It’s also called the competition board, where categories, teams, order of skate and – later – there would be results are posted.

Someone said, “Do you see who we’re up against?”

We were one of two teams in the advanced category. However, we didn’t celebrate a medal by default.

The other team was the St. Andrews Novice Precise-ettes. The best team in our region. One of the top teams in the Manitoba. No one in the Interlake dethrones the St. Andrews Novice Precise-ettes.

Yes, the Arborg Junior team were 1990 Manitoba Precision Champions in our division, Recreational C. However, St. Andrews won gold at the 1989 and 1990 Interlake Winter Game trials. In 1989, they placed at the Manitoba Precision Championships in Novice and advanced to the Canadian Precision Championships in Edmonton, Alta.

We couldn’t concentrate on the who, because we were competing against ourselves. The competition was speeding by because unlike previous competitions, there wasn’t a warm-up or compulsories. Teams skated cold.

Advanced was the last category, and St. Andrews went out first. Giving us time to breathe and share a laugh or two as we lined the hall. Our team stood in our on-ice order, and I was third from the front. I could see St. Andrews’ program through the chicken wire covered window in the arena door.

They has poise and grace, pure panache. Then a Precise-ette fell. We started to walk down the concrete steps towards the ice when another Precise-ette went down. We were at ice level, and there was another fall. I glanced at one of my team mates with raised eyebrows.

St. Andrews looked shocked when they came off the ice. We were shocked. I think everyone in the building was shocked.

They announced our team, and we stepped onto the ice and into our block formation. A four by four square of skaters, shoulder hold, left-right-left, change line at the turn, the regroup into the original block.

Maybe we couldn’t match St. Andrews’ technical level or artistic elegance – but we had speed, power, and a funky style. Think Viktor Petrenko and Kurt Browning during the early-90s. We were a team of Kurts.

We hit our starting position – an “A.” Yes, “A” for Arborg. While I don’t recall much about the program, I’ve heard those are either the best or worst. Considering the reaction from the crowd, it must have been good. One moment stands out. Near the end of the program, we performed a forward kickline with a shoulder hold into a perfectly timed drag. And zero falls.

A note about kicklines. Precision skaters weren’t the Rockettes. We didn’t kick six feet into the air. A precision kickline is a fast moving line with the skaters’ feet kicking close to the ice. The danger is tripping over yours or someone else’s skate blade – or being off time.

After our program, we sat in the changing room. We were fixing our hair. Pretending to dig in our skating bags. Trying to keep busy until the results were posted. But within 10 minutes, we were back on the ice for the medal ceremonies despite the fact our results were a mystery. Our coach and team manager were in the dark too.

At the previous Precision Regionals, our team knew we won a silver medal before the ceremonies. This, however, felt like the 1988 Winter Games in Calgary. When the audience didn’t know which Brian – Boitano or Orser – won the gold until the medal ceremony.

Stonewall SC skaters brought medals out on dowels. The Arborg Juvenile team won a silver – adding to their silver from the Juvenile division at provincials – and the Arborg CanSkate team won bronze in their category. Hearing this we cheered, and we started the precision chant of, “We are proud of you, hey, we are proud of you, say.”

Meanwhile, the St. Andrews Precise-ettes Novice and the Arborg Junior team stood side-by-side. St. Andrews seemed less jubilant than the previous Regionals, when they were doing the wave during the ceremonies.

We were furthest for medal delivery, and we weren’t paying attention to how many categories were in the competition. Maybe there was a miscommunication, but during a stretch of silence, Stonewall skaters appeared with medals for the advanced category, swinging on wooden dowels.

And 16 faces fell.

Gold medals were facing our team. Some of us glanced at St. Andrews, where there was a string of silver. We started to whisper and turn to each other, shrugging our shoulders with a “What’s going on?” reaction. St. Andrews was silent. A few were digging their toe picks into the ice.

Was this a mistake? Were the skaters on dowel duty going to switch spots? Murmurs were heard throughout the arena. The P.A. announcer hesitated before they said, “And the silver medal in the advanced category goes to … the St. Andrews Precise-ettes.”

Our screams made the announcement that we’d won the gold medal almost inaudible. I’ll never forget cheering from our families and friends. Our teammates were hugging each other, and we saw Joanne on the sidelines, pumping her arms into the air. One of my friends leapt at least *24 inches off the ice before she threw her arms around me.

We were still hugging and laughing as people from the Stonewall SC awarded our medals. We looked at the medallions, then we almost huddled, flipping them front and back, admiring them, clenching them to our chests.

We were giggling like little girls while the Interlake Spectator – our local paper – gathered us together for a photo.

Our coach, Joanne, was waiting in our changing room, crying, and she was hugging everyone. Once she left, our team was buzzing, talking about our season, winning provincials. A teammate said, ” … and our name was in the Free Press,” Manitoba’s largest newspaper. We’d capped the seven-month journey off on a golden note. At the time, when you live in a small town – a *village – and your precision team’s name appears on the same page as NHL scores, it’s a thrill.

Our first competition, also the Interlake Regional Precision Competition, was 35 years ago today – March 10, 1989. My dad video’d that one, including all three teams and the medal ceremony.

The 1990 Regionals were bittersweet. There was still daylight as we drove home. We were happy, thrilled, name the adjective. But it never hit me until the next competitive season that my precision days were over. There weren’t enough people in my age category for a team.

The majority of the Arborg Juniors hung up their competitive skates, a couple for the second time. Those of us who stayed focused on singles. A handful of the younger members balanced both disciplines.

At times, I wonder does the 1990 Arborg Junior team ever think about that season. I hope the answer is “once in awhile.”

Especially that day in 1990, when the impossible was possible.

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In 1998, synchronized skating replaced the term precision, a sport founded in 1956. When these posts reference a team who skated prior to 1998, precision will be used for historical and preservation purposes. (Resource: US Figure Skating)

Photos: Family archives, 1990 Arborg Skating Club ice show, Movie Mania
Newspaper clippings: Interlake Spectator
*Arborg officially became a town in November 1997.