Written by 2021-2022 U.S. Figure Skating DREAM Program and Haydenettes Member, Maddie Beery
It was our first competition of the season. As with any first, nerves and excitement were running especially high as we prepared to debut our program in front of an arena full of cheering spectators. I took the ice with my team, our music started and we headed into our first element, the moves. For a split second, everything was going great... until I caught myself off-balance coming out of my Biellmann. I attempted to turn backwards while still very unsteady, and the next thing I knew, I was sitting on the ice.
As skaters, we have the tendency to be hard on ourselves when things don't go according to plan. I definitely found myself in that headspace after that competition, in complete disbelief of what had just happened, remembering how many times that element had gone just fine in practice, and wishing I could rewind the clock to start the program over again. But try as we might to stay on our feet,
everyone falls sometimes
. When you're skating on blades just a few millimeters thick and moving at extremely high speeds alongside up to 15 other people—not to mention those pesky ruts in the ice—there are bound to be mistakes every once in a while. Of course, no one wants to fall during a competition, but we unfortunately cannot control the timing.
It does us more harm than good to spend our time at competitions worrying about everything that can possibly go wrong; I'm a firm believer that the more you
think something is going to happen, the more likely it is to
actually happen. One of the best things you can do in a competition environment is to practice displaying confidence and to have trust in your training.
It's also important to remember that the fall itself is far less important than the way you
react to it. As difficult as it might be, it's better to not dwell on the mistake and to just move on—to pick yourself up and skate the rest of the program like you have practiced so many times before and as if nothing has happened. At the end of the day, we can't go back in time when things go wrong. What we can do, however, is determine what comes next.