The season 21/22

The season of 21/22 is coming to an end and we´re looking back at it with pride. We officially started the season in May 2021 after a long period of not being allowed to practice together on the ice. We´d just started training in groups of 8 skaters, wearing face masks. As the spring progressed we were able to workout outside and spent June building up our strength.

After a bit of time off, we gathered in Säfsen, Dalarna, for a full week of training. During the week in Säfsen got to know each other better and started to skate more as a team.

In August we were back at our home rink in Landvetter and continued to build programs. We met challenges when we started with technical elements that some of us haven’t tried before such as group lifts and advanced variations of death spirals. We started from scratch with some elements since we spent most of the previous season improving our skating skills, but we pushed through.

The first public performance of the season was Pre event that was held in Kungsbacka by the end of October. Most of us were a bit nervous since it had been a while since everyone’s last public performance, but we still managed to skate clean. The feedback we got afterward from people in the audience and the judges present where very positive and they all expressed how glad they were to see Sweden finally get a senior team again.

By the end of Pre event, the Swedish figure skating association announced Team Inspire as the Swedish national team. All of us were thrilled to have completed a big goal.

The first competitions, Qualification 1 in Borås and Qualification 2 in Kungälv, went fine. Some parts of the programs we skated were very good and some parts we could improve. It was a good start but we wanted to reach higher.

After the qualification competitions, we had a period of challenges. In January we planned to attend Lúminere Cup in Netherlands and Leon Lurje Trophy in Gothenburg. Both of the competitions were canceled due to covid-19. We tried to keep the motivation and continued to work hard and improve.

By the time Swedish nationals came along we were ready to show what we got. We had a few mistakes in the skates, but the overall performance was improved from previous competitions. For the first time, we could declare ourselves national champions.

In March we could finally make our international debut. We went by bus to Neuss to attend The German Open. We started the competition by skating a clean short program. It was the best performance of the season so far and a great international debut. In the free, we made some mistakes, but it was still a good skate. We ended up in second place overall

The final of the season was the World Synchronized Skating Championships, which was held in Hamilton, Canada. We arrived in Canada a few days in advance of the competition. For most of us, it was our first senior Worlds and it was exciting and a bit nerve-wracking. The first day that we spent in Canada we spent exploring Niagara Falls and on the days ahead of the competition we practiced in the unofficial rinks.

The day of the competition came and we started with a short program. The overall performance was great. In the free program, many technical elements were super good, but we had a few mistakes. We got a total of 169,92 and ended up in 10th place. Overall it was such a powerful experience that we´re going to remember for the rest of our life´s.