Cape Breton's Magazine

changing. There's little things that you might notice that look good, so you'll want to put it somewhere that'11 highlight it, and show it off--if that's a good as? pect of your skating. Or there might be something that's kind of not so great, so you kind of stick it in a comer so that they don't notice it as much. (So each day, practicing....) We might do two dances in a day, or a variation and a dance. Lawrence: If you practice all week, you'll do all 9 dances in a certain block of time. Then (the coach will) assess them, and the next day she'll say which ones were the worst. And she'll take the ones that were really bad, and we'll work on those for a week or so. (What is it that people should know about figure skating that perhaps they don't know, or they don't stop to think about it.) It's hard. There's a lot of patience involved. Like, we're two terribly differ? ent people, and it's hard to, like, be as one when we skate. Colleen: Especially when you have a fight. (That's interesting, because a lot of peo? ple would have figured the two of you would have chosen each other because you get along perfectly, you're so much alike.) We skate alike. But that's probably where the line is drawn. We're friends. We hang around sometimes, but.... We never used to when we were little. 'Cause when you're that age it's like, "Oough, I'm skating with a boy!" We used to fight a lot, a long time ago. But when we moved up there, I guess we knew that we had to live with each other, so we hardly fought at all, like, almost never. (Why is this important to you?) Well, I suppose when you've been doing something for the majority of your life--I've been skating for almost 11 years now--that's bound to make it something important. It is your life, actually. Basically, skating is my life. I do other things, but they're for fun. They're not anything that I would seriously think about. -'' Rodney Walsh, New Waterford: (Where did you get started in boxing?) I guess we have to go directly to my mum's parents, the MacGibbons--5 brothers--all boxed, all had a lot of experience in the ring, ama? teur and pro. From there I just knew--ever since I was this big, it was always put in? to my head, "Come, watch the fights." Show me this, show me that. And I think I put on my first glove when I was about 4 or 5. I was only a youngster. But I honestly got serious when I was about 10 or 11, I guess. I started training. I had my first fight when I was 11, right after about a year's training. Lost my first fight! Kind of dis? couraging. But my grandfather told me how things are, and he explained. He was proud of me. He said, "Stick with it. You've got to harden. You're going to be able to do it." So it went from there. It stayed true, too, everything, right to the last word. Even today. I mean, it paid off totally. I got a lot of respect from a lot of people. And met a lot of people. It didn't do one bit of harm to me. Except maybe flatten my nose a little bit or some? thing! Other than that, it didn't do any? thing else. It's done nothing but good. After that, I went on to about 15 or 20 straight victories. I went to my first na? tional championship, after winning two provincial championships. I was 14, and I went to Sherbrooke, Quebec, in the first of my national competitions. I won a silver medal. It wasn't too bad. I boxed twice. I fought a guy from Manitoba. I beat him. Then I fought a guy from B. C., (85)