INSYNCH
Editor’s note: Dirk Mariage is the father of four girls who grew up participating in synchronized skating and competing for their respective colleges. Today they continue to be active in the sport, with all four competing in the adult divisions. Dirk inked this piece on his family’s fulfilling involvement with collegiate synchronized skating.
A LIFETIME OF MEMORIES
Four sisters find fulfillment competing in college by DIRK MARIAGE
Four sisters. Four college graduates. Nine
national collegiate titles. And a lifetime of memories from synchronized skating. It all began with a learn-to-skate session in
Colorado for two little girls with a lot of energy. “Your daughters are very talented; you
should consider private lessons,” an instructor told their mother and me. In 1990, a job transfer moved us from
Denver to Cleveland. Tere, we followed the advice of the learn-to-skate instructor and found our first coach, Marcia Sherman, of the Rocky River Skating Club. She took Lindsay and Alissa Mariage under her wing, giving them individual lessons as long as they skat- ed with the Riverettes Precision Team (later named Cleveland Edges). We had no idea what precision skating was, but we decided to give it a go.
Te first big competition was the
Mid-America Synchronized Skating Cham- pionships, in Fraser, Michigan. During that weekend, the Miami University senior team walked by. What a focused group of young ladies, and when they hit the ice, wow! How amazing would it be to have these girls grow up to skate with a college team? Fast-forward to the late 1990s. Two more
little Mariage skaters entered the mix; all ex- periencing precision skating together. We had Lindsay, a powerful skater who learned the ropes of team skating quickly; Alissa, a success- ful singles freestyle skater; Jaime, who with her beautiful posture, went on to compete at ju- nior nationals with her ice dance partner; and Brittan, who skated almost as soon as she could walk.
Teir mom, Leslie, meanwhile, decided to
give skating a try despite working two jobs, vol- unteering as president of the Cleveland Edges Skating Club and shuttling the girls back and forth to practices. Participating in everything, such as ballet, dance, individual lessons, camps and team practices, it seemed almost like a fam- ily business. All four girls, and mom, were now a part
of the Cleveland Edges skating teams and com- peting at different levels. Te hard work paid off as Lindsay and Alissa finally won the gold medal with the Cleveland Edges at sectionals. In 2001, Lindsay enrolled at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo and became
52 OCTOBER 2016
our first to skate on a varsity synchronized skat- ing team in college. During her junior year at the 2004 U.S. Synchronized Skating Cham- pionships in San Diego, the Broncos won the gold, while in the master’s event, Leslie and the Cleveland Edges took the silver. Lindsay’s strength and passion for syn-
chronized skating continued to inspire her sis- ters.
In 2003, it was Alissa’s turn. After a year
in Michigan with Lindsay, she decided to take a leap of faith and applied to Miami Universi- ty in Oxford, Ohio. She was accepted into the
school and made the collegiate varsity synchro- nized skating team. Our family spent that year moving from the Western Michigan Universi- ty section to the Miami University section, as both girls competed in the collegiate division. At the U.S. Synchronized Skating Cham-
pionships in 2005, we witnessed two great skates. Alissa and Miami’s collegiate team cap- tured the gold, the first of the current 12 con- secutive titles. Lindsay and the Western Mich- igan University Broncos claimed the silver. Alissa graduated with her degree and a total of four titles with the Miami University collegiate
(l-r) Sisters Lindsay, Alissa, Jaime and Brittan Mariage attended the 2016 U.S. Synchronized Skating Championships in Kalamazoo, Michigan.
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