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Winnie Wolf
Junior Fiona Junger’s blood trickled down her hand as she skated off the ice, rubbing it off on her Lululemon shirt sleeve, she tried to ignore the Band-Aids being offered to her.
“I’m fine, I’m fine,” Junger said to coach Bonnie Wienberg, adrenaline still pumping.
Junger had been attempting a haircutter — a spin in her program where she pulls the blade behind her head with her hand — but her tendency to lose her gloves left her hands exposed to the sharp blades on her skates.
Coach Bonnie Wienberg recalls the bleeding hand story as just one of the many entertaining moments that come with coaching Junger at Kansas City Ice Center
“It’s funny because you can tell she really is dedicated and really wants to do the best she can when she’s skating,” Weinberg said.
Born in Kansas City, Junger’s family moved to Canada when she was two years old. Junger started playing hockey like all of the little kids but she eventually traded in her hockey pads for sparkling dresses and took up ice skating a year later.
When her family moved back to Kansas City when she was five, Junger decided to continue skating. Since then, it’s been the core focus in her life — with daily practices in preparation for about four skating competitions a year.
Even though Junger is a member of the Kansas Figure Skating Club at KCIC, she competes individually at each competition. But when Junger was in middle school at Pembroke, she felt deprived of the team bonding and friendships her friends were experiencing and decided to quit ice skating to try out more team-oriented sports.
“The individualism in skating is the reason I took a break in middle school,” Junger said. “I tried swim, dance, track and basketball because I wanted to be on a team where I could meet people and make friends.”
But after Junger started to miss skating, she returned to KCIC in eighth grade to skate competitively.
Her readjustment to the sport changed even more when Junger made the decision to transfer from Pembroke to East for her junior year. While transitioning from the private to public lifestyle and leaving her friends behind was hard on Junger, skating was her only constant.
According to Junger, the small skating community and her friends she she had at KCIC made the move worth it, especially when she was able to spend more time at the rink due to the difference in East’s class scheduling.
Junger’s friend, junior Cameron Hughes, met Junger at East this year.
“I thought it was really cool when I found out she skates,” Hughes said. “I don’t know anyone who does it competitively so when Fiona showed us videos of her skating, I was like oh my gosh, she’s really good.”
Junger’s schedule this year includes her alarm ringing at 5 a.m. every weekday so she can prepare herself for morning practice on the ice from 6:15 to 7:45 — one of the differences in her new routine at East. Practice is followed by a day of school starting in second hour AP U.S. History and skating after school for an hour on Mondays and Fridays.
“School work and skating is really hard because you want to stay up late to do your homework, Junger said. “But it’s also like, well I have to get up at five tomorrow so should I really stay up until 12 doing homework?”
While practice at the rink means developing technical skills like tight aerodynamic positions, Tuesday through Thursday after school Junger can be found at AYC Health and Fitness doing high intensity interval training with Weinberg to train her heart rate.
“I’m very proud of Fiona,” Weinberg said. “It’s been fun and rewarding to watch her work ethic develop and also her overall fitness levels increase and improve.”
Because the ice skating competition season lasts from summer to fall, Junger is currently training and focusing on perfecting her short and long programs — the two different length routines Junger performs at competitions — to get as many points as possible from the judges.
Even though Junger skates strong at competitions, according to Weinberg, her goal is for Junger to skate a clean and precise program in the Novice level for the upcoming season.
To keep track of her personal progress, Junger created a skating account on Instagram to post videos and share with her friends and followers.
“I’m not trying to become famous or anything,” Junger said. “I did it to have fun and watch myself skate so that way I can say this looks good or that looks bad.”
Junger’s self motivation and determination brought her to pass Free Skate this year — a series of spins, jumps and turns ice skaters have to pass in front of judges — and have the national title of Free Skate Gold Medalist.
If she passes next year for the last time, Junger will move up to the Junior level. The final step in skating is making it to the the Senior level — but the advanced group of Double Gold Medalists includes skaters who will be going to the Olympics.
“I just want to be the best I can be now,” Junger said. “I tell myself that I only have one and a half years left because in college I’m going to be skating recreationally and I probably won’t have the time or resources to do it as much as I do now.”
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