Awesome, how fun, thank you for sharing this piece of your life.Sadly, this happens in dance as well. Even when I was dancing professionally. I had more than one choreographer tell me.....For such a big guy, you have really nice leaps. Another said "Wow, you're really great, you're the Heaviest dancer I've ever hired." I did NOT take it as a compliment. These athletes are already hyper conscious about how they look. For dancers, we trained hours a day staring into a mirror. Trust me, we KNOW how we look. Imagine a complete stranger telling you, you look better in person. They always say "The Camera adds 10 pounds" I remember seeing Tonya Harding and Kristi Yamaguchi in 1991 and could not believe how tiny they were. I'm sure that Kristi didn't way 100lbs, and was about 5ft tall. Tonya, who always appeared very athletic, especially her legs, was maybe 105lbs and not much taller than Kristi. Why not just tell these skaters, "I love your skating, could I take a picture, please" When people are polite, it's nice to hear good things. These athletes spend YEARS in a freezing rink and between the short and long programs, they spend about 10 minutes at an event smiling and doing their absolute best. Flowers, or a stuffed animal can go a long way. Having an event program is also a nice way to ask for an autograph. Here's one of the final music videos I was in ( More than 30's ago ) It's Chaka Khan's "Love of a lifetime" You can see me, I'm the black boy wearing an aqua Tank Short when she sings "Good for you" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2igCau3i87s