Before the 2013/14 season forum is archived, I thought I should post a final update to this thread.
Firstly, at the start of April, there was a State Visit to the UK by Michael D. Higgins, the President of the Republic of Ireland. This was the first time there had been a state visit by a head of state of Ireland.
To mark this, there were a number of events to emphasise the close ties between the 2 countries. There was a state dinner for notable Irish people (North and South) at Windsor Castle, and a show at the Royal Albert Hall featuring Irish performers (North and South).
Kelly Gallagher and Charlotte Evans were invited to both! But, not only that, they got to meet the Queen and President Higgins!
Here is a photo of Kelly outside Windsor Castle before the state dinner, from her Facebook page:
https://fbcdn-sphotos-d-a.akamaihd....714_762178190473055_8522964912919827505_n.jpg
And here is a photo taken at the Royal Albert Hall, also from her Facebook page:
https://scontent-a-lhr.xx.fbcdn.net...779_762306223793585_6489071248305263222_n.jpg
Unsurprisingly, the local newspapers were full of coverage of the State Visit. And they were very quick to pick up the story of Kelly meeting the Queen.
So, I’ve updated the Bibliography in my last post accordingly. I should add that there was a 2-page spread in the Belfast Telegraph on 12th April 2014, but, unfortunately, our copy disappeared before I got my hands on it.
On Saturday (31st May), there was a special event held for Kelly in her hometown of Bangor. Haven’t come across any stories about it or photos yet, but here is the promotional poster:
https://scontent-b-lhr.xx.fbcdn.net...135_789453077745566_5050872929404386861_n.jpg
Speaking of people from Bangor, I haven’t heard much about
Aimee Fuller in terms of snowboarding since the Olympics. But, there has been developments in one of her other passions.
Motorbike racing is practically the national sport here in Northern Ireland. And, even though she was growing up in England, Aimee was no different. When she was a youngster, she was quite a successful motocross racer. But then her family moved to America, and that was when she took up snowboarding.
In the week before she went out to Sochi, Aimee passed the Compulsory Basic Training part of her bike test. Since coming home, she has passed the rest of her bike test. She was being taught by former road racer Phillip McCallen, and a few weeks ago she was his guest at the North West 200 road race.
As for
Jenna McCorkell, she and Kevin van der Perren celebrated their sixth wedding anniversary (I really can’t believe it has been that long since they got married!) a couple of weeks ago.
But, there was something she was joking about on Facebook that I found interesting. You know how I’ve mentioned a few times over the past year or so that Kevin was now coaching in Belgium, and that Jenna has been helping him out. Well, it looks like Jenna is following in the footsteps of her good friend and former coach, Lorna Brown (1974 Jaca Professional World Champion), in turning her hand to choreography:
Wow I have to say choreographing 17 new programmes is certainly challenging but I'm loving it!! Thank you to everyone for giving me this opportunity! Having a great time! I have to say a hot bath and an ice cream is on the plan tonight! Knackered!!
Source:
https://www.facebook.com/jenna.mccorkell/posts/10152436309801885
I assume it is just Kevin's students that Jenna is choreographing for at the moment. But, it will be interesting to see if she ends up choreographing any top level skaters in the future.
Unfortunately, the next person I am going to talk about never reached the Olympics. But since the threads about her have been archived (
1st thread,
2nd thread,
3rd thread), I thought that this would be an appropriate place to talk about another of our former figure skating stars.
2nd May was the first anniversary of losing our 1996 British Junior Ladies Champion,
Katie Scarbrough (née Allan), to bowel cancer.
During the final stages of her illness, the Belfast Telegraph ran quite a few stories about her, and to mark the anniversary, they did an interview with her husband, Stuart, about the past year.
Unfortunately, we didn’t buy the Tele that day. However, Stuart posted a photo of the article to Facebook. So, here’s the link:
Belfast Telegraph 2nd May 2014
On the anniversary itself, Stuart posted some photos of how the family marked the day, including a couple of Katie’s grave. I am not normally a fan of grey headstones, but Katie’s is just so beautiful:
https://scontent-a-lhr.xx.fbcdn.net...7_10152116967642671_5697839806865568387_n.jpg
I just love the carving at the bottom. It is a bit hard to make out against the grey background in the main photo, so Stuart also posted a close-up of it (
https://scontent-a-lhr.xx.fbcdn.net...3_10152116966782671_6147904850335418235_n.jpg ). That must have taken some work to carve! Like, you can even see the holes for the laces on her skate!
So that we are not ending on a sad note, I would like to finish by letting you in a little project I have been working on.
After Kelly Gallagher & Charlotte Evans won the VI Super-G Gold in Sochi, I started working on making a poster of all of Northern Ireland’s Olympic and Paralympic Gold Medallists.
I am hopeless at editing pictures, so it took a LOT longer than I imagined to get it to this point. But, here it is:
https://fbcdn-sphotos-g-a.akamaihd....8_10154036129735538_5756200578032083095_n.jpg
Unfortunately, I was not able to find photos of four of our Gold Medallists (Jimmy Gibson, Eddie Lucas, Alice Bailey and Mark Gibson). So, if anybody has photos of them, or knows where I can find some, could you please let me know?
Before the 2012 Olympics, Culture NI compiled a list of all Northern Ireland’s Olympic and Paralympic Medallists. They also did profiles of all of our athletes competing in London 2012. Although it has not been updated since then, I found it invaluable for this project.
So a massive thank you goes out to the Culture NI researchers for doing all the hard work.
If you want to see the NI Champions website, it can be viewed at:
http://nichampions.culturenorthernireland.org/
When I started this project, I did not realise that we had quite as many medallists as we do, be it gold or otherwise. It just goes to show that people from a small country like Northern Ireland can compete on the big stage, and achieve great results.
Congratulations to all of Norn Iron’s Medallists. You have done “Our Wee Country” proud!
Good luck to all our future Olympians and Paralympians
CaroLiza_fan
Jade Etherington will be the first away with Bib 1.
