Gas Prices Are Killing My Figure Skating Budget

I mystery shop for gas! This means every so often a company will reimburse my gas for reporting on the service at the gas station. I have been doing this for a while, and having to go to the rink frequently takes me past several stations I can shop at and at times that I did not used to be in the area so I can shop the site as required. For more info http://www.volition.com

I actually ended up having to quit teaching at one rink because I realized that the gas to get there (it was 35 miles RT) was taking up about 20% of my take home pay. Added to the commute, which meant I was driving 90 minutes to teach for 60 minutes, it just wasn’t worth it. When DD was training, the best dance ice was an 1 1/2 away. Just close your eyes, grit your teeth and write the check.

I just noticed how expensive it was this morning. Almost $40 to fill up my car. It needs to get a little warmer so I can get the motorcycle out. Thats how I will save on gas!

When you find out let me know!

Our rink is on the other side of town with construction in several places along the way. Now I'm going to be going to the next city over (about an hour drive both ways) for synchro. I drive a big Jeep. *sob*

However, I am just about to order pic skates so I'm hoping that will help a bit this summer too.

Icemom, We recently traded in the van for a small fuel efficient car for this very reason. Green guilt + $$ at the pump. Life post mini van has been OK – I have adjusted. The real reason I am commenting is I am wondering what “The Swamp” is!

I'm guessing “The Swamp” is a mess in Ice Girls room

Hey, Cake.

I thought that the PIC skates were going to save my figure skating budget. They really do mimic figure skates, but they're slower.

Ice Girl took a hard fall onto the pavement and I think she bruised her tailbone. V. painful. Now she's reluctant to use them.

The moral of the story: use good pads everywhere. Concrete isn't as forgiving as ice. When you fall, you don't slide at all.

Good luck! (P.S. E-mail me and let me know what size you need. I might be able to hook you up with a pair of used ones, If Ice Girl will let me!)

Ice Mom

Yeah, The Swamp is Ice Girl's room Should have caught that in proofreading – sorry. Anyway, The Swamp comes complete with a Swamp Thing and banjo music. Good thing Ice Girl never visits my site. I'd be in huge trouble!

To her credit, she did clean on Sunday. However, the dust bunnies are still lurking. They're an evil breed, those dust bunnies.

We do 3 ,4 and 5 – when we can. I do work in the rink, often. And sometimes I even have to sit in my car for quiet during conference calls for big clients. I bought a Toyota Corolla last year for gas purposes. I have been trying to convince jumpingbean dad to move closer to the rink, but he is in love with his space and privacy- 30 miles away from the rink.

Oh, no, Synchromomto2. Sixty miles round trip? I'm having trouble breathing.

Wow – where do you get your skates sharpened? Sounds like you are going to one particular person and not just another local skate shop 100 miles down the road. Can you get that person to drive to your neck of the woods? If your rink could drum up more business they may be willing.

That's what happened in the DC area. Michael Cunningham was the best skate sharpener on the East Coast (some thought in the US) and he started making weekly trips up to Newark, DE where the ice dancers and pair skaters trained. By the way, now his shop is in Maryland.

Or get others to include their skates on your skate sharpening odyssey and have them contribute to the gas bill.

Good luck! Ice Charades

Yes Ice Mom – 60 miles round trip, 6 times a week on average- and that doesn't even count the driving to competitions- 3 times this weekend to the same place.

Hey, Ice Charades!

Yeah, I take my blades to a particular person because I don't have confidence in the folks around here. Let's face it: those are $500 blades. I'm not going to let just anyone sharpen them and ruin them.

I do take other people's skates, but i never charge gas money. I think that might change!

It's not terrible, terrible to drive that distance because I can make a side trip to see my mom. I know some people who go to that rink every week to see a jump coach. I have a friend who drives his daughter 2.5 hours to Chicago and back every Saturday and Sunday. Yeah. They don't stay in a hotel – they drive back home. Ugh! I couldn't take that.

Ice Dad and I average 80 miles together on a weekday and sometimes I do 80 miles when I make two trips to the rink in one day. Sixty miles is about right, I suppose.

I guess it's not so bad – WHEN I DON'T THINK ABOUT IT.

When I think about it, it kills me.

Whenever I can I also adjust my schedule to take less trips, work from the rink/home or an office in another town. The real kicker is our Saturday mornings. DH makes the 5:30 am trip to the rink to make the ice (small rinks make for many different hats) and I leave with Sk8nLane at 6:15 for skating. That 45 minutes of extra sleep is huge. That equals 80 miles total on the 2 cars – UGH!

Otherwise our local rinks are only 20 miles either direction from home. The kicker to my gas costs is connecting to the coach my dd connects best with. Last year it was Sunday trips every week 2 1/2 hours each way. This year is is monthly trips 3 1/2 hours each way.

Bright side is I can incorporate the skate sharpening into these trips:-) I have seen way too many blades ruined as most around here think they should be sharpened like a hockey skate.

Yeah, I'm not taking Ice Girl's blades to just anyone. The thought of ruining those $500 blades makes me ill.

I try to combine my trips with grocery shopping and oil changes. That makes me feel a bit better.

Problem: our rink's Wi-Fi is unreliable. Drives me nuts and, of course, I'm too cheap to pop for mobile broadband.

Three-and-a-half hours? You are a warrior.

I'm lucky that I don't have to log the miles that you do, however, our local rink is undergoing renovations this summer, which is forcing us to use another rink for the next 6 months that's further away (and in the opposite direction of anything I could possibly combine it with) – so that will be adding to the overstretched gas budget we already had just from our commuting to work.

One possibility that we're looking at (this was my husband's somewhat self-serving idea): Purchasing a motorcycle for him to use during the summer months and have me use our gas-budget friendly Toyota Yaris instead of the mini-van. If he manages to convince me to do this, and if it saves as much money as he says it will, maybe I'll just buy him a Carhartt snowsuit and let him ride it through the winter too!

Regarding that : “I have a friend who drives his daughter 2.5 hours to Chicago and back every Saturday and Sunday. Yeah. They don't stay in a hotel – they drive back home”, wouldn't it be CHEAPER to stay one night in a hotel ?!? It's about 5 hours driving which could be “spared”, so, I guess, ~300miles of gas, time, vehicle maintenance, etc !
No ?

Hey, Diane.

You know, as I was typing out what my friend does – his home -> Chicago ->home -> Chicago -> home thing, I couldn't help but think that a hotel would be cheaper. I'll have to ask him about his rationale.

Vicki! You are a genius! I'm SO going to do this and I'm going to Tweet it and Facebook it, too. Smart gal, Vicki!

Men will do anything to get a motorcycle, won't they?

Good argument, though!

im lucky that i live so close to the rink i can walk when in uni and wen out i go every other time with my mum as i share the car. but the petrol lasts a week and a half in my little nissan mirca and it is cheap and green to fill but i love how everyone thinks petrol in us is expensive we have prices over £1.20 ($1.8) per litre and there are 4.5 litres in a gallon! so about $8.1 per gallon. it costs £40 ($61) each time to fill a little car like my mirca which is a lot i think might be higher than us at the moment

OMG! $8.1/gallon! I have to sit down, icebethy. I freaked out when gas hit $4.02/gallon in July of 2008. Here gas is $2.87/gallon, which is…um…$0.64/litre?

At least you can walk to the rink. Dang. I'm not pitying myself so much anymore.

Or, perhaps make an ice friend in the Chicago area and offer $30 or so……that's got to be better than driving, there got to be some other compelling factor.

Yeah. I'm going to have to ask him why he's making the trip back and forth.

Petrol prices in the UK have shot up again recently and it hurts, so I entirely understand your frustration re gas prices in the US and the impact on skating travel. Even my cheap Nissan Micra is costing me £40 every time I fill up, when it used to cost about £30 – £32. Caravanning holidays with our diesel Kia Sedona is now more expensive because diesel is even more expensive than petrol (it used to be the other way round). Daylight robbery.

Isn't it funny, DollMum, how the gasoline companies always show a profit? Not the local station owners, but the company itself. I think about that when I fill up on their gas.

O.K. Must fire up the happiness machine: I can afford to buy gas, my van works pretty much, our rinks are plentiful here and frozen during the summer months, and I'm a writer with a job! Yay!

Don't forget the happiness of home-made custom dress on the ice for the first time!

Oooh. Sparkly.

I would say it could be worse.!! Our gas is 3.45, our sharpner is almost 400 miles, we live 20 miles from rink/town, and make a few trips every day. We also go about every 6 weeks 400 miles for training, where we stay at least 4 days.
we have only two instate comps, at 400 miles away, anything else is only by plane.
We have tried to make trips just at once, they skate and we do something else in town till next scheduled event ie ballet class ect.

You win! You win! 400 miles or by plane! You totally win!

See all of you have made my drive look easy…thanks for making me feel better!

*snicker*

{{Hugs}} to all you wonderful parents

lol,would rather not win!!!
Then I think about others that are from other countrys and have it worse than us:}

Sorry, Angel. You get the crown. I can't imagine anyone flying to competitions around here. I mean, sure, a National-level competition, but just plain ol' competitions? No way.

Enjoy your title, Angel, Queen of the Travel Budget!

For your reward, you receive our sympathy and the right to wave to us like royalty (elbow, elbow, wrist, wrist) as you fly overhead.

Luckily for me the skate sharpener is in the skate shop in my rink so the trip my parents have to make each month is only 20 miles there and back.
I get dropped of by my parents because the trip to and from my ice rink isn’t a huge one. But one of the girls I know at the rink and who also goes to my school lives out of town and so the trip to get to and from the ice rink every day is hitting her parents hard due to an increase in petrol prices. To combat this, she has changed her coaching lessons and practise ice time to after school. Then she takes the bus that stops practically outside of out school and gets off at the stop nearest the rink. Sure she has to pay £1.50 every time (but compared to petrol prices at the moment, that’s not all that much) and has to walk a reasonable distance from the bus stop to the ice rink but she says that its alright since its better for her parents and the environment. She also says that she hated getting up at 5am everyday anyway and so its better for her too.
However all the suggestions you’ve mentioned seem like great ideas and I may suggest a few to my parents if it means I get more ice time.

Luckily for me the skate sharpener is in the skate shop in my rink so the trip my parents have to make each month is only 20 miles there and back.
I get dropped of by my parents because the trip to and from my ice rink isn't a huge one. But one of the girls I know at the rink and who also goes to my school lives out of town and so the trip to get to and from the ice rink every day is hitting her parents hard due to an increase in petrol prices. To combat this, she has changed her coaching lessons and practise ice time to after school. Then she takes the bus that stops practically outside of out school and gets off at the stop nearest the rink. Sure she has to pay £1.50 every time (but compared to petrol prices at the moment, that’s not all that much) and has to walk a reasonable distance from the bus stop to the ice rink but she says that its alright since its better for her parents and the environment. She also says that she hated getting up at 5am everyday anyway and so its better for her too.
However all the suggestions you've mentioned seem like great ideas and I may suggest a few to my parents if it means I get more ice time.

Yeah! Tell your parents you’re sleeping over at your skating friend’s house because she lives nearer to the rink than you do.

Mom, Dad! I’m saving money and your time if I sleep over at my friend’s house. So…you should give me an extra hour of ice for being so thrifty and considerate…

Let me know how that works, will you?

Yeah! Tell your parents you're sleeping over at your skating friend's house because she lives nearer to the rink than you do.

Mom, Dad! I'm saving money and your time if I sleep over at my friend's house. So…you should give me an extra hour of ice for being so thrifty and considerate…

Let me know how that works, will you?

I only skate about once a week, and that isn’t too far. But, unfortunately, if I need get a new pair of skates, or an outfit or tights, I have to travel about 15 kilometres there and another 15 back.

Oh. That’s a bit far, to say the least.